Operation: Make Sythe Awesome Again

We all know that Sythe is a fantastic website for all of its users. For many of us, it is a large part of our daily routine. Recently, however, it has began to decline in awesomeness. The reason? Well there are a few. It can be seen in the spam forum as Oldfags post about the "good ol' days", and in other sections as well. I have been here for exactly a year now, and I can honestly say that the site is already vastly different from when I started. I am proposing a radical list of updates/changes to reinvigorate the amazing sythe community!

1. Add a Diablo 3 Section

We need to take this and run while we still have the chance. Diablo 3 has the potential to be a huge market, and instead of dragging our feet and waiting to see if its a good idea, we need to act. We have the opportunity to become a staple in the Diablo 3 black market, why not take the leap! Blizzard has delayed the real currency auction house to an unknown date, which has opened up a window in which the black markets can boom. Do it now! Whats the worst that could happen? If it gets inactive we just remove it, no big deal. Sythe can only benefit from this move.

2. Stop the "After VB4" junk

There have been some great suggestions that have been delayed because no one wants to change anything until after VB4. As far as I am concerned, that's bull. VB4 was supposed to be released about 2-3 months ago, and so continuing to put off changes is useless. If the upper-staff has no intentions of releasing VB4 anytime in the very-near future, then it is only harming sythe to keep using this "After VB4" excuse.

3. Redesign the Games section

All of the game's sections have become a huge pile of inactive mess. These sections have the potential to be very active, and even bring in lots of new users. Runescape is such a small portion of the gaming world, so why are we only giving attention to it alone? This is another one of those suggestions that got the "After VB4" excuse. By putting this off we are again only hurting the site. I am urging staff to finally pull through with this. I think they will be very happy with the results.

4. Advertise!

Who doesn't long for the opportunity to make money playing games? I know that's why 99% of us joined, and that is the beauty of Sythe. It offers the opportunity to make money playing the games you love. So why aren't we reaching out to more people? I guarantee that if Sythe invested in even a small bit of advertising we would see a boom in activity. Everyone wants the chance to make a quick buck for playing an online game. Not to mention it could easily bring activity to other huge markets, such as WoW. If we start the movement, it will be a chain reaction, and more and more people will hear about the site. Plus, more traffic = more money for advertising. So the site would be pulling in more money in the long run. I am sure Sythe could afford it, so why not?

5. More staff involvement in community events

One of the greatest parts of Sythe is the community. The IRC is a great place for people to hang out and chat, and the off-topic section is a great place for the entire forum to discuss things from current news, to the meaning of life. But lately we have really been lacking in the community spirit department. Whenever we do have contests, we might get a staff participant here and there, but they never really promote it like they should. The Staff should be actively involved in getting everyone into the spirit. Why not make a news thread about a up and coming contest? Does the news section really have to be only for promotions? That could be another hub for the community to gather.

Also please do not post unless you have something constructive to say. I know most of this is an off limits area, but honestly, things need to be changed. Sythe has the potential to be much bigger than it is, and at the rate things are going, we're not getting there.

Thanks for reading

 

On topic: Support for 1 if they also do 3. No support for 2, VB4 has a lot of features and changes from 3.6-- a lot of the suggestions they deny in anticipation for the update would break upon the conversion to VB4. That's why it's necessary. 4, if we're not already then yes. Advertisement needs to be done. 5, staff are volunteers, so you can't make them participate in anything besides completing their monthly quota of mod logs. Many suggestions demanding a new requirement on staff have been denied for that reason

 

1. That's unsure at this point as we don't know how well Diablo III will do, however I have heard very good reviews already from people. If it really, really seems to be going to take off, then a section 'may' be considered for the forum before VB4. I don't fancy having another 'Star Wars: The Old Republic' section disaster again.

2. VB4, is coming very very soon. A lot of work has gone into it and it's just a few last things now that need to be checked over before we upgrade so it will go smoothly as possible. It's not like it's being delayed for fun, VB4 upgrade costs money, not to mention a lot of time and effort has been put it to make all the add-ons on the site to work perfectly with VB4 as they do now. It will come soon, just give it time.

