I spent half an hour this morning writing a post that IMO couldn’t be considered anything but constructive feedback, only for it to be deleted with no explanation of why. The community guidelines don’t seem to mention that feedback on how this forum is ran (and on the forum software) is unwanted and subject to summary deletion, so I’m a bit confused.
I didn’t see the post, but please realize that this forum is dedicated to Coding and Development Using Corvid. You can share your thoughts with the Wix support team and they will pass on your feedback to the Corvid Community Team.
Well, quite. My feedback is aimed at promoting exactly that. I managed to save half of my post because I still had a tab open in which I’d viewed it. I apologise for not following your above direction, but I feel if I did that there’s every chance I’d not hear anything back and I’m trying to evaluate whether I’d like to continue posting here. That isn’t supposed to be a melodramatic threat - I’m sure nobody cares all that much either way - I’ve just found the below issue frustrating for a while. So here is the post again:
IMO too many threads are getting locked.
There are a few contributors that routinely reply to new threads by telling the OP that they should have searched the forum and will link to (usually) relevant older threads. That’s fine and these members are obviously making positive contributions.
But if you follow their advice and search for older posts, or just click their links, you best not reply, because that’ll result in the thread getting locked.
So either every post that hasn’t received a reply in a month should be automatically locked (I don’t think so), or volunteer moderators should exercise more discretion when locking threads. We can’t build better threads to which we can link or for people to find if building on existing threads is stymied at every turn. It’s also a question of searching for well-ranked threads on Google and being unable to reply to them. I’m slightly less bothered about locking when people wade into old threads and request help, but if we’re offering advice I don’t see how a lock is warranted.
I’ve seen Wix employees go back to dozens of long-abandoned threads at once and update each one with the same new information (on the release of a new feature). It’s funny how discretion was exercised in that case.
Hey Lee,
Thanks for taking the time to bring this up. It’s clear you are invested here - This post alone is a testament to your involvement. - So, firstly, Thank you.
II will jump in - I see a few points here. 1: Old Thread bumping, 2: Locking threads, and 3: Rule Sharing / Etiquette
Thread Bumping: What we, as the community moderator team, experience is folks googling an issue and getting brought into the forum via a post. The reply is usually “I have this problem also”, which of course does not add value to the post. I’m not saying this is what you are doing - I’m simply stating what I see daily. These replies get locked immediately - as they should. The behavior we wish to encourage is searching and discovering for personal growth. The correct way to engage with a new post is to title it appropriately, reference any forum posts you might have read, and distinguish the difference between the new post and the answered post. If we do it this way THAT post becomes interesting and it evolves and references other closed threads so the next reader gets multiple links to community-sourced answers.
Locking Threads: The clear criteria for locking a thread, in my opinion, is any thread that doesn’t make sense in the title. HELP, or NOT WORKING - These do not add value because they cannot be searched effectively. The appropriate way to lock/delete threads is to get a response from a moderator as to WHY the thread is being locked/deleted - and the thread is to remain for 3 days and then it will be deleted. (Again, not accusing you of this behavior - Just making the moderation rules clear) This brings me to 3, Rule Sharing.
Your feedback is very valuable and appreciated by me personally. I will recommend to the team that when threads are closed we present 1: Why it was locked, and 2: How to post properly. As long as we stay between those lines the forum will continue to become more and more valuable to all of us. Again - Thanks Lee. Oh, and reach out to me anytime. 
Thank you for the reply Brett. It was exactly what I was looking for.
If you’ll indulge me, I’m going to share some more of my thoughts. I don’t expect it’ll change all that much - there’s no reason it should since I’m just one minor stakeholder and I’ve only been contributing for a relatively short time, but hopefully it can’t hurt.
It exemplifies a routine half a dozen long-standing contributors (who are otherwise beyond reproach - I don’t mean to single out GOS here) have fallen into, where their default reply is simply to parrot the documentation. Having spent time on many online technical forums for well over a decade, I fully understand what the ideal thread requesting help looks like and how you’re supposed to detail the steps and research you’ve completed so far. As we all know, in the real world these ideal threads are very few and far between.
Damn, I didn’t realise this was GOS again. Honestly this isn’t an attack on him - not least because he’s far from the only one that does this!
https://www.wix.com/corvid/forum/community-discussion/bug-access-control-allow-origin-not-being-sent
Here the same thing happens to me, where the issue isn’t mine, but a now-fixed bug in Corvid that another poster later comes along to verify. It’s frustrating enough that major parts of Corvid can essentially go offline for days at a time, multiples times within the space of a few weeks. It’s doubly frustrating when you take the time to investigate and diagnose the issue and write a barebones test case that illustrates the bug and you’re STILL told to RTFM as if you were lazy and clueless. I have heard that you’re working to improve the bug reporting process.
