As an upgrade to the forum perhaps they could introduce a classifieds section at the back of the magazine. Then we could all communicate using short cryptic messages. STW Towers could even charge per word just like in the olden times! 🙂
#prayforstw
"It’d be interesting to see STW’s user-demographic actually. I wonder if it’s as male, pale and stale as you’d think from the forum."
you missed out self-entitled
Male, pale, stale and self-entitled. At less than a pound a week I'm frankly amazed that anyone would be tight enough to not have a P. Particularly when you get a superbly put together magazine thrown in for free.
The amount of whingeing and complaining is frankly embarrassing. The guys who run and work for this business do so at a time that is incredibly difficult for the publishing industry. They're desperately trying to make ends meet whilst trying to improve things, and all they get is (for the most part) a bunch of spoilt "little Englanders" complaining. Shame on you.
And no, I won't be getting rid of my P. Great value at twice the price frankly, and at least I'm not a freeloader..
😲
“Thst would show a bit of respect for the STW customer base.”
Apparently we’re not customers 🙄
On you still not one Zokes?
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 16px; background-color: #eeeeee;">The amount of whingeing and complaining is frankly embarrassing. </span>
Best just put up with a product that isn't fit for purpose.
Increasingly less so, Drac. Along with many others, it seems...
cba
Male, pale, stale and self-entitled.
I’ve or complained yet, but whilst I’m male and stale - pale isn’t one of my characteristics. I’ve not complained either so not self entitled.
When people are paying for a service - as some of the complainers are, if that service becomes poorer and worse value for money - I think that’s fair. Even in a difficult times within the industry, people should get what they pay for.
“little Englanders” complaining.
That’s a little harsh, especially since a large part of that demographic is often criticised for being wet, Euro-centric and liberal ‘snowflakes’...
I have cancelled my rolling sub. I don't read the magazine even though I do download it sometimes. I dipped into my pocket for the P because it felt like the right thing to do considering how much time I used to be on here and the sometimes invaluable advise and banter. The adds never bothered me, even when I was a freeloader (sic). The logouts i could live with. The starving hamsters was but a minor inconvenience.
Bottom line is we the users, especially those who pay, are being used and short changed at every turn. Look at all the threads about redirects, porn adds etc.
If anyone dare complain they are labelled whiny cockbags or worse. Someone earlier in the thread used the term self entitled. Some of us pay for this shite! Well we do till something better comes along and I suspect the writing may well be on the wall for this place.
And to think, most of this bad feeling could have been avoided with a little communication, which literally costs nothing.
Nah, much easier to be snarky at your customers.
How effective a business strategy that snark is remains to be seen
at least I’m not a freeloader.
I bet you cycle on roads paid for by motorists vehicle excise duty, don't you?
Oh, hang on a mo....
Yes of course times are tough in publishing. All the more reason to not piss off your customers eh?
I currently pay for a service. The service is falling way short of the standards it used to so I am not paying for it anymore. Why does that make me "self entitled" or "whiney". Would you continue to pay for a mobile provider who regularly made it impossible to use their network? Or a bike shop that kept on failing to service your bike properly? BT were properly crap and I moved away from them, but at least they never redirected me to a porn site in front of my partner and her daughter.
Yeah, those porn redirects were/are simply awful and shouldn’t have ever been allowed/accepted on a public sports based forum.
We were told that all that has been sorted, but it did seem like those redirects went on for an extraordinarily long time.. which TBH IMO is unacceptable timeframe from first reported to them ceasing (have they ceased I wonder)..
The forum is ( according to previous comments from Mark) the only bit of STW that makes money. the posters on here provide the content that attracts people to the site and thus create the advertising revenue. This update has made the experience of using the site much less nice. Posting things is tricky especially if you want to copy and paste stuff in. I find even if I click "clear formatting" and "paste as plain text" I still have to post then go back to edit the post to remove all the <span >etc nonsense that makes posts unreadable. A worse user experience will surely result in a drop off in traffic / posts / users which will mean a drop off in ad revenue.
I would be very interested to see the drop off in traffic on the page. It would seem this update has been done very poorly and risks killing the golden goose.
Isn't self-entitled a redundancy anyway? Just "entitled" would have been sufficient. And in this case subscribers are arguably entitled to a functioning forum.
Seems like that's not what's annoying most people though, more the odd lack of comms from STW Towers and the sense that they're refusing to "own" this shambles.
In short, there are some legitimate gripes from normally sane and balanced contributors amid the whiny cockbags here - yet one gets the feeling everyone's been tarred with the same brush.
We know STW don't like being told how they could do their job better, but I'd be happy to provide some basic pointers on online customer service if it might help.
🙂
Good luck with that
You'd be on the DNR list to be fair Zokes.
