Click here for video to closed captioning
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Thanks for the basic orientation. How do I tell the system what to include in my “Tracked” page?
How can I set my categories and tags?
How do these added categories and tags effect my feeds?
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Hi @Mercurius1
So, your old boards were converted over as Tracked for you - either as Categories or Tags but you can always adjust them in your preferences. Click on your initials in the upper right and click the human icon all the way at the bottom, then choose preferences. Here’s a direct link for you: https://discussion.fool.com/u/mercurius1/preferences/account
In the Notifications section, you’ll see three sections - Categories, Tags, and Users. you can click through each to see what came over for you and add and remove. Then click save and it will be updated. Anytime a new post (new topic or reply) occurs in those categories and tags, it will show up next to TRACKED in the sidebar on the left. If you click it, you’ll then see a list of all the new posts that qualify. This is what mine looks like now:
You can also add the specific categories and tags to the sidebar to create quick links to just those. For example, I currently have one new reply in the New Site Help Category (granted it’s cut off a bit):
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An invaluable tutorial video! Thanks Jen, well done!
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I would help if this video had captions on it…not everyone has ears that work.
Hi @Bearbutt
Excellent point…I’ll see what I can do. I made it last Friday on the test site so we would have something over here to start with but we do need that. I can provide my script but it probably won’t be great for timing.
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Thanks, much appreciated. The script won’t help much as you surmise, it needs to be cued with the video–. It’s something to keep in mind going forward for all videos–especially as TMF is a global community, so it’s not just about access for deaf folks, but for those who speak English as a second language, and so on. The captioning technology is getting better and better, but it’s not clear if TMF hosts their own videos and has captioning software embedded in the platform. If not…they have a little work to do…
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Hi @Bearbutt
So, the recording system I used doesn’t currently allow the closed captioning to be downloaded with the video but here’s a link to go watch it on their site where you can turn on the captioning.
As soon as they allow downloading of it, I’ll replace the video but hopefully, this link will work for now:
“Loom | Free Screen & Video Recording Software | Loom”
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Many thanks, the link worked well–.
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Dear CMFMints and Motley Fool,
Thanks for trying to improve your website. I think it’s going in the right direction, however there are major problems.
Starting with where to find basic information and an apparent fear of hierarchy.
Notice your opening webpage:
There is nothing on that page that directs the user to Basic User Information. You have your hamburger, the fool logo, a search icon and our avatar. You have the sidebar. But nowhere is there a permanent sidebar, button, anything for instructions on how to use this site. Worse, when you do find the, “New Site Help And Feedback” button, and open it, this is what you get:
“The new Community Boards are Mass Chaos” as the opening post.
Now, what is wrong with that? For one, the help video is gone and replaced with commentary from the community.
Why is that a problem? Because the “community” doesn’t know how to use the boards. You do. So why aren’t the instructions a permanent feature, in a prominent place, that doesn’t change, where people can find them???
The problem with this board is the same problem with many social media experiments. It doesn’t acknowledge the reality of “authority.” Even in the most basic and logical way. It puts the ignorant community on the same level as the people who create this space. Illogical. Commentary is great, useful, smart, but it isn’t and hasn’t created this space so it doesn’t know the technical limitations or even the layout. So, please,
do some basic instructions that stay in the same place, that are immediatley apparent – and keep the commentary in it’s own space. Don’t intermix them so they are indistinguishable from each other. That is what is causing the confusion. And extra work for everybody while you play whackamole, answering the same questions over and over again–and the community interacts with each other in exasperation!
Provide people the confidence and security of knowing where to find the basic functions and how they work. You’ve created the ground for a great board, but make it comprehensible. That’s your job.
As an aside, Saul’s board was a good board because it laid down who was in charge and what the parameters were. And where to find them, prominently on a sidebar, always in view for easy reference. There was a hierarchy. Hierarchy works so there isn’t anarchy. Take a cue from biology: Structure is what makes things hang together.
Good luck with this. – and something maybe even more important: Provide an archive of the old board. Decades in time and eons in terms of the cumulated experiences of thousands of people should not be tossed away without deep and rightful respect. Don’t set us back to the dark ages because of falling in love with some new technology. Use them together–or your technology is pointless. Perhaps the people making the decisions are too young to know what they don’t know and haven’t figured out yet that that can have dire consequences. Be wise. Be alert to possible blindspots.
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Hi
Thanks for the feedback…a few things to note.
