Subforum Split?

[księżycowy]

An idea has been tossed around in which this subforum could be split up into several smaller subforums on a linguistic, rather than as a geographic basis. I'm curious what the general feeling is on this from those of you who frequent this forum.

The proposed split would create subforums for the following families: Algic, Iroquoian, Na-Dene, Siouan, Salishan, Eskimo-Aleut. A general NAIL forum would still exist as both a place for those languages that don't fall into these groups, and as a potential general meeting place for those of us learning NAILs.

So, my question to y'all is, what are your thoughts on this proposal?

Typical poll rules: It'll be given a week for responses. If "I don't care" ties or wins, it'll default to the other tied option (or second place), and all votes for yes will be weighed against all the no votes.

If you select "Yes - but I have another idea" you must comment below or it won't count!

Please feel free to give your comments, questions and concerns below.

[aaakknu]

For me, either way is fine.

I've changed my vote three times.

Firstly, I voted for the split. But then I thought it might not be very good idea, because we cannot create separate forums for smaller languages or isolates. Also, there are several people interested in Native American languages, but we are interested in different languages/families. Currently, there are several people participating in this subforum. But if we split it, there may be one person per each new forum, and talking to oneself is not fun. Whereas here all the people interested in any NAIL can communicate. We can always split the forum later, when more people become in NAILs or more new members register. But at the moment I do not see such a need. Because of these reasons, I changed my vote to "keep the NAIL forum".

Later, I changed my vote to "I have another idea", because I thought it would be cool to have an Eskimo-Aleut forum. But, on the other hand, I do not have much time to participate actively on that forum at the moment, and I'm afraid that in this case it will be very quiet.

But my final vote is "I don't care", because I think the NAIL forum is good as it is, but if it is splited, it will have one advantage: the threads about languages I am interested in will be easier to find.

[księżycowy]

As a mod -

All I know, by the way, is I am very much in favor of splitting up the NAIL forum. My "specialty" (if one can even call it a specialty) is in Iroquoian language. Where as I have dabbled a bit in random other NAILs, and am willing to help people find resources and other non-linguistic things, I am no help to people otherwise. I don't say this not as a negative outlook on myself, but rather was a fact.

I know Northern Iroquoian languages. But that doesn't mean that 1. The other languages encompassed by the NAIL subforum shouldn't have a home, 2. Nor am I unwilling to help anyone with any of the proposed language family subforums.(I'm not sure if I should mod any of these forums, but we don't have mods for every forum already, so....idk. Yes, I agree we should ideally have mods for every subforum, but this isn't a perfect world.)

I just think that we should play to the mods strengths, not make it something were people assume I know Lakota and be able to help them, for example.

I will add that I dream of one day learning other NAILs outside of the Iroquoian languages, but I don't know if/when that would happen. I have other priorities (and languages) to deal with first.

As a user - I think this would make languages more visible, and de-clutter a lot of these larger subforums.

TL;DR - I am very much in favor of a split.

[vijayjohn]

Uh-oh, I guess I'm too late.

[księżycowy]

If it's any consolation, I doubt one vote would have changed much of anything.

Feel free to share your thoughts though.

Just cause the poll is done doesn't mean we can't discuss it anymore.

[Koko]

I thought that maybe the split would be good, but I feel like there's not enough people interested in the same languages/language families for enough traffic in the subsequent forums. So I ultimately voted against.

As a user - I think this would make languages more visible, and de-clutter a lot of these larger subforums.

The point about making more languages visible is a very good point though. There are so many languages that don't get a lot of attention and giving them more visibility would mean a lot.

[vijayjohn]

I'm in favor of a split in theory, especially if we're going to have languages outside North America split up by language family (it would only seem fair to have this one split up in that case, too...). It seems as if a lot of people are concerned about traffic, though - probably more so than I'd think to be.

[księżycowy]

I mean, let's face it, the forum isn't as active as it used to be. But so what?

Does it really kill anything to have a bunch of "dead" forums at this point?

[vijayjohn]

I'm going to have to leave that question to somebody else to answer because I don't have a strong viewpoint on that and haven't been convinced by the answer I've seen so far.

[księżycowy]

I'm curious what answer your referencing.

[vijayjohn]

viewtopic.php?f=9&t=52635&start=420#p1103158 (to which I responded that I wasn't convinced)

[księżycowy]

Ah, thanks for refreshing my memory.

[vijayjohn]

To be fair, especially in light of the poll in this thread and some of the comments over on the general forum renaming/reworking thread, I'm starting to get the impression that people do care more about forum traffic than I might have thought. So I might have been wrong on that point at least.

[Koko]

Yeah i'm caring less about traffic as i think about it more. I feel like i'd be sorta kinda mostly responsible for keeping the Algic language forum somewhat alive Which would be sorta motivation for keeping on top of Cree.

And about being lonely in the subforums, well, there'd still be a general NAIL forum for the other language families and as a possible hub since games would be pretty dead in the subforums.

[księżycowy]

Yeah i'm caring less about traffic as i think about it more. I feel like i'd be sorta kinda mostly responsible for keeping the Algic language forum somewhat alive Which would be sorta motivation for keeping on top of Cree.

I feel the same say about Iroquoian.

And about being lonely in the subforums, well, there'd still be a general NAIL forum for the other language families and as a possible hub since games would be pretty dead in the subforums.

I agree, and I think the same about the games. They'd have to stay in the general NAIL forum. There's no way that we could consistently keep them going in any language (family) specific forums.

I'd like to ask those of you who voted "no" who haven't shared their thoughts to do so, please. I think it would go a long way towards the conversation that me and Vijay are having in the info subforum.

[vijayjohn]

Yeah i'm caring less about traffic as i think about it more. I feel like i'd be sorta kinda mostly responsible for keeping the Algic language forum somewhat alive Which would be sorta motivation for keeping on top of Cree.

I'd definitely be doing Lnuismk there. I would keep Michif in the general NAIL forum, though, since it's a mixed language. That would guarantee that both an Algic forum and the general one would get some traffic since I go through my TAC on a regular (albeit slow) basis.

[aaakknu]

Yeah i'm caring less about traffic as i think about it more. I feel like i'd be sorta kinda mostly responsible for keeping the Algic language forum somewhat alive Which would be sorta motivation for keeping on top of Cree.

I feel the same say about Iroquoian.

And I will keep alive the Eskimo-Aleut forum.

And about being lonely in the subforums, well, there'd still be a general NAIL forum for the other language families and as a possible hub since games would be pretty dead in the subforums.

So we're not going to get rid of the general NAIL forum? If it so, I have nothing against spliting it.

[księżycowy]

The plan was never to get rid of a general NAIL forum. Rather the general NAIL forum would be for general discussion, games, and languages that didn't fit into any of the split off language families.

[Massimiliano B]

So we're not going to get rid of the general NAIL forum? If it so, I have nothing against splitting it.

This is also my position. I thought that "split up this forum" would mean to get rid of the general NAIL forum.

[księżycowy]

I'm starting to sense a pattern here.

Would anyone like to disrupt my train of thought?