Having checked out the Beta for the new version of Photo.net. . .

[Tim_Lookingbill]

<p>Bob, this is the first beta test I've ever done on anything code related. My graphics background made me react to the look and design of the site. I understand the PN administration's priority on beta testing for functionality over form.</p>

<p>I see character in the current Photo.net that's made it different from all the other sites like an old friend "The Continental" donning a pipe and smoking jacket switching to haute couture only it's the same suit everyone else is wearing and thus somewhat losing its character of distinction.</p>

<p>It's got to be done. I'm seeing a lot of form and function updating of other media outlets happening currently especially Time Warner Cable's switching to all digital and offering those without digital boxes a free converter and promising better picture and sound. Scrolling the program menu with my remote has picked up speed considerably.</p>

[mhahn]

<p>http://www.qa.aws.photo.net/photo/15119956/p1013267%252C-adj-%2528adj-feb-2012%2529%252C-smaller</p>

<p>So what is a "vibe score"? For instance, the above picture on the beta site has a "vibe score" of 96.</p>

<p>And it has 5 "admires"? What are they?</p>

<p>Do vibe scores and admires exist in Photo Net now?<br>

---------------<br>

Grumpy middle-aged man here again: So when I first sign in on the beta site, I see a picture of . . . bubbles. Why should I want to see bubbles when I sign in, for god's sake?!</p>

[mhahn]

<p>And where is the "most recently submitted photo for critique" on the beta site? Honestly, it is grumpy middle-aged man's favorite aspect of Photo Net, as currently constituted, to be able to post pictures and see them, however fleetingly, on the home page.</p>

[Doug Obert]

<p>Martin,<br>

Since nobody has answered your questions in many hours, I'll take a stab at them.</p>

<p>1. Vibe. NO idea, wondered about that one myself.</p>

<p>2. Admire. I'm "guessing" it's what it says. Somebody admires it, similar to a facebook "like".</p>

<p>3. No, they don't exist now on PN.</p>

<p>Your second unanswered post. Photo.net 2.0 is NOT "live". As I understand it, it's not even really in beta form yet. Pre-beta if you will. Only "some of us" get to see and use it. With that in mind, submitting a photo for critique (if it's even possible) would be pretty much pointless, IMO </p>

 

[GerrySiegel]

I still would like a brief laundry list of the accepted recommendations from past surveys and recent bitch lists that have been judged useful and will be adopted in the updates, now and in the offing....Why? That would provide to the simple minded but pure of heart like some of us a guidepost for evaluating the look and the feel of any beta proposal.

 

Now any change is applaudable since the well has been getting dry of some time and now it looks like rain... Change aimed at what is keeping so many smart folks from getting more engaged is surely the goal, am I wrong or half right?. That is the grail surely . We will not nitpic graphics or maybe we will. Or try to crash the site. I leave that to the site wonks and I am sure there will be many that have such skill.

 

I trust this will be read as constructive and encouraging, Glenn. As intended. I will be around when the beta goes up as well and after the dry run...best and aloha to all back in beantown. -g-

[Laura Weishaupt]

<p>Martin,<br>

If you post an image for critique on the beta site you'll see it on the entire top page of the critique section. If you look under the "Explore" tab, you'll see "Seeking Critique" Go there. The most recent image submitted fills the page. Scroll down and you'll see others. No, they don't seem to make it to the front page, but the entire top of a page......does that do anything for grumpy mid aged manhood?</p>

<p>No idea what "vibe" score is. I've asked and not gotten an answer. Social media influence perhaps? No one seems to know. It doesn't feel left over from the 60's when we knew what good or bad vibes were.<br>

Agree with Doug, "Admires" may be similar to "likes", whatever they are. I recall many comments in the past where folks expressed a desire for a "like" button on posts. Maybe it's a way to express an anonymous opinion without words.<br>

The bubbles are at the top of my portfolio. I'd like to be able to put the image of my choosing there and maybe that's in the future. Maybe they had to put something in that space and bubbles seemed appropriate.<br>

<br />It's good to be able to kick the tires on the new site, whether alpha or beta. It's a positive sign that something is in the works.</p>

<p>A question about images posted on the beta site. Is there a size limit. If so, what is it? It would be helpful to know. Thanks.</p>

 

[Laura Weishaupt]

<p>Martin,<br>

I just figured out how to get rid of the bubbles. In the portfolio view, hover the mouse over the blue box with belt buckles. Don't click on the photo, just make that blue box open. You'll see an option to "Set Photo Cover". Click on that and the photo will replace the bubbles. YEAH!</p>

[anthea50]

<p>+ Laura, well said.</p>

<p>I am wondering (and of course this would mean more work for the elves, sorry) if it would not be prudent for Glen or someone on the team to make up a quick survey so that most of the feedback can be more clearly appraised. After reading all the posts I think most folks would appreciate a simple way to give their comments and suggestions, but could just my research background influencing me.</p>

