What part of "We cant do shit to the boards" do you dont understand?

You were a mod, you know exactly what we can and can't do.

Good is most likely going to get axed.

The other boards are more complicated than the /chat/ and /oat/ situation due to the possibility of merging three different boards or none at all or merging two and leaving one combined with the fact the topic has never been broached to those boards en masse.

The /chat/ and /oat/ thing has been discussed to death, so the only things needed are people's opinions.

>>161217
If you can discuss merging /chat/ with /oat/, you can discuss merging the others, too.

i'm not asking you to do anything. Let us not get directly into the blame game, alright?

If the situation of the other boards is in limbo because it hasn't been discussed enough, then let's discuss it. this is why this thread exists.

The first two sentences of your post are just not necessary. We can discuss this in a civil manner, but i just don't appreciate the snark.

>>161218
Alright then, civil with zero snark.

First off, i felt my first two sentences were necessary as you seem to be under the impression that things will happen with /chat/ very soon.

This is false.
I dont know when anything could be done.
It could be tomorrow, it could be next week, it could even be next month.
I had a lack of relevant data regarding the current opinion of /chat/ and sought to remedy this so that a properly informed decision could be made.

Onto your initial point about discussing the merger of other boards.

I dont want to even start that because i do not want to end up in a situation where everybody is waiting for admins to do something, again. while, like you said, the /oat/ and /chat/ merger keeps getting mentioned.
I may mention it a lot, but it is not 100% me that is constantly bringing it up.
All in all, it is statistically unlikely that people will feel extraordinarily jaded over nothing happening once again, meaning data gathering is a reasonably safe option.

In any case, to go into finer details without the effected parties present is something you have previously expressed distaste for, and we are of a common mind in that regard.
Therefore, i will only be speaking in generalities here.

-----

/int/ could be merged with /gala/ and have zero problems, they are essentially the same board anyway, only separated by a few language barriers.

/Vinyl/ and /g/ could be thrown together to rebirth /Media/ as both boards deal with non-pony sources of media.

/art/ could possibly be merged with /pic/, but zeke is currently messing around with something for /pic/ so that's shelved for now.
It could also be paired with /fic/ and or /collab/ and we could dub the combined board /Fan/, the one stop place for everything created by the fandom.

/dis/ is fine as is, it serves it's niche purpose and merging it with any board would most likely break that.

/merch/ is in a similar spot, although it could possibly be thrown into /fan/ depending on how well the idea is received.

/ooc/ and /rp/ i am unfamiliar with, so i will have to defer to other people's opinions until i can gather the relevant data for myself.
I will say that the initial creation of /ooc/ was not because of how fast the /rp/ board was, but merely to have a dedicated place for organizing things.

>>161220
>>161220
It was not my intention to make it seem like anything was going to happen to /chat/ soon. We both know, it will be a process.

Likewise, any decisions regarding the other boards will be a process, too. The first step of that is discussion, and this is what the thread is for.

Just like how nothing is happening to chat, just discussion, this is the same, for other boards. If anything, i am encouraged that real discussion is happening on the board itself.

While i don't agree with the way the question was framed, i do agree that going to the source is the best way to do things.


As for the board discussion itself;

I. i feel that the creation of /media/ will be an empty board. Vinyl and /g/ combined are still not even a quarter as fast as /chat/, assuming /chat/ is our meter stick for minimally necessary activity to keep unmerged.

i would suggest merging /g/ and /vinyl/ with /oat/, /art/fic/collab/good/ into /brony/ (or something)

/int/, as you said, could be easily fused with /gala/. While /dis/ has a niche, it isn't exactly active. /chat/ has a niche, and /int/ has a niche. But neither are active enough to warrant their own boards, and /chat/ merged with /dis/ could bring /chat/ out of the realm of redundancy. it is something to consider.

/pic/ i suspect is fine as it is, though i still think some tweaks could be done. i trust Zeke to do that well though.

