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[GilmourD]

From what I've been reading from O'Keefe and Anderton that seems to be the intent, and this would have been more seemless had the old forum not completely dropped a deuce.

So, I wonder, how close to vB CAN Lithium get? How close do you guys actually want it to be?

[lefort_1]

I've got my own theory on this look-n-feel thing. This is totally unfounded, no facts behind it, but I think it might be a potential explanation..if not, then think of it as one of those recent-history-docu-dramas.

Background:

In the corporate world of the TwentyTeens, You Ain't Nothin' If You Ain't Trending.

And HC/GC definitely lives in the corporate world...not ours, theirs.

Lithium is seen (by some) as a leader in social network design, and "gee if that ain't trendy".

The modifications to HC:

Twice now, GC has rolled out a new HC design that obviously has tried to capitalize on the new/trendy social media stuff. Lithium's answer to 'how to build a community' has worked for some customers, and not for others. And 'turning down potential work' probably doesn't fit well in their (Lithium's) business strategy.

So here comes GC saying: "We want a new interactive forum, but we want it all NewNetworky so we look like hepcats and, oh, by the way we'd like it to generate more customers so we can meet our banknote obligations". From the comments of the mods, it sounds like the Product Specification (if there was one) did not require conformity with the past forum.

And Lithium responds: "We can do that".

So here's our result... it looks lightweight, which is what is needed for mobile apps and communications bandwidth. Since GC/Corporate didn't spec that it had to be clone of the old UI, Lithium went with something that looks like their past successes...heck, they could probably even assign a non-top-flight development team to it, cuz it looks like just a cosmetic re-code of other mobile forums/chats, etc. 

To answer your question "how close"?....well, it can be 100%. If it was coded once, it can be coded again. It may have different underlying 'function calls, libraries,utililities', but the experience can be duplicated.

To me, the real question is: Is that what GC wants?

I have a feeling that some in that biz may be happy if it was simply populated by just their customers and potential customers, and that it was "the place they wanted to hang out and chat about their new, cool purchases at GC"...as that would tend to stimulate more purchases. The problem is, this place began its life WAYYYYYY BACK OVER 13 YEARS AGO as a non-aligned forum for the brandishing and bashing of all things musical. It has always been irreverent. It has always had elements of commaderie, codependence, comingling, and clowns juggling chainsaws. It also had some good, detailed User Reviews (pre 2.0) but they weren't always gracious towards new products (and potentially new sales). And notice how quickly (ie NEVER) the old User Reviews wee brought back....sez Corporate: "Heck, most of them aren't even currently being made....why burn CPU cycles or disk farms for something we cannot sell?"

So what you see here is the skeleton of the Positive, Live In The Now, Social Network-type of forum that will be bottomline friendly. "Kudos" to that.  : pukes :

To test my Fictitious GC-Corprate World Theory, lets see how fast they work on restoring functionality that lends itself towards 'non-positive social interaction':

-polls

- anything like an "anti-Kudo" (we had thumbs-down for threads before, right?)

- and I bet multi-quote goes away, as it leads to point-counterpoint. Heaven forbid we understand the context of a chain -of-logical arguments.

User Reviews will never be like the were, once upon a time, because they served the used-market far better than the new-market. Don't be suprised if you can't make an entry for something like a Hot Chili Tubester, a Silvertone Amp, an Alamo guitar, or an MXR Phase 45 (oh wait, Dunlop bought that name...never mind). Anyway, you see the point? 

The form of this forum (and the other formerly cool stuff at HC) is not necessarily in the best interest of the powers at GC. Their interest is, of course, stirring up purchase-interest. They will likely add in a few things that are simple and low cost to implement, but expect it to cater to their perception of their customerbase, not the past users of the old forum.