Your Watchlist: Feedback Wanted!

John:

Actually I rather enjoy having the Watchlist there. I have always used it just in the way it was intended, to keep track of what people I'm interested in are saying.

I do however think it takes up too much space in the profile, how about adding the feature of collapsibility to it? Meaning that when we want it out of the way we double click on the "Watchlist" tab and it collapses down keeping out home screen more organized.

1. Do you use the Watchlist at all? --- some, but not much

2. Do you use the Watchlist as a "friend list," or do you actually frequently click through to see what those people are posting? --- occasionally

3. Do you ever use the "Show" drop-down box to show only the new content from people in your Watchlist, or do you not find that useful at all? --- not the show list, but I usually check mainly user conversations rather than any other.

4. Would you miss the Watchlist if it disappeared? --- Hmm. Only that I couldn't occasionally check to see what some users have been saying.

Mostly I've used it to be able to click through to profiles and send private messages.

Not being able to remove any items from something I've added is a definite yuck.

I never figured out what it could do for me, and when I heard about the inability to delete people, that was just too control-master-ish to submit to. (I always baulk hard when I'm not enabled to fully own what I produce.) Also I feared that once I had a few names there, anyone I'd missed might think I didn't like them, so it would never end.

Pipsy Wrote:

"Would the wonderful Jennyzhu miss the watchlist? Maybe she just does not want to show any signs of favouritism! I think we should be told. "

Ha ha ha. This brings back memories of uh, last April, when this was all new, and I knew about the watchlist (and added like everyone to it, big mistake) and kept watching Jenny's watchlist. I tried sooo hard to hopefully be on hers, thinking she would some day around that time start adding people, so I made sure I responded to all her posts, etc.... yet today, on her watchlist, is... nil.

(John, once you get Jenny to be an expert Uno player, next teach her how to add ME....errr... how to use the watchlist)

I just snag a user's RSS feed and use GoogleReader.... much easier to see where and what they posted.

Just to add my two cents: I don't use the watch list, but do occasionally check others' list. Would love to have a member directory, "search member" option and more extensive profiles.

why do we not have a "members directory". Is the number a secret? Is it a privacy issue? (the ability to opt out would solve that).

Wow, lots of good ideas here. Thanks a lot, people. I especially like the ideas of being able to edit your own comments/posts and more extensive profiles. We will work on both of those.

Keep the ideas coming if you have more!

Nope... not using the watchlist, but I could see myself using a "search the members" directory that Henning suggested above.

AND... an idiom deciphering tool to explain to me "gilding the lilly". Once I learn what that means I plan on employing it in conversation often.... :u)

Don't use it. Some good ideas mentioned by others.

I actually do use it from time to time, but I suspect that the CPU cycles could be put to better use. Frankly, the people I tend to track are in every other thread anyway, so it's sort of like gilding the lilly.

I like the most active user thing, but I would like it more if I knew what the number represented (number of posts ever? In one day?). Never use the watchlist.

Would the wonderful Jennyzhu miss the watchlist? Maybe she just does not want to show any signs of favouritism!

I think we should be told.

Yes I agree with Henning. That would be fine.

Based on RJBerkis post above:

What would be really nice in my opinion: a searchable directory with *all*users that have agreed to have public profiles.

That would not limit us to our friends list. Too many important names here, anyway.

I agree with taipan. I use it to send messages to individual users. How else could you quickly find them? I guess the answer is I use it mostly as a friends list. I also use it to search for old posts known to be by a certain author. Yea I use it. I would not want to loose it.

Excuter summed up my feelings quite nicely.

I don't use the watchlist at all.

I, too, think it would be cool to have a keyword search for the conversations.

I don't use the watchlist, though there are certain posters whose comments I like to follow regularly. I basically keep track of them through the recent conversations.

I use the "My conversations" (OK now it´s called "your conversations" ) and the "userposts only" option (offcourse I also use the "all conversations" option to get back to the complete list too) and would miss them if they´d been gone, but the other parts of the showbox and the watchlist are a waste of space I think. :-(

I realy would like to have a search option :-)

Me too...:)

I never use the watchlist, for me it's just a waste of space.

User search would be nice but not really important (If it is , you can always do the usual hack of editing the address line in the browser.::) , while conversation search is important.

Also, it would be nice to be able to edit your own comments after you posted them, if that is possible.