I fully appreciate that a reply that demonstrates there are people here reading posts and are willing to help and engage is better than no response at all. And a single post to double check the OP has indeed read the documentation doesn’t hurt anyone. My main point here isn’t to criticise the good work of my fellow contributors. It’s to demonstrate that locking a thread closes the door to people like me who are more interested in solving the problems brought to us, regardless of an absence of expertise or preparedness on the part of the submitters.
No doubt there are submitters who cannot or could barely code “hello world” and essentially request that we develop entire websites for them. I understand the need to discourage this and specifically the intent that this is a community for coders to learn more about Corvid. However, I think there are basic requests such as “How do I hide an element on the click of a button?” that we could solve with code examples rather than shunting people off to the documentation. We often tell people to RTM, or pay someone, when neither of those things are considered an option by the submitter. The result is their web site isn’t as good as they’d like and Wix as a brand/customer experience is ever so slightly hurt each time.
This forum has grown to the point where Wix staff can’t be expected to read and respond to every thread. That’s perfectly fine. We’re still a long way from being big enough where rigid moderation is called for IMO. Many of you will likely be familiar with all the moderation activity that occurs on StackOverflow. You’ll know how moderation can turn off people stumbling in to ask for help. To some extent, that’s the point. Passers-by don’t create enduring resources. But moderation can turn off the people in the trenches also. Just saying.
One reason you feel the need to lock threads is because of spam. The forum software itself is deficient in this regard. When a spam post is deleted, the thread’s last modified time (on which the topic list is sorted) should be returned to the time of the most recent remaining post. That way people don’t stumble into old threads and reply as if they’re current. I imagine you’re aware of this and fixing up the forum software just takes time.
Another strand of my frustration is that I felt shut out of Wix Arena. I recall reading that applications to join were closed. Here I am donating dozens of hours of my spare time helping strangers, and it felt like there was a group of moderators locking threads, signposting people towards the Arena. This prevented me from helping for free or bidding to help for money. Surely some of the mods doing this are themselves in the Arena and this left a bad taste – it is a conflict of interest. As I say, this was just a feeling I had, not an alleged conspiracy on your part. We have >60 Wix subscriptions and I’m confident we could successfully complete projects that I know from this forum Arena members are charging for and failing to deliver. After a productive conversation with a Corvid product marketing manager yesterday, I now understand that applications are open and have since applied.
As for deleting threads from regulars offering constructive criticism and destroying their work in the process, well, I ‘d like to think I don’t even need to argue why that’s bad. This “Community Discussion” forum has room for community discussion. That’s a fact.
Full disclosure: I have experience of being a top contributor on a StackExchange site (to the point where I received a second round of physical merch based entirely on my contributions before the first round) but became disillusioned around the time mods were selected (I didn’t apply). It’s entirely possible I just have a personal issue with the enforcement of rules or at least the abruptness of locked threads in general. In the StackEchange case I abdicated my opportunity to speak up and, if not shape policy, have my voice heard. This time I have not.
I do spend time administrating and moderating forums also. I know what it’s like when some genius who lacks the full facts posts a thread like this. So yeah, I probably should have reached out sooner to say what had been bothering me.
Thank you for reading.
While I appreciate the concern I would like to remind you that this is still a Corvid forum for Corvid issues, not a general area to air your grievances about your Wix Arena Application.
As far as the below goes:
We often tell people to RTM, or pay someone, when neither of those things are considered an option by the submitter. The result is their web site isn’t as good as they’d like and Wix as a brand/customer experience is ever so slightly hurt each time
Corvid is an open source development platform and the user is responsible for their own code at the end of the day no matter how small or big the task is.
You are attacking Community Mods by saying we charge clients in the Arena and are failing to deliver. I don’t understand what is your intention here. Are you interested in making the forum a better place, just diss on us Moderators or are you looking for a place to vent?
How did you reach the conclusion that the Mods who are also in the Arena are charging people and failing to deliver. I see that you have mentioned on your profile that you are full time web developer at a Wix based agency so are you simply taking this opportunity to promote yourself?
Since you are not part of the arena I do not think you understand how it works. The arena assigns clients on an algorithm, us referring them to the Arena does not mean we get the project. I am in the Arena too but I hardly take projects from there as my main project flow comes from organic sources so no matter how many times we refer someone to the Arena it does not mean we do it for ourselves.
