Action Plan

[Kardan]

Ooh, you've got a point there.

People could be buying them for 49c and then trading them in for 50c each. They would be making 1c per time and If they were to be doing this all the time, they would make some money.

Also, would we have enough funds to do big trades and who would we trust with the money?

This is why you'd have to propose a limit on how many exchanges you can do. And if you impose a token fee alongside it, it means only people that use the forum can try and get this profit, so it might get more people on the forum.

[Explorator]

Yeah the credit exchange thing is a risky one and it is why I stalled it so many times. I know that people buy them for 49c but I was willing to risk that that was because that was just the way things are so the idea was more about throwing a spanner in the works and seeing if it attracted any attention. If you used the grabber to top up the bronze coins so it was sustainable then it could work and that was the intended plan. I was worried that demand would outstrip supply and that the grabber wouldnt be enough and then ofc the ultimate question that it gets potential new users using the service but how to get them to Habbox itself.

A grabber is a really good idea.

I feel that if Habbox were to offer a much better deal than other grabbers, yet still try to make some profit off it, It would attract a decent amount of people

[Mr-Trainor]

In regards to offering 50c for everyone's gold bars, I can already picture a few people coming and selling a gold bar for 50 bronze to you, then going and buying one for 49 bronze and coming back to sell it for 50. Multiple people could keep doing this for their own gain and you'd be losing out and have none left for the person who comes along genuinely wanting to just exchange their only gold bar for 50 bronze.

What you could do instead, is something like giving 45 bronze and 5 goes on a 1c grabber (or 1 go on a 5c grabber) for a gold bar. That way people would be doing it far less often, I'd assume.

- - - Updated - - -

And yeah I assumed the credit to tokens had been scrapped or something because it's been ages and hasn't come out. There was discussion a while back with suggested prices and stuff from myself and others.

[Kardan]

Why does the competition department give out rep and not tokens?

[Mr-Trainor]

Why does the competition department give out rep and not tokens?

And the events department, unless it has changed now.

[FlyingJesus]

Hey,

'Sup

I've been wanting to write this feedback thread for a while but decided to wait it out and see if I could be surprised. When I resigned from AGM, I resigned because I felt the general management team needed to be friends and while I don't think we hated each other's guts (could be wrong), there wasn't any of the banter and camaraderie that a good strong team needs. Habbox is in a slump so it really needed that to help boost it out of it. I recommended Jade because afaik Jade and Matt talked more consistently than the occasional conversations I ever had with him while also having the creativity and determination to improve things. I say all this because the general management team being good friends doesn't necessarily result in a more constructive team and some of the horror stories I've heard suggests that the current team is actually doing more harm than good so after Martin's firing, I decided to make this thread to perhaps turn the spotlight onto the general management team rather than the department managers.

While it's definitely true that the most effective GM teams have been ones where those involved were chummy, it doesn't necessarily have to be the case with all involved. Sometimes having someone you don't like actually gets people working harder (like when we all strived to get Oli fired or secretly trained up new potentials to replace Garion when he started being a nonce) and I think too much camaraderie is definitely detrimental to how any team runs. That goes for singular departments, managers as a group, and the GM team: the people involved need to work well together but "together" isn't the only important word in that, there's also "work"

No-one is irreplaceable
This is a principle I've stuck by throughout my time at Habbox. Everyone can be replaced; trialists, staff, management, general management and it's stupid to think that the higher up the ladder you go, the more irreplaceable you are. I've also seen how damaging it can be when someone believes they're irreplaceable. They get arrogant, they feel untouchable as if they can do anything and it doesn't matter or they no longer do the work they did to get to that place of feeling irreplaceable and too valuable to let go and do the bare minimum and allow others to do it.

Matt was going to resign but decided to stay after Jin persuaded him to. I don't have the full details obviously but from what I gathered, Jin didn't really trust anyone else to replace him and y'know what, that's fair enough because it's clearly a big job and you don't just want anyone in the position but from that moment on, they really should've been keeping a lookout for the next GM (even if that person wasn't necessarily staff or in the general management team already) because it feels like Matt is just going through the motions and I remember he turned into the worst troll ever for a few months (thankfully he calmed down). This brings me nicely to what I think is the main cause of the downturn.

