Welcome to the new platform
Comments
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can they just leave well enough alone? This new format is awful.
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Hi @finallyoverit,
We understand that adapting to new changes can be difficult, but we believe that the new features will encourage more interactive ways of participating in discussions that weren't possible in the previous iteration. If you have any questions on how to do something, feel free to private message our @moderators account or tag us in a comment. You are also welcome to provide suggestions or requests for features you would like to see here: https://form.asana.com/?k=fy-8Kz4OziDNlUDAoQq2Yw&d=10457227289678
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I'm looking at the user guide in Discussion Forum Features. One thing mentioned is an activity function, which supposedly shows up in the quick links menu to the right. It doesn't. Has the feature already been removed?
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Also, I agree with the comments about the font sizes. Having all the font sizes and styles the same, except for the header (user name) and footer (reactions) makes it hard to distinguish what is comment/post and what is signature/profile stuff. Fine straight lines separating segments of a post are the same as the fine straight lines separating posts. Legibility design seems to have been ignored in the process.
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I've entered all my diagnostic information, but it doesn't show up. I can't find where to redo it. I also didn't find a place to enter type of surgery or treatments. My signature part seems to be working. This isn't user-friendly. Add me to those who dislike the light gray font color. I have cataracts and I can barely see it.
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Three other legibility comments:
- there is nothing to distinguish the original post from any other, making it harder to know what it was about if there are more than a couple of comments.
- the original post doesn't show up on succeeding pages of comments, which I think it had before the change.
- in the list of active threads, even the threads' subject lines are the same font as the other lines, making it hard to focus on that, and since the subject is the active link, the link is harder to find since it's all the same as EVERYTHING ELSE.
PLEASE. People who come here have enough stress in their lives. We don't need to have the platform itself be a source of stress. Make it EASY for us to use, not hard. So far I am not impressed.
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Hi @mountainmia,
We appreciate the suggestions and feedback you've shared. You make a number of good points. If you submit them in our feedback form, they will go directly to our tech team, who will be able to review and implement changes on the new platform:
https://form.asana.com/?k=fy-8Kz4OziDNlUDAoQq2Yw&d=10457227289678
Hi @alicebastable,
At the moment, the diagnostic information is not active yet the way it was on the previous platform, but this feature is coming. Adding the information to your signature has been the workaround at the moment. We have an article on how to do this titled: How to create and edit your diagnostic and treatment post signature.
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@moderators okay, submitted. I don't feel very hopeful. I honestly don't understand why the look wasn't vetted during this extremely long development and launch process.
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Thank you so much, @mountainmia. We really appreciate you taking the time to submit your feedback, and we do apologize for the lengthy time it has taken to migrate to the new platform. But feedback, like you have shared, is immensely helpful in allowing us to adapt and implement changes that will have a meaningful impact on your experiences while using the site. We definitely hear and understand the frustration.
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mountainmia, I completely agree with you re: font size. You can't distinguish anything. The font size is basic graphic design. This has me ready to leave and I'm not mad, I've stuck around for everything but this is a critical issue. Here's your post
- in the list of active threads, even the threads' subject lines are the same font as the other lines, making it hard to focus on that, and since the subject is the active link, the link is harder to find since it's all the same as EVERYTHING ELSE.
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We certainly hope no one would leave due to things we can potentially make better in the future. We thank you for your feedback, and hope you stick around to see the changes in the future. We are discussing all of the above and look forward to improving the forums! Thank you as always for your patience, and remember, we can always quickly and easily see your feedback when you use this form to share:
https://form.asana.com/?k=fy-8Kz4OziDNlUDAoQq2Yw&d=10457227289678
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A quick note about differentiating post signature from posts: In order to help others see a difference, you might want to consider going to your signature settings, scrolling down to your signature, and then highlighting the text and either making it bold, or italicized, or both — you can see we've done this for our post signature, below. We hope to have a global solution for this so that all members' signatures look similar in terms of styling, but this is a quick and easy workaround in the meantime.
For more on styling text:
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Yes, MountainMia. Ultimately, we decided the community portion of the activity function wasn't super helpful and may increase confusion, so we've disabled it. We may bring it back in the future if we see a use for it, but wanted to focus on the conversations in the forums first. The activity on your personal pages and other's pages is still functioning. We'll be updating the user guide in the next day or so. Thank you!
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Thank you for trying to help but realistically that isn't going to do it unless everyone in the membership who ever posts does this. Otherwise 98% of the font is still the same, and we still have the fine horizontal line that is the same as the fine horizontal line between comments. Also I for one am not going to make the efforts to add a sig line or diagnosis info until other things are working better. I haven't decided whether or not to stick around.