As for /ooc/, i do think community input is necessary. My surface observation is that while it is helpful for organization, other than those short bursts, it is otherwise desolate. In that case, perhaps it will be better just to put it in /rp/? it may help to bring more exposure to newly forming roleplays, as well.

On /ooc/ and /rp/.

As much as I don't go there anymore, both are useful and /ooc/ gets as manay posts as /rp/ or more. It's were campaign are planned, people are approved to join campaigns, planning and organization are done, etc. It's also sort of like a /gala/ dedicated to /rp/ posters.

They are both fine the way they are in terms of merging/leaving them.

/oat/ and /chat/. Merge 'em, don't merge 'em that's up to the mods. If they aren't merged, though, I would hope we reduce the redundancy of them by closing /oat/ to off-topic OPs and leaving it fandom and content related. If a thread eventually changes topic, whatever. Don't be strict about it, but don't make threads that aren't related to the show or fandom.

/good/
PLEASE GET RID OF IT IT'S USELESS.

/vinyl/ and /g/ becoming /media/.
Only people who might have issues with this are the elitist /mu/ posers on /vinyl/.

I have literally zero opinion on other boards.

Just start by fixing /oat/ and /chat/ somehow.

And get someone who's more invested into the site than Inkwell has been.

>>161224
>>161224
>Merge 'em, don't merge 'em that's up to the mods.

well, i would hope it's up to the users.

> If they aren't merged, though, I would hope we reduce the redundancy of them by closing /oat/ to off-topic OPs and leaving it fandom and content related

...i... uh, think we should keep that to the other thread.

>>161223
>While i don't agree with the way the question was framed, i do agree that going to the source is the best way to do things.
That thread is mainly for my own use in gathering data, if it were an official "it's happening" thread, i would have phrased the question more along the lines of "Mods believe that /chat/ and /oat/ would work well as a single board, do you agree, disagree or not care?"

My way is slightly more natural and more likely to get somebody's true feelings (Or lack thereof) about the matter.

Speed isnt the main issue, otherwise we could likely push all of the specific category boards into /oat/ to really boost it's numbers.

The main issue is to clean up the board structure so that people can get what they want quickly and easily, while also giving each board's audience a rightful place.

Merging /vinyl/ with /oat/ for instance, would kill the small community it has because they prefer long lived threads centered around music, which simply wouldn't happen on /oat/ except in rare circumstances.
If it did, they would just post on /oat/.

Likewise with /g/, although video game threads do appear on /oat/ sometimes.

Like i mentioned earlier, /dis/ and /chat/ are two different beasts, and combining the two would kill one or the other because of the incompatible posting styles both boards are used to.

>>161224
Working on it.

>>161229
i don't know... even the framing of your question is not a great one. "Mods believe that..." is a leading question; a framed question.

The best question i think is not "would you care if?" but "Do you support..."

i'm not saying the answers will make a big difference, of course... but it is a little detail which makes could potentially have big effects. i have done polling for a long while... so i am always on the watch for that.

that said, i also understand that the poll is for research, and not supposed to be a gallop poll; just something for reference.

>>161229
All I can ask for.

>/merch/ is in a similar spot, although it could possibly be thrown into /fan/ depending on how well the idea is received.
I've generally liked the idea of a /fan/ and used to push for that as an idea a while back. I really think that projects, merch, fandom music, podcasts, etc could all work out well together on one board. While the old boards like /www/ and /media/ did slow down quite significantly, I've felt the losses of them detrimental for anyone wishing to run a pony site or write pony music for finding purpose in coming to this website. Perhaps with all of the ideas running around on a single board, some of the content that died off from Ponychan will be encouraged to begin flourishing again, too, due to higher activity.

The one thing is, putting /merch/ into a /fan/ suddenly causes there to not be a clear place to discuss official merch. Would that be moved into /pony/?

Also, bring back /hi/.

Last edited at Mon, Sep 8th, 2014 14:44

>>161238
/pony/ or /oat/, depending on whether the latter starts being more open to pony topics.

