There is, like, a million and one topics on each conceivable subject

For the title of this thread, I used a phrase from new member artjomh's introduction thread https://www.russiadefence.net/t4290-greetings-and-salutations

This is a very serious issue that I have been complaining about a few times.

Having too many threads does not make a forum richer.
It just makes it harder and less user-friendly for members to navigate through.
It is very time-consuming and utterly silly to have to open 21 threads just to read one or two posts from each thread.

Here are examples:

-Do we need a thread about relations of Russia with X country, and also with Y country and also with Z country etc. etc. ?With time we will have about two hundred separate threads just about Russia relations with....

-Do we need a separate thread for MSTA and another one for Koalitsya and another one for Russian artillery systems?

-Do we need a thread about status about Russia navy, and another one for submarine force, and another one for naval systems and a separate one for anti ship missiles and on and on?

-Do we need a thread about economic news and another one about Russia's economy and its dependence on energy and a couple of other ones?

- Do we need a Situation in Ukraine thread, a Novorossiya thread, a Novorossiya armed forces thread, a Crimea thread, a Novorossiya multimedia thread ...?

etc.
etc.
etc.

The two famous historic Russian questions are:

Кто виноват? Who to blame?
Что делать? What to do?

In my opinion, we are all at fault for letting this happen. Mods included.
-We should be resisting the urge to start new when it is not absolutely necessary. I know, I know ... I myself opened this new thread to discuss this matter.
-Before opening a new thread, we should be looking at using existing ones.
-Experience with many forums tells me that what makes a forum successful is just a handful of very popular threads. In our case we have the Russian photos/videos thread, the navy status thread, the situation in Ukraine thread and a couple of others. Let us use these as much as possible.

I kindly ask our beloved Mods to be more attentive to this issue that is going out of control (specially since the number of members is growing fast). In my humble opinion:
-Old and unnecessary threads should be closed
-Whenever possible, two similar threads should be merged
-Members (and Mods) who open too many threads should be politely reminded

I have said what I wanted to say. I ask fellow members to chime in and voice their opinions about this matter.

I am heading to Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabagh) and will be off-line for a few days.

By the way it rumored here that the Armenian Army will be getting PANTSIR gun/missile air defense systems along with the ISKANDER systems.

Having too many threads does not make a forum richer.
It just makes it harder and less user-friendly for members to navigate through.
It is very time-consuming and utterly silly to have to open 21 threads just to read one or two posts from each thread.

I have a lot of sympathy for what you are saying... as a mod I have to pretty much read everything posted, which usually means I sit down every night to 40-50 threads to open and read.

However I think keeping separate discussions separate does make it easier to find specific conversations on specific topics.

-Do we need a thread about relations of Russia with X country, and also with Y country and also with Z country etc. etc. ?With time we will have about two hundred separate threads just about Russia relations with....

It depends. Do you want to wade through hundreds of posts about Russian trade to India and Russian trade to China to find a spread out conversation about Russian trade with Mexico? Or would it be easier to separate out each of these quite different though related topics?

-Do we need a separate thread for MSTA and another one for Koalitsya and another one for Russian artillery systems?

If there was one page of posts in each thread then you would have a good point... if there were 20 pages in each with unrelated discussions then keeping them separate means having to open more threads but having to read through fewer unrelated posts to find what you want.

-Do we need a thread about status about Russia navy, and another one for submarine force, and another one for naval systems and a separate one for anti ship missiles and on and on?

We could turn each section into one large continuous thread which would mean it would be easier to find the right thread... but it might take days to find what you are looking for because you would have to go through the entire thread to find it... 500 pages anyone?

-Do we need a thread about economic news and another one about Russia's economy and its dependence on energy and a couple of other ones?

Again, I agree that quite a few threads are very similar and could be merged, but often they cover different aspects of topics and I think are worth keeping separate.

- Do we need a Situation in Ukraine thread, a Novorossiya thread, a Novorossiya armed forces thread, a Crimea thread, a Novorossiya multimedia thread ...?