- What you are seeing there is not the main page. the home page looks like this - with a sidebar on the left and a list of all the categories (old boards) in the middle. This is what any new user will see when they arrive on the site, as will any user who hasn’t made their own bookmark or changed their home page configuration in preferences. The first thing at the top is the Help Section and right below that are links to all the categories, the same as the old main boards page. And all new users have the New Site Help and Feedback on their sidebar, pre-added for them, it’s only missing if you went in and added your own and removed it.
- For a new user, the Help Section has the overview video pinned at the top. Once a person sees it, it unpins for them only but any new person will see it there. But yes, I’m not a fan of the video disappearing for folks but if I keep bumping it up, everyone will want to know why they keep seeing it - catch-22 (but I’ll bump it again)
- Finally, every list page (latest, top) has an announcements section on it and the Help Guide is a permanent link on the announcements. Yep, I get it, folks don’t like to read announcements and they skim them but hopefully, some folks will notice that it’s there. And I know, no one likes to read the manual but sometimes it can help to just skim it. And go back to it over time to learn new things.
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Thank you TMJMints. I appreciate your work and time.
I get what you’re saying. But how do i know i’m not seeing the “main” page? and how do i find it? Things are always moving around…I suppose it may be so complicated that it can’t be put into directions and it must be found by trial and error? But that seems to totally complicate the point of a message board, which should be it’s usefulness, not it’s opaqueness.
I’m sorry. I need to ask you how would i have known not to change the main page if it was so changeable that i don’t know how to get it back??? That’s my point. I should not be able to erase basic information from a page that’s so important, which is what I am trying to illustrate.
And no, announcements are not appreciated if they look exactly like every other bit of text on the page. Fonts and colors and permanent positions help make an announcement effective.
I’m just giving you my feedback. As the sidebar below shows, it stays on every post – so pretty quickly people get the idea to read it. especially since there is a callout to newbies to read first…
There are a lot of subjects on that sidebar. And they stay in place and cannot be moved or removed. And they cannot be confused with commentary.
I still don’t know how to do some basic things on this site, and i’ve been interacting with it since it opened. I’ve that read people are leaving because it’s too complicated. – At least give us a location that is permanent and visible so we can learn how to use this board and stop wasting our cumulative time and yours. Let’s get to the subject of investing, which is why we are here.
Thanks for your patience. I’m trying to understand your points. BTW, I thought your video was very helpful.
Thanks.
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About 14 seconds into the overview video I hear something like 'on the left side of the page is is a sidebar that functions similar to the old my dot fold-out com page …" but at this point, I’m totally lost. Any good suggestions about how I can go on from here? Or maybe about how I can get started in the first place?
culcha
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I believe that is the old my.fool.com page.
(I strongly suggest you return to the video, but a short synopsis of what I have found useful is below.)
I think of the left side-bar as similar to the old My Favorites page. The link I used for that page:
https://discussion.fool.com/FavoriteBoards.asp?sortby=date
Keep in mind that this system is all threaded, not individual messages. A Topic (new name) is what we used to call a Thread.
Categories correspond roughly to the old Boards, or groups of boards as some Categories have sub-categories. For example, Investing Strategies has Retirement Investing and Falling Knives, among others. The major exception are specific company boards, about which more in a moment.
If you put the mouse cursor on Categories, you will see a pencil to the right. Click on the pencil and you will be able to edit what specific Categories are listed under that in the side-bar. I suggest adding everything you used to have as favorites that are available.
Tags are used for individual companies. Again, there is a pencil for editing what tags - what companies - you want displayed there. By default all the company boards you had as favorites in the old system have been tagged for you.
Higher up on the left side-tab, under Community, I find Tracked to be important. All the boards you followed as Favorites on the old system were converted with the Tracked attribute. So Tracked will show you Topics (threads) with new posts for all your old Favorites.
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THANKS!
I wonder where I could find that video so that I can watch it again.
If the new boards fail this will be a main reason for it.
The efforts of the volunteers here are admirable, but it seems like the Fool’s head honchos have zero respect for the community that was created by them and evolved over 20+ years. They talk long-term investing but toss everything older than 9 months into the garbage?
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Except for one very active board where they discuss mainly short term investing.
—Peter
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I’ve been busy so haven’t been here.
We’ll see what we get to keep. I forget how long we have til they dump them? I’ve saved some things but I don’t know how to copy all my bookmarks.
Does the way back machine do anything?
I checked a few URLS, not in wayback. They said they would keep them for at least a month (from 9/23). I would not be surprised if the old boards are gone on 10/23, with no further notice.
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