As far as locking old thread goes, this was implemented as a Community wide discussion where the opinions of the masses are preferred over a few and contrary to me feeling the same way like you on this topic its not something that is going to change by criticizing us Mods.
Your above comment started off very constructively but then you just dive into promoting yourself.
I would request you to keep further discussions related to Corvid.
Thank you for editing your reply and unlocking the thread.
Firstly I must apologise as there is definitely some misunderstanding here. I’m certainly not accusing any moderator of anything like that. I was explicit in stating that the locking of threads gives me this feeling of injustice. I don’t actually believe there is anything nefarious going on at a surface level. I would also assume on the balance of probabilities that the people failing to deliver in the Arena are different people to the community moderators here.
I don’t wish to patronise, but you seem like competent coders and the dedication to community involvement also speaks for itself.
I don’t have any grievances about any Wix Arena applications. I applied for the first time barely 24 hours ago. My intention - and again I’ll acknowledge that my post was rushed and unclear - was to open up a discussion about the fairness of Wix profiting (if only in principle if not financially) from our free labour on these forums but excluding us (me?) from the Arena process. You needn’t point out that we knowingly give our time for free with no strings attached. This was a fairly moot point from the outset as I thought Arena applications had been closed for many months. Apparently I was mistaken.
I’m not promoting myself either. I know that my actions here if anything serve the opposite purpose. I’m clearly not making any friends and that is genuinely regrettable. Believe it or not, I’d sooner become more involved in this forum than make a buck.
And that’s the point. I must have missed this community-wide discussion. If I was aware that such a thing had taken place I might not feel the way I do about the locking of threads. I suspected such discussions had taken place behind closed doors. Think about this from my perspective. I had no idea a community discussion had taken place and now for some reason we’ve reached a point where (meta) community discussion is literally forbidden in a forum with that exact name. StackOverflow (of which I am fond) is the quintessential example of a forum that is heavily moderated and they wouldn’t for a second entertain the idea of forbidding community discussion. I find the very narrow focus (“strictly Corvid code only!”) baffling, inexplicable, strange, alien to any comparable forum I have experience with. But if that’s what you’ve all agreed, fine.
As a result of this thread I’ve made outside contact with Brett and I can now go to him if I have something to say and present it in a more considered manner than I have done today. That we’re supposed to go to third party websites to establish contact with authority figures is also alien to me. Maybe that’s a result of forum software limitations or maybe I have a lot to learn about how contacts are made in business.
Lastly, can I ask where we are supposed to discuss this forum software? Copy and pasting code doesn’t work properly and that seems rather strange also.
My intention - and again I’ll acknowledge that my post was rushed and unclear - was to open up a discussion about the fairness of Wix profiting (if only in principle if not financially) from our free labour on these forums but excluding us (me?) from the Arena process. You needn’t point out that we knowingly give our time for free with no strings attached. This was a fairly moot point from the outset as I thought Arena applications have been closed for many months.
Wix is a company and similar to others they have team members and departments handling different sectors of their products. The team responsible for the Arena & the one behind Corvid are 2 different entities so while I understand where you are coming from on this, the Arena team might not be aware of your contributions to this forum.
Apart from that I know for a fact that the Arena has been closed for a while so if it has been reopened recently like you said I wish you all the best for that.
My advice: Do not contribute to this forum and expect something in return. If you really enjoy helping others keep doing it and due time your contribution will be recognized.
And that’s the point. I must have missed this community-wide discussion. If I was aware that such a thing had taken place I might not feel the way I do about the locking of threads. I suspected such discussions had taken place behind closed doors.
You are correct, the discussions were held by a select group and it was not open to the Community here but I really like the idea of having open discussions and with more members like you the open discussions will make more sense moving forward.
Think about this from my perspective. I had no idea a community discussion had taken place and now for some reason we’ve reached a point where (meta) community discussion is literally forbidden in a forum with that exact name. StackOverflow (of which I am fond) is the quintessential example of a forum that is heavily moderated and they wouldn’t for a second entertain the idea of forbidding community discussion. I find the very narrow focus (“strictly Corvid code only!”) baffling, inexplicable, strange, alien to any comparable forum I have experience with. But if that’s what you’ve all agreed, fine.
I agree, this is what was happening until now but today a new version of the forum was released. See my screenshot below, now you can open Discussions with Community Members.
Lastly, can I ask where we are supposed to discuss this forum software? Copy and pasting code doesn’t work properly and that seems rather strange also.
Currently there is no bug reporting system in place but open up a Question with [BUG] in your title and someone from the Wix team may notice it and send it for evaluation.