News Department Feedback 2k13

[Martin]

Introduction?

We used to have one but it was a flop, but rhyss' is alot better as it's shown in the front page but think it is more effective when posted on the forum

Introduction of a GOOD one then

I think the thing which makes them stand out is the fact its been made more of a feature, with its own cute little banner, and it has a really good structure etc. Interactive things like this always seem really appealing to more people and they can be extremely useful. I think Rhyss has done an absolutely amazing job with them, just wish they were given more publicity and stuff as its little things like that which can stand out and get people interested in Habbox.

[FlyingJesus]

Not gonna reply to everything but some of these are rather important

News can be VERY community based, its just not realised half the time and the interaction isn't there. More involvement with the community needs to be achieved in order for news to gain more readers. News Reporting itself can be very community driven, afterall it is news about the community for the community and I think the writing is more appealing when its done on a more personal level in which people will relate to.

100% yes this has been a huge problem for years and management has clearly known but done nothing about it. It's absolutely ludicrous that we have this forum community that news has seemingly no desire to count as its readership or as a casual writing resource. The very simple fact is that no-one thinks to themselves "oh I wonder what's going on in the world today, best pop over to Habbox" but the news team don't seem willing to spend an extra 2 minutes putting their work somewhere that people will actually see it

You currently only have four staff, which seems incredibly low for a department like this, and when people are posting away etc you have hardly anyone remaining, I think there needs to be some sort of encouragement to drive people to want to be news reporters (hell I would jump at the chance to report news again if I wasn't in habbox prison), because people need to have a passion for it and be proud of seeing their work on the front page of such a prominent fansite. Back in 2010 the staff number was around the 10-16 mark which is obviously a lot higher and allows the workload to be spread evenly whilst ensuring everything is as up to date as possible. News Reporters need encouragement, need praise for the good things they do and its all about shaping them into becoming excellent writers and most importantly they need to enjoy it and understand the creativity of it all. The style of writing plays a huge part as to the entire perception of the news department and whether people will actually bother to come back and read more news.

I know Habbox is against having guest staff for some unknown reason but let's face it there are plenty of people around who wouldn't mind doing an article every now and then as long as they're not forced into it on a regular level and that ought to be picked up on by management. It would not only encourage but ensure community involvement, the number and variation of articles would be improved, and since the pitiful amount of staff we currently have aren't always even making themselves available to do the work they've signed up for there is literally nothing to lose and everything to gain

Real Life news and 'Articles' may as well be scrapped because I think right now the focus NEEDS to be on the Habbo news, as this is what is being missed out and is letting the entire department down. There is obviously a set minimum which needs to be achieved and I feel this should be punched into Habbo news until the flow is stable enough again to allow other things to take place. The sections definitely need looking into, because again they just look stale and old when nothing is posted in them for weeks/months/years.

Dividing news into sections when there's so little of it is daft and makes it look even more sparse. It's like when people set up a forum and have 50 sections but only 3 posts

I think the big question on peoples minds is; "Is the News Department really worthwhile anymore?" and that is something which could be answered in a lot of ways really. I've heard a lot of people say "Well it hasn't really been given chance" and I think this is right in some ways. There are a few suggestions in the first post of this thread, and I haven't seen that many of them put into action yet.

News and articles have in some way been around ever since I've been on the forum if not long before so it certainly has been given a chance lots needs to change if it's going to still be able to claim that it's worth keeping

I take it people are able to register again to Habbox.com now in order to post comments on articles? I know last year there was a problem in that nobody new could sign up/ therefore post comments. I think something interactive like that needs to be available on the site and it's just not there. You want interaction, you want news themed competitions, you want good looking articles which are unique and different from the rest and if they are kept up to date then it makes the service far more viable and people might actually start using it and becoming interested in the main site again.

The problem is that having separate site and forum accounts splits membership when we should be trying to interlink it all. Trying to force commenting in an area that doesn't require it when there's already a huge place here specifically for the purpose of discussion seems utterly pointless. I don't know why news managers find it so difficult to understand forum integration but it would be one of the most genuinely simple and effective things to do without being a burden to anyone. All that needs to do be done is post an article as they usually would and then have a thread like

really boggles the mind how that is seen as difficult

[Inseriousity.]

The improvement in the department definitely fluctuates. One minute you think you've finally made some progress, some other issue will crop up you need to deal with. A lot of news is being missed but that is expected thanks to the small size of the team. It seems to be a cycle of replenishment rather than building a strong solid team which can be quite disheartening. Get new members, old ones leave so it balances out and you're back at square 1. It needs a manager who has the time and energy to put 110% effort into it to turn it around so that's why I had to leave. This seems to be a recurring problem across all departments though and perhaps a symptom of a wider Habbox problem that isn't being addressed properly by general management.

