The Officers/Committee members responsible for a given are of the society (ie, UPDate) should be ideally I think moderators of those sections. So Neal for Roadshow, Alan for items relating to Membership, Simon for things that relate to Society fincances and so on.
I think they’re based on how much traffic they get and how often they’re updated perhaps?
I think thats how it works for the first photo. The tags is a difficult one as Guy has pointed out as the DIscourse software relies quite heavily on them so we don’t want dozens of unrelated tags filling up the place. The suggestion of a starter ‘set’ for each area of the forum seems the most sensible first step. Then as we migrate and get used to the software things can be amended as needed or deemed appropriate by Guy.
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To quote multiple items/posts, just select them, select quote, then repeat until you’ve quoted what you need and then put your responce to each quoted section in the relevant areas.
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Like this?
And this!
And this!!
That’s pretty cool. Much easier than some other forum software
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I think Committee may need to co-opt some others for the migration/set-up. Even if this is not “admin” with power, but assistance in generating tag sets.
a@y
To some extent Guy already has for this forum experiment, I’m sure he’ll ask whomever he deems necessary to help with the migration, whether it is to this software (not 100% certain from Guy’s recent posts) or something else, in which case we’ll start this experiment again I’d imagine. But on the impressions I’ve gotten I think this software meets most of our needs, the question mark is over migration.
I don’t think so: at least it hasn’t happened on the OTA test. Unless it is linked to status of whomever adds the first attachment?
a@y
Kelly,
Your reading of the migration (and what follows) is close to the impression I’ve been getting.
A number of us saw what happened when RMweb’s former servers “fell over” - a few warning signs that didn’t look like much - until it went “bang” - and Andy York suddenly had to bring forward a planned migration and hope things went right.
OK - I know the sites are different sizes etc. - but I suspect that Guy doesn’t reckon he’s got too much time available before he’ll need to “jump” somewhere. I get the general impression that Discourse appears credible - but nobody will know for certain if it’s actually right for us until after migration - until then, it sounds like Guy probably doesn’t want to be fully committed.
As for who “deals with” different areas of the forum, what you’re saying sounds credible. I’m sure there will be some forum topics that don’t really “fit” with specific “Committee” / “Officer” remits - somehow, I can’t imagine too much difficulty in identifying appropriate people to “take care of” these areas on the new forum.
It’s possible some of these people might initially need a bit of guidance regarding the forum software, “controls” etc. - but I doubt if this would be too much of an issue in practice.
Perhaps an element of “watch this space” … .
Seems you’re right. Must be a setting on creating a new topic that does it I can’t see as the Showcase Retrospective post doesn’t have it, though I added photos to the second post later, same for the Harding’s Staithe’s post, the images were added later on, so they probably have to be added to the topic at the start. Not sure if that can be overridden later or not?
All this stuff about creating new topics - or “spinning them off” from others - seems well timed.
By the way, apologies for the thread drift in the UPdate content thread on the old site - but it looks like I might just have found a potential discussion topic for a future VAG meeting - as long as “agree to disagree” remains available at all times.
(OK - it wouldn’t be needed with anything so far in the “what is post 1955” thread - however, I’m sure we’ve all been to club open days and seen posters on the walls having a “pop” at either “kettles” or “diseasels” … .)
Understandably, I’d be wary about advertising a “what is DEMU’s remit” / “what is modern image” discussion in a VAG thread. As we’ve already seen on this test site, there can sometimes be too much potential for “robust debate”, even amongst people who really don’t want it - and whose opinions might not actually be very far apart.
Anyway, I don’t know what was involved in “spinning off” topics on the old site - but I suspect that it’s something that might need to be looked at on the new one.
Tags are another potential issue - particularly some people learning what they are / what’s involved in creating and managing them. I don’t think it helps that a number of “explainers” about the features of different software often seem to be aimed at people who already understand the stuff.
Some people might point out that this isn’t an issue only with software, websites etc. (such as Discourse, Zoom etc.) - it can also be an issue elsewhere - what about equipment manuals, often written in jargon, which leave the unfortunate user no wiser (and even more confused)?
Anyway, back to this site, once the new site is up and running (and who’s allowed to manage tags - and other stuff - has been finalized), I suspect that some people might need some “easy to understand” guidance on how to do certain things.
This would probably be the case with any migration, anywhere. It would even have been the case with the old site - for example, if new people were to become moderators or join the Committee.
Stuff like this could be a problem - but probably won’t be, especially as I’m certain it’s been planned for.
Hi folks, sorry I’ve been quiet on here for a while.
I had to migrate DEMU off Google Apps/Workplace this weekend which was actually a massive job. They were going to start charging us a ridiculous amount of money to stay ($1000s).
So we now have another company managing our email (for £25/year instead of 1000s) and a single ‘committee’ Google Drive that we pay a nominal amount for (again, something like £20 / year).
Anyway, back to this… I met up with Gareth briefly last week and he will hopefully be able to help with AWS. Next step will be to test the migration.
Alan, yes agreed we will need help from members with tagging etc but I’d like to prove/disprove the migration first.
Regarding the theme plug-in for images on topics, yes, they take the first image from the first topic.
Cheers!
Guy
Thats certainly a big saving! A number of people seemed to have issues with the google system, hopefully Committee and Officers will better be able to use the email now.
Thats good news about the help with AWS. Good stuff Gareth.
Hopefully the migration goes as hoped, if not I’m sure you’ll figure out a plan. Getting that proven first is a obvious first step.
Anyone has the right to be digitally forgotten by an organisation - basic GDPR as I understand it (something we’ll still need to address for members from EU even if the UK comes up with a replacement). That will include removing all content created by that user. No idea if you’d also have to remove any places where their username was tagged.
Steven B.
I’ll ask t’other half, who does this for a living. I don’t think it is quite how you set it out, but will check and post the answer.
a@y
As do I (do it for a living) and have certification. With regard to forum data, it’s not that clear cut.
As long as the data (in this case forum posts) are anonymised and the individual can’t be identified then this is ok. Thing is, that can be quite tricky with modelling posts on a forum.
But the individual has to invoke the right to do this.
Guy
I’m not sure this has been tested in court, but here’s a thought: if someone contributed to wikipedia and then decided not to and invoke their ‘right to be forgotten’, it would be almost impossible to remove their work from the wiki. Their ‘work’ on the wiki is not the same thing as their ‘personal data’ and shouldn’t be considered such. When I leave an employer and invoke a right to be forgotten, they don’t delete all of the documents I’ve written when I was in their employment. Same goes for forum topics in my opinion.
In fact this is catered for in GDPR under Article 17 part 3 - Freedom of Expression. It’s a censorship issue. If I post something about Alan and he invokes the right to be forgotten, you can’t remove my post. Not quite the same thing as self-generated forum posts but it’s a massive minefield. I suggest we try to incorporate something into the terms of use.
I think it might more come under copyright laws possibly? the user would own the copyright to their own photos and words, and posting to the forum would require something in the terms of use about ‘give the society the right to use’ type things like a lot of companies such as Flickr have in their terms. They own the copyright to their work still even if published in UPDate, however it’d be impossible to remove it unless the PDFs of old issues were edited accordingly and it is implied that they give permission for use (though typically if I were to use outside of the issue I’d seek permission again as a courtesy if nothing else).
As Guy says, it is a bit of a minefield, and there are balancing issues: for example for accounting purposes we’d still have to keep details of what someone paid, and when. Ironically if someone applied to be “deleted”, you’d have to keep a copy of what you’ve done to show you complied… although that would be away from public view of course.
And of course the paper Updates wouldn’t be affected…
a@y
What t&c do we have on the forum currently?
Including wording along the lines of what Flickr etc do would seem a sensible way forward, and the change of forum software / migration would be a good opportunity to get everyone to sign up to new T&Cs
Out of interest I have just looked at RMWebs T&Cs in which it mentions that they will anonymise user names if required, but there is a need to make a specific request if you want your actual content deleting as well.
I couldn’t find a post labelled terms and conditions, but there is this rules post:
And this one:
Updated 2012 and 2014 respectively. I looked at the website/forum as an unlogged in user and theres no link to T&Cs and the link to the rules on that page goes to just the public forum with no rules visible.
They look mostly reasonable though, so probably just need tidying up.