How about turning the "Music, Movies & Television" forum into a sub-forum of Off-topic. It would help to concentrate the topics, reduce main index clutter and should increase its visibility. I know that I always forget to check on it when I visit the forum.

I wouldn't want this to happen. Making it a subforum wouldn't increase its visibility in my opinion, rather just hide it away with the Video Games.

 

 

 

And the thing I like about Tipit forums is that there aren't many subforums and everything is easy to get to.

 

 

 

So a no from me.

I agree with jemathonical when he says that subforums actually tend to hide a forum rather than make it more visible. In general, I'm not a huge fan of subforums, I actually think they make the forum look a bit more cluttered :ohnoes: But that's just my opinion :ohnoes:

In most cases I agree, I personally hate sub-forums most of the time. But this is a special case, the tip.it forum has now grown to such a size that is has over 40 forums on its main page (Way to many in my opinion and probably overwhelming for new users). That is a lot of links to scroll through.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Many users of Off Topic are not users of the rest of the forums. I can not remember the last time I visited one of the runescape related forums. (Well I lied, I had a quick visit to General P2P a few weeks ago). In many ways it acts like a community within the larger tip.it forum. Being able to navigate between the different off-topic 'forums' without returning to the index page would help to speed up navigation and help concentrate similar topics.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Not to mention it would help to preserve server bandwidth. Every time a user visits the main index (depending on cache setting) the server has to provide not only the links to the forums but the name of the last poster and the date which it occurs.

I think that the Music, Movies and TV board is sufficiently active enough to warrant its on section rather then being hidden away in a subforum.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And for the record, subforums actually have more database queries than normal forums overall due to the breadcrumbs and other such features.

I think that the Music, Movies and TV board is sufficiently active enough to warrant its on section rather then being hidden away in a subforum.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A good index layout and ease of navigation should have priority over the amount of usage of any one forum. In the long ran a cluttered layout with poor structure would result in a overall reduction of users.

I dont consider subfoums easy navigation.

I agree with tripsis, and mercifull, that subforums aren't easy navigation..

If you claim that then it is obvious that you have not used a forum which has used Sub-Forums in a appropriate and correct manner.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A good example of their use would be the forums at http://www.gpforums.co.nz . They are a busy community with dozens of different forums on a broad range of topics. If such a forum just used 'forums' the main index would be ridiculous in length and not easy to navigate.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The main index is split into a range of broad topics. Many of which had sub-forums, one for example has 9 different headings. Using the "Hardware and Tech. Help" forum for a example in there they have 6 sub-forums which all flourish. If sub-forums were not used all of the discussion would either had to be concentrated into a single forum or the main index would be ridiculously long. This is a good use of sub-forums and it works well and greatly aids in navigation and finding relevant topics.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A couple of bad examples on the use of sub-forums would be http://forums.overclockers.co.nz/ , this forum is less busy but generally fairly well run. Now click on the motherboards forum. They have split it up into 9 sub forums most of which have not been used since last year if not earlier. Such a system fails because their is not enough interest and the subjects complement each other. If a person has a question regarding motherboards chances are they would have several to compare in which case the layout completely fails.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Another example of bad use of sub-forums would be in the deeperblue.net forums. Their they split Speargun discussion into 5 different forums. It just makes it hard to find any relevant information. Plus the forum is not busy enough to support so many forums.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sub forums would work on Tip.it, and would improve the ease of navigation because tip.it has a busy community and has alot of different forums already in the main index.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Turning the MM&T forum into a sub-forum would be a success. Because it is busy and it is not overly niche and the main forum is already getting cluttered with the number of forums already being linked to. MM&T also naturally belongs in off topic.

Sub forums work when you have a large category with several subcategories

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

* General Discussions

 

 

 

** Off Topic

 

 

 

*** General Off Topic

 

 

 

*** Music, Movies and TV

 

 

 

*** Tech and Computers

 

 

 

*** Video Games

 

 

 

*** Gallery

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

NOT when theres is only one or two which can easily be hidden away and not noticed.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

* General Discussions

 

 

 

** Off Topic

 

 

 

*** Music, Movies and TV

 

 

 

** Tech and Computers

 

 

 

** Gallery

 

 

 

** Varrock Library

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

If Tip.it used subforums more often then it could work but in the current scheme of things it just would look messy and confusing to users. Unless the admins were going to have a complete reshuffle of the entire boards then this just shouldnt happen.