There are some suggestions I might offer to the admins. There are many empty topic areas that serve no real purpose, which can easily be spotted by their low post counts. The number one rule I learned from founding and administering two forums in the past, creating too many random areas of discussion can dilute the discussion and create the dreaded empty-room affect. While it’s understandable for the need to create various topics when starting a new forum, these empty sections can harm the community vibe. Nobody wants to visit an empty pub, and an online forum is similar to a neighborhood pub where common interests can flourish if managed correctly. I’d recommend removing the empty space and moving those discussion into more relevant areas. This is the practice of curating.
I would also add that it would be helpful to request a current public statement from Bambu regarding the intent of this forum. Is it simply a relief valve for tech support due to limited resources, or is it meant to foster a community? Discussion forums with features such as likes and ranks, like this one, are inherently intended to create a community. Yet, given the benign neglect this forum has received over the last year and a half since its inception, I’m not convinced that Bambu Labs is committed to that notion. A public post from the admins would go a long way in clearing this up.
A suggestion to Staff about categories
One tip I might offer the admins of this forum while performing some much needed housekeeping of categories and prune the empty forums and add new ones, consider the following approach.
Based on my experience managing similar forums, everyone wants their pet topic to become a subsection. The ‘written’ policy that we operated under was that a new subsection would be created only if a member suggested it and a specific number seconded the motion, usually through an admin poll being added to the post. Of course the Admins reserved the right to deny the suggestion if it was too far off-topic. A frequent suggestion and denial was a subsection for Politics.
The suggesting member and volunteers had to provide a list of related topics to populate the new category, proving sufficient interest. This avoids the “field of dreams” phenomenon of empty sub-forums. By having community stakeholders create a list of related posts, admins can move those posts into the new section, generating instant buzz and organically creating an active topic area. This leveraged community effort, freeing admins from searching for topics and increasing the stake of those wanting the subsection. If the person who nominated the new group couldn’t provide examples, it was an easy way to let them down gently and self-police suggestions.
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Having said that, I will give an example of what I mean. I am about to post a topic on 3D Maker-specific CAD software. There really isn’t a category for it, but it is relevant to this community. The problem is we don’t have a proper “general discussion” area, which is odd, to say the least. You can’t post a general question without the forum software shoehorning you into a product category. Similarly, I recently posted a generic topic about filament with no really good place to put it other than “Bambu Filament.” Was I perhaps guilty of an off-topic post? Perhaps I was, but since we don’t have an admin mission statement and such posts appear to be tolerated, I have to assume it’s OK, albeit not posted in the most ideal location.