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22-08-2006 08:32 AM

The Fifth Horseman

Quote:

And again, how surprised are any of us going to be if an unregistered person doesn't leave a comment, as opposed to just voting 'no'?[/b]

A lot. Guests can only post in Troubleshooting and Games Discussion.

21-08-2006 08:08 PM

Mighty Midget

Wouldn't that lead to one forum clogged by noob questions/requests that no member (?) would care to read through and one members only where the answers for the noobs would end up?

21-08-2006 08:04 PM

uk_john2005

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Mighty Midget @ Aug 21 2006, 08:59 PM) [snapback]250047[/snapback]</div>

Quote:

But there's already obvious (?) benefits: There are sections of the forum available only to registered members.
[/b]

But the bulk of the forums are public and that's where most of the registered users go anyway! If there were 2 links on each game review that took you to the community page that was an exact replica and a link to the main forum, as a registered user you could decide which forum you wanted to go to. As unregistered you'd only have one.

In other words real benefits of being registered.

21-08-2006 07:59 PM

Mighty Midget

But there's already obvious (?) benefits: There are sections of the forum available only to registered members.

21-08-2006 05:53 PM

uk_john2005

Well I think there should be the FAQ page that comes up for unregistered users, and any unregistered user that leaves a message gets that FAQ pop up again. And evertime that same unregistered person posts a message on that visit and next visit, he/she will get the FAQ popup. On the FAQ popup you would have in fairly large letters that 'This FAQ will stop appearing once you register' Any person that posts a few messages, or comes back more than once will start seeing the benefit of registering.

21-08-2006 05:14 PM

Shrek

I definitely say "No"!
If we force people to register in order to post, then we would have - most probably - an avalanche of people registering to post one single question and then never to come back again... And I bet that next time these people needs to ask something - imagine it a few months later - they would most probably create another member account just because they don't remember their old one...

The questions would be done the same way, and threads would continue to have 500 posts with the same problems being described and answered 20 times and additionally, we would have 20000 members instead of 7000 (from which, only about what - one hundred? are regulars).

21-08-2006 04:02 PM

uk_john2005

I have commented on the thread about the FAQ page before the forum page for unregisterd. I have pointed out that if you don't have to register to leave a message/question this is the next best thing. Nevertheless, allowing unregistered to leave messages/questions make trawling in Abandonia forums a lot less enjoyable. In forums where questions aren't repeated ad neuseum you get a wider variety of comments that are more interesting to read. Once I have seen the twentieth unregistered person ask 'I can't get this to run in XP', I get so frustrated I inevitably stop reading and look for the answer on the web.

I don't really see the benefits of registering anymore than I see any downside for not. Hence, I don't blame people for thinking they can just come to a particular game thread ask their question, get their answer and never come back.

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Horoma @ Aug 21 2006, 04:26 PM) [snapback]249964[/snapback]</div>

Quote:

I think you're presenting the situation too much as black & white :
All registered users are helpful people, who read the forum rules & faqs, who search before asking, etc.
All unregistered users are spammers, who ask 10 times the same question, don't read the faqs, etc.

Though I am pretty new to this site (as a registered user

), I can say I have seen plenty of guests helping others out, posting interesting links and providing useful info. I also visit many forums, and often reply to questions when I can, but only register to the forums I frequent a lot.

I don't think it's a good idea to force someone to register to make just a handful of posts, though I support the idea of an intermediary page to warn guests.
[/b]

Yes, but you are registered. And again, how surprised are any of us going to be if an unregistered person doesn't leave a comment, as opposed to just voting 'no'?

21-08-2006 03:26 PM

Horoma

21-08-2006 02:09 PM

The Fifth Horseman

Quote:

I'm not sure... One possible way to go, litterally, is to have a "Have you read the faq or any relevant thread?" page shown when unregistered guests and whatnots are about to post a new one. Thing is, that some guests have a question that is hard for them to find the answer to, due to little or no computer know-how (they just want to play...), and maybe even too little knowledge of English. They would need a taylored answer, perhaps? Letting unregistered users out of the forums would probably lead to less usage leading to less registered users. I'm not sure about all this, but I'm pretty sure there are better ways of dealing with and avoiding "unwieldy" topics.
[/b]

That's pretty much what has been suggested here

Also, it has occurred several times this year that the GD forum had to be isolated for decontamination during several particularly nasty bot attacks.
While number of new posts plummetted to almost nothing, it was so silent that after a few days I almost missed the spambots.

21-08-2006 01:57 PM

Japo

I dunno, I've seen pages where registration is mandatory to post, and what you get is loads of users with 1-5 posts who never return. I think that the idea of putting a FAQ page between the unregistered and the forum, but still letting them post, is better.

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