07-29-2020, 06:55 AM
Various thoughts here:
First, each page in the EG (and most everywhere else) has a Contact Us link at the bottom that takes the user to a contact form. The form gives them the option of either making a general comment or notifying us of an issue with the page. The result is emailed to us when they hit Send.
We get a fair number of these in any given day - mostly spam but also the occasional question, comment, artwork inquiry, or error or typo notification.
It's not the most obvious thing in the world, particularly for the longer articles, but it is there.
In the redesigned website, the main page and 'business pages (= non EG pages) will place the Contact Us link at the top of the page under the Participate button - which will be part of the overall controls, which will 'hover' at the top even if someone scrolls down. So a bit easier to find.
Currently all of our redesign efforts are focused on the main page and the 'business pages'. This because when we polled the membership about what changes they wanted made, nobody said anything about the EG pages. Well - other than me, and the changes I requested have all pretty much been implemented already.
That said - Trond and I have talked about this a bit already and once the current site redesign is complete, we will likely turn our attention to the EG. At that time, things like this kind of proposed change could be seriously looked at. But we don't currently have time and resources to make this change right now.
Speaking more generally - While I'm not flat out against this kind of thing, I find myself feeling quite leery of it on the principle that we have no interest in 'feeding the trolls' or otherwise making OA similar to the comment sections on various news websites or Twitter or the like where people can (and do) spout off whatever random nonsense comes into their heads - mostly because they can. While it's certainly not a major effort to fill out an online form or join the forum, that minor bit of work perhaps keeps some of the less pleasant aspects of the online world a bit removed from us. Something that wouldn't necessarily be the case if people could just post any random thought from any page in website.
Not saying that would definitely happen or that I'm definitely against this idea - but we would need to have a good think about it.
Todd
First, each page in the EG (and most everywhere else) has a Contact Us link at the bottom that takes the user to a contact form. The form gives them the option of either making a general comment or notifying us of an issue with the page. The result is emailed to us when they hit Send.
We get a fair number of these in any given day - mostly spam but also the occasional question, comment, artwork inquiry, or error or typo notification.
It's not the most obvious thing in the world, particularly for the longer articles, but it is there.
In the redesigned website, the main page and 'business pages (= non EG pages) will place the Contact Us link at the top of the page under the Participate button - which will be part of the overall controls, which will 'hover' at the top even if someone scrolls down. So a bit easier to find.
Currently all of our redesign efforts are focused on the main page and the 'business pages'. This because when we polled the membership about what changes they wanted made, nobody said anything about the EG pages. Well - other than me, and the changes I requested have all pretty much been implemented already.
That said - Trond and I have talked about this a bit already and once the current site redesign is complete, we will likely turn our attention to the EG. At that time, things like this kind of proposed change could be seriously looked at. But we don't currently have time and resources to make this change right now.
Speaking more generally - While I'm not flat out against this kind of thing, I find myself feeling quite leery of it on the principle that we have no interest in 'feeding the trolls' or otherwise making OA similar to the comment sections on various news websites or Twitter or the like where people can (and do) spout off whatever random nonsense comes into their heads - mostly because they can. While it's certainly not a major effort to fill out an online form or join the forum, that minor bit of work perhaps keeps some of the less pleasant aspects of the online world a bit removed from us. Something that wouldn't necessarily be the case if people could just post any random thought from any page in website.
Not saying that would definitely happen or that I'm definitely against this idea - but we would need to have a good think about it.
Todd