Thank you for addressing our concerns. This community has been around for more than a decade, and it means a lot to us. We have lost scads of great contributors due to different admins changing things and making it less veg friendly here.

Does your team of writers get paid? Would our members be paid for article submissions? Why were member articles not brought up before?

They work for VerticalScope. Guest articles would not be paid but we would definitely allow an author bio with a link to their site.

Although we have asked our moderator team if they wanted to write guest articles for our Featured Articles and Topics (We currently have one that was posted by Dave in MPLS and one by Werewolf Girl.) I had not yet asked the members if this is something they would be interested in doing.

The team currently discussing the ideas offered within this thread. As an example, the idea about common questions for those new to the site. We could use individual common questions (for featured topics) that all members could add their thoughts to. Once we had several of these, we could create a sticky (for common questions) with links to the threads.

To answer Ledboots' question in the first post: I think many people get tired of, or bored with, a message board and just leave. The drama can get out of hand and drive still others away. But largely, boards just have their ups and downs. I joined my first message board in 1999; since then, I've seen some fold, and others deteriorate to the point where I couldn't see wasting my valuable time on them.

Nowadays I just laugh at trolls (if I pay any attention to them at all- which is rare). But sometimes even a troll brings something up which is worth responding to.

I'm not conservative by any stretch of the imagination, but I'm probably to the right of the VB membership generally. It doesn't bother me.

The front page articles read like every other magazine filler that rather than promote veg'nism, just gives it a patronizing thumbs up. They're everywhere- magazine racks at check out lines, the local news, website cover pages, books... People that come here already have an interest, and want to explore it with people experienced in veg'nism. The front page articles are just more fluff. It's been very obvious by the members who come and go,and just cause irritation.
I love this forum and when Michael left I tried to like his as much, but it never seemed to fully develop.
We have members here who regularly write well written, well formatted posts that would suffice for front page status. No Whey, Naturebound, Joan Kennedy, Ledboots, Capstan-- those stick out, but I know I'm leaving others out.

https://www.veggieboards.com/forum/sh...d.php?t=200593
Trolling does not seem to be taken seriously on this forum case and point. Sometimes one person will have 5 new silly threads you have to scroll through on the first page of active topics. Also the vegans can be a bit hard on the vegetarians sometimes which kind of sucks. In truth though the good far outweighs the bad so I will stick around

So Verticalscope pays non-vegetarian, non-veggieboards members to write articles about vegetarianism. And you might allow members, many of whom have been vegetarian for many years and have helped others on this forum, to write articles for our forum, but not pay them. LOL.

We have an Articles section that contains many pieces written by VB members, past and present. If there's a need to feature articles on the home page, why not draw from these, rather than solicit non-members- basically strangers- for their work?

Also, I think the home page should serve some utilitarian purpose, like information on who the current mods are, and how to contact them, maybe a FAQ article, and a quick link to the posting guidelines, for easy access.

I agree with some others -- the front page is very generic, and I almost never visit it. It makes VB seem like just another ad revenue-generating site with minimal content.

Sometimes I get tired of the "vegan police" attitude that sometimes seem to take hold on VB, and people who make abundant posts when they first join but never give any indication that they read or appreciate the advice given. I think sometimes this is a maturity issue, but it does make me leery of putting a lot of time or effort into posting.

I've never attempted to read any of the articles on the VB main page, but the stock photos are a big turn off. Many members of this community are passionate, intelligent, and creative, and having such an inauthentic, generic exterior does not do justice to what is, was, and could be inside the forums.

Just an FYI, when I was moderator, I sent numerous private messages to the author of "My Dad" and other threads with warnings and pleadings, only to be ignored. I then asked the administration if it would be possible to put these types of trollish members on moderated status so that their posts would have to be approved by moderators before being seen by the public. The moderators do not have the power to do this. Again no response, nothing. I left shortly after so it's possible something was set up after I left. It's also difficult to simply ban members and delete threads without a mod consensus unless it is something really obviously rule breaking, like spam or promoting meat eating.

I suspected something was going on when Leeds stepped down. And then when the Numerous Repetitive Question Threads weren't dealt with, I thought there was a mod problem (not enough, or hands tied by admin).

Can't they just leave veggieboards alone?

Hi LD.

My thanks have to go to Naturebound and Capstan for highlighting problems that I perceived have plagued the mod area for a while, culminating in the nightmare that Naturebound had in dealing with a very difficult case over the Christmas period.

To be honest, I resigned from being a mod for two reasons. I thought that on odd occasions, the forum accepted posts that contravened the following rule:

The other reason was because for quite a while, I'd found it difficult to feel part of a "mod team". It seems obvious from what Naturebound says that by Christmas, she'd also reached that same conclusion.

Things need to change at VB if a decline is to be reversed. I'm pleased to see as a first step that the list of moderators is at last much more easily accessible (ie by tapping on the rules tab at the top of the page). I'm also pleased that the mod complement has increased with the excellent addition of No Whey Jose and Silva. I just hope that the existing mods give them the help and support they'll need for them to feel part of an effective "mod team".


