Boards News

dahamsta

One more burst of creativity tonight and I'm off...

In one of his Homer-J-Simpson-Flushing-Meadows-Dreamlike-States[1] recently, Tom noted that Boards has great potential to become a tech news site that would easily rival the likes of ENN and siliconrepublic.com. I agree with him to some extent. Boards has everthing that is required for a project like this: a high population of users interested in technology, a relatively high population of users that understands and can write about it, the box and bandwidth to handle it, and the skillset to develop it.

There are issues with something like this though, the main one being that news is traditionally a commercial operation, and I doubt even the admins will deny that there would be a temptation to switch this to commercial if it were successful. We're not communists after all, and we all like making money. That said, if Boards did go ahead with something like this, the bulk of the work would be done by the community, so no doubt the first sniff of commercial goings-on would cause an uprising of global proportions.

There are other issues though. For a start, building a pool of writers isn't as easy as it looks from first glance. Sure, we have lots of tech fans around here, but writing good stories isn't the same as posting the odd rumination. You could increase the number in the pool a fair bit with a good editor but that would pretty much be a full time job[2]. And on top of that you're going to find it hard to keep the writers, because some of them are going to get bored, or busy, or ticked off with doing it for free.

As should be obvious, I've thought about this quite a lot, and that's because I've wanted to introduce something like this on Foot.ie for quite some time. I haven't done so because of the reasons above and others, but I'd like to try something, so next week I'm going to roll out a news posting system to the Foot.ie mods, and the week after to the users. It's a very simple system, so if it works I can expand on it and maybe eventually get users posting articles; if it doesn't, I haven't lost a whole lot.

In essense, all it involves is cutting and pasting the titles and an extract from footie articles on the web into a form, and pushing that data into a table in the database. That data can then be used in a frontend that pulls the stories out and displays them Google News style. It has a separate table for news sources, to save a little hassle and to group articles, and I've also added a Links toolbar button that can pop a submission window while you surf - and fill in some of the fields - for reporting without having to specifically visit Foot.ie.

The system is integrated with vBulletin in that you can only post if you're a user, and your post will be held for moderation if you're not a moderator -- this works because most posts will probably come from moderators, so they can be notified of new posts when they come in to post a story themselves. The first thing I'll be adding is integration with the forums, so users can post comments on stories; and if it's looking like a success, I'll then update it to include stories written by users.

Ok, so in essense it's a blog without the commentary, but that's why I like Google News so much, and it's exactly why I don't like most blogs. I'm also keen for this to succeed because I'm a complete and utter news addict and I like bringing cool and interesting stories to people's attention. And finally, to be frank, I'm a little tired of spending ten minutes trying to figure out which forum the story I just found fits into best. I just want to post it, let other people sort it.

So anyway, I have this and I'd be happy to provide the code to Boards, and to continue development if it succeeds; either in parallel with Foot.ie or standalone if it doesn't work there. Is there a demand for this though?

adam

[1] Remember Homer visualising Flushing Meadows? With the meadows? And the toilets? And the flushing? Yeah, you remember.
[2] Company for Dan!
[3] I think Boards did something like this before, so I might be looking for a little help.

DeVore

I'd be interested in looking into this, we've some ideas here for Boards but right now we are getting things sorted for the launch of the supporters pack (found a few nigglies we have to sort out on the logistical side of things).

Can you let me know how you get on? Look forward to reading it on foot.ie.

DeV.

dahamsta

No problem Tom, I'll point it out to you when it goes mainstream.

adam

Gerry

I'd certainly be interested in doing this. I've considered doing it before, but I didn't really have very much time this year, with final exams in college etc. It needs a fair bit of work by the main initial contributors to get it established, fairly obviously. I also agree that it would be difficult to get a good pool of writers. Boards does have many people who could do the job, but to be honest I don't think it would do much good to have everyone posting their tuppence, if the news site was to gain a decent reputation. It would have to be carefully edited, but with enough volume to keep people coming back every day.

With regard to content, we don't need another site which consists exclusively of linkage to other sites. It would have to have original content, like articles, reviews, or even just original musings on the state of technology. I'd hope that the comments are kept to a separate page, thats what I think you are saying anyway.

So basically I'll help if you want, as I will have plenty of time to do so.

dahamsta

Thanks Gerry. In all honest I don't have a problem with the straight linkage concept, for the simple reason that I would find it useful; and because I haven't seen many sites like it for the Irish audience. And I wouldn't be mad about going the whole hog on this for the reasons outlined above, i.e. lack of reliability, waste of effort if it doesn't come off, etc. However that really wouldn't be my decision, it would be the admins.

adam

DeVore

Firstly I would rather one well thought out review/article/editorial a day then 10 PR-reheats.