I agree with community involvement. The weekest link was one attempt at that (could be improved or replaced with a more 'open' weekly event), introducing more weekly articles, anything to get people involved and give news something to advertise. The 'big' idea I wanted to put in place was something like Habbo pollsters finding out opinions of regular Habbos, feeding back to management and campaigns directed around those issues, sorta like a Habbox campaigner (even more so now uservoice has gone).

Rhys' badge guides are definitely a good feature. Glad he joined the team.

[Martin]

Not gonna reply to everything but some of these are rather important




100% yes this has been a huge problem for years and management has clearly known but done nothing about it. It's absolutely ludicrous that we have this forum community that news has seemingly no desire to count as its readership or as a casual writing resource. The very simple fact is that no-one thinks to themselves "oh I wonder what's going on in the world today, best pop over to Habbox" but the news team don't seem willing to spend an extra 2 minutes putting their work somewhere that people will actually see it



I know Habbox is against having guest staff for some unknown reason but let's face it there are plenty of people around who wouldn't mind doing an article every now and then as long as they're not forced into it on a regular level and that ought to be picked up on by management. It would not only encourage but ensure community involvement, the number and variation of articles would be improved, and since the pitiful amount of staff we currently have aren't always even making themselves available to do the work they've signed up for there is literally nothing to lose and everything to gain



Dividing news into sections when there's so little of it is daft and makes it look even more sparse. It's like when people set up a forum and have 50 sections but only 3 posts



News and articles have in some way been around ever since I've been on the forum if not long before so it certainly has been given a chance lots needs to change if it's going to still be able to claim that it's worth keeping



The problem is that having separate site and forum accounts splits membership when we should be trying to interlink it all. Trying to force commenting in an area that doesn't require it when there's already a huge place here specifically for the purpose of discussion seems utterly pointless. I don't know why news managers find it so difficult to understand forum integration but it would be one of the most genuinely simple and effective things to do without being a burden to anyone. All that needs to do be done is post an article as they usually would and then have a thread like

really boggles the mind how that is seen as difficult

Completely agree with everything you have said there

As for the last part, when I was first news manager in 2009 we had a system which would copy any news article posted into a special section on the forum under news.

Infact if you look at the online users in the past 24 hours list you will notice that a member called "53898" is always online, and this is infact an rss feed/robot of news that was posted on the main site.

http://www.habboxforum.com/member.php?u=53898



So I'm guessing the news/forum intergration thing would be similar to that, except news reporters would create a thread each time they create an article?

[Inseriousity.]

I was against 'guest staff' at events dept (the nature of that department means it'd be difficult to manage a set of guests/regular staff effectively) but I did suggest to skynus to scrap minimums in the news department. His response was that he'd consider it when staff were hitting their minimums which was the whole reason I suggested scrapping them in the first place! As for the forum, I would say that news in its current state is behind the forum so if news was put on the forum, it'd be more prudent to just scrap the news team altogether which would be a possible course of action if the big space could be accommodated for with something else.

[FlyingJesus]

I'm not against scrapping the news team as you say they're always behind the forum anyway and are really just an entertainment piece that no-one's entertained by, so if they're not willing to do anything about it then there's no reason to keep them around as a department. I got the old "articles" department shut down for the same reason; it was just a bunch of people who didn't want to lose their staff status but weren't doing anything to actually promote the site at all at the time, and it's just resources going to waste

Martin, definitely not a fan of the bot (as you get duplicate threads that way) but realistically if our reporters are going to call themselves that they should be getting to the news before anyone else gets a chance to post about it anyway. The fact that it's mostly just copied news from someone else rather than anything that the staff have had any involvement in themselves really serves to show more and more that they aren't doing the job they've been given

[Martin]

I think another nice touch in terms of personalisation and connecting with the reader would be to like take screenshots/images etc more if that makes sense? I know in the past things like videos have been tried and stuff which are quite fun and I know I own a Habbox News Youtube account which something similar could be utilised I guess!


I was feeling nostalgic so went looking through my news files (yes I'm sad) and found this (might be nice for some of the old timers LOL)
@Judas; @Faboosh; @Shockwave.2CC;





I have literally hundreds of these as I made a different one for every week LOL





I miss Joomla haha!

- - - Updated - - -

I'm not against scrapping the news team as you say they're always behind the forum anyway and are really just an entertainment piece that no-one's entertained by, so if they're not willing to do anything about it then there's no reason to keep them around as a department. I got the old "articles" department shut down for the same reason; it was just a bunch of people who didn't want to lose their staff status but weren't doing anything to actually promote the site at all at the time, and it's just resources going to waste

Martin, definitely not a fan of the bot (as you get duplicate threads that way) but realistically if our reporters are going to call themselves that they should be getting to the news before anyone else gets a chance to post about it anyway. The fact that it's mostly just copied news from someone else rather than anything that the staff have had any involvement in themselves really serves to show more and more that they aren't doing the job they've been given

Yeah that's the reason we removed it It was so annoying because the forum used to lag and then we would come back to like 20 of the same article that had been duplicated LOL It was the bane of my life It also basically just died out and wasn't really used much anymore and had become stale. Back then I would say it wasn't SO important to have forum intergration but these days you are right in that the two need to be linked somehow.