See this all the time whether it be a newly-promoted senior thinking they're owed a manager role just because it's open or someone already in management being offish and rude when given direction or suggestions. I know Matt's been around a long time and has had a lot of stuff thrown at him most likely but he's one of the worst for this - constantly either totally ignoring criticism or attacking those who give it to him. Still not sure why serial bully Cassie still has a job other than because she brings numbers up, Martin's only just been given the boot after months of ineffectiveness, news has gone back to having no forum integration (and therefore dividing the userbase) so not sure what Sam's doing, and then of course there's the whole of V7 development being unacceptably crap. That's just to name a few prominent cases

Lack of vision + leadership
I couldn't stand Oli. He deliberately kept policies not because they were any good but because I got so wound up about them and clearly he found it amusing to have that control. However, on the rare occasion when we weren't trying to get our scalp, I remember asking him what his vision was and he was able to state it quite clearly (focus on the noobs in brief if you're wondering) and it was also where we agreed with each other. Everything Oli did was focused on that vision and if it didn't fit in with that vision then it was quickly discarded - that's not to say older members were completely ignored because obviously he had to find that balance and most things to attract newbies can appeal to older members as well - which people found harsh but that was leadership and he had the drive to see it through. I do not feel that Matt has any vision or idea what to do next. It has always seemed to me that he is merely biding his time for someone else to come up with the next ideas rather than working on his own. Rule 1 of how not to lead is to wait around for someone else to lead. I'd actually say that Matt is not alone in this and many managers have fell into this trap but it's more noticeable with Matt when he is top dog. To also be fair to Matt, when the chips are down, he can also see things through so he's not entirely incapable but it's not very consistent.

Been that way from the start tbh, he had the role thrust on him because Sam had to leave abruptly and then with Jin being a non-entity ever since there's been no reason for him to want to do anything but keep things steady, which of course in modern times means going backwards fairly quickly

Laziness
This feedback thread isn't about how I was an amazing AGM who was perfect. I'll elaborate further in this point. I believe the lack of leadership has resulted in a lazy atmosphere in general management. There's no drive or passion from the leader then it's quite discouraging. Putting policies into place is tough. It's not as easy as saying here's a new policy. You've got to create a sustainable system or structure and identify potential issues before they occur so when obstacles inevitably arose, it was far easier to leave it and come back to it later than take it head on and there would be no consequence for not doing so because of Matt's lack of leadership. I think it'd be unfair to completely blame Matt for that. I am responsible for my own choices and fell into that trap myself but the point I'm making here is that it is made too easy a trap to fall into. Despite my AGM record not being particularly thrilling, I am very proud of my work in competitions management and we now have an AGM who hosted rare giveaways even though she wasn't a manager and as I recall was filled with ideas and thinking of solutions to problems (even if I didn't always agree with them). It's now been a couple of months and all we've had so far is a rehash of Hx24 besides from the usual seasonal events and I can't help but wonder if a combination of these factors mentioned already have helped this.

I think a lot of attention has been paid to how some department managers manage their departments and while they aren't completely off the hook, if recent stories I've heard are true then it is little wonder that morale is exceedingly low. General management should be supporting managers to help them improve not belittling them into the ground. You should be creating a dialogue where ideas can be discussed and bounced back and forth then support their implementation not simply berating them for not being good enough because yeah that'll improve things clearly.

I haven't actually been staff under Matt but as an observer that's exactly how it appears. We often get told that those we criticise "do a lot of work behind the scenes" or "are trying" (wow congrats) but even if that is true there needs to be an actual presence to front it all. I'm having to look through the staff list right now to see who the managers are because there simply aren't any strong characters who exude leadership in the entire lot of them, and half of them I had no idea held such roles. Our STAFF MANAGER is inactive and invisible, and that really says it all

Action Plan
The solution to all of this then I feel is an action plan. I think there's a fairly vague version already but a more detailed action plan to help establish a vision. By vague, I mean "improve listeners", "get more members" without actually saying how or what you're going to do or put in place to help that. This could be posted publicly then everyone will know where Habbox is heading. I don't really like threads that post a load of problems without any ideas so here are a couple of what I was working on as AGM and think could benefit if they were taken forwards.

1. Tokens/Habbo integration. I posted a thread in forum management ages ago about this then never carried it through: add credits to the tokens system and replace 'rep' in prizes with tokens. I came across the obstacle that everyone had lots of tokens already and figured it'd bankrupt Habbox straight away so see point 'laziness' because if you just weathered that storm then it'd calm down after that and mr-trainor came up with the idea of limiting the amount of times you can get it per month as well. I regret not pushing that one through.

I'm not a fan of tokens as I think it's essentially yet another way for Hx to lose revenue through giving away even more free VIP, although it does take a lot to get that. I think similarly it would have to take so many tokens to get credits that it wouldn't be worth anyone saving them for it because otherwise we're giving creds out from a fund that we already don't have, and since the option is already "furni or rep" (would then be furni or tokens) no-one is going to really want to collect tokens just to later get furni unless tokens are worth far more than we can afford to give out. Add tokens as a potential prize if there's a market for it, but credits for tokens just seems like a waste of resources

2. Credit Exchange. If anyone is wondering what that little section to the side of my lottery room was all about, the idea was that it'd be the place of credit exchange with no commission. You have a gold bar and want bronze coins, here's 50 bronze coins. Not having to lose out on credits might have made it an appealing attraction to non-members. Again, bankrupting Habbox or just being saddled with all these gold bars because everyone wants bronze coins means that I got stumped by this one. I think a possible solution is below and it might be a worthwhile idea to revisit. I'm still 50/50 on this one.

