New Chat Update
Posted: Sat Apr 17, 2010 8:00 pmTime sure flies, it is already a month after the new chat went live!
1) Technical Stuff
With the new chat we changed the room structure, but it was primarily the introduction of brand new software. As far as the technical aspects of the new chat software, we have received overwhelmingly positive support with a few complaints mainly to do with missing features and browser compatibility. In this version, we ditched support for Opera (for now) and opted for Chrome/Safari instead to cover more platforms since Opera is more of an alternative while Safari is platform specific on Macs. Understandably, a few people (About 8 users) have decreased functionality but several people (about 50~ users) have increased functionality. Unfortunately, those are just programming choices we will have to make. We will never please everyone, so we try to please the most people. Leshana will be making a separate post to cover the features added since go-live.
2) Rules & Room Setup Stuff
It is a bit of a hit-and-miss. The new room setup was, to be fair, an experiment. We tried to maximize varieties for a couple groups of people, giving all of them even coverage. To sum it up, we learned a few things!
Chat Dynamics:
On this graph, you can see a few things:
1) The chat started on March 14th. We can see that general population increased by 10%.
2) At first, the user distribution was very even, but is starting to stray with the vore room picking up in usage while Roleplay room and OOC room usage is dropping rapidly.
3) Library seems to be a very popular function room
Considering our goal is to distribute the users more evenly. Does that means our goal has failed? Personally, I don't think so. The old setup was there for 4 years after occasional tweaks. This new setting has only been in use for one month. So far, we had only made one tweak in favor of the vore room. This is to increase roleplay timer from 30 minutes to an hour.
Sadly, after that change we are seeing a flocking effect: People who are looking for roleplay simply go to the room with the most people, making the Vore room very overcrowded as a result and leaving the roleplay experiences in Roleplay room quite a bit lower.
On top of that, due to the overwhelming number of people flocking to vore room (which was initially a problem for ooc/ic room too until we tweaked it), the OOCW room is receiving much less attention since it is now for strictly discussion and RP is no longer possible.
To counter that we are going to add some tweaks.
1) New rule
Remember those LFRP post? Those are going to be a thing of the past.
No more saying (( LFRP )) in the chat. Or any other form of public roleplay solicitation or advertisement. To let people know you are looking for roleplay, simply use the status and set yourself to LFRP. If you have specific thing you are looking for, use profile! Possibly put it right up top in order to let people know what you are looking for.
Just to clarifies on LFRP post being disallowed:
1) Basically, asking for roleplay, and stating that you are looking for roleplay in public is being discontinued, please use the status instead, if you have specific request, use your profile, saying a summery of the type of scene you want up on the top should work just fine.
2) Saying (Open) after your introduction rolelpay post in the roleplay room is still acceptable, it is not considered advertisement to specifies that your post is not directly aiming for someone yet.
2) Ticker
Of course, we are not going to just disallow public messages without giving something to replace it. Here is our solution:
Underneath of the message input box will be something we call a "Ticker". People in all rooms will see who is currently LFRP, OPEN, or other roleplay status. They will be able to see their profile and whisper them directly.
Of course, to further empathize that the vore room is not for people looking for roleplay, your name will only show up in the ticker when you are in the Roleplay room and OOCW room with the correct status. Library, game room and motel are for people who already arranged something, so people in those rooms would not have their status advertised. Vore room is for people to hang out, for people who want to talk, but also don't mind running into roleplay. If you are looking for roleplay, you should try our designated Roleplay room.
3) Other changes
We fear that just adding those are not going to be enough, so we will be modifying the effect of the LFRP, OPEN, PREY, and PRED status in the vore room. *Basically those status will no longer display in those room. We expect people to make use of the other rooms we have available when they are looking for something more specific, instead of flocking to the biggest room for the attention.
Hopefully, these changes we are adding down the pipe line will be enough to revise the unbalanced dynamic and give every type of user a better experience!
* Edited by Eka
1) Technical Stuff
With the new chat we changed the room structure, but it was primarily the introduction of brand new software. As far as the technical aspects of the new chat software, we have received overwhelmingly positive support with a few complaints mainly to do with missing features and browser compatibility. In this version, we ditched support for Opera (for now) and opted for Chrome/Safari instead to cover more platforms since Opera is more of an alternative while Safari is platform specific on Macs. Understandably, a few people (About 8 users) have decreased functionality but several people (about 50~ users) have increased functionality. Unfortunately, those are just programming choices we will have to make. We will never please everyone, so we try to please the most people. Leshana will be making a separate post to cover the features added since go-live.
2) Rules & Room Setup Stuff
It is a bit of a hit-and-miss. The new room setup was, to be fair, an experiment. We tried to maximize varieties for a couple groups of people, giving all of them even coverage. To sum it up, we learned a few things!
Chat Dynamics:
On this graph, you can see a few things:
1) The chat started on March 14th. We can see that general population increased by 10%.
2) At first, the user distribution was very even, but is starting to stray with the vore room picking up in usage while Roleplay room and OOC room usage is dropping rapidly.
3) Library seems to be a very popular function room
Considering our goal is to distribute the users more evenly. Does that means our goal has failed? Personally, I don't think so. The old setup was there for 4 years after occasional tweaks. This new setting has only been in use for one month. So far, we had only made one tweak in favor of the vore room. This is to increase roleplay timer from 30 minutes to an hour.
Sadly, after that change we are seeing a flocking effect: People who are looking for roleplay simply go to the room with the most people, making the Vore room very overcrowded as a result and leaving the roleplay experiences in Roleplay room quite a bit lower.
On top of that, due to the overwhelming number of people flocking to vore room (which was initially a problem for ooc/ic room too until we tweaked it), the OOCW room is receiving much less attention since it is now for strictly discussion and RP is no longer possible.
To counter that we are going to add some tweaks.
1) New rule
Remember those LFRP post? Those are going to be a thing of the past.
No more saying (( LFRP )) in the chat. Or any other form of public roleplay solicitation or advertisement. To let people know you are looking for roleplay, simply use the status and set yourself to LFRP. If you have specific thing you are looking for, use profile! Possibly put it right up top in order to let people know what you are looking for.
Just to clarifies on LFRP post being disallowed:
1) Basically, asking for roleplay, and stating that you are looking for roleplay in public is being discontinued, please use the status instead, if you have specific request, use your profile, saying a summery of the type of scene you want up on the top should work just fine.
2) Saying (Open) after your introduction rolelpay post in the roleplay room is still acceptable, it is not considered advertisement to specifies that your post is not directly aiming for someone yet.
2) Ticker
Of course, we are not going to just disallow public messages without giving something to replace it. Here is our solution:
Underneath of the message input box will be something we call a "Ticker". People in all rooms will see who is currently LFRP, OPEN, or other roleplay status. They will be able to see their profile and whisper them directly.
Of course, to further empathize that the vore room is not for people looking for roleplay, your name will only show up in the ticker when you are in the Roleplay room and OOCW room with the correct status. Library, game room and motel are for people who already arranged something, so people in those rooms would not have their status advertised. Vore room is for people to hang out, for people who want to talk, but also don't mind running into roleplay. If you are looking for roleplay, you should try our designated Roleplay room.
3) Other changes
We fear that just adding those are not going to be enough, so we will be modifying the effect of the LFRP, OPEN, PREY, and PRED status in the vore room. *Basically those status will no longer display in those room. We expect people to make use of the other rooms we have available when they are looking for something more specific, instead of flocking to the biggest room for the attention.
Hopefully, these changes we are adding down the pipe line will be enough to revise the unbalanced dynamic and give every type of user a better experience!
* Edited by Eka