Secondly, I agree with keeping the discussion from the same page as the article but I do think we should have discussion... more brains = good. (usually!)

I'd want a crack team of hard core techies and writers. People who are willing to commit at least a chunk of time to it and are respected for their knowledge.

How this would tie in with Boards.ie I dont know yet but I'd prefer to see the people who are powering it, owning it. Some kinda hook up with Boards is obviously on the cards of course.


DeV.

dahamsta

I also agree on discussion. It's nice to be able to comment on stories, but anything more than "6 comments on this story" annoys me, because it's wasting my connection -- I mightn't /want/ to read the comments. As to tying it into Boards, well, I think it would defeat the purpose NOT to tie it in. The thing I'm firing onto Foot.ie is built as a plugin, and only Foot.ie users are allowed post; and only moderators allowed approve submissions. Posters are obviously linked back into their profile page, and one of the blocks will be "Top News Posters".

Again though, and sorry to keep restating this, I think going the whole hog out of the starting gate would be a still risk to take. Slashdot is a massively popular site, and all that does is link to stories. People just want to read news. If anything, homegrown writing should be an add-on if basic news is successful.

I think I might have been a little premature posting this. Sowwy.

adam

DeVore

Theres value in saying "I saw this over here" and linking to an announcement.

Theres value in writing an indepth review of some piece of tech or other.

The problem arises when you simply reheat PR's and pass them off as balanced, informed and considered review by a knowledgable journalist

DeV.

dahamsta

Oh, gods, I wouldn't have any interest in the latter DeV, and I wasn't suggesting that for a second. The Foot.ie News section will be purely a news aggregation service at the start.

adam

GuanYin

Having recently tried to push the cause for more science stuff on boards I heard about this thread. Sorry if I'm dredging it back up.

I think it would be a great idea, and although it seems that the idea so far is based around techie stuff, I'd be interested in science related articles (alá New Scientist).

Originally posted by DeVore
Firstly I would rather one well thought out review/article/editorial a day then 10 PR-reheats.

Definitely, having them reviewed by people who know the area might be an idea as it would allow the best and original to come through.

Originally posted by DeVore

Secondly, I agree with keeping the discussion from the same page as the article but I do think we should have discussion... more brains = good. (usually!)

What about a link from the article to a thread that can be started with it. Will increase traffic to certain boards and also be an in-board advertisement for the article.

Originally posted by DeVore

I'd want a crack team of hard core techies and writers. People who are willing to commit at least a chunk of time to it and are respected for their knowledge.

I'd be more than willing to help out, and would like to be considered if it comes about. I've experience myself in peer-reviewing for scientific meetings and a few minor journals and I think that it would be excellent experience for myself and well worth the time involved.

yellum

I wouldn't mind seeing something like Fisking in relation to news stories.

Boards people are very opiniated and there are some very intelligent posters out there and having them comment on fresh news stories would be a good resource.

DeVore

Yeah, I dont think we can support that fisking idea (though I've been thinking about a Breaking News board). On the Boards News idea... yeah we have it pretty much working. The whole "Spin going out of business" thing has put it on hold for the moment but its there or there abouts.

Hopefully in the next few weeks we'll have it sorted.

DeV.

Thorbar

Fark has a very nice model for this sort of news posting/commenting thing.

GuanYin

Could this incorporate stuff like film and computer game reviews too?

See this thread.

DeVore

yes it could and it will. Unfortunately (or fortunately if you are us) most of the admins are settling into new jobs at the moment. (My first day was friday. I spent a curious 15 mins explaining to the director of the company I now work for that , yes that *was* me in the paper, no my name is Tom and not DeVore and that he hadnt actually hired a complete nutcase.

So, in the mean time you'll have to wait for Regi to get some time to make the front page go and all of this loveliness will come flooding into your lives.

Be patient, Boards wasnt built in a day.

DeV.

Illkillya

Originally posted by sykeirl
Could this incorporate stuff like film and computer game reviews too?

See this thread.

good idea, but sykeirl thats my avatar you ****

GuanYin

Eeep devore, sorry, I only posted coz it seemed like it was a related topic!

oh and I change dthe avatar!

dahamsta

Rolling out Foot.ie News next week or so. Only about three months late.

adam