>>161238
>While the old boards like /www/ and /media/ did slow down quite significantly, I've felt the losses of them detrimental for anyone wishing to run a pony site or write pony music for finding purpose in coming to this website.

Getting those sorts of people to start coming to the site is not a task we'll be able to easily solve by shuffling boards around. This more notably applies to /art/ and /fic/. People who want to create things have scores of better specialized places to go for that now and without the people already here to support that, we're never going to fix that problem. Unlike some boards, these boards require a significant number of posters to be useful, and that lack of posters is keeping away new posters. They should either be culled entirely, or completely repurposed such that they can draw people in for reasons other than feedback.

>>161220
>/int/ could be merged with /gala/ and have zero problems, they are essentially the same board anyway, only separated by a few language barriers.

Would make definite sense.

>/Vinyl/ and /g/ could be thrown together to rebirth /Media/ as both boards deal with non-pony sources of media.

Makes sense in theory, but in practice these two topics have nothing in common as far as their posters are concerned. I don't think it would fly.

>It could also be paired with /fic/ and or /collab/ and we could dub the combined board /Fan/, the one stop place for everything created by the fandom.

A nice idea, but I think even with those boards all combined it would end up dead and pointless.

>/dis/ is fine as is, it serves it's niche purpose and merging it with any board would most likely break that.

/dis/ is definitely doing really well right now, honestly, and doesn't need outside assistance from anything.

>/merch/ is in a similar spot, although it could possibly be thrown into /fan/ depending on how well the idea is received.

I think /merch/ might land best on /pony/. They already get toy discussions of some sorts over there. The biggest issue being that "fan made merch" doesn't fit so well on a board that's mostly for official things, and advertisements for things you've made and selling won't fit there, either.

>>161223

>/art/fic/collab/good/ into /brony/

/good/ just needs to be axed. It was a neat idea at the time, but we don't want donation drives and requests for volunteer help to be shoved into a dead board no one uses. Those need to go on our most popular boards to get as much exposure as possible.

>/chat/ has a niche

Well that's really the debate, isn't it? Whether there's a niche there at all? Whether the people that use it are there because of a niche, or just for the hell of it? That's the question going about /chat/, at least, and at least a few of its posters fall into the latter category.

>>161242
I agree that shuffling the boards alone won't get those kind of people. The problem that I see is that we pretty much have no place that is clearly for such people. Mods would make a decision at the time as it arises, but there's no friendly sign saying "Post it here!" And there's not been an introduction board for a long time, so there's no good way to just dive in and ask "where should I post X and Y?"

Of course, changing infrastructure to encourage such community may be too little too late. That said, even if such content never returned, I think a /fan/ could be more beneficial for everyone that posts on the boards that would be put into it. Of course, it'd be best to ask the people of the boards. I know for my own personal interests, I'd very much like such a board.

>>161241
Personally I think /pony/ would be the best for such a thing.

>>161243
>And there's not been an introduction board for a long time, so there's no good way to just dive in and ask "where should I post X and Y?"

That is something we can change, and it is entirely a matter of site layout rather than organization. In practice, we really do have a main board. It's /oat/. That's the general board that covers literally every topic, it gets the most threads per day, and possibly the most posts, that is where we want new people to be funneled to because that is the most likely place for them to get answers. And that can be fixed just by sprucing up the main page or the navbar. Rearrange how things are ordered. You come to Ponychan and look at the main page, and what's the first thing you see? /meta/? We don't want newcomers going to /meta/. And one just did, so it's definitely something that happens. That whole /meta/ category should get moved to the bottom, because it's the least relevant to new people.

>>161244
Yeah /oat/ certainly functions best as the intro/new people board but there's almost no way for new people to tell... I mean it's named /oat/, they're going to think it's the cooking board...

>they're going to think it's the cooking board

>>161223
>the board with more poni than the rest of the site is dead
>it's fine

>>161249
... :c sorry, i do not understand. but, i guess my understanding is limited too! so, perhaps my brainstorm was not the most fruitful

>>161254
No it's okay, I forgive you this time

We should just combine /merch/, /art/, /fic/, and /collab/ into /fandom/

/vinyl/ and /pic/ into /library/

/oat/ and /chat/ and /dis/ into /talk/

And /gala/ and /int/ into /cereal/

>>161258
Why would you merge a discussion board with an image dump?

