I’m giving it some thought, and I know that some of you have asked for it. Do you think it’s a good idea or are there already enough of them? Just exploring here…
June 7th, 2009
Whisky Advocate Blog
News and views from Editor & Publisher John Hansell and the Whisky Advocate Writers
Interesting. I’m sure most of us are already active on some (or several) forums. I have an account on at least five of them and I don’t like the fact that none of these forums have become THE reference forum. This means you have to keep track of all the forums just to notice that they all have one or two interesting topics (but not enough to abandon the other forums).
What would make a Malt Advocate forum could be different? If it’s just more of the same, I’m not sure it makes sense.
No! Haha! Kidding
I think there’s always room for more forums but only if they offer something different or better.
They’re also an awful lot of work to run!
It could be a good thing, depending on the CMS you use and the interface that is designed. If ind many of the forums out there now to be quite clunky.
That said, you could improve things around here immensely simply by allowing nested commenting so we could all have threaded discussions.
You also have a fairly large following, with some of the major bloggers making it a habbit of posting. So perhaps it is even time to just introduce an “open thread” like they do on political blogs – a daily or weekly spot where folks could come with questions or just to converse.
Best.
Another forum is always nice, however, I too would like to see something other than:
“What bottle did you finish last night?” on every single forum I visit!
I think that a valuable question to pose would be what would you like to see that hasn’t been offered yet? How can the forum be different? How can we not duplicate some of the important work already done?
For one thing I would suggest working WITH other fora on such things as taste notes. Simply link to WM or WWW in a reciprocal fashion!
I would like to see the taste notes sorted by user. Some users have similar palettes and this would be a useful way to interact with the database.
Would a SKYPE type tasting feature be useful to carry out tastings?
Just a few thoughts.
Love the magazine BTW.
John,
Applause, applause.
Check out AbsoluteWrite.com for a forum that works. I’m sure it’s a ton of work. You occasionally read a comment there posted by a knot head: requires a moderator to step in. Sometimes (few compared to the number of posts) a poster gets the boot or at the least muted for a while. Based on the posters I see here, I don’t see that happening here.
Still willing to help if you need it.
My two bits
Slainte!
I also belong to several forums, and am frustrated with the lot of them. The ones I really like have trouble attracting new members, and thus become a bit inbred. The one that has a natural draw for new members has become unsatisfactory for a lot of reasons that it wouldn’t do to go into here. A Malt Advocate forum would draw from MA’s readership, which is intelligent, sophisticated, knowledgeable, and extraordinarily good-looking. My fear is that Brits and Europeans would see it as “the American forum” and decline to participate–one such commented to me once that he though MA too oriented toward American whiskeys (when in fact it simply isn’t totally Scotch-centric). But yes, absolutely, I think it’s worth a shot. Maybe two shots, and a chaser.
I’m not sure that the world needs another whisk(e)y forum. I participate in three and find myself wishing that they were all joined together because it can become a pain to keep checking all of them. And as with all things, some are more useful than others.
I think your blog is a great way for readers to interact with you; I don’t see the advantage of MA jumping on the forum bandwagon right now.
I agree with Mr TH…the forums I visit tend indeed to be “inbred.” That’s one of the things I like about this blog; there’s a lot of diversity in the responses. If we can continue and expand that in a separate forum, I’m all for it.
If not, then why bother?
I’d say no, it is not worth your trouble, due to what I observe as relatively low information content on most forums and their tendency to go inbred pretty quickly. I find it frustrating to go on to a forum to find long threads on whether someone paid $59.99 or $65.99 for a whisky in hand – it is excruciating. What does it taste like? Not always discussed. Not to say there is not interesting and useful information on many forums, you just have to dig for it. Due to high information content, I tend to visit this blog often, far more so than any forum.
As an alternative, maybe we could post questions to John periodically as potential discussion topics. A second suggestion related to the one above, as many people participating in this blog read other forums, they could suggest links to other forums when something interesting is discussed – I’m not sure what permission issues are involved, but this seems to work for The Week Magazine as a business model.
I’d surely look in if there was a forum here, but there are lots of forums. And participants can get a bit ratty over all sorts of thing. People fall out with others they’ve never even met over the Internet, as sometimes it’d difficult to recognise the tone of a participant’s post.
The quality of a forum depends on the quality of its members, and I think you could get enough quality members to make a good forum.
But there are forums out there already, and if anyone wants to see something in particular in a forum that already exists, they can just start a topic on that subject there.
John
Now that I think about it, John’s blog already is more of a forum because lately he posts more ‘topics’ than just press information or tasting notes. Especially compared to other blogs that are more mono-directional in their communication. I guess you just need more threaded features in the comments part.
If you take away all the discussions from the blog, it will need a new purpose to keep it alive (or just more of the traditional content).
It’s so true– the discussions folks have on this blog are of a much higher caliber than what you tend to see on forum threads. “Why?” One might ask. I think that every one here knows.