😉
😱
It's probably been suggested already, but have they tried turning it off for 30 seconds and then switching it back on?
"<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #444444; font-size: 12px;">It would seem this update has been done very poorly"</span>
It would seem that it has been very poorly tested and implemented, true. The worrying bit is that there doesn't seem to be a roll back plan which to be honest as a PM I would have invoked by now.
Communication has also been touched on above. From the contents of this thread Cougar is trying to firefight and offer workarounds but to be honest asking people to paste from notepad or Word isn't really acceptable.
If it were up to me, I'd be looking at a roll back sooner rather than later.
"You’d be on the DNR list to be fair Zokes."
Do not resuscitate? a bit harsh even by the standards of this forum
Do not resuscitate? a bit harsh even by the standards of this forum
Well it means "Do Not Reply", but I don't think the similarity is accidental.
😀
👋🍆💦
<p style="margin: 1rem 0px !important; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 12px; vertical-align: baseline; background-color: transparent; line-height: 1.2em; color: #444444; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: auto; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">Do not resuscitate? a bit harsh even by the standards of this forum</p
As has been drilled home relentlessly, Zokes is not a customer.
So how can you resuscitate that which does not exist?
The problem is that they seem to have taken that attitude with the entire customer base, most of whom probably don’t have the patience to be bothered.
‘Still not a customer’
Please get it right and yes I read DNR as in the medical term, thought it was a bit harsh. 😂
As has been drilled home relentlessly, Zokes is not a customer.
As has been drilled home relentlessly, Zokes (et al) are the product, not the customers.
Christ, now I just feel dirty
Sorry, mate, but someone had to let you know sooner or later 🙁
Well, I guess we’re all in it together 😁
As has been drilled home relentlessly, Zokes (et al) are the product, not the customers.
Nah, We're the talent. 😉
We're getting pimped out for monetary gain by STW towers.
You may be talent PP - according to Mark I am the pub bore who never buys a round
@pp: That’s more like it 😂
💃🏼
according to Mark I am the pub bore who never buys a round
I think you'll find you provide a certain degree of entertainment value TJ, admittedly to a more niche audience.
You're more like a fetish 😉
😂😭😂
[b]chakaping[/b] wrote:
Seems like that’s not what’s annoying most people though, more the odd lack of comms from STW Towers and the sense that they’re refusing to “own” this shambles.
This for me is why I'm contemplating doing as suggested in the thread title. Though it's not so much the lack of comms, but as already mentioned by a few people the condescension and avoidance of the issue when there are any comms. I note that Mark's latest post is on a locked thread where he can't be engaged with - I presume being a delicate flower he doesn't like people disagreeing with him, but as a business owner that's something he ought to face up to. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think there's been a single post by Mark apologising, admitting this has gone a bit wrong or admitting they should have done it differently. No, all we've had are grandiose statements about how it has to be done this way (which is all a bit Captain Rum "opinion is divided") and that it will all be wonderful when it's finished. That or the most recent have been announcing that they're reinventing Google (on another thread DezB suggested he'd knocked up a forum in an afternoon - well it took all of 5 minutes to generate https://cse.google.com/cse/publicurl?cx=002353871167780190211:ffna6g0opko ).
Of course if there really is a good explanation behind rolling out untested software which we're all missing, then why not tell us? And no, the explanation given that the upgrade had to be done because of the existing mess of software and old version of the underlying software isn't an explanation of why it went live when it did. Nor is it an explanation of why fixing the obvious issues has been made a lower priority than reinventing Google. There have been numerous opportunities to take a different course, but it seems the STW forum upgrade process is like a supertanker - it's course shall not be diverted.
We know STW don’t like being told how they could do their job better, but I’d be happy to provide some basic pointers on online customer service if it might help.
There is so much expertise on this forum - expertise which is being ignored or effectively being told we're wrong.
Ewwwww!
If you give up your P do you still get access in the magazine app to the magazine issues that were released in your period of subscription?
Lolz @ PP
DezB suggested he’d knocked up a forum in an afternoon
In a lunchbreak, if you don't mind 😉
Pfft. In my day we'd knock out a forum in a tea break.
Are the people who are paying for a 'P' not customers? They are buying a service/product...if so, it is only the non-paying users who are not customers, but they are the ones that seem to generate a revenue just by using the forum (through ad revenue) - so not customers but a (potentially vital) source of income...
I'm in agreement, the (lack of) comms on this is the thing that really gets me - personal experience in my job, but if things aren't going to plan, the worse thing to do is keep quiet - you flag it and keep folk updated on what is being done to fix it.
I'm happy to remain being a source of revenue (although as an individual it will be a tiny amount), I think there is life in this, but things need to change to get a large number of regulars back on-side and interacting with the site the way they used to.