>>161258
i like the fandom idea!

would not merging vinyl with pic simple just be pic? i hope it is not snarky to say that

Last edited at Tue, Sep 9th, 2014 22:51

>>161264
I was more thinking that merging the music and pictures board would essentially create a media content /library/.

>>161265
/pic/ is for dumping pony pictures with no conversation and /vinyl/ is pretty much /mu/, the two don't make sense together at all

>>161265
i guess i can understand that suggestion c:

i think it might not work the best though. /pic/ is all pony pictures, but /vinyl/ is all kinds of music, even non-pony. it works more like a discussion board in /vinyl/

Those boards were always dead. /chat/, a once healthy board, had its legs broken. The least you could do is put it out of its misery.

>/fic/
Sage in peace, old friend...

>>161269
I'm hesitant on making an opinion on if /fic/ should go or not. Writing to me has always been meant as a slower and more studious process whether you're the writer or reviewer. What's your thoughts on /fic/ being put into another board like /fan/?

>>161270
I can't even muster the interest to yell at the fresh meat; I think that encapsulates my thoughts on the continued independence of /fic/. It's dead, and no amount of sentiment is going to change that, nor should it stop it from being changed to maybe breath some life into its zombified corpse. Pretty much all discussion has moved to FiMFiction where, frankly, the site's layout just works better, and I am a fan of efficiency.

>>161280

Yeah, just like I was sayin', there really is just literally no hope for boards like /fic/. There are sites out there that specialize in MLP FanFiction, and a dozen others that can support it, and all we have is an imageboard that no longer has a community. It would need a massive overhaul to even imagine being useful by comparison, and then we'd have to somehow lure people away from major sites like FiMFiction. The effort would be enormous, and the chances of success low even with the effort applied. Furthermore, since /fic/ was mostly separate from the rest of the site, I think people's time would be better spent improving and maintaining our other features instead.

>>161280
>>161281
I just wanted opinions from people I know that use the board regularly. I don't go to /fic/ at all, so I really don't know what dead is or isn't and don't want to be one to make that judgement since it is such a separate thing from the rest of the site.

>>161304
Drop a thread in there and see how many replies crop up. That should give you an idea of things.
>Just going through my pony reaction images for reading now

>>161305
Maybe that'll be good inspiration to finish my terrible Luna x Space Core flash ship fic I promised space core for his birthday three years ago. I don't even know where the original is saved

>>161267
>but /vinyl/ is all kinds of music, even non-pony
/vinyl/ has always been for non-pony music only.

And people were complaining about boards like /vinyl/ being "dead" even a few months after said boards came out. Personally, I like the slower boards. I actually have a life, so I probably wouldn't enjoy /vinyl/ & /g/ as much if they were as fast as /oat/, because then I'd be missing a shitload of threads (though I do wish that they have some more activity these days).

Anyway these threads have never worked, aside from /media/, which actually was dead and had literally no life in it, and /phoenix/, which had activity every time a new topic was chosen, but became completely dead after a few weeks.

>>161223
and to bring something up from an earlier post
>i would suggest merging /vinyl/ with /oat/

As someone who stuck around /vinyl/ ever since it was created, I highly object to this, and I'm sure that the few remaining members would as well.

I know that this is Ponychan, but pony music fad threads on /vinyl/ have never worked out (and not just because they weren't allowed on the board in the first place). And merging /vinyl/ and /oat/ would mean that every music thread has the possibility of being flooded with brony crap. I like /oat/, but I also like having a decent, pony-free music board.

I would love it there were any actual attempts to increase it's traffic (and not just discussions of ideas that never get implemented like in every thread about /vinyl/ on /meta/ in the past two years), but merging it with /oat/ would probably be the worst thing to happen to it and it's community.