I think we do, because it means members can discuss specific things in the relevant thread and separate conversations on such threads that can grow rather rapidly wont get lost amongst other discussions. But that is just my opinion... please share yours.

The two famous historic Russian questions are:

Кто виноват? Who to blame?
Что делать? What to do?

In my opinion, we are all at fault for letting this happen. Mods included.
-We should be resisting the urge to start new when it is not absolutely necessary. I know, I know ... I myself opened this new thread to discuss this matter.
-Before opening a new thread, we should be looking at using existing ones.
-Experience with many forums tells me that what makes a forum successful is just a handful of very popular threads. In our case we have the Russian photos/videos thread, the navy status thread, the situation in Ukraine thread and a couple of others. Let us use these as much as possible.

First of all let me say that who is to blame is not an issue... there is no value in finding someone to blame for this.

The focus should be... is this actually problem that needs a solution. If it is then what are the solutions available. Will the solutions actually solve the problem or will it just create new problems.

The best way to find the answers is to discuss it here... so lets hear what you think... old members and new members... what are your thoughts?

I kindly ask our beloved Mods to be more attentive to this issue that is going out of control (specially since the number of members is growing fast). In my humble opinion:
-Old and unnecessary threads should be closed
-Whenever possible, two similar threads should be merged
-Members (and Mods) who open too many threads should be politely reminded

We can certainly do that, though as the number of members increases and posts increase we mods would like to ask that members support us by mentioning cases of this situation as it arises. We are happy to merge or even change the names of threads to make things easier.

I have said what I wanted to say. I ask fellow members to chime in and voice their opinions about this matter.

X2

Don't be shy.

I am heading to Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabagh) and will be off-line for a few days.

So, poke the hornets nest and then run why don't you... Bah!

BTW if I have told you once I have told you a billion times... don't exaggerate!

TheArmenian wrote:-Do we need a thread about relations of Russia with X country, and also with Y country and also with Z country etc. etc. ?With time we will have about two hundred separate threads just about Russia relations with....

Yes

-Do we need a separate thread for MSTA and another one for Koalitsya and another one for Russian artillery systems?

Yes.
They are all actively developed/modernized systems and there is more than enough regular news and new info on each one. For the older or less publisced ones; that's what the general Russian artillery systems thread is for.

-Do we need a thread about status about Russia navy, and another one for submarine force, and another one for naval systems and a separate one for anti ship missiles and on and on?

And yes.

Whatever little is lost through inconvenience for new users and 'window-shopper' users who just want to click 1 topic and get their intake of news all in one thread instead of having to check all 10-15 threads each day; is far, far outweighed by what is gained through organization, through the far decreased amount of time needed to find information about specific topics of interest, for users who may only be interested in certain topics and not in others (usually those who have been on these forums for at least a few months; you enter the groove), etc...

There is an excellent function on this forum. It's called "View posts since last visit". It displays every thread with new posts. At just one glance; you can immediately see which topics there have been new posts and/or news in. If you happen to take an interest in every one of those; then sure, you lose some time compared to if everything was just in one thread; but if it's only certain things you're interested in (and most people aren't interested in everything); then it's very convenient.

In short it's something that may take a little getting used to; but once you do you see the benefits and most wouldn't want to go back to e.g. the way it was in mp.net; where ALL the news on Russian weapon systems, military reorganization, procurement, R&D, etc... was all just mashed together in one single thread, with a few short-lived threads manifesting every week for particularly interesting news or developments, before subsiding into thread death and obscurity; with the info within never to be seen by mortal eyes again.

russiadefence.net on the other hand is organized more like a library of knowledge; threads don't really die here, they go dormant but as soon as news arrives they are revived. The end result is that little information is ever lost here to thread obscurity and death.

-Do we need a thread about economic news and another one about Russia's economy and its dependence on energy and a couple of other ones?

