RE: AMA's Questions & Answers...
EvilSuperHeros
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in General
@RedSoloCup Why do you post these in a Google Document vs posting them on the forums?
If they were on the forums, they would be searchable by the users. Which is what I personally would like to be able to do. I'm sure others would find this easier to do, than to go and open multiple Google Documents when searching for an answer you provided on a previous AMA, but no one can figure out where it find it.
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First AMA he did here, he hit limits to how long a forum post can be. That's why he decided to go for Google doc
Plus (pardon the pun), a Google doc is more likely to outlive a forum/site
Half of that could have been cut out. Random questions went on for about half of it.
Maybe next time leave that bit out and it would fit in a tread or if more relevant questions are going to be answered then a Google doc is a good idea.
In my semi-ideal world, there would be an Ingress blog and these would be posted there. In my absolutely ideal world there'd be a blog and these would also go into the support articles database, but who has time for that?
Remember there is an AMA archive where you can search for past questions: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1W0FUKoW2oV9g80ZWWQfBJqohAT3PloYeG1K3Rnblizw/edit
But that doesn't cover the AMA from the past year or more.
So much for trying to put everything in one place.
@XQlusioN Because he can't break it up into separate posts?
As @RedSoloCup Mentioned in the August Q&A Post, "I have noticed a trend of Agents asking repeat questions relating to things like Portals on military bases, postboxes, fast food playground, etc. These have all been asked and answered in the recent past (sometimes multiple times). The answers have not changed."
Well, if we don't have a one stop place to search for these answers, we are going to keep asking the questions over and over again. Not to mention new agents looking for information have a tough time trying to figure out where it is. Heck, veteran agents have a hard time figuring out where stuff is. It's almost like you have to have a list of where to go to find stuff.
If there going to do AMA then they should just post them all into 1 section called AMA.
It will give everyone a simple place to look if they have a question to check first.
But I still feel that they answered a lot of pointless questions, seeing as they have just dropped wayfarer.
It would have been alot more time answering questions that will actually inform the community instead of answering questions like are there portals on the moon.
Yeah I was pretty frustrated with some of the questions asked that were either google-able or something someone would have been able to answer on the forums. It's like finding a genie asking them what the weather is going to be like tomorrow.
It's not that I do t like the idea of the AMA but if you are going to do it do it right.
@RedSoloCup Do you think you could get someone to create a Sub Forum under the AMA's called AMA Answers, then set the rights, so everyone can VIEW it, but only MODERATORS or whatever group you and the rest of the Niantic folks are in, can Create/EDIT ? Then the AMA questions with the answers can be searchable via the forums, instead of making people search each individual month (or bi-monthly's) answers that are on Google Docs (and NOT on the forums) ?
@NianticCasey Tagging you on this as well, as it seems you are the one posting about updates for the forums most often. Maybe it's one of your projects/duties/ect ?
The forum has a character limit.
I wonder if a wiki function could be added to a forum? Reddit has that functionality so any questions can be saved for reference while the forums were separate
Even when things were searchable one place, people still asked repeat questions. There were even links to archives and the consolidated compendium. I think you underestimate how most users don't **** or care to do any research beforehand.
OK. But it can't be changed? Or no one has access to the admin panel to change it?
I care, and I was asking because I'm tired of trying to find answers for myself or others. But hey, it's your product. Do with it as you will.
I just see lots of potential for modifications for the forums that don't appear here, and have no idea if there is anyone exploring them yet. Because the forums still feel very "Vanilla".
I used to run a VBulletin forum with 2k+ active users who posted 10k+ unique posts per month. We had many fun mods/hacks/add-ons like an arcade, a point system, the ever fun Miserable users add-on, gifting system, gamer cards, ect. I know within VBulletin you could change the length of the posts to make for larger posts or smaller posts. (We used the smaller posts in one of our sub-forums.) Even having some base information available when looking at the main forums before deciding where to go was nice. Seeing who responded last, at what time, on what date, along with thread and post counts? (example below)
Since it was asked, I started on it.
ingressama.com
Currently has all the AMA's I could find (it's still missing the oldest ones) and allows for searching
I'm planning on adding notes to certain questions if the answer has been altered in future AMA's or other official documentation.