Online Communities Don’t Always Work
I have been observing an online community lately that is just going down the tubes. They have an excellent platform and concept, but very weak management and community moderation. I see press releases that they’ve raised millions in funding, but I don’t know what they are spending it on.
Here’s a quote from a blog post I made on Minti 8/10/07:
1. Minti needs an anchor. This could be an affiliation with a respected professional or organization. Promotion of this anchor should take up a good portion of the main page as well as have a separate tab. For example, Minti could partner with a school of medicine where the interns/residents provide advice as part of their coursework. The school or hospital would receive free press and the students would receive valuable experience. More advertisers would be interested because the site would have more credibility.
2. There is too much redundancy in how the activity is represented on the main page. The same information is listed several times. It would be more useful to members to be able to customize how the information is displayed. This could be accomplished through profile settings or even a drop down menu.
3. The site does not seem to be professionally moderated. Online community moderation takes a special skill. There is a delicate balance and it isn’t something everyone can do.
Unfortunately, the posts that float to the front page are mostly the ravings of bipolar anonymous visitors or flaming tirades directed at new members trying to add their own advice and opinion. A good moderator would redirect some of the negativity, encourage the intelligent, motivating and supportive members to post more and remove members who ignore their code of conduct.
With so many members, they are sitting on a potential gold mine. Going through messages from the administrators, it seems they’ve even had problems with the advertising and viruses. The members dominating the discussion are dragging down the network with their negativity.
I hope they are planning changes to make this place a success. It has potential and I hope to see a big turnaround soon. I will keep checking in and posting until I get flamed like the other new members.
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