>>161395
I honestly never post there much anymore because music discussions on /oat/ are just as active and have a lot of the same people sometimes I'd find there.

I'll make an effort to post there more.

>>161388
>>161395
i didn't know /vinyl/ had such a nice little community! i wouldn't want to erase that, if it really is so special.

i very much agree that we should take efforts in expanding boards before merging them... to try and help, before we just wipe good things away.

do you have any ideas on how to maybe expand /vinyl/ a bit?

>>161209
>Yet, what about some of these other boards? i understand /good/ is in limbo, a result of a failed effort to do community outreach.

It's more of a failed assumption that bronies are well to do financially, which most of us are not.

Would it be inappropriate to suggest an on-screen pixelated tumbleweed spawns when you load the front page?

Late to the party, but oh well. I should browse /meta/ more often.

I can't say much on the rest of the boards, but considering that /ooc/ and /rp/ are kind of my territory, I may as well give my input on those.

Both boards have slowed down over time. Unfortunate for us RPers, but it's true. (I'm mulling over a few ideas, but I've been busier than usual lately. Story for another time.) But I believe that a merge of the two boards is not a good idea. A long time ago, we didn't even have an /ooc/ board. It was just /rp/, and the IC threads and OOC threads ran alongside each other. The problem there wasn't that there were too many threads or that there were too many posts going into the board. It became a matter of thread purpose.

For a good while, people would RP in both the IC and OOC threads, and there would be OOC discussions in both threads. At times, it could become very unclear as to which thread was which! (Hell, I recall one or two groups that had things backwards: There was more IC action in the OOC threads, and there was almost no RPing in the IC threads due to OOC communication!) Thus, the separation was a matter of organization for the users who enjoyed RPing.

Now, all RPing happens in the RP threads, and OOC discussion happens in the OOC threads! It keeps both of the threads on task, and we don't have to worry about confusion due to post content. Plus, whenever new users come in, they can hop on over to /ooc/ and more easily be able to sort through the various canons because they don't need to worry about IC threads getting in the way! Yes, this sort of slowed the two boards down, because it cuts the posting in half, but that's to be expected! And posting on /ooc/ has slowed down more over time because most, if not all, of the canons have shifted over towards usage of Skype, Steam, or some other off-site message system for quick and convenient communication. Sure, it'd be easy to just do away with /ooc/ and have us use our Skype groups, but that circles around to making it harder for new users to sift through what's available. Especially since threads on /rp/ tend to keep going long past the autosage point. (Some threads have been known to be regularly active while on page 6 or more!)

If we merge the boards, it would almost become a requirement to have more activity in the threads that aren't used often, because they'd be otherwise kicked off of the front page. If the most current OOC thread for a canon is on page five of the board, is a user really going to be able to find it if they're unfamiliar with the site and/or board? We would have to be constantly checking to see where our threads stood on the board, and bump them to keep up visibility. And if there's no relevant post to be made, then we're just filling OOC threads with nonsense. With some threads being more or less serious than others, this can pose a problem in and of itself!

Basically, though, it all just boils down to the convenience and organization provided by having the two separate boards. However, that's just my input. If there's enough reason to counter all I've said, then I'd love to hear it! Given enough reason, I'd be more than happy to discuss something with the users to see if we can work out a new system for a single board. Provided we can reach an efficient system, I'm down for whatever!

TL;DR
The boards were separated for efficiency and organizational purposes. Not for issues with too many posts coming too frequently. Go back and read it. This is /meta/.

I haven't posten here in a long ass time, but i used to troll post in the /rp/ and /ooc/
At one point, they both were one, and one was both, and it was glorious.
/rp/ and /ooc/ were created to make shit clear, but now its so slow, that the only real people posting are the ones who are in deep.
It's also hard as hell to find a thread in /ooc/ and even harder to get enough posters to move it to /rp/ but that's another rant
Long gone are t he days of the General threads on /rp/ i think that merging them back would make it easier, mostly because /ooc/ like, never gets posts.
on the other cheek, /ooc/ and /rp should be separate because there are some threads that are nothing but borderline circlejerks, with the occasional character sheet, or something of the like, and moving all of that shitposting to /rp/ would just be disastrous.

