Having said all that, here is my concept for an IMDb forum replacement right here on Criticker , an idea which was born in and as a result of this fruitful discussion.
conceptual screenshot:
The idea is ridiculously simple:
- • add a tab next to the ratings tab (see screenshot)
- • It's that simple. Now every movie on Criticker has its own forum.
- • The topic links on the tab link to the movie-specific forum, where the topics are physically located.
- • So, mpowell, you don't have to code a whole new forum. That's the beauty. You can use what you already have!
Internally, you just store the thread IDs for a film. That's it. - • The user can access a topic in 2 ways: either by clicking on the topic title on the tab or – exactly as usual – by clicking on the (same) topic title in the movie-specific forum. Both links point to the (same) topic. The topics on the tab are in fact just mirror links.
- • The button keeps its current function (meaning you don't have to code a new form for creating new topics) BUT is moved from the movie-specific forum to the tab (see screenshot).
- • This ensures that every movie-specific thread is created on the film page, therefore linked to a specific film and, as a consequence, listed on the film's tab.
- • topic titles in the movie-specific forum should be displayed as follows: [movie title]: [topic title entered by user]
- • bottom line: the concept is very much in line with how mini-reviews can link to the full reviews forum.
- • BTW: a full review should have a backlink to the (highlighted) corresponding mini-review on the ratings tab.
In the same way, all movie-specific topics should have a backlink to their (highlighted) place in the mirror-links on the tab: www.criticker.com/film/[filmname]/talk/[threadID] - • Incidentally, this is also where the user should be brought (redirected) back to after submitting a new topic, so that the user can both see the created (highlighted) topic in the list and continue to read other topics for the same film.
advantages:
You get the best of both worlds:
- A forum for each film.
- AND you can still visit the movie-specific forum the same way you used to, in order to see what recent activity is going on (of all films combined). This helps to spot the currently active threads.
- Users writing on the talk tab are more likely to also write mini-reviews on the neighbouring ratings tab (given that they are aleady at the right place). Therefore there is a good chance, the site-wide percentage of scores with mini-reviews will increase.
Haha, I hope I've earned myself something with this. At least lifetime sponsor status, I hope
Afterthought:
With this concept in place, all new topics will appear on the talk tab. It would be nice though, to also link all previous movie-specific topics to the talk tab. Mpowell, we could help you with that and turn this into a community-driven effort if you give us a tool for adding existing topics to the talk tab (in the same spirit as having us add films to the Criticker database). Already linked topics could be garnished with an icon (e.g. ), signaling that this topic has already been linked, so that it's easy to spot those topics that still need to be linked by the community.
Hope you like it.
marketing perspective:
Now with IMDB forums gone, this would be a lovely replacement. I think this enhanced forum would generate much more discussion. (Case in point: Criticker currently has only 772 movie-specific topics. That's about the number of topics I, alone, have created on IMDb ... whereas on Criticker I wrote only 1 movie-specific topic. The reasons for this imbalance are explained in this thread pointing out the painful ratio between the large number of Criticker users and the tiny fraction of them who talk: mainly movies not having their own place for discussion. I never bother visiting Criticker's movie-specific forum, because there is simply no chance the films discussed there coincident by chance with the film I just saw.) The possibility to discuss specific movies here and the increased discussion as a result are likely to drive a lot of folks to your page. There are literally millions of people without a home now, eagerly searching for one. This would also be the perfect time, as no real IMDB forum replacement candidate was able to establish itself thus far. Criticker could fill the void, but only within this narrow timeframe now before another site manages to unite the former IMDB forum users currently dispersed over a multitude of lesser known sites just like Criticker. Therefore the potential of growth would be very real for Criticker, but only if you act soon.
I really consider this a once-in-a-lifetime chance for Criticker.