Forum:New forum feature testing

__NOWYSIWYG__

Not sure how many of you guys know, but I'm a member of the Community Council (a.k.a. Wikia feature Beta testers), and we've been asked about enabling the new forums feature on our wikis. If you've been to Avatar Wiki lately you will have seen the new forum in action. Personally, I think the forums are a great addition, and I really think Young Justice Wiki can utilise the feature to our advantage.

I've spoken to Thailog about this briefly, and we both believe that a user-friendly forum is really the only thing holding YJ Wiki back from becoming the ultimate YJ resource and fan site. The new forums do function along the same lines as the Message Walls, which I'm a huge fan of. There are also some additions to the walls, such as;


 * threaded discussions, so you can follow individual conversations rather than pages with multiple conversations
 * notifications, both on-wiki and in e-mail, help you keep track of the conversations you're involved in
 * Wiki admins can create Boards to organize threads
 * a new way for admins to highlight discussions that they want everyone on the wiki to see; a far more efficient system than the Community Corner, which I personally believe is ultra-ineffective

Should YJ Wiki activate the forums, I think the feature could really make up for the fact we don't have article comments enabled. Structuring the forums not unlike Toonzone's Worlds Finest forum, we could have "official" discussion threads for each main character, in addition to the official discussion blogs we host for episodes and comic issue releases (I'm not yet decided on whether those blogs would also be moved to the forums). We have a huge amount of activity in user blogs, but more than half of those blogs could just as easily be forum threads, which I think would further support discussion, especially with upcoming forum features of which I cannot yet disclose.

The wiki would really benefit from the creation of separate Boards, some I think could be useful are;


 * Episodic and issue discussion: board pertaining to the discussion of new episodes and comic issues
 * General YJ discussion: where the official character discussion threads would live, as well as any other topics that most blogs cover
 * YJ news and updates: self-explanatory, for the discussion of news and updates. A blog post would still be made, however comments would be disabled, replaced by a link to the forums, a la The World's Finest.
 * Other discussion: anything else that doesn't fall under the other blogs, such as wider DC related material

I'm open to the idea of giving each Board a more YJ-related name, such as "The Daily Planet" for YJ news and updates, but that can be decided upon later. I also wouldn't mind introducing role playing to a separate Board, since IRC RPing is struggling.

If enough people support the idea of introducing the forums, I'll get in contact with Wikia Staff and have it enabled. Apologies for the large post, I had a lot to say. :P I look forward to hearing from you all. :) 09:28, August 22, 2012 (UTC)