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Results are not good enough

ankica's picture
Submitted by ankica on 10 February, 2007 - 13:05.
This Website

Although site is pretty nice I still cannot navigate easily...

example:

i go to February 1, and I don't know if that event is on february 1 or
deadline is on february 1... than I open and it says: to be held in
april and than there is a start time in december and end in march...

I think that this whole idea of a web site was great, but i think that results are not good enough.

even this forum is more used for posting a event and there is no conversation in it.

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I think (actually,

Submitted by ankica on 12 February, 2007 - 12:32.

I think (actually, researches shows, and every day contact) that most of the people (specially) young people will leave if they cannot find instant answer to their question... they surely wouldn't search FAQ.

and i didn't find that  mockery funny.

You may think your actions are meaningless and that they won't help, but that is no excuse, you must still act. (Gandhi)

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A few points...

Submitted by mac on 13 February, 2007 - 19:34.

Hello ankica,

The post was not meant to be mockery, but informative. English is not my mother tongue, so if my phrasing let space for that interpretation I apologise, it was not meant. Some additional consideration about FAQs might be needed, then:

  1. FAQs are a standard feature of informative websites, and they are exactly meant to respond to the wish of having immediate answers to commonly asked questions.
  2. Online communities do have codes of conduct (called netiquette). One of the basic rules of netiquette is "read the FAQ first".
  3. Nobody in the secretariat (as far as I know) has ever addressed people badly, telling them to read the FAQ, or to search the website first. Yet, we do remind people to do so because if they do, they will not only relieve the secretariat from answering over and over the same questions, but they will also benefit from a smoother and more effective web experience.

Beside this clarification on why I mentioned the FAQs, some additional considerations on your post:

  1. There is all the time space for improvement, and this site makes no exception.
  2. Nobody in the secretariat is particularly defensive towards the website, we are sincerely open towards feed-back, but this has to carry a piece of usable information: "it's not good enough" states an opinion, but doesn't give us elements for improving. Tell us what you were searching for, where you did expect to find it and why, what would have helped you in having a better web experience, suggestions you might have to improve the user-friendliness of the site... this would be something we will be able to consider, think over and eventually build upon.
  3. When we got feedback about something, we tried to use that information at our best: we changed layout and adapted visuals, we redesigned the online calendar, we changed e-mail policy, etc, etc...
  4. I am personally unaware of researches showing that "most of the people / young people in particular leave if they cannot find instant answer to their questions". I have read once about people "spending an amount of time in finding answers, that is proportional to the subjective importance of the questions themselves", though. [M.Pollo, 2000, in "Quaderni dell'animazione", if I am not wrong...].

We wish however to thank you very much for having engaged in this discussion: we would be delighted if more people would be as concerned as you are about the effectiveness of this website. A campaign about participation can't do anything else than benefitting from more... participation! :)

Many thanks again! 

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  I finally found answer

Submitted by ankica on 11 February, 2007 - 12:58.

 

I finally found answer to my question. I thought it has been moved or something. :)

Of course I realise that this website and it content are not work of an individual, however, the most important thing is to create simple navigation that can take you where ever you want to go.  Even this forum - in the field of "last reply" - you cannot click and get last reply -  you have to go inside of forum, search for topic with new reply and than click to see who posted last... 

this things are not so important... but  I think that people, specially those who are not engaged in the field of organising events and posting them - should give minimum of effort but still, to find what they are looking for. 

Even I couldn't find your answer, but i had to put my name in "search"  :)

 

______

You may think your actions are meaningless and that they won't help, but that is no excuse, you must still act. (Gandhi)

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Finding info...

Submitted by mac on 11 February, 2007 - 21:11.

Glad you found a creative way to find your moved post... you can have a look to the FAQ (website section) to discover further ways to ease your web-life! :)

   http://alldifferent-allequal.info/faq

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Yes and No

Submitted by mac on 11 February, 2007 - 04:33.

Hello Ankica,

thank you for your feedback. I agree with part of it, and disagree with others.

CALENDAR OF EVENTS:

It has been mentioned in various thread that the calendar of events is under heavy rework. Many new features are being implemented. As you follow the website since some weeks, you should know that the reason for which events are being posted in the forum space is because the event section has been closed for a couple of weeks. Long term projects - true - are annoying in the calendar visualisation, yet... we surely can't eliminate them for aesthetic reasons, can't we? :)

USE OF THE WEBSITE:

The way the website is used doesn't really depend too much from the website designers. The secretariat (or more precisely the young people who took part in the preparation symposium) decided to keep this website as open as possible, i.e. not to have it as a kind of beautiful shop-window but as a platform for exchange. For this reason for example is possible to comment on any piece of information published, regardless it being a forum topic, a first page news, or a page of the content tree...

But are the campaigners, who choose what, where, and when to write.

Don't take me wrong... I'm not saying that if one thinks the website is not good, then s/he should conclude the campaigners don't do a good job. I am rather saying that the website content reflects a far larger picture than the website designers' ideas and capacities.

With so many exciting and events happening all over Europe, this forum could be packed of stories, impressions, suggestions and ideas. With so many campaigners thinking and reflecting about the themes of teh Campaing, we could publish a featured article every week. With 600 different people visiting every day, and over 9000 in one month, there could be an almost "live" exchange of ideas...

I personally believe that If all of this doesn't happen, the reason must go well beyond the simple look&feel of the website. :)

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