You’re a modest guy, John, and I know you don’t like to hear this kind of thing, but the main reason this blog works so well is because of you. You’re capable of coming up with topics that are both accessible and meaningful. You post them one at a time. If one generates significant interest, you usually hold off on new posts to give things time to develop. All the while, your status ensures that folks take the topics and the discussion fairly seriously. You’ve created a space where passionate and knowledgeable whisk(e)y drinkers don’t feel like they’re just wasting they’re breath.
MrTH, I would also like to think that a blog attached to this site would be superior because of the crowd it would draw. But I also wouldn’t be surprised if it didn’t turn out that way.
I’m sure it would be too much work to be worth the trouble, but perhaps a trial period might be interesting?
Hi there,
I don´t know why but the discussion reminded me of the title of this strange little piece you might not yet know.
http://www.thegrocer.co.uk/articles.aspx?page=articles&ID=199944
As most of you have already mentioned many of us try to follow more than one forum which can take up a lot of time. And yes there is often a lot of redundancy. The way I read it John the expectations set onto you are to create a different forum. “Different” as yet being a somewhat undefined qualifier.
A tall order.
As to participants from outside the US I think that if the forum is “different” it will attract posters from all over the world, naturally.
Greetings
kallaskander
After reading the responses here, I do agree that if it is just like every other forum (“show your stash”, “what are you drinking now”) it will not stand out at all… what might be worth considering is an “Ask John” feature or a “Question of the Week” (which you seem to be doing lately). That way if people can ask pose questions and not only you, but the community that is already hear can respond to them – should you deem the question worthy of posting…
I could not agree more with the general tone of the comments. There are quite a few forums and it is tough to keep up with them. Many forums see a reduction in the quality of the posts, some rather quickly, to the point that those with something to say simply go elsewhere or stop participating. It is the “different” ideas that stand out and remain a success, and few can provide what is available on this blog. WDJK, and MA in general, has always been about providing quality information beyond simply repeating press releases or promoting self-interest. I believe it is that model that attracts the level of quality participation, including from many of the other sources of whisky information that I value. I don’t know if that could be captured in a forum.
Perhaps the best addition would be a method of noting when new comments are posted on slightly older topics as mentioned above. Perhaps just a sidebar that lists the last 3-5 active topics in terms of comments. At the same time, it is refreshing that topics do not have the chance to linger too long, reminding us that there is always some innovation or issue in the whisky industry around the corner.
I gotta agree with Bruchladdict, Sku, Todd, and related comments. The current forums out there are overrun with fluff. No need for another board that ends up cluttered with social chit-chat… or worse, people competing to see who can get the highest posting “status.”
David S’s idea to have a way to keep track of the topics with active comments is excellent. I’d love to see that.
The obvious advantage of a forum is that we readers can open discussions on our own topics. I have a few of my own that I’d like to put out there.
But there are two major potential problems. First, lot’s of newbie inquiries, such as ‘I just had my first fill-in-distillery-name, how do I learn more about scotch/bourbon/whatever.
Second, many forums are taken over my a handfull of individuals, restating the same, tired arguments, over and over again. Potential examples, why Glen Whatever isn’t as good as in the good old days, and when exactly the good old days ended.
Slainte.
Louis
John,
On the surface, I’m for it but – and I admit, I’m a snob – I like to correspond with serious and like minded people. Unfortunately, forums tend to attract a lot of people who don’t share the same sense of propriety. Nonetheless, if you and the others at Malt Advocate are interested in starting up a forum, I’ll be a charter member!
- Josh
Oh how glad I am that the majority of the responders are not happy with the forum idea. Even though every now and then some have proposed or asked for forum. Don’t get me wrong, I read this blog, but I think the forum is just not needed.
A couple of words about the blog. One trend that I have noticed (or maybe it is just me) is that the information provided by the original posts has gone down, not the quality but the quantity. There seems to be more posts like “What do you think about…”, or “What is your XXXX day drink?”
I do not want to be offensive or anything negative, just want express my view (fair enough). I would like to see more informational posts, which John is well capable of providing to us. Also the guest bloggers have been excellent. Tasting notes? They are OK too.
Excellent feedback everyone. (Sorry for my absence yesterday, but my birthday was on Sunday so I took it and Monday off to celebrate.)
Based on your comments, my current feeling is to hold off on creating another forum. Instead, I think I will continue to find ways to make this blog better. I’ll be looking into your recommendations (nested commenting, open threads, etc.) and see what I can do.
Mr. TH: Yes, Malt Advocate readers are extraordinarily good looking.
Abinash: I ask questions like “What do you think about…” on this blog because it encourages feedback and participation from the readers of this blog. And the readers of this blog are very passionate and knowledgeable (with diverse backgrounds), which is one of the reason why WDJK works.
Any chance that the Website, and particularly the Blog can be made PDA friendly?
DavidG, we’re having a staff meeting next week to discuss this and other advancements.