Suggest Community membership instead of having to join community and declare a group.
Details: I have observed that patrons sign onto Communities where they have to join a group.
I'm a Missionary in Communities. I was Group Leader for 4 groups.Kentucky 251 members; Georgia 66 members; North Carolina 123 members; South Carolina 59 members.
During my time in the old community, not one of the people in either group ever posted a question to the group or answered a question by another patron.
I would @ a specific group when I found a question in General Topics ( for instance) that could be answered by someone on one of my groups. No answer form the @ed group. I would then do my best to answer the patron. Occasionally I would @ someone I knew in the mission to get help for the patron. :(
No one but me posted anything in the 4 groups. I posted things in the groups that I thought might be enticing, but no response.
One of the patrons who asked a question that could have been answered by some member in ie Kentucky, didn't get an answer until I answered. He mentioned that looking at the group without any activity was disheartening and didn't look good for the Community as a whole.
All of this is to say that I wish patrons could establish an account in Communities without having to pick a Group; ands then browse through the groups, asking here and commenting there.
Perhaps the tracking of patrons is linked to their use of a group. Still a patron can go to other groups and comment or ask a question without joining that group, right? I'm not sure of that, as I'm in Communities Mission, and can't test if a patron can do that.
It seems that a wide open Community (with each patron having an account) would be fun and useful.
Groups such as mine could be grouped together.
I don't know. It just seems constricting and restricting, to have patrons belong to a group and never go back after their initial post.
I get it that the algorithms might not be able to be written to accommodate that kind of freedom of movement within the Community, and still keep track of patrons. My son is a systems architect, so I get that.
Maybe someone thinks that "belonging" to a group is satisfying somehow. I don't know.
Anyway, that is my comment and I will try to keep quiet about that now.
Love FamilySearch.org.
Well, I did have another thought.
Perhaps missionaries could be called to a group to answer questions, instead of patrons having to join a group. Sort of like FamilySearch call in system.
I loved my mission in the FamilySearch call in. I served two years. Loved it, loved it. But I got really tired with the hours required, not to mention I always went over the required time, having so much fun.
I will stop here, but you can call me anytime and I will visit with you regarding Family History.
Yours,
Anitra Whittle
Comments
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I suppose one could just ask: is it really necessary to have a "Groups" section / named groups in "Community"?
Many of us managed perfectly well on the old GetSat website with no sub-sections at all. The only point that was ever really questioned was whether there should be a separate section for exclusively LDS issues / queries.
Regarding the demise of GetSat, we now have TWELVE sections in its replacement forum of "Ideas". Are twelve options really necessary, given the fact that the individuals wanting to help in addressing any queries raised in "Ideas" now need to visit twelve sections instead of one!
With regard to "Groups", I believe I just counted 145! I'm sure many of these do have a firm, specific use - especially ones like "Places" and "Indexing Chat". However, given the few posts made in each, is there really a need to have (say) a "British Isles" group AND separate ones for England, Scotland and Wales?
As you suggest, Anitra, it is a particular problem answering questions in the different "Groups" sections, because one needs to be a member of a group in which one does not necessarily have any firm interest.
Joe Martel and others have confirmed that the Vanilla version of "Community" is still a "work in progress". In which case, I believe posts like yours should be given serious attention by the FS developers, with a view to passing ideas to the "Vendor" (Vanilla) where appropriate, so the whole platform can be enhanced to better suit the needs of its users.
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Also see my reply on the same post by Anitra, but with a different title, posted in Ideas/FamilySearch Community
Joining a group??? https://community.familysearch.org/en/discussion/83881/joining-a-group#latest
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