Huge investment considering the sheer number of credit trades that go on all the time, and we'd of course be at a constant loss. There's also the issue of availability - if you start this scheme with a few hundred credits then you're letting the first 5 or 6 people benefit and that's that, hardly a worthwhile investment of Hx funds as well as likely being used mostly by current members anyway as they'd be the ones who know that the exchange event is about to happen. It's a nice idea but can't see it being beneficial without having several thousand credits to start off with

3. Runescape Achievements. I think the awards system is pointless so adopting a Runescape Achievements system could be a way forward. For those who are unaware, the runescape task system is that you complete tasks (some serious, some not so serious) that have a range of difficulties for different areas of the game. Runescape is largely built so that this is fairly straightforward whereas at Habbox it'd be a lot trickier hence why this never really got off the ground either but I do think it's a good idea as it would be something to aim for and give newer members something to do to get involved with the easy tasks and older members more of a challenge with the harder challenges. It's also a way to show off all of what Habbox has to offer (instead of 'towns/cities', it'd be different departments: forum, habbox, habboxlive, events, hxhd). Obstacles for this are: what would the tasks be, how would you prove youve done the task.

Wouldn't mind this, badges on Habbo are popular even when they're connected to really crap quests so there's almost certainly a market for it and it would give the graphics department a reason to exist. Obviously it would require a bit of work (hi there comps with your ridiculously low minimums) but I think this would prove popular with both new and old members as it would be something that's a bit of fun just for a short while but enough to keep an interest in the site, as well as potentially spark some good discussions and if done properly perhaps forge new friendships (awwww) by having group activities. Workload aside I don't see a downside to this one

4. Bring back HabboxTV. Admittedly, this isn't a project I was working on at the time but I think it's something worth exploring. I present to you HabboxTube: a youtube for Habbo videos. It's a bit of a niche area so perhaps that's a bit ridiculous although I still believe that a good way to get out of the slump is to offer something unique. I tried to introduce radio plays and that was a complete failure but I still believe in the concept and think it might be the perfect opportunity to bring HabboxTV back. I say this because afaik, Laura is the current content manager and is very keen on the idea herself (unless I've imagined reading this somewhere which would be embarrassing) so it could easily be incorporated into that department. To bring up why I mentioned radio plays, as well as the text on the screen that you can read, there could be voice actors as well. Might give it more depth or make them even more incredibly cheesy than they already are but yes that would be the main output for Habboxtube but there could be competitions or viral videos made. Anything to get Habbox back on the map really.

Could be very fun, myself and some of the Old Spam guys made plans for a new version a few years back and just the planning of it was enjoyable even though we then realised that none of us had any time or money to pull it off. People LIKE crap usermade videos (look at Tara's stuff and the old Dom_C videos etc) because it's short and a bit daft and just fun for people to feel involved with - and feeling involved is what we need from people so that they stick about. Teenage Lives as a written project was huge and had a tremendous following so yes I think it's definitely time for Productions to have a comeback in a recorded version, assuming we can get the staff for it not to be too rubbish to watch

5. More big events. This one's cheating because I don't really have any ideas at the moment but there was a time when there was something big going on at least every 2 months. Nowadays it seems everyone just waits for the next seasonal event then everyone pitches in but everything drowns each other out. This point is more to the whole of management rather than just general management but general management do need to support that process as well. It's free advertising for your department if you do something outside the norm outside the usual timeframe. Do something big during a seasonal event and while appreciated, it just gets lost with everything else going on. Do something big outside of that and you can get a forum notice all for yourself! You can see for yourself on the "Habbox Competitions" page examples of how I did this when I was in competitions manager (and if you dare say 'well you were comps manager, im just a content manager so that's not what we do', I will bury you alive).

Just more events at all... would be great if other dept management got going with something, yes, but at a time when we've got 6 or 7 events booked in a day out of a possible (although perhaps not entirely plausible) 24 we really just need anything to boost our visibility. I suggested in one of the many threads bashing events that we allow for guest hosts in slots that are coming up and not booked, provided they are supervised by senior events staff or a manager. These people would not be staff and would not have to work to specified minimums so it's a more relaxed way of filling up event slots as there are many people, myself included, who wouldn't mind hosting an event from time to time but don't want to be in among the peasant class of staff or don't have the time to commit to regular events. Big events are great, but the number of new people we get from them is negligible really since they get swamped by screaming regulars who are high on points, so I think while events is in a slump it's best to work on building up continual presence rather than treating ourselves to watching Kirsty and Laura have a breakdown

6. Funding. This isn't my own idea, it's FlyingJesus' but it's an idea I support in principle so I've added it here. If we can get funding for the events department to start giving out more consistently good prizes then that'd be great. I know Tom wants a fully funded department but I've done the maths and it sounds almost impossible to do so straight away (If you say an average event has 3 rounds and a 2c prize per round then maximum would be 1008 credits a week. More realistically, I'd say 600-700 when it's at its peak but you've got to account for these things) but it's definitely a goal to work towards. The grabber has been changed from 1 1c one to 3 different grabbers and while I've been critical in this thread, I'd say this is a welcome change so make this grabber a weekly event in the calendar at the very least especially now that there is also an event area for someone to host an event as well (another welcome change) and then use that funding to work with developing a better prize fund for the events department.