3. Again, I would personally prefer this comes after VB4. It seems an ok idea, but I think focus on the main priority (VB4) then start getting everything else out of the way. Trust me, as soon as VB4 comes the suggestions and changes to the site will all happen VERY quickly.

4. I don't know if the site needs more members at the moment, whenever we do seem to get new people, 2/10 at most actually stick around and such, the 8/10 go on to scam or just leave. If the site desperately needed more people, advertising would already have taken place.

5. That's up to the staff themselves to decide if they want to get involved with community events and such, not ALL the staff have free time on their hands to get involved with events and such. It would be great to see the staff getting involved more, but not all of them have the free time on their hands to do so. With possible suggestions to the news section, what do you think could go in there then?

 

As a user of this site for at least five years if not more, (I happened to lurk for awhile before I joined) I can agree that the site isn't the same. However as time moves on things change. Now to address each point you made:

1) A separate forum for Diablo 3 may bring in additional users, not only generating a higher pay out for ads but allow for a possible black market to develop as you stated. The problem is whether or not the community would embrace such an action. http://multiplayerblog.mtv.com/2011...w-trading-gold-and-items-for-real-world-cash/ States that Diablo will actually be setting up a store and my question is once it up and running would we still exist?

Second, I'm not sure of the legality of what you are requesting and that would be a decision for the higher ups.

2) and 3) No comment

4) I remember I join because of in game advertisement on Runescape. I like the idea maybe we need to make that a community event or something.

5) What ideas do you have for community events? We would love to hear them.

 

I am planning a haxball tournament right now, but I still have only been acknowledged by one admin, Verts, about getting a competition winner rank as a prize. Unfortunately she cannot give ranks, but those who can don't seem to care enough.

I am sure there are many other competitions that could be had, and that I and others could think of, but extra support would be great.

Now in response to Moh, if a staff member is only here just to get their modlog quota, them I am sure there are people who would be willing to take their place, and would excel at doing it. Everyone appreciates the work that Mod's put it, but just doing the bare minimum to get by month to month pretty much defeats the purpose.

 

As far as I am concerned Richard hasn't been making as much of an appearance on the site as he maybe should be. I understand he has college to deal with etc but in many of the recent disasters or occurrences it was a mod that handled the situation the most, and while Sythe may have been handling things behind the scenes, I think it is pretty important to make sure to show the whole community he is still there and paying attention.

 

Only Richard, Matthew and Govind can give fun ranks out now as they were given out too freely when all the administrators could do them.

I'm not leaking previous mod scores, but I will say VERY FEW of the staff actually do the minimum to get by on. The only problem with that is, non-staff can't see the complete mod scores, so they just assume someone is doing the minimum to get by on if they don't post round much that month. There is a lot of behind the scenes as well as posting around and such. Something of which only a current staff member/ex-staff would actually know what I mean. Believe me, I'm pretty sure the staff would love to get involved with the community and events and such, they just don't all simply have the time. Some are working full time jobs, are in full time education (with exams at this time of the year) or other special circumstances. The staff don't HAVE to be involved with the community events and such, believe it's nice when they do. But they do need to moderate the site as well as bunch other stuff going on in their lives as well.

What other ideas do you have for events and such? And with , there shouldn't be a problem handing that out provided it is an actual competition and there is a winner and such.

If you look in the feedback section, you'll see Richard's been trying to fix the site server errors and attacks that occur and such, and I must say the site performance seems to be much better off at the moment. So he is still around, and he only really posts when he needs to, to be honest.

 

It may defeat the purpose of wanting mod (because who wants to be obligated to do nothing but listen to whiny market kids), but that's beside the point. That's ALL they're hired to do, anything else is great-- and is clearly indicative of a awesome mod if they participate in everything they can-- but not manditory

 

1. Games like Diablo III that were highly anticipated turned out being not so active on Sythe. Even if we make a Diablo III section, there is no way of knowing that it would become a "staple" in the Diablo black-market area, and that it would be active. The thing is, once a section is made, it's rarely ever removed, if it can guaranteed that the section could be removed if it's not active, then maybe. But, I don't see why we just can't wait until we see if there is any activity originating from the game before we make any decisions/actions towards it.