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Terrible update - so much knowledge has been lost. No-one here cares about likes or other tabs to hit. We care about connecting and finding information easily. Do you know your audience? As in age range and what they want? Cos it’s really just made it harder to access info within the community section. I don’t come here too often, but when I do it’s important and generally has been helpful. But this is a train wreck.
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What happened to our locations?
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As someone who has been on this forum since 2019, I’ve found it so helpful. The mods knew the last update was horrible and did listen to users, who I believe actually asked for a like button and other types of things like that when they didn’t have time to respond and wanted to let someone know they saw their post without actually writing a comment. They did listen to the users, and the users asked for them. They also let the mods know they didn’t like the dislike button, so they immediately took it back off.
I know the mods who work for breastcancer.org care deeply about everyone on this site, so if you let them know the issues you have, they really do want to fix them. I do realize not everyone is going to be happy, but there is no way to do that.
I want to let the mods know I appreciate everything they’re doing to try to make this site be what you envision.
Kris
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Damn, I swore I would never sign in again, but here I am signing in, and posting even. But I can't stay silent on this.
No, the Mods/BCO did not listen. The biggest issues with the discussion board since the March 1st 2022 changes were:
1) Legibility - and that has gotten even worse with the redesign.
2) Signature lines and diagnosis information that couldn't be input and shown properly - and after 15 months, that still isn't fixed.
3) Ease of use - people were frustrated that the site had become more difficult to use but with this new redesign, the level of difficulty has increased 50-fold. Members who have breast cancer or are in the diagnostic process are already stressed enough; a support site should be intuitive and easy to use - what BCO delivered is exactly the opposite. Members are being told that they have to be patient and go through a learning curve. This is now a cancer support website that requires 5 discussion threads and multiple videos to explain to members how to use the site. Does this make sense to anyone (outside of those who work for BCO)?
On top of that, approx. 90% of the history on the breast cancer threads has been deleted - and members were very clear in the migration discussions that they wanted to be assured that none of the history would be deleted.
The Mods had to know that so much of the history would be deleted (and I suspect that Melissa J, as senior management/Community Director, was involved with the work deciding which threads to delete and which to keep) and yet they never said anything. In fact no one from BCO has yet admitted that they deleted so many threads, despite the number of people posting to say that they can't find old threads (but I did get that admission directly from BCO in a private email).
This is what I posted in the Reporting Forum Feedback thread on April 28th, just after the relaunch - and there has never been any response or comment from the Mods. But from reading other posts, I know that I am not alone in what I found on the "new" BCO discussion board.
"First, has anyone noticed that thousands upon thousands of threads have disappeared? Take a look at the number of threads in the forums. Just Diagnosed forum - 135 threads; DCIS forum - 61 threads; IDC forum - 95 threads; Stage 1 forum - 33 threads. A few years back, when the board was busy, that number of threads would be started in a single month. How is it that this is all that has been carried over from the old site?
What this means of course is that many of our posts are gone. In my 16+ years providing information and support on this site, I posted over 14,000 times. My new post total is 1,444. BCO have wiped out 90% of my
contributions.Second, what happened to my PMs? I hope this is just a temporary Glitch and that it's just affecting me,
but when I clicked on my private messages, I had 2. Every other PM that I had saved from my 16 years here, including quite a number from people who have passed away, is gone. "Lastly, there is the confusing organization and structure of the forum. Over the 16 years that I was on the site, a lot of changes were made to the organization of the site and the layout of the discussion board, almost always in response to issues that came up. Most of those changes, many hard fought by the members, have been wiped out with the new board structure.
So no, BCO did not listen, and the Mods, whose job it is to represent discussion board members' interests to BCO, are complicit.
I know that we are supposed to only post constructive suggestions, and my post may be seen as being too negative. It may be deleted shortly. If BCO had been more open over the past year about what was planned, and more open over the past few weeks about what has been done to the site, I wouldn't be posting this. But so many of the members' questions have been going unanswered, and I think my post provides some answers.
Now I will leave for good, I promise.
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I don't know where the glitches thread is, and I don't want to go through three pages of tutorials to find it. I logged in, but when I got on this thread, it was in read-only mode with no reaction buttons or comment space. I exited the site, then opened it again and logged in again. Still showed read-only on this thread. So I hit the "Looks like you're new here" button to log in again, but instead, it acted like a reboot button because all of a sudden, the reaction buttons and comment box showed up. It's all so frustratingly random. The new platform was NOT ready to launch when it did if so many bugs still need to be worked out.
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And what's with the circled part?