Leedsveg

Some personal thoughts:
List of moderators shouldn't be accessible for the safety reasons, with it it's much easier to establish at which hours to attack.
Moderators should have additional anonymous accounts for moderating purposes only, and not use their private accounts for this - sometimes it makes hard to intervene when you know the offending persons and you don't want to loose their sympathy, etc.
It would be nice to have a subforum/hidden posts accessible only for registered 18+ users for more "drastic" discussions, hello threads, etc., it would make forum much cleaner for tourists, less friendly for spammers, and more welcoming for honest discussions. To lift off some moderators duties, if enough people would mark some thread as inappropriate for general viewing it should be moved automatically to a closed subforum without any moderator intervention.
Also moderators should be mostly for supporting forum users, not for prosecuting them. After all, we have the same goal, even if we differ in means to get there.
Ignoring/silence is not a friendly way to deal with troublesome users, because it's hard to tell the difference between negative silence and positive silence, and it may put off also friendly users. Treat all users as adults, and there's a chance they will start to behave like one If someone is still troublesome, it should be clearly marked and visible for him/her and for others.
OK, enough for now

In reference to the front page: in my opinion, it's pretty awful. It just seems so...commercial, for lack of a better way of putting it. The numerous stock images give it a feel of a website that was put up quickly and with little care or thought by someone with no interest in the topic at hand. In other words, it just seems like "filler". I actually hesitated in joining again when I saw the front page because it was obviously not the same site that it was previously. I understand that things change and everything evolves eventually but it's not always for the better. I think this is an example of just that. Honestly, I don't know what the answer is, however, I think some good ideas have already been put forth in this thread and they definitely warrant a closer look.


In addition (and this may be an unpopular opinion but I'm going to throw it out there anyway)...if the current administrator is non-vegetarian then I see that as a primary issue in and of itself. Simply put...you can't understand this lifestyle and all the things that go along with it if you're not actually living the lifestyle. For example, I may have a rudimentary knowledge of airplanes but if I've never actually flown one myself, I don't need to be the administrator of a forum catering to pilots. I'm certainly not trying to offend anyone...I think it's just a matter of needing to have a genuine, working knowledge of what you're involved with.


For the record, I was a member here years ago when it actually felt like a real community...back when you would see several familiar names posting frequently and always with helpful advice and insights. It definitely doesn't have that same feel now. Just my 2 cents...

This, ^^^ @SpookyKid . I totally agree that the admin needs to be vegetarian for VB to be real. To have a sense of community.

Look out behind you, ethnically diverse, attractive young womenfriends!

Bigfoot likes to watch people dressed in primary colours ... I thought everyone knew that.

We have a team of writers, who work here, so they get paid to write for a large majority of our sites, there are a few vegetarians on the team of writers and in the company there are also a good amount of vegetarians and a few vegans. On the forum support team is a few vegetarians and some of our spouses are vegetarians. I myself eat mainly vegan, but that is dues to health issues and allergies.

Verticalscope owns the site, but we let the staff do what they like to the forum. So if anyone wants to volunteer to be part of the admin team, then by all means let us know and Cricket will stay in the background. You all seem to have great ideas! so use them.

We can't pay users for their articles because that means they are employees and can cause some legal issues for us. Don't forget we are based in Canada and have to follow the governing law of the province.

I brought in Cricket to try to help the site grow, she generally is quite good at it, but i would be more then happy to build an admin team that can do all that while the support team takes care of the tech stuff.

The home page articles were only being written to help keep the front page active, google will de-rank a site with a dead home page, which means no one would see the site since it would loose its position when you google common terms. So it was to ensure people looking for information can get to the site.

Most traffic coming to the site comes from google search of key terms, so the home page rarely comes up when you google, it is generally a thread topic. So the home page is not as much of a deterrent as you think. The people who come to the site when we post an article and see the home page and generally already a vegetarian or vegan, so the controversial article and the responses actually will attack more vegans/veggies then not, since they will want to participate. It is statistics and trail and error and A LOT of looking through google anylitics of a site. Since starting with the articles one the home page again we have moved up the ranks in google placement, so we are getting noticed more, and despite what you all think, more users are joining and staying.

So really it is all trying to keep this forum relevant and a resource for new vegans/veggies as well as getting people who currently live that lifestyle to come and talk about things.

You are all correct we are not experts on the vegan/vegetarian lifestyle BUT we are experts on forums and the software that runs them.We are here to ensure the site is healthy and that it is relevant in google so that people can find it.

So if you want to help rebuild a moderator team, and get people in place to manage the flow and get content on the home page, then lets do that. But if not then you need to trust that Cricket has the best intentions and the forums health in mind.

Helena
Manager, Community Management.

Many thanks Helena. I think you've given quite a few people, me included, quite a bit to think about!

Leedsveg.

I was a frequent reader of "Stupid things that omnivores say". But this tread has been moved to Siberia (far away and deep down below the Veggieboards ... The Veggie Patch). Result: New members don't find it.

Thanks, @Helena , for your response.

