# Forum Reorganization



## pjk (Jul 24, 2009)

The forums have been slightly reorganized. The "Speedcubing" forum has been renamed to "Expert Village". A new forum called the "Intermediate Area" has been added. This new forum will serve as a medium between beginner and expert posts.


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## spdcbr (Jul 24, 2009)

It's Expert Village when I go into it, but the link I click still says "Speedcubing."


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## pjk (Jul 24, 2009)

Refresh the page (Ctrl+Shift+R or Apple+Shift+R).


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## *LukeMayn* (Jul 24, 2009)

wow this is really cool, thanks


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## pappas (Jul 24, 2009)

theres a cinema thing in australia called expert village as well! OMG


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## DavidWoner (Jul 24, 2009)

I fail to see the point. People are going to be unable to tell the difference between an "expert" and an "intermediate" topic and post randomly in either forum.


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## DAE_JA_VOO (Jul 24, 2009)

Vault312 said:


> People are going to be unable to tell the difference between an "expert" and an "intermediate" topic and post randomly in either forum.



+1

Also - what's the point pjk? I appreciate your effort on this forum, really I do  but what's the point of this?

When are you classified as intermediate and when are you classified as an expert? And surely the intermediate guys can learn from whatever the expert guys are discussing, and vice versa?


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## Kian (Jul 24, 2009)

Vault312 said:


> I fail to see the point. People are going to be unable to tell the difference between an "expert" and an "intermediate" topic and post randomly in either forum.



I really think there are people that would realize they're very far from "expert" cubers, and would shy away from that forum for random posts. It won't work all the time, of course, but when presented with the option "beginner" or "speedcubing" many believe themselves not to be beginners. I don't think it follows that they would also consider themselves "experts". I think this will do a good deal to keep the expert forum cleaner, but will make the intermediate section pretty much a second beginners section.


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## Erik (Jul 24, 2009)

I think that'd be a good thing. There is too much junk in 'speedcubing' now, that people think is just not for beginners anymore but is certainly very boring and tiring for the 'expert' cubers. Scaring people away from expert would be a nice thing, intermediate would be a good place to ask about stuff like lookahead/speed. But yet, I'm not certain about the precise content of all subjects. Maybe PJK can give some clarification on that?

BTW, it would be nice if it was possible that you don't see posts from the beginners or intermediate forums when you log in and see the latest posts.


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## Kxg (Jul 24, 2009)

Erik said:


> I think that'd be a good thing. There is too much junk in 'speedcubing' now, that people think is just not for beginners anymore but is certainly very boring and tiring for the 'expert' cubers. Scaring people away from expert would be a nice thing, intermediate would be a good place to ask about stuff like lookahead/speed. But yet, I'm not certain about the precise content of all subjects. Maybe PJK can give some clarification on that?
> 
> BTW, it would be nice if it was possible that you don't see posts from the beginners or intermediate forums when you log in and see the latest posts.



User CP -> Edit options -> Exclude Forums from "Get New Posts"


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## Stefan (Jul 24, 2009)

Erik said:


> But yet, I'm not certain about the *precise content of all subjects*. Maybe PJK can give some clarification on that?


I suggested it, so let me describe my view as well. It was inspired by people discussing making an forum only writable by selected few "high quality" members. I didn't like forcibly locking people out and suspected exactly like Kian said that beginners only cluttered the speedcubing forum because they didn't consider themselves beginners anymore, and that they'd instead post in "Intermediate" and not "Expert" if we had this distinction.

No precise content specification is possible, but _roughly_ this is what _I personally_ think:
*Beginners* still need orientation and ask _general_ stuff or talk about stuff we've talked about many times before so is well-known or obvious to more experienced cubers, but the beginners just don't know that.
*Intermediates* do have some experience and know better how to ask good more _specific_ questions.
*Experts* know much already and are thus less asking and more giving, in the sense of trying to increase the cubing community knowledge.

The "beginner" forum existed before and after the change, so it looks like "speedcubing" was splitted into "intermediate" and "expert". But you can just as validly think of it as "beginner" being split into "beginner" and "intermediate", and "speedcubing" renamed to "expert". Again, the distinction isn't precise and never will be. Also again, these are my views, not necessarily exactly the same as Pat's. Wel'll see how it turns out.


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## Erik (Jul 24, 2009)

Nice idea Stefan 
I hope it will function as planned!


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## mazei (Jul 24, 2009)

Why not have the an expert section and a speedcubing section instead of the intermediate?

In any case, I really hope this idea will return the forum back to its glory days which I missed out on.


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## pjk (Jul 24, 2009)

Vault312 said:


> I fail to see the point. People are going to be unable to tell the difference between an "expert" and an "intermediate" topic and post randomly in either forum.


People will have a hard time knowing the difference between the two, so we are working to come up with a description that will allow them to tell the difference. As far as the point of doing this: something needed to be done. People who were around 20-25 seconds kept asking questions that a lot of experienced cubers had no intention of reading. This happens many times a day. There needs to be some type of bridge. However, trying to get people to post in the correct forum will take some time, but we eventually plan to make it work out.



Erik said:


> I think that'd be a good thing. There is too much junk in 'speedcubing' now, that people think is just not for beginners anymore but is certainly very boring and tiring for the 'expert' cubers. Scaring people away from expert would be a nice thing, intermediate would be a good place to ask about stuff like lookahead/speed. But yet, I'm not certain about the precise content of all subjects. Maybe PJK can give some clarification on that?


I agree with Stefan. We are working on describing the forums a bit better so people have a better understanding of where they should post.


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## blade740 (Jul 24, 2009)

I like Stefan's descriptions as well. Intermediate is for asking questions, Expert is for sharing information.


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## rjohnson_8ball (Jul 24, 2009)

If I go to http://www.speedsolving.com/
the Forum Navigation area on the left side does not show the new forums correctly.


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## Stefan (Jul 24, 2009)

blade740 said:


> I like Stefan's descriptions as well. Intermediate is for asking questions, Expert is for sharing information.


Well, somewhat like that, I think. Certainly there can also be questions in Expert, and sharing nice information in Intermediate or Beginner. It really depends on the question/information. It's just a rule of thumb that from Beginner to Expert you probably ask less questions and become more constructive. Polls can also fit nicely everywhere, where exactly depends on the poll content. And I think Intermediate could now be the best place for community threads like "Cubing in Somecountry" or "Somecity cube meeting" which are neither beginner talk nor expert talk nor really off-topic (Or we could have a "Community" forum for that, though we have quite a few forums by now already).


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## Dene (Jul 25, 2009)

I think this will help, but I still think we reed a reduction in subforums, not an increase.


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## Faz (Jul 25, 2009)

I find it kind of annoying going to the intermediate section to get to the accomplishment/scrambles threads.

Is there some way you can have them stickied in both subforums?


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## Lucas Garron (Jul 26, 2009)

While we're at it, could you change the how-to forum description to "Here you can find a compilation of general how-to's, tutorials, guides, etc. *This is not the place to request help or ask questions.*"
People still ask in threads way too much, and I think it should be their responsibility to post in the correct forum (most often Hardware), not our responsibility to save their thread by providing information.


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