2. I'm pretty sure that VB4 is coming soon. The last time Matthew talked about it on IRC, he said that it was on the final stages. So, I'm assuming that the upgrade won't take that long.

3. Yeah, the games section does look kinda messy, some redesigning would be a great improvement. And, I'm fine if this will be done after VB4. I'm pretty sure that it's the higher-ups decision to implement suggestions after VB4, anyway.

4. Any suggestions?

5. You really can't force the staff to participate in contests. They're dealing with matters that are more important, anyway. I think the occasional staff participant is fine, and competitions are generally for the community anyway.

 

Banner ads on gaming oriented forums or sites should do the trick, though not Runescape ones where Sythe would be rejected or already known.

 

1) Fully Agree.
The only way that a Diablo 3 section can become a huge asset is if we get a section going from the start and get the first black-market kids on our site.

2) Again, Agree.
So many of these great ideas are so simple to change and no one can be bothered with shit around here.

3) Yes. It's retardedly unorganized and is a pain to navigate.

4) I hear where you're coming from. I've been trying to sell a main of mine for like a month now with no interest. There just isn't the user-base that there used to be... buyers that is.

5) Yes.
& If the problem is that staff don't have enough time to do their duties and participate- then get more staff. It's not like you're paying these guys for their time, and there's a lot of trustworthy users who would like the opportunity.
Sythe isn't some fascist war-zone: it's a community.
Let people have their say, and if someone is willing to devote a large part of their time to this website, then let them.

More staff members = less time spent on duties.
Less time spent on duties = more time to participate in community events.
more time to participate in community events = more community events.
more community events = happy users
happy users = more referrals
more referrals = more members
more members = more money from advertising.

 

Quit sucking up to the admins and give an original thought for once, Laptop.

On topic: Thankyou very much for this post x339. The site is on a downward decline for a while, as we all know. Activity, administratively, and community wise. Although I do not believe any of this will actually happen, 1-4 seem like fantastic ideas. Why not take non-risk experimentation, anyway?

 

I've wanted to redo the games forum for years.

 

I have no word on this points, but I'm going to state that the forum has been losing it's "community". After being busy for like 2 months and coming back to finally finish my second omm app, I'm only seeing lack of involvement, even more in those users who are always around.

I'm not saying specifically an action must be taken, but something must be done.

 

Why are you so sure that Sythe can afford it? I don't know myself about the costs of running this website, however, it's been stated before that all the money coming from advertising other websites are put towards keeping the website up, and this (almost) exhausts all of the money made. Regardless, any advertising suggestion would have to be approved by Sythe himself.

While it's all nice for staff to participate in competitions, many don't have time, and many aren't interested. To be honest, most of us have real lives and focus on the moderation of the website rather than the community. There are some of us that can devote some time and "get in the spirit," but there are also some of us that have other responsibilities in real life.

I agree, it's very nice when the staff promote/participate in competitions, and I like the idea of announcing official competitions in the news section. I'll see what I can do about this.

 

The reason the site is vastly different than it was before is because back then there was no expectation of the things that happened to make it "awesome". It was the spontaneity that made it great.

Trying to reconstruct the atmosphere of the old days is kinda pointless. Back then the community was smaller, so it was more close knit. Sythe has grown immensely, and the bigger it gets, that harder it's going to be to unify the community and the more the focus will shift towards just keeping things running smoothly. Plus, most of the people that made things awesome in those days are either banned or have moved on in life. Trying too hard to recreate those days just doesn't work.
I dunno if I'm getting my point across clearly, because I'm starting to get pretty drowsy, but yeh, that's my $.02

also, now that I think about it, what would we get out of the community being revitalized? I don't want to sound so anti-community, but as long as the staff are getting their ascribed jobs finished, why is it so wrong that they feel like focusing on other things irl and spending less time on the computer?

^forget I said that. Without a good community we'd become similar to PB or something

 

Definitely support for the advertising.
I've been a member here for some time, and the activity has not increased THAT much. Using maybe 20-30% of profits for advertising would definitely help the site grow!

 

I will after work.