<p>For myself, I would agree it is quite Flickr or Viewbug like, but maybe that's what photogs expect these days. I made PN my home back in 2009 and I have no intention of shifting house. What I really like is the ability to see how many views and comments my images have received, especially after posting an image for critique. That's a HUGE improvement over the current system. I will be sending my feedback to Glenn when I can get my head around it all a bit better.</p>

[Doug Obert]

<p>Thanks for clearing things up for us Laura! I've only been looking around on a test account Glenn "graciously" set up for me because I'm an idiot! My word NOT Glenn's! I am patiently waiting for a reset to occur so I can "do" things on the site.<br>

The bubbles would not be my choice for the photo in that spot, but they don't bug me too bad. I can't see any "blue box with belt buckles" anywhere. I've hovered over everything else and don't come up with a "Set Photo Cover". I'm guessing I just don't have that with this test account...I can wait! :-)</p>

 

[mhahn]

<p>Will I have a home page, with a list of all my galleries, as I do now? That's a basic feature that I think is needed and that I don't see in the beta version.</p>

<p>And when I scroll through the thumbnail-size images in a gallery, I see rectangular crops of each picture, which I personally find incredibly annoying.</p>

<p>Please tell us that we will each have a home page similar to what we have now and that thumbnail images will not be cropped.</p>

<p>Laura, I tried to follow your advice, but maybe I'm just not a good mouse hoverer. I didn't find a way to change the bubbles to something else. But you did it, so I guess it can be done.</p>

<p> </p>

[Laura Weishaupt]

<p>Here is a screen shot of the blue box (they look like belts with buckles to me). This is on the Portfolio page, not on the Gallery page. Hope this helps.<br>

The same blue box in Gallery doesn't have the same capability. Hopefully that will be fixed. We should be able to submit to critique from within a gallery.</p><div></div>

[Doug Obert]

<p>I think I've figured out why Martin and I can't change the "bubble" photo. Laura's screen shot looks like she's uploaded some of her photos to the new site. I have NOT...therefore there is nothing to change it to?</p>

[G-P]

<p>"set cover photo" is the function that will change the bubbles out into your own personalized background using the photo you have chosen. </p>

[G-P]

<p>Hi all - i am drafting a FAQ to help answer all/most questions all at once. Please send any questions you have to me directly - if you have a question that is frequently asked question it will be addressed through the FAQ - if its not a FAQ, then I will try to respond to you directly. </p>

[Laura Weishaupt]

<p>Actually, no, photos weren't added to beta, they were already there, just as they are in the current site.</p>

<p>Glenn, I think the FAQ is a good idea.</p>

[G-P]

<p>I don't want you to think I'm ignoring your questions - I'm working on a FAQ to address all frequently asked questions. We will have a mouse over explanation of Vibe soon....but Vibe score is a numerical representation of the amount of attention the photo is garnering on photo.net taking into account all components of engagement for a photo. Certain components are weighted heavier than others, so a view is not equal to a comment or critique or a admire or favorite. So if a photo has a high number of views, admires, comments, critiques, favorites, etc it will score higher. A vibe score of 99 means its in the top 1% of photos garnering attention on photo.net. We will be recording the peak vibe scores and displaying. All soon to be former ratings have been converted into admires under the following scale - a 7 under the old rating system will be a full admire in 2.0, a 6 rating is a .75 of an admire, a 5 is a half of an admire...and so on. Trending (under the explore tab_ allows all uploads (not private photos) a 3 day stage to get exposure - the more views, comments, admires favorites it gets it goes higher on the trending page. 3 days is something we can make longer or shorter depending on how it tests out. If we start getting 50000 uploads a day we will have to shorten that time period and change how the components are weighted. Working on FAQ - please feel free to send questions to me. </p>

[Doug Obert]

<p>Thanks for the clarification Laura! There are NO photos anywhere on my "test account" (other than the bubble picture) Glenn setup for me to "look around" (Glenn's words) I also don't see "set cover photo" anywhere. NO BIG DEAL...honestly! I'll just wait for the reset to occur in another week or two so I can use my real account. It was "my" mistake and I'll live with it! :-) </p>

[MichaelChang]

<p>This version appears to load a little faster than the previous one from about a year ago which was excruciatingly slow; or is it simply due to Windows 10.<br>

I have found the site to be more cluttered with superfluous information and text I don't want to see, and more difficult to construct a mental map of the site so that I can always know where I am. <br>

I can browse for an hour and still not feel like I've gotten a sense of what Photo.net is about, and part of this is because I have no means of quickly seeing members associated with content - it takes effort, and one has to deal with the slow loading. <br>

To be honest, if I was a new user, I'd probably give up pretty quickly because the site isn't offering me any sense of affinity toward it, and at today's fast pace everyone expects, I suspect few are going to have the patience to develop the affinity on their own over days.</p>

<p>What I'd like to see is something more streamlined and compacted so I can see more in less time, and experience a painless process in exploring the thousands of users and their content.<br>

Oddly enough, the new site has made me appreciate the site we're currently on even more because I can access content quickly, so in my view, maybe a marriage of the old site with a "prettied up" interface is all that's required, or even preferred. </p>