- Do we need a Situation in Ukraine thread, a Novorossiya thread, a Novorossiya armed forces thread, a Crimea thread, a Novorossiya multimedia thread ...?

Maybe some these can be optimized and merged, I've noticed many of these ones are not clearly delimited, many posts are doubled between threads and information pertaining to one (poorly defined) topic is often posted in another thread instead.

-We should be resisting the urge to start new when it is not absolutely necessary. I know, I know ... I myself opened this new thread to discuss this matter.
-Before opening a new thread, we should be looking at using existing ones.

I agree with all this; we already have threads for many different topics here, and before opening a new thread users should first look for a specific thread relating to the subject they want to discuss/ask about, or article they want to post - and if they don't find such a thread, then look for a more general one that could encompass the subject matter; and only if they don't find one of those, should they post a new one.

-Experience with many forums tells me that what makes a forum successful is just a handful of very popular threads. In our case we have the Russian photos/videos thread, the navy status thread, the situation in Ukraine thread and a couple of others. Let us use these as much as possible.

We don't need that here.
This isn't F16, mp.net, TheMess, Spacebattles or whatever else.

Here it's ALL about Russia, nearly everything here pertains to Russia one way or the other.
We don't need a Russian photos/videos thread; we have a whole forum sub-section for Russian photos and videos; so we can afford to be more specific and save users some time by categorizing new stuff into threads so that no-one is forced to look through stuff they aren't interested in before arriving something that they are interested in.

The X country photos/videos threads do have a place here; but for every country apart from Russia; not Russia itself as this forum is focussed on it.

Ru land air sea that ok. but...
Global Defence less traffic need fix!

No need 8 asia country. 1 click asia topic better
somtime post the good topic but no reader. he can no find thread

Hi Garry, I agree with all the points that you have made.

Best,
J Helb

TheArmenian wrote:
-Do we need a separate thread for MSTA and another one for Koalitsya and another one for Russian artillery systems?

...

-Do we need a thread about status about Russia navy, and another one for submarine force, and another one for naval systems and a separate one for anti ship missiles and on and on?

Regarding these two items, definitely. How can it be any other way?

I must say I am a little slack in this regard as I often just open threads and read contents for the purposes of moderation without thinking too much how many other threads there are that are similar and I would like to thank George1 for his excellent work at identifying very similar topics... both before he was made a mod and after and also his efforts in posting news in a wide variety of topics and sections.

There are also a lot of other members who support us mods by either pm or simply posting on new threads that copy or overlap existing threads... sometimes I merge and sometimes I don't...

A recent example was the failure of a western rocket to reach the ISS... a separate thread was created, and it was suggested that this new thread should be merged with the US rockets and space thread, but it was my opinion that this thread was more about western attitudes to Russian failures and the comparison with the reaction to a US failure... and there was also a degree of gloating... neither of which, I thought belonged on the thread about US space craft and achievements.

I will admit I do make mistakes and when things need to be changed please speak up, either on the forum itself or just pm me.

Flattery will get you a long way, but I do want you guys and ladies to feel comfortable here and that this is your forum. I also understand that some want conflict and contradiction... I hope you will settle for a variety of opinions rather than outright arguments... this is a discussion forum, not a fight club.

Book. wrote:Ru land air sea that ok. but...
Global Defence less traffic need fix!

No need 8 asia country. 1 click asia topic better
somtime post the good topic but no reader. he can no find thread  

I 2nd that, the Asian sections are too sparsely populated, take time to navigate and could do with a merge.

But the same can be said about most of the 'continent' sub-forums.

you probably mean mainly china and india sections?

Follow this link and go to the bottom of the thread and you will see a few posts in the India and the China areas but very few in the rest.... of course the current layout means if you want to find information about Australia or Malaysia you can immediately see how many threads there are without having to wade through the China and India threads to find a specific thread... of course when I say wade... with such small overall numbers you wouldn't get your ankles wet...


https://www.russiadefence.net/f10-asian-and-oceanian-militaries