This is a fantastic idea and whoever came up with it should be GM. Seriously though even if grabbers have gone down in popularity recently they're still often very active and people seem to like gambling on them despite the hideously poor odds of actually winning more than you put in, which is obviously a good thing for a fundraising plan. I'd suggest having the grabber running as often as possible - although obviously not in detriment to other events that are booked - whenever management are around and free to man it, as this way we not only get maximum potential income but also make more of a name for ourselves. Habbox might be the biggest and oldest fansite but we're not the most popular or even famous any more necessarily, so being known as the fansite that does good grabber events rather than the one that has cheap rooms and robotic hosts would be fab

7. Habbo rooms. I've said this elsewhere but building more popular Habbo rooms and linking them up to the help desk would be a good idea (including the grabber/lottery room btw). One idea I had was one of those 1 room mazes where at the end you put yourself in for a big credit prize. If they signed up to the forum with a screeny of them in the room saying the message (changes every week/month) then someone logging in and welcoming all the newer members who signed up just for it in an attempt to get them to stay. Either way, linking to the help desk, there's usually someone in there (even if there isn't anyone behind the desk) who could welcome them and show them what Habbox has to offer.

Problem with mazes is that recently Habbo seem to enjoy changing all their physics systems which messes them all up periodically I do think having more Habbox rooms up and running would be a good thing though, again for the added presence. Currently we have HxHD and then whatever event may or may not be on and that's it - we even have management asking people not to use Habbox in tags on really popular games rooms for some reason, when really we ought to be looking for more sponsorship/endorsement

[Sho]

Why does the competition department give out rep and not tokens?

This is something I've been thinking about starting but never got around to actually discussing. We give tokens for big events, but I'm not too sure about having them for individual competitions as well.

[Chug!]

It's very well having Tokens to Credits, and getting people to post more often but that means moderation would have to be stepped up too, otherwise people would troll and trolling would increase. do you not think we have enough of that already with certain people, lol??

Great ideas though - as everyone said, how to get there -I think the GMS will need help, and tbh im not even sure the GM team are that strong anymore - this isn't because of who they are but ideas seem to be drowning out; just a thought.

[lawrawrrr]

Skimmed Mikes post but tend to agree with bits & pieces.

Lazy AGMs and managers lead to a general disillusionment in staff and members alike. As well as when relationships start to get strained... it really rubs off on managers. But I think a general attitude here is that managers & especially AGMs are almost untouchable. Which they shouldn't be. If they can't function well within the various situations Habbox throws at us, then they shouldn't have the job.

Credit exchange has the opportunity to be massively exploited - people buying them at 49 and getting profit from Habbox.

Habbox TV - it's something I'm looking into after Christmas, I wanted to focus on that but I am considering different alternatives!!


on phone xx

[Inseriousity.]

I don't think it'd be a waste of resources. Atm its 'whats rep' then at best even if you say 'rep on habboxforum.com wooo sign up wooooo' generally its a no thanks whereas with 'furni or tokens' they'll still ask 'whats tokens' and you can say 'currency on habboxforum.com register and you can work your way up to a gold bar is a lot more appealing.

You've basically pointed out why the credit exchange thing never got started. I do think there's potential there but there's finding a balance between limiting it to not be totally outrageous and not making it so stifling that there's little point using it or it diminishes its intended effect (attract non-members who find it appealing). On balance I don't think the pros outweigh the cons but it's an example of trying to think outside the box which I don't think is happening very much at all so I kept it in.

I always found the idea of HabboxTV appealing so maybe my attempt to bring it back is just cos I'm gutted I missed out on it. I know Sammeth tried to revive it cos I wrote a script for it myself but it petered out. If it was taken on by someone who could drive it through then I think there's potential there to build something and it's an old idea that would seperate us out from other fansites.

When I made the grabber the intention was to have it running more consistently so yes definitely more work on this!

The maze was just an example because I remember enjoying them and they're always full (that one where the whole room was basically just avoiding the pillows, stepping on the tile to open the gate was always very popular and very difficult because of everyone getting in the way!) and it could entice them over to the forum but it could branch out to other popular rooms as well.