<p> </p>

[Tim_Lookingbill]

<blockquote>

<p>Vibe score is a numerical representation of the amount of attention the photo is garnering on photo.net taking into account all components of engagement for a photo. Certain components are weighted heavier than others, so a view is not equal to a comment or critique or a admire or favorite. So if a photo has a high number of views, admires, comments, critiques, favorites, etc it will score higher.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>This is really cool, but I wonder if it will turn photo appreciation on PN into a sport where too much focus is placed on the score numbers. I think a comment/critique should be considered the heaviest weighted component since it shows there is a real human taking an interest in the photo over clicking on of buttons by anonymous folks.</p>

<p>I do hope though a similar graphic depicting a collection of appreciation buttons accompanies photos uploaded in discussion forums even if they are instructional or to demonstrate a technical issue. Lula has a click counter for such images that at least indicates if anyone is benefiting or even interested in the sample or instruction based image.</p>

[anthea50]

<p>I've just changed my profile pic and it was very easy. Thanks again Laura for the screen shot!</p>

[G-P]

<p>@Michael - Thank you for your thoughts. <br>

Speed it should/will dramatically improve once we go live as there will be more horsepower behind it. Try not to judge too harshly based on current speed of pre-beta site although I know its hard. </p>

<p>Navigation - We have feedback from new users on current site that our current navigation is overwhelming in that there are just too many choices in terms of where to go. We would agree that a power user of current site will know exactly where to go to get what they need because they are higher on the learning curve, however we have found that for new users on current site that curve is longer than it should be. Simplified & Streamlined - We have taken 9 tabs on current site to 3 tabs in 2.0. </p>

<p>Explore Tab - The goal of the explore tab is to help you find the photos that you what you want quickly. In 2.0 you can find quickly recent uploads from the entire community by going to either Explore>browse by category>recent photos OR Trending which is a 3 day stage for all public photos. As of now, on our current site your photo does not make the gallery (therefore gets little to no exposure) unless you make available for ratings or critiques. In 2.0 if you make it public (which is the default) and categorize it, you will get significantly more exposure as defined by views, admires, favorites, comments, critiques, etc. This exposure is the catalyst for meaningful discussions - creating connections, learning from peers - as we put it on the home page - discover, develop and discuss photography. </p>

<p>Learn tab is where our articles will reside and our plan there is to still generate original content BUT also to curate articles from other well known sources, which we will be able to do much easier on the new CMS (content management system). We believe this will be a huge plus for our community! </p>

<p>Community Tab/Forums - we are bringing over every single word ever written in our forums so the archive will exist.</p>

<p>Last but not least "member center" which is where you will manage your account from A-Z. Here in addition to viewing, editing and uploading to your own portfolio, you can easily find recent uploads of photographers you follow (ones that inspire you, that you've made friendships with etc), but also put your photography on the critique stage (again easily found off Explore Tab - "seeking critiques"). To start subscribers will have a max of 20 photos they can put up on stage for critiques, they can swap out critique requests so if one photo is not getting the kind of activity they were seeking, they can replace it with another photo they want critiques from the community on. Our goal was to we keep the "seeking critique" stage fresh with a ever evolving supply of photography that we can all learn from and become more enlightened photographers. Learning from your peers is central to what photo.net all about and we feel as though again - this speaks to our messaging of discover, develop and discuss as found on the home page. </p>

<p>I don't know if this helps but thought I'd share some of our thoughts on current site versus 2.0 in the hope that you can see 2.0 through the eyes of the people that will be building photo.net hopefully for many years to come. Oh can't forget - and iOs and Android apps coming in v2.1 so you can enjoy photo.net across all screens! That was not possible on our current platform, however it is in 2.0+. </p>

[Norma Desmond]

<p><em>Radical (or not-so-radical) idea:</em></p>

<p>Make some area for visibility of photos with fewest "admires" and lowest scores. Those are the photographers who will likely benefit most from visibility and the comments that come from such visibility. Also, since popularity (high scores) doesn't often correlate with good photography, some of the lowest scorers will be the most interesting and innovative photos. I know I'd be much more likely to want to look at photographers that are NOT popular than photographers that are, so setting aside at least a corner for the non-popular might be a really good idea, not in terms of mass appeal and typical contest-like numerology but in terms of interesting potential for growth and for seeing stuff that's more outside the mainstream.</p>

[Doug Obert]

<p>I like that idea a LOT, Fred!</p>

[G-P]

<p>@Fred - those will be easy to find in one of a few places - 1.) Explore>trending which will be home to all new uploads of public photos for time period TBD but to start 3 days and then by 2.) easily sorting by date by vibe in Explore>BrowseByCategory>Recent Images. but also 3.) if you find a photographer you have not come across before that peaks your interest - you can easily sort their entire portfolio by date, views, vibe, comments, favorites and admires - both most to least and least to most.</p>

[gordonjb]

<p>Glenn, will it also be possible to sort 1.) & 2.) both most to least and least to most ?</p>