If it's a conflict of legal interest for VerticalScope's veg*n employees to be actual members of VB, would it at least be possible for us to be introduced to them? Perhaps an article listing who they are, and a little about them? Or better, a byline on each article, which would also give them credit for their work? The ideal situation would be, if they could post on the boards, and join the conversations, but you say this is prohibited by Canadian law? Maybe there's a legal way around this? Could you not create a special group for them to join, where they would be listed as VerticalScope Employees, perhaps as "writers" or "contributors," but not as members, yet still be able to post? I think it would go a long way toward defining the community, if we know who we are. All this anonymity is a little too mysterious, and a little bit creepy. Does there really have to be such a rigid legal wall between VerticalScope and VeggieBoards members?

We are already working on ways to eliminate articles all together, except from the Mod Teams and members.

Thank you for responding. I am not looking to write articles or make money off VB, but you are saying that you cannot pay someone for writing content unless they are an employee? Is it illegal in Canada for people to work on a contract basis?

I did LOL at the typo saying that the front page anonymous articles will Attack more veg*ns (rather than attract, which I assume you meant). We are attacked everywhere, which is why I want VB to stay a real vegetarian forum. It can't be with (sorry) ignorant articles on the front page.

I laughed at that typo, too!

I completely understand and appreciate that the admins and other VeritalScope employees are just doing their jobs. I'm sure that the omnis assigned to VB didn't specifically request an assignment on a vegetarian forum. I hope that they can appreciate, though, that for many of us vegetarianism isn't simply a hobby or an interest but a vitally important social justice movement. Half-hearted, passionless articles, however well-intentioned, are bound to fall short. I think that removing the articles entirely will be a good move and I'm glad we're going through with it. Even if the front page doesn't receive as many hits as individual threads, I would like to be able to tell people that I'm a mod at VeggieBoards and feel confident that the site will reflect positively on our community should anyone feel compelled to check it out.

I really do appreciate the hard work that everyone puts into VB. This place has become a home to me over the last few months. I'm excited to be a part of this team.

From what you say Helena, my understanding as to VerticalScope's position is as follows:

i) VeggieBoards moderators should be able to govern themselves and deal with the day-to-day running of VeggieBoards without the involvement of VerticalScope.

ii) VerticalScope writers over the last year have been contributing articles relevant to veg*nism to the Home page to try to increase the footfall of "outsiders" visiting the site. (The purpose of this being twofold - the more visitors, the more money generated and also the more chance that visitors decide to stay and become members). The Articles page with its contributions from members may seem slightly similar to the Home page with its features but these do not link into search engines and so cannot attract visitors to the site. (Initially, VerticalScope brought in Cricket as an admin to try to increase to increase the number of visitors by her promotion of Home page contributions. Unfortunately the contributions from among VB mods/members was not as successful as was hoped hence the 'in-house' writers at VerticalScope being tasked with providing the material.)

iii) For whatever reasons, VeggieBoards has lost 4* very active mods during the last year (including one who was also an admin) and I'm guessing that Cricket has had to step in during the last few weeks to deal with the fallout from the shortage of active mods?

* I've not included Aristede in this complement because he would be the first to agree that due to his heavy commitment teaching abroad, his participation on VB during this period was quite severely but understandably, limited. (Don't ask me why I decided to check the mod list before ending this post but I did.....and I now see that Joan Kennedy is no longer a moderator.)

So Helena, is my above summary fair and correct?

What do other members think?

Leedsveg

You could have two really good articles, and then alternate them on the front page, once a week; I'm sure that would fool Google into thinking the front page was active....as a basis for a mode of operation.

Just today I noticed a thread from 2004, yes, 2004, bumped by a new member, proba ly found the thread through google, no?

Is it just the front page that gets the $ hits? (I'm unfamiliar with how this works)

Wow, I was oblivious to all those changes, not sure how I feel about VB now.

Back to the OP's question, I come and go, look at food pics and recipes, not really interested in debate, feel I have been there done that over the years enough. I don't feel engaged or connected with VB, can't explain why, lots of dedicated and articulate people here so its probably just me.

Well personally, what keeps me coming back to VB is that we DO have a core group of regular and old time posters that are incredibly smart, generous, funny, articulate, and compassionate. These people feel like my family, and they give so much of their time, knowledge, and experience here on VB. As much as I am sometimes bothered by the way things are run here, I also feel a sense of community among the regulars. And sometimes we get newbies that stick around and become great members too, and I love how people welcome them and embrace them with open arms. We have a diverse group of members if you take the time to read threads and get to know others here. Not everyone is good at debate, but some are great cooks, some are great researchers, some are compassionate about certain causes, some have a great sense of humor and some are very down to earth.

I am also a member of other Vegan/veggie forums but I have had a hard time "breaking in" to them and not really feeling valued or welcomed as I do here. IDK, maybe it's the combination of personalities, or the types of subject matter discussed. I have invested more time here than any other forum, and would be terribly sad to see this board fall apart completely.

I want newcomers to feel the same sense of community and welcome that I have felt. But different people have different reasons for visiting. It seems that a lot of people that visit here and become members are new to the lifestyle and looking for a start, not really here to become part of a community. And that is fine too, but I would like to see how we can attract more potential members who will stick around long term.