I just started playing around with the watchlist but so far have found little use for it. I agree that search features and more biographical fields about users would be great. You guys probably aren't ready to do a full-blown Facebook-type treatment, but I would imagine you could incorporate some baby steps, including more extensive bio details and a way for users to rank their favorite lessons, conversations, etc. for the whole C-pod world to see.

Here are my answers:

1. Do you use the Watchlist at all?--- No

2. Do you use the Watchlist as a "friend list," or do you actually frequently click through to see what those people are posting? --- Rarely.

3. Do you ever use the "Show" drop-down box to show only the new content from people in your Watchlist, or do you not find that useful at all? ----- Yes, I've use this function multiple times to search for a postings by someone (a crude way of searching I guess)

4. Would you miss the Watchlist if it disappeared? Not really.

Before the switch to CPod V.3 there was a section on the home page that showed the top-most commented lessons/episodes. I liked that a lot. I think it should be brought back. The lessons with the most posts are probably the most interesting ones and to have quick access to it would be nice.

My answer would be the union set of calkin's & Taipan's.

I only use it for messaging and as a search replacement.

john, rather than dedicating all that space to most actives and stuff, what about more personal details. facebook type categories but learning chinese related

where have you studied, how long, age occupation, why learning blablabla. more pics.

I found the show list, and it is helpful thanks John, and Calkins.

I do use the watchlist for a couple things...

If i want to find a user and message them directly, i go there to click their name.

I use it as a replacement for the lack of a search feature on conversations. If i want to reference a conversation that I know someone from my watchlist started or at leasted posted on, I could go there and do it. I do that because I had never seen the dropdown box listed above.

Whether my whatchlisters are online or not, never seems to be accurate, so I don't really use that.

I'd like to be able to delete ppl from my list, but I don't think I can.

And if I want to see what anyone has recently posted I'll use it.

I like it.

I don't use the Watchlist at all. A handful of times after reading an especially interesting post by a user I've checked their Recent Posts on their profile to a read what else they've posted recently, but that's it.

I do however miss the Dictionary today. Haven't been able to access it all on several occasions the past 18 hours or so. And even more off topic, as helpful to me as Conversations Search would be a Vocabulary Manager search. I'd like to see if a word is already in my vocabulary list, as I recently printed out my current list of what I thought was 3,000 words only to find that a couple of dozen repeats had snuck in there.

Thanks for posting the ultra-clear screenshot, calkins!

Wow, this is very good to know. It seems like NONE of you are using the Watchlist.

I totally agree that user search and Conversations search are both needed; we are already working on implementing this.

Any other ideas for what would be more useful to have in the sidebar of the Conversations page? We have the "Most Active User" list on the main Conversations page now. We could also include individual user stats, like number of comments posted, number of New Posts, and even your overall ranking in the "Most Active User" algorithm, etc.

Ideas?

No, I don't use it, and I wouldn't miss it.

I believe I tried to use it for a while, but discovered the postings wound up lacking context--"Yes, that's right, 42" someone would post, and I'd have no idea what was going on.

The main way I track conversations is through NetVibes; usually for RSS feeds I use NetNewsWire, although for some reason the ChinesePod feeds are too delayed/ inconsistent there. Actually, if it's in ChinesePod's power to allow MANY MORE items to appear in the NetVibes feed, that'd be great (it's currently maxed at 20; 50 would be more useful).

And searching would of course be wonderful.

You should be able to find the "Show" pull down on the main Conversations page.

John, I don't seem to find a show drop down box either, maybe we don't have one because we haven't developed a watchlist? Anyway, I don't tend to use it. Sometimes I wish I could find an old conversation that has dropped out of my My Conversations feed. I'd like it more if I could reference a conversation with a search of a phrase that was used in a conversation. Like when you responded to Bazza with the interactive subway map. If I hadn't saved the url elsewhere, I'd have liked to type in Shanghai subway, or metro and have it turn up. Maybe we already have such a thing, and I just don't know about it?

I also don't use the watch list. I usually just monitor the conversations tab. "'Show' dropdown box"? huh?

I don't use the watchlist at all, sir. I can't even FIND this "Show" thing you're talking about.

1. I haven't used it at all.

2. No.

3. I've never used it.

4. I wouldn't miss it...as you can see I don't use it at all. In general, my favorite users are the ones who post the most - so I usually just weed through the latest conversations.

I do think it'd be great to have a search feature for conversations. There have been a few times when I've wanted to find a specific conversation, and/or make sure I wasn't creating a new post about something already covered.

Thanks for asking!