My original point of how things are advertised and put to the community covers this really, as I think half the time its just not done enough. Big articles and weekly articles especially really need to be thrown out there and talked about etc. I like your idea of making threads etc and I completely agree with you that news reporters need to get there first and be investigative. That's the whole point on reporting stuff, being a part of it, making it unique and in their own style rather than just stating facts and nothing else, it really makes for boring reading and doesn't really promote anyone to comment or discuss at all.

[Inseriousity.]

I don't really think it's anything to do with 'not willing to do anything about it.' The few members of the department actually do have the right attitude, it just needs to be aided by a strong manager capable of putting the time and effort in. I was unable to provide the latter so I had to step down. As I pointed out in my action plan feedback thread (still waiting for that), the problems with Habbox as a whole seem to be down to a lack of leadership. That then trickles down to the department managers who have to deal with as best they can with the fallout with naturally a bigger impact on small departments that already have a 'tough sell' (getting people to write in their spare time is like pulling teeth, hence my support for the 'guest staff' role in this situation).

I do not accept the premise that they write entertaining articles that entertain no-one so they should go, it would be a vast waste of potential to not utilise that concept and find things that do (I would say that the articles are probably not intended for cynical old grumpy sods like you anyway ). The horoscopes idea in my sig, for example, seemed to receive positive feedback even if that is not reflected on the site itself (the registration/commenting thing is a load of ****, think everyone can agree there). This article was advertised on the forum, dan's rare values weekly article is regularly advertised on the forum.

Here's the recent rare values weekly thread: http://www.habboxforum.com/showthread.php?t=796531
It's an unfair assumption to assume the forum is being completely ignored just because you personally have no interest in the contents of said article so would've been unlikely to see it advertised.

[lRhyss]

Introduction of a GOOD one then

I think the thing which makes them stand out is the fact its been made more of a feature, with its own cute little banner, and it has a really good structure etc. Interactive things like this always seem really appealing to more people and they can be extremely useful. I think Rhyss has done an absolutely amazing job with them, just wish they were given more publicity and stuff as its little things like that which can stand out and get people interested in Habbox.

Maybe the News team could either re-name it's self/start fresh as "Features Reporters" - Instead of posting all of the generic news to the main site and/or the forum (which users can just get form Habbo.com) why not only focus on things people want to hear? These can be anything from updates to the Sandbox Hotel, New badge additions/guides, The introduction of the Habbo Builder scheme (Updating on it, keeping a watch out on what they're doing to help with quests/rooms). We could even report on thing that are nothing to do with Habbo Updates, maybe something like "Weekly safety updates" Where someone would inform users of any new KNOWN scam sites that exist within the community, tips to avoid getting scammed and more.

The implementation of a "Scammers" database could be a good thing, not sure if it's against the Fansite way or not...

But what we could do is either do it as it's own report, or add it to a weekly update. Providing known scam games, rooms and Habbo's as long as the "accusing" is backed up with a VERY reliable amount of proof, provided by a RELIABLE source?

Another idea could be something along the lines of a Monthly/Weekly Forum competition ran by the Competitions Department alongside us News Reporters where a theme would be given for the week/month such as "Habbo Poem - Write a 10 line poem describing what you like most about your favourite Habbo Room" or "Conduct a funny and random interview with your Habbo Idle". The best entries would then be read and a winner would be picked. The winner would then receive a forum badge, credits, token or rep (or any combination of those) as well as having their article presented on the Habbox Front Page and maybe even a cheeky trial offer? That way maybe a staff influx would occur.

Again, I think this may have existed in the past, but, what about a weekly Habbox newsletter, written by ALL members of staff - Each staff member contributing something to be included (Best event this month, small room reviews, interviews, etc...) It could even be posted via the forum, that way more people would read it and possibly subscribe to it (Same way the Competitions Department has paid subscriptions)

[FlyingJesus]

Here's the recent rare values weekly thread: http://www.habboxforum.com/showthread.php?t=796531
It's an unfair assumption to assume the forum is being completely ignored just because you personally have no interest in the contents of said article so would've been unlikely to see it advertised.

That's a good example of news being done as it should be - it's presented properly to the community at large and Dan obviously cares about his subject rather than just wanting to get his minimums. Unfortunately it's not being done by the others and we've had at least 2 managers who've said they'd get staff to do this sort of thing but have completely failed to do so. As you say, it's a leadership issue, and it's not at all helped by the clique at the top being reluctant to take chances on people who aren't their friends or take power from those who are