Keep dead threads alive somehow to save the Idea Exchange!

[SteenSchmidt]

Motivated by the comments to this idea I'll try to submit a suggestion to somehow save old lingering, almost dead, ideas. This isn't limited to the LabVIEW Idea Exchange, but there is no "Ideas General" topic, and it is an idea . Here goes...

When posting an idea it's quite demotivating to so often just being pointed to a "similar" idea that is several years old and often hasn't gotten any obvious attention from NI back then. Sure, that old thread might touch on something similar, and it would be wise to put the old and the new idea under the same umbrella somehow, to not fragment the Idea Exchange. But, LV versions and abilities have probably changed in the meantime, and the new idea often hasn't been discussed in the years old thread. Of course one could have posted in the old thread anyway, but usually in discussion boards threads are deemed dead when they haven't received any updates for 2 years or more. My hunch is that a new post, however novel, would just drown there, so it isn't worth the effort. Too much of that and I won't be posting anymore here. Enough of that, and the Idea Exchange will die eventually.

I suggest that NI somehow mark "interesting" threads so they can live a life outside of limbo. Not "Declined" nor "In development", but maybe "Noted, more input wanted"?. What do you suggest - maybe just a better way to search and group ideas, to allow fresh threads about similar ideas to pop up while maintaining that virtual umbrella?

Cheers,

Steen

[SteenSchmidt]

Motivated by the comments to this idea I'll try to submit a suggestion to somehow save old lingering, almost dead, ideas. This isn't limited to the LabVIEW Idea Exchange, but there is no "Ideas General" topic, and it is an idea . Here goes...

When posting an idea it's quite demotivating to so often just being pointed to a "similar" idea that is several years old and often hasn't gotten any obvious attention from NI back then. Sure, that old thread might touch on something similar, and it would be wise to put the old and the new idea under the same umbrella somehow, to not fragment the Idea Exchange. But, LV versions and abilities have probably changed in the meantime, and the new idea often hasn't been discussed in the years old thread. Of course one could have posted in the old thread anyway, but usually in discussion boards threads are deemed dead when they haven't received any updates for 2 years or more. My hunch is that a new post, however novel, would just drown there, so it isn't worth the effort. Too much of that and I won't be posting anymore here. Enough of that, and the Idea Exchange will die eventually.

I suggest that NI somehow mark "interesting" threads so they can live a life outside of limbo. Not "Declined" nor "In development", but maybe "Noted, more input wanted"?. What do you suggest - maybe just a better way to search and group ideas, to allow fresh threads about similar ideas to pop up while maintaining that virtual umbrella?

Cheers,

Steen

[SteenSchmidt]

It could also be so that the old thread somehow emerges at the top of the new ideas list if the thread gets revived by a new comment?

[Wart]

Maybe "Under Consideration" ?

[RavensFan]

The question is how do you go about determining which ideas to read?  How about others?

I have been through all the ideas and have read them all, kudoing the ones I've liked along the way.  When I go into the board, I just go and read the new comments, thus anything with a new comment is brought to my attention again.  I'm am not likely to ever go back and reread threads I have read before without a specific reason to.

Now when I see new ideas, of course they are now new and hot.  If they sound like I've heard them before, it isn't hard to search and find the old thread.  I'll identify the new idea as a duplicate or related if no one has already done that.  If someone else is done that, I will jump back and look at the old thread.  Sometimes I'll find myself adding a kudo to an older idea.  Perhaps now when I read it, it seems like a good idea to me where I didn't think it was all that important when I first read it a long time ago.

So for me, if an old idea gets a new comment, I'll read it.  If it is a new idea, but is a duplicate, at least it brings the old idea back into attention.  So it does help revive the idea out of the black hole.  So even having duplicates is not a bad thing.

I have no idea what the criteria is for the "Hot Ideas" list.  (Recent kudoes?  Recent comments?  How many does it take to make it "hot"?)

I think what could help bring some new life to older ideas  would be to put some sort of random rotation so that let's say 5 random ideas are added to the top of the list you are in and identified as such.  Perhaps they are there for 10 or 15 minutes and if someone sees them and has some activity on them (new comment, new kudo) it could cause it to float up in the list of "hot ideas".  I don't think older ideas are stale, or that NI isn't considering them.  It's just that it has fallen off the list to get any new attention.  The Idea board is only about 2 years old.  And the ideas that have been implemented took about a year, or even 2 years from first suggestion to implementation.

I don't think the "under consideration" tag has any meaning.  I see that used a lot on the LabWindows/CVI thread.  Sometimes the tag is changed the very same day the idea was posted.  Really?  A brand new idea with only 1 or 2 kudoes is suddenly "Under Consideration"?  I think the Under Consideration tag has a use, but it should be for ideas that have started to gain traction with an above average number of kudoes, and have made it on an NI list to seriously look at, but perhaps not at the point yet where they will either commit to developing it or will definitely reject it.  But I don't think the tag will help bring any new attention to older ideas above and beyond the fact it will now have a new comment added by the NI moderater showing the status change.

[SteveChandler]

I think this belongs in the feedback forum. I posted something about this concern a while back and another one more recently.

[Darin.K]

A good start would simply be a Leaderboard page like every other board has.  On an average day most ideas with just a single kudo will show up in the first couple of pages.  Given the current (voodoo?) method of choosing Hot ideas, no amount of kudoing is going to revive a 6-12 month old idea.

I have gotten very, very close to committing civil disobedience a couple of times by purposely duplicating some old ideas.  A few Kudos before it is tagged as a duplicate and there is some free advertising for a week.

[Darren]

Any idea that has received less than 3 kudos within 3 years after posting will be automatically declined. #irony