More text in the recent activity emails please!
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Please please please could I have the option to include more text in each entry in the recent activity emails? These mailings are basically USELESS for my group in the current form. There's never enough substance to give anyone a reason to click through. I need either the option to include the full text of each item or the ability to set a character limit higher.
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I'm not talking about email blasts, I'm talking about the automatically-generated updates that give an overview of recent activity on the groupsite. Of course the limit was set for a reason: so that the updates don't get too long. The problem is that the limit is set so low that the updates don't actually contain any information. For example, your posting would show up as "Not to say you personally would spam..." and an invitation to an event would show up as "Hi everyone, there's an interesting..." It's just too much trouble to click through on these things, so people don't have a sense of what kinds of conversations are going on, so they don't join them, so we never get a conversation off the ground. (The fact that you have to leave email and go to the website to participate is also a problem.) I set up my group 9 months ago and while it's an attractive and thoughtful environment it just doesn't click the way Yahoo! Groups does.
Good point. Some of our members would probably prefer texting to emailing. Either way, the point is that the environment needs to work for people with all sorts of work habits. But only power users will come to the website on their own.
CollectiveX is wonderful about permissions, so people already don't get them if they don't want them. And again, these are automatically generated updates that are standard for all CollectiveX groupsites. I have nothing to do with it. But it's just not useful, and it could be. I feel this way about the updates I get from all my CollectiveX groupsites, whether I'm running them or not.
I completely agree with Amy. I rely pretty heavily on the email digests to pull people back to the groupsite, but the information the digests is too scant. I would love an option to increase the amount of text included in the digests. Great idea Amy.
Great conversation folks - I spend a lot of time wrestling with the inbox issue. Personally, I feel that way too many people are defining most of their relations by their email only interactions (or with six graders in my son's class, I see them sitting in the same room texting each other instead of actually getting off the grid and playing a game in person!)
That being said, I agree that a snippet of information that doesn't really tell you anything doesn't help.
One of the feature requests that I have submitted to our development cue is the ability to subscribe to a Discussion Forum. Today you can subscribe to a Discussion Topic within a Forum but no the entire Forum.
With this feature, you could ensure that you get full text emails of every post that is made to the Forum. If you want everything, subscribe to all.
We do, however, have Groups with thousands of users who are extremely active. I don't know about your inbox but my inbox is completely broken. The 100's of emails I get everyday make for a very crowded place where things can easily get lost.
I have a few groups that I care enough about to check in with on a regular basis and see what is going on and how I can help. This is one of them.
Replying "lol" from my iPhone at a red light is not my idea of how to build a meaningful relationship.
I also understand that Recent Activity updates can serve as a great recruitment tool for those groups that are trying to grow.
We will continue to look into how we can improve and we welcome all comments and suggestions.
I personally believe that multi-tasking is an efficiency myth and while many people are typing lots of words day, I often question how much social capital they are actually building with real people in the real world. I like to think that our social collaboration tool is helping people come closer together rather than keep them further apart by living only in their inboxes.
Hope that didn't sound like a rant.
Shaun
Here is the "Catch 22" on this topic.. There has been an ongoing issue with users I come in contact with.. the feel they want to "get to know me better" and ask for me to post a "personal" image of myself online. I would never consider doing this.. Nor would I ever use my personal name online.. just posting these two thing allows one open for all kinds of issue.. (and I'm not saying that it can happen here) Personal fraud, stealing of images etc..
"If you do not want something stolen, then don't put it online."
Granted I'm beginning to see that this is a "professional" social networks atmosphere, and At times I feel maybe I shouldn't be here. I just an average guy with some mobility issues.. with ideas, thoughts and comments to post on any network. I spend apporx. 90% of my day online.. Searching, and reading and yes commenting and offering ideas to networks like Collectivex.
If The CEO of Collectivex needed to met with me on any subject matter, I'm just a hop, skip and a jump down the road.. or did they already know this.. Then an only then I would reveal my true name and my issues.. and I would expect anyone meeting me, would have the common curtsy to keep my name and issue to their self and honor my wishes.
But Yes I agree with having personal connect with someone when discussion matters and issues, and have attempted this many times.. I have but one user online that I have know since day one.. and she lives in New Zealand. I would consider her to be one of my best friends and I send her gifts and emails on a daily bases.
Oh so does this mean my wife doesn't or isn't aware of what I'm doing?. hardly.. I keep her informed ever day of my activities.. She (my wife) is my strongest asset and my best friend. She realizes what I'm capable of and of my limits.
The internet offers an escape from reality, and people look to escape or become something they are not.. As for myself, I have been told "you speak from the heart" or I like what my wife said.. "Hun, your just to honest for the internet" So try to over look the typos.. and try not to read between the lines on anything I say.
Wizard - I understand and thank you for your comments. Thoughtful comments that are coming from a good place are always welcome.
Please understand that 80% of our groups are private professional groups that do not want to be found by the outside world. Groupsites provide them a collaborative "sanctuary" where they can do everything from manage projects to support company intranets. In these cases, there is no need for anonymity. In fact, it would defeat the purpose in many cases where they are looking to locate subject matter experts who may be in the next cubicle but they never knew.
My son knows not to put his real information out on the internet, he has email aliases that can be deleted at anytime, never uses his real birthday and doesn't provide home address info ever.
Prior to joining the CollectiveX team, was President of he Identity Protection Company and we ran MyNameIsProtected.com which helped victims recover from identity theft so I know what can hapen with these things.
When I invite friends into my home (which I often do), we all use our real name, actually shake hands and the smiles are not emoticons. That does not make the Internet a bad place, just a slightly different one.
You are a welcome addition to this community and I thank you in advance for for the insights and feedback you will have in helping support this group's mission of helping groups make things happen using Groupsites.
Shaun
Wizard - I agree. The 3rd party options I referred to were not accessing our photo galleries to create slide shows but rather, they created slide shows in their own environment (Flickr or whatever) that could be embedded into a Groupsite using our Embed Video/Widget module.
Thanks for submitting that feature request, Shaun! Let me know when it's live and I'm happy to give it a try with my group!
Heh.. I'm not so technical.. to some degree.. and I had a feeling I "high jacked" the thread.. soorryyy..
Other networks I have taken part in have told me, That a I "bring another level to the conversations" I would take that as a complement and I Do.. My wife is an optimist and of course i'm the pessimist.
I feel we all need a bit of each side to debate the "pros" and "cons" of an issue.
I am with Amy on this one. I need longer "recent activity" text on my emails as my group (whether good or bad) limit their activity to scrolling through the latest activity emails. That is because we are primarily a calendar group (i.e., lots of events on the calendar) rather than a discussion group. People want to scroll quickly through the latest events added to the calendar and then only visit those that look interesting.