TL;DR Purple, because alien's don't wear hats.

I don't post on /meta/ ever, but I'm going to put my two bits in.

I agree with Nimble's position here. Merging /rp/ and /ooc/ would make finding threads more confusing, and the board would be cluttered. OOC discussion and sign-ups would be mixed in with IC threads, and confusion would come because two kinds of threads have different kinds of content. /rp/ and /ooc/ are separate boards because of just this: they organize the threads into two different locations, making it convenient for one to find the thread they're looking for.

i am glad the /rp/ and /ooc/ issue is getting discussed! i know little about the situation over there... it seems some really like the current system for organization purposes, but other(s?) feel it has taken away from the spontaneous atmosphere?

i feel if it is isn't broke, then it should not be changed... but then, i think every point should be considered, too

>>161428
Pretty much what i'm sayin.

/rp/ is now just a festering cespool of old ideas, lazy people and the same old canons.

/ooc/ is more of a Mausoleum to the good ideas that died from a lack of posters.

If, and i mean if, we were to induce an influx of RPers that were like the Rpers of /oat/ back before they cracked down, perhaps some OC would be flushed back into /rp/.

but that would more than likely only come about if Rping were to be allowed on /oat/ for a few months.

Side note: When i'm on /oat/ /rp/ /ooc/ /chat/ or any of those cool places (RIP /ef/) I don't really think of other boards unless someone else mentions it, or links it off site, like on Skype, Steam, or any other places like that.
Perhaps if there were more places to mingle, and to learn what's what, and who's cool.

>>161430
RP has been allowed oat for a long time now.

>>161425
>Sure, it'd be easy to just do away with /ooc/ and have us use our Skype groups, but that circles around to making it harder for new users to sift through what's available.

I think, in that case, the better question is not whether /ooc/ and /rp/ should be merged, but what we can do for /ooc/ to make it more appealing than Skype.

>>161428
>>161430
>>161431
One of the ideas that was suggested to me by Quinch was to hold some sort of regular RP thread on /oat/. It would be contained to one thread, and it would be relaxed, open, and not strictly set to any one scenario, much like the old days of /oat/ RP were. We could use that to possibly try and bridge the gap between the two boards, both giving an opportunity to have /rp/ posters come out of the little bunker we've made for ourselves and to have /oat/ posters consider trying out some RPs that are already there or create new ones! Any thoughts on this? Any other possible ideas?

>>161432
I wouldn't even be able to begin to imagine how we would do that. Since each of the canons have become such a close knit group, the OOC threads have mostly become official places for new applicants and/or official messages regarding the canon as a whole. They stick to Skype for chatting since it's a faster and more convenient way to just chat with your buddies. It's like... it's like each canon is another serial on /gala/, but they've only got 10-25 members. And that group doesn't change very much, if ever at all, due to the groups being closed off unless you apply. (In most cases. Some canons are open. But with a lack of new users on /ooc/ and /rp/, that's almost a nonexistent factor.)

>>161433
I guess that part of the good thing of having all those OOC threads on RP is it made people actually LOOK through the threads for a thread.
so if you saw a thread you liked, you'd join.
but now you don't see any canon but the one you're looking for.
(not to mention there are no random threads
Hey, here's an idea
A board called /open/ where there is only ONE thread. and we derail it as hard as we can.

Would it not be possible to have tags that filter? Then you could have both OOC and RP tagged threads on the same board with the option of flicking one or the other off to clear the clutter.

>>161461

You could, but then you have to ask what the purpose of combining the boards was.

Delete all the boards except /meta/

>>161474
You're willing to lose /spacetime/?

>>161476
Secret boards don't count.

It hasn't been the same since it got invaded and wiped though.

>>161433
i like this idea! i do not see why we cannot just post threads like that as users and see where it takes us c: