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Site News 2022 Suggestion & Feedback Thread

Shawn

Shawn

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When SouthernWX launched 5 years ago, our goal was to make a welcoming, positive, and relaxed community for people to talk about the weather. This website has exponentially grown, and we owe all of our members a big THANK YOU because you all made it possible!

We wanted to make this thread to both express our gratitude and allow you to give us your opinions of how well we're doing. We also want to know what suggestions you have, and how they would make SouthernWX a better place for you, personally, and even what would make it worse for you?

We've added a small questionnaire template with some basic questions as a starting point, but we would love an open discussion about anything else you'd like to see, your feelings, or even dislikes.

Questionnaire:

1) What do you think sets SouthernWX apart from other communities?

2) If you're a member outside of the traditional Southeast, what encourages you to visit us over other websites to discuss the weather?

3) If you could change or add one thing to the website, what would it be?

4) What are your thoughts on sub-regional forum sections?

5) Would you recommend your weather enthusiast friends to participate here? (If not, why?)

6) In your opinion, are the website rules clear or would you like a clearly defined set of rules that are easily accessible?

7) Do you predominantly access SouthernWX from a computer, tablet, or mobile device? (which one(s))

8) What do you think of storm observations in the main thread, versus it's own?


Again, these are just some basic questions and we welcome any and all of your suggestions and feedback outside of the questionnaire.

Thank you!
 
Forgot to mention, what are you guy's thoughts on the current layout of the forum? The types of threads and sections we already have? Would you prefer it arranged differently, kept the same? Also, what would you like to see added or removed thread topic wise, outside of the general weather discussion threads?

And on the part of the weather threads... would you prefer the tropical section left as is; or included with with the general weather section versus it's own area?
 
Good site but we need to separate friendships and business especially when it comes to warnings and banning. One poster in particular causes a lot drama and offends people based off there beliefs sexual orientation ect that should not be tolerated. Blocking the said individual is a good option but I'm afraid thier presence hinders our growth.
 
SNOWMANN said:
Good site but we need to separate friendships and business especially when it comes to warnings and banning. One poster in particular causes a lot drama and offends people based off there beliefs sexual orientation ect that should not be tolerated. Blocking the said individual is a good option but I'm afraid it hinders our growth.
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Please send me a message with more details.
 
I think sub forums might be a good idea. I love weather and have paid my dues by living 45 years of my life in SC/NC. I feel good with the group we have, just sometimes don’t like the hate and comments about iowa or me. I’m a southerner, just happen to be living in Iowa. I track any interesting events down there, especially snow. I access the site from my phone 100 % of the time. I’m old school and like a seperate OBs thread. Rules are pretty clear, IMO
 
BirdManDoomW said:
Good site but there’s a few members from one particular site that comes here and just wanna cause drama with me and even others when I take a break from posting. It’s the same old farts too just new usernames and they don’t really wanna see this site succeed like I do. They hate it when I provide good forecasts and information or point out Robert and others completely bombing their forecasts to rev up money from grandma and grandpa on Facebook.
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Thanks for making this about you like everything else
 
Tarheel1 said:
I think sub forums might be a good idea. I love weather and have paid my dues by living 45 years of my life in SC/NC. I feel good with the group we have, just sometimes don’t like the hate and comments about iowa or me. I’m a southerner, just happen to be living in Iowa. I track any interesting events down there, especially snow. I access the site from my phone 100 % of the time. I’m old school and like a seperate OBs thread. Rules are pretty clear, IMO
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On the sub forum part; what would you prefer personally? Like mountains, carolinas, midwest, ne, etc? or something different?
 
BirdManDoomW said:
Good site but there’s a few members from one particular site that comes here and just wanna cause drama with me and even others when I take a break from posting. It’s the same old farts too just new usernames and they don’t really wanna see this site succeed like I do. They hate it when I provide good forecasts and information or point out Robert and others completely bombing their forecasts to rev up money from grandma and grandpa on Facebook.
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Robert is a respectful member of the weather community. I personally learned a lot from him when I was first starting out, and I don't fault him in making some money, especially for very personal reasons, to help himself out.

Every forecaster has been wrong Birdman. Every. Single. One.

The people you personally have issue with, send me a message with details.
 
Furthermore, really like storms obs in the main thread keeps it all together and most younger people today use phone to access this site or at least all my friends do. I think we stand out because of certain posters like fro and Webber when they are active. I do wish we had more cross linking updates when certain threads are made maybe a push alert we could sign up for via text or twitter or Facebook. And I still think it would be cool if we had more connection with wx twitter posts if we could somehow bring their tweets here in a rolling feed or something on the main page cause theirs a lot of talent and time spent on twitter that would benefit our taste buds.
 
Shawn said:
On the sub forum part; what would you prefer personally? Like mountains, carolinas, midwest, ne, etc? or something different?
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It is tough to say. I think at American, when they had a SE forum and then that split into a Tennessee region, that was silly, but I’m thinking if you aren’t open to change, things get a little stale. I think maybe just big chunks like SE is fine, maybe the plains divided into just Southern plains and Northern plains, but weather is pretty boring out here about 6-8 months of the year
 
Tarheel1 said:
It is tough to say. I think at American, when they had a SE forum and then that split into a Tennessee region, that was silly, but I’m thinking if you aren’t open to change, things get a little stale. I think maybe just big chunks like SE is fine, maybe the plains divided into just Southern plains and Northern plains, but weather is pretty boring out here about 6-8 months of the year
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The one thing that is worrying is a potential fracture of the community. We'd hate to have regional sections with only one or two people posting. But on the flipside of that, it could encourage others from "outside" the traditional southeast to possibly want to participate.
 
Shawn said:
The one thing that is worrying is a potential fracture of the community. We'd hate to have regional sections with only one or two people posting. But on the flipside of that, it would encourage others from "outside" the traditional southeast to possibly want to participate.
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I've been thinking about this and I do wonder if the best thing to do is keep a general monthly discussion thread then break that discussion into regions as events get closer. It doesn't fracture the community as a whole but gives everyone a place to discuss where their needs are similar to get a storm
 
Honestly, no complaints. Site is pretty straightforward and easy to navigate. There is a nice mixed bag community here. All genders races and ages. I think it would be cool if we were able to have a scholarship program for some of these young guns. I’m not sure what all would go into that but it sounds good on paper. Great site. Great community.
 
I have been around these weather forums for a long time and enjoy each for what they bring to the table. I feel there is more of a sense of "community" here which is one reason I spend more time here than anywhere else and actually wouldn't mind contributing when you guys roll the fund raiser back out.

That being said, splitting the team aka. moving to subforums is a mistake in my opinion. Sure, this forum leans heavily to the Carolina folks but our input is typically valuable from an upstream perspective and our Alabama/Tennessee guys are valuable to us from an upstream perspective as well. If it's not broken.....

Moderation here is adequate and typically not over the top which is a draw for me. Some posters love drawing attention to themselves and are seemingly given a longer leash but the ignore feature does work if that becomes an issue.

Not a big fan of tap talk so I usually access on my laptop.

A pinned post with public accessible links to model pages and run times may be helpful to eliminate those questions. "Reading Bukfit soundings for Dummies", etc. could be helpful.

All in all, I have participated on sports and weather forums since the late 90's and find this one to be solid and appreciate it very much.
 
DixieBlizzard said:
I have been around these weather forums for a long time and enjoy each for what they bring to the table. I feel there is more of a sense of "community" here which is one reason I spend more time here than anywhere else and actually wouldn't mind contributing when you guys roll the fund raiser back out.

That being said, splitting the team aka. moving to subforums is a mistake in my opinion. Sure, this forum leans heavily to the Carolina folks but our input is typically valuable from an upstream perspective and our Alabama/Tennessee guys are valuable to us from an upstream perspective as well. If it's not broken.....

Moderation here is adequate and typically not over the top which is a draw for me. Some posters love drawing attention to themselves and are seemingly given a longer leash but the ignore feature does work if that becomes an issue.

Not a big fan of tap talk so I usually access on my laptop.

A pinned post with public accessible links to model pages and run times may be helpful to eliminate those questions. "Reading Bukfit soundings for Dummies", etc. could be helpful.

All in all, I have participated on sports and weather forums since the late 90's and find this one to be solid and appreciate it very much.
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On the top of the page, we have a wiki and model resource section. It's a bit dated and needs to be improved but it has links and info for some common questions like weather model sources etc. If someone's on mobile, it's the white area to the "left" of the logo (theme is bugged) to drop the menu down.
 
SD said:
I've been thinking about this and I do wonder if the best thing to do is keep a general monthly discussion thread then break that discussion into regions as events get closer. It doesn't fracture the community as a whole but gives everyone a place to discuss where their needs are similar to get a storm
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Most of the time, a potential storm will naturally divide by region depending on the areas most affected. For example, the coming midweek system really only poses a threat to the western areas and the most active users will naturally be those most directly affected. For the rare times a board-wide hit is incoming, there is even less incentive for subgroups since it's natural to want to see what is ground truth upstream.

Weenies that are interested will post and follow along from other regions regardless. As the site grows, perhaps a more regional storm-specific view will be needed, but I just don't see enough clutter for the need to worry much about separate regions across the south.
 
Not much of a poster and don’t take this the wrong way. Love the site but a lot of times I look for maps on areas west of N Carolina but see images or messages only pertaining to N Carolina. Might be nice to separate that since their climate is a bit different as I was schooled on.
 
Branch said:
Not much of a poster and don’t take this the wrong way. Love the site but a lot of times I look for maps on areas west of N Carolina but see images or messages only pertaining to N Carolina. Might be nice to separate that since their climate is a bit different as I was schooled on.
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A majority of the maps posted are from premium services and it's usually up to them what areas they post. We're happy to have whatever they post here. If you're not seeing a lot of imagery for you're area; it's likely not looking too good or eventful, imo.
 
Shawn said:
A majority of the maps posted are from premium services and it's usually up to them what areas they post. We're happy to have whatever they post here. If you're not seeing a lot of imagery for you're area; it's likely not looking too good or eventful, imo.
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Well, not always true about the "the area not looking too good" however, if asked, most of the Carolina guys will oblige and post maps further west if requested which is very nice.
 
Branch said:
Not much of a poster and don’t take this the wrong way. Love the site but a lot of times I look for maps on areas west of N Carolina but see images or messages only pertaining to N Carolina. Might be nice to separate that since their climate is a bit different as I was schooled on.
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If we have incoming here in Ga, trust me, you'll have more images than you can handle. And that's just from me alone!
 
Love the site. Always have and that’s why I’ve stayed apart of it for 4 or so years. If there are some things that annoys me sooooo much it would be a couple of things.
1. Posting a video should be soooo much easier I should be able to just click a video on my camera roll from my phone and post it just like a picture. I think that would make this place much more fun during actual events as everyone can easily see what is happening at someone’s current location (when we get thundersnow later this winter I wanna be able to show y’all how hard it’s snowing at the time;) ) and I know you can post like a YouTube video or something like that but that’s so much extra work to go make a YouTube account post there then bring the link over here and hope it works and all that jazz.
2. I have no idea if this is a problem that’s able to be fixed by y’all or if it’s just a bug that happens on the phone but.. I use this site pretty much solely on my phone but occasionally on my laptop.. for my phone it would be amazing if I could just stay logged in all the time. I try hitting the remember me button when I log in but every time I leave for a couple hours and come back I have to resign in and it doesn’t remember any of my information so that I would be able to log in faster

Again these are just small quality of life fixes that would be amazing and make the site more appealing but they certainly aren’t deterring me from using the site at all.
 
Since icing events are so different it might help us learn to have one thread dedicated for ice maps. That way users can stop cluttering the main storm thread with bogus maps that never verify.
 
Can we have an explanation thread for all the new symbols? I’m too old and might pick one that’s inappropriate.

In all seriousness, keep it all together. It keeps the community and I like the Iowa updates.
 
NickyBGuarantee said:
Love the site. Always have and that’s why I’ve stayed apart of it for 4 or so years. If there are some things that annoys me sooooo much it would be a couple of things.
1. Posting a video should be soooo much easier I should be able to just click a video on my camera roll from my phone and post it just like a picture. I think that would make this place much more fun during actual events as everyone can easily see what is happening at someone’s current location (when we get thundersnow later this winter I wanna be able to show y’all how hard it’s snowing at the time;) ) and I know you can post like a YouTube video or something like that but that’s so much extra work to go make a YouTube account post there then bring the link over here and hope it works and all that jazz.
2. I have no idea if this is a problem that’s able to be fixed by y’all or if it’s just a bug that happens on the phone but.. I use this site pretty much solely on my phone but occasionally on my laptop.. for my phone it would be amazing if I could just stay logged in all the time. I try hitting the remember me button when I log in but every time I leave for a couple hours and come back I have to resign in and it doesn’t remember any of my information so that I would be able to log in faster

Again these are just small quality of life fixes that would be amazing and make the site more appealing but they certainly aren’t deterring me from using the site at all.
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The logout thing COULD be becasue you are switching IP addresses as you move around
 
These are all good suggestions guys; keep em up
 
Tarheel1 said:
Yes! Posting images and videos should be easier for us boomers! Like a jitterbug phone or something! Just push one button and then it’s posted! ?
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The reason why we do not have direct upload of raw video (right now) comes down to storage space. Once we start getting our attachments offloaded onto another source other than the actual server itself.. we will be able to enable it.. along with allowing larger upload sizes for gifs etc
 
Alright, I'll try to answer the questionaire, but keep it from getting tl;dr (but not making any promises).

1) The site strikes the right combination of serious weather discussion and having fun. As Mac mentioned earlier, the site is also more welcoming than others to new members. It’s easier to break into the conversation here. That is extremely important to growing an online community.

You also have a great mix of people who enjoy the weather and (for the most part) click together. Different regions, ages, etc. Each has their own strengths. You’ve got people great at pattern recognition, and others better at finer details (for example). Stuff like that..

3) Need more certified mets. The ones here are great. The non-mets who know their stuff are great too. It’s just sometimes good to have one around to keep us grounded. We have a tendency of either getting TOO excited for a potential storm or cliff-diving from run to run. The experienced mets know not to do that, and I feel their presence would help calm these overreactions.

4) I’m not a fan of sub-sections, but me being from NC might affect that. If I lived in AL, I may feel differently. I will say that one issue subforums won’t solve is a sense of geographic tension which will ALWAYS be a thing. You see that now at times between the Carolinas and AL/GA in a broad sense. But you’d see it also within subforums if they were created. A Carolinas forum would have a NC vs SC tension for example. An NC forum would have potential Triangle vs CLT area divide. You see my point..

SD's suggestion about having sub-forums for specific events may be a good compromise BTW..

5) Yes

6) The rules are clear. Your issue is that sometimes they may not be enforced as equally among members, which is not a southernwx issue, that's an everywhere issue. That emboldens the troublemakers to argue and push limits.

7) I access predominantly from a laptop (that’s why I’m a little wordy sometimes, lol), but also from my phone.

8) I like the obs in the storm thread, and am honestly baffled that some consider it a big issue. In my opinion, the bigger problem in storm threads is the inevitable amount of noise from posters that put out information that’s either not helpful (or repetitive) or bantery as it gets closer. That’s not a knock against the mods, who I know are having to delete/move many posts. I’m just saying that I don’t feel the obs are that disruptive at all compared to other potential disruption, and in fact are mostly useful. Keep them!

Finally, it may be useful to merge in Tropical Weather into the main weather forum. I honestly forgot it was there.
 
Shawn said:
The reason why we do not have direct upload of raw video (right now) comes down to storage space. Once we start getting our attachments offloaded onto another source other than the actual server itself.. we will be able to enable it.. along with allowing larger upload sizes for gifs etc
Click to expand...
Yeah that’s is probably the biggest quality of life change I can see happening to the site. Having to crop images to fit the upload size limit and all that jazz is very much a hassle sometimes but it sounds like eventually we will get this fix ?? Thanks
 
YetAnotherRDUGuy said:
Alright, I'll try to answer the questionaire, but keep it from getting tl;dr (but not making any promises).

1) The site strikes the right combination of serious weather discussion and having fun. As Mac mentioned earlier, the site is also more welcoming than others to new members. It’s easier to break into the conversation here. That is extremely important to growing an online community.

You also have a great mix of people who enjoy the weather and (for the most part) click together. Different regions, ages, etc. Each has their own strengths. You’ve got people great at pattern recognition, and others better at finer details (for example). Stuff like that..

3) Need more certified mets. The ones here are great. The non-mets who know their stuff are great too. It’s just sometimes good to have one around to keep us grounded. We have a tendency of either getting TOO excited for a potential storm or cliff-diving from run to run. The experienced mets know not to do that, and I feel their presence would help calm these overreactions.

4) I’m not a fan of sub-sections, but me being from NC might affect that. If I lived in AL, I may feel differently. I will say that one issue subforums won’t solve is a sense of geographic tension which will ALWAYS be a thing. You see that now at times between the Carolinas and AL/GA in a broad sense. But you’d see it also within subforums if they were created. A Carolinas forum would have a NC vs SC tension for example. An NC forum would have potential Triangle vs CLT area divide. You see my point..

SD's suggestion about having sub-forums for specific events may be a good compromise BTW..

5) Yes

6) The rules are clear. Your issue is that sometimes they may not be enforced as equally among members, which is not a southernwx issue, that's an everywhere issue. That emboldens the troublemakers to argue and push limits.

7) I access predominantly from a laptop (that’s why I’m a little wordy sometimes, lol), but also from my phone.

8) I like the obs in the storm thread, and am honestly baffled that some consider it a big issue. In my opinion, the bigger problem in storm threads is the inevitable amount of noise from posters that put out information that’s either not helpful (or repetitive) or bantery as it gets closer. That’s not a knock against the mods, who I know are having to delete/move many posts. I’m just saying that I don’t feel the obs are that disruptive at all compared to other potential disruption, and in fact are mostly useful. Keep them!

Finally, it may be useful to merge in Tropical Weather into the main weather forum. I honestly forgot it was there.
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In regard to #3, I’d wager there are a few more around than we realize ;)
 
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