If I can't enter my diagnosis and treatment information, why is there a sarcastic-sounding comment as the default? It's really rude to make it look like the lack of information is the members' fault.
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- @goldie0827, you can add your location when you add it to your signature or your Tagline, if you want for now. However, "about me" (bio) will be coming soon, along with the rest of the profile pieces we had before. Here is how you add your signature and tagline: Account Access and Profile
- We have the feedback going through the forms (see links at the bottom of this post) so they can go directly into a database for our team to collectively view and prioritize. Otherwise, we mods are gathering feedback in the various discussions, in private messages, and from various emails. Using the forms helps us not miss anything, allows our whole team to see in one place, and keeps it organized allowing us to systematically move through the entries. In addition, it's okay if we receive multiple reports about the same feedback or technical issues. The more received, the more we know it's an issue we should take a look at. Posting in a thread about what you wish was different, what isn't working, or wasn't isn't like isn't an effective way for us to gather information on issues or wish-list items. We sincerely want to resolve questions and issues as fast as possible, and this is what we know works best for our collective team.
- The platform we selected is called Higher Logic Vanilla and is very reputable. We know that the American Cancer Society, as an example, uses this platform. No platform is perfect, and we are eager to try and provide the best experience as possible.
- Change is difficult for everyone, so we preemptively tried to have many Help videos and guides prepared.
- @beesie.is.out-of-office, your PMs should all be there. The number is only an indicator of unread in your inbox.
- Yes, we pruned the boards. There was 20+ years of topics. We migrated all discussions that had been active or well visited in the last years, to ensure that the content here is still accurate, helpful, and popular. All conversations are archived, not deleted.
- @kbl Thank you for your support. We really DO care!
Best,
The ModsAgain, if you're having a technical issue, please Report the problem here.
And if you want to share feedback, have an idea or want to add a wish-list item, please Share feedback with us here.
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You are welcome to share your feedback with one another, but the team is collecting and reviewing all feedback as it comes in from the feedback forms. This way we can work most effectively to getting the issues resolved, and the wish-list items evaluated.
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A couple of quick follow-ups to close things off.
Re 5: Thank you for pulling my PMs out of archive. They were not in my mailbox. I'm not stupid, nor am I technically challenged, and I of course knew that the number was only an indicator of the unread PMs in my box. I scrolled down to review the entire list and nothing was there. I checked multiple times to see if they would turn up (especially after my previous post). Absolutely certainly 100% not there. Since I hadn't signed in for more than 6 months, my guess is that maybe BCO archived all the PMs of members who had not been active for some period of time.
Re 6: Many members return annually when they have imaging, or return when they are dealing with new problems or a new diagnosis (as happened with me a few years back). These people will now return to find all their previous posts and all their history missing. How do members access older threads that have been archived? And what happens now when someone has an unusual issue or concern and does a search to see if there are any older posts on the topic? Those posts are gone. Can members search the archives?
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"Can members search the archives?"
My question as well. Being archived is the same as being deleted if members can't access it.
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SUPER frustrated. I copied active links into a comment, and they don't show up as links. They were highlighted in blue when I dropped them in but then the highlighting and the hover-linkage disappeared. THIS SHOULD NOT BE SO HARD.
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ALSO note, as beesie has noted, I also have had comments from my history disappear (which I understand you deem to be a feature, not a bug.) And the number of bookmarks I have active is incorrect in the right-hand column, which I have reported with a tech form. AND I still haven't had an answer to beesie's and my question about being able to access any archived material. As I said before, being archived is the same as being deleted if members can't access it.
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I'm still having sign-in problems: I sign in, it acts like I'm signed in, but when I open a thread, I'm not. So if I want to participate, I have to hit the silly "Looks like you're new here!" button (NO. I AM NOT NEW) which finally hits the splatform in the head with a well-needed hammer, and I'm then fully signed in. I'm not filling out a form because how the heck would I know if anybody on the alleged tech team would even be able to see it? Maybe all these splatform glitches mean that those forms are disappearing, too.
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@mountainmia We're sorry about the links not showing up, we understand that can be frustrating. If you're copying and pasting, make sure you're selecting 'Paste' and not 'Paste and Match Style', which will not copy over the links. If you're adding your own link, once you've added it to the phrase or word, it should be linked as 'Display as text' (the little line on the right of the link box). Hope this helps!
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@alicebastable We're so sorry to hear that! That issue should have been fixed by our tech team, how frustrating that it's persisting for you. Can you shoot us a pm so we can get some info and get it resolved for you?
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Mods, can't you just copy and paste? I've already posted what the problem is, twice. I really shouldn't have to do more work for BCO than that, nor should anyone else who has reported problems of any type with the site.
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