Feed headlines into game chat

[Dukasaur]

Concise description:

• When new announcements are posted and headlined, links to them should automatically be fed into the game chat of active games.

Specifics/Details:

• Currently when an important announcement is posted, a link to it is fed to the home page: http://www.conquerclub.com/public.php?mode=home. This is called "headlining". I'm suggesting that these links can simultaneously be fed into the chat of active games. The elements already exist: the headlining process exists and a tool to feed messages into the chat of active games already exists. It remains only to connect the two.

How this will benefit the site and/or other comments:

• Although the recent improvements to the game engine seem to be working, and game play is increasing at last, this has not been reflected in the non-gameplay parts of the site. Contests, tournaments, foundry discussions, the newsletter, forums, etc., continue to languish. These non-gameplay elements are often "out of sight -- out of mind" for those who are not active forum goers. Even being on the homepage doesn't help much, since most users go directly from login to their My Games page without lingering for long on the home page.
• Every online game I've ever played has a feature similar to this. The details vary, of course, but invariably there is some mechanism for broadcasting current contests and special offers into the game chat window.
• Whenever there's been discussion about what distinguishes CC from similar competing sites, the most enthusiastic CCers tend to say "the community", but that community has taken a hit from the years of decline in the game itself. Now that the game seems to be on the mend, it is crucial that we mend the community, or we risk losing our special status among similar sites.
• People who just log in to take their turns will inevitably get bored. The people that stay around for years are those that develop some connection to the non-game parts of the site. This is a good, cost-effective way for letting the former find out about the latter.

[chapcrap]

I wonder if this should be used for all the announcements or just reserved for some announcements. Over the past few months we've been averaging a headlined announcement a little over once a week. I wonder if that would be irritating to people to have that posted in all of their games.

[spiesr]

I would support this for announcement of things that directly affect games (stuff like the change to team game round limits) but oppose it for anything else.

[Dukasaur]

I wonder if this should be used for all the announcements or just reserved for some announcements. Over the past few months we've been averaging a headlined announcement a little over once a week. I wonder if that would be irritating to people to have that posted in all of their games.

I don't think so. If you play on Pogo you get an announcement of one kind or another in your game chat every 15 minutes it seems. Once or twice a week does not seem like very much at all.

Many games are over in less than a week. It would be entirely possible to go through several games and never see even a single announcement. Not very obtrusive at all.

I would support this for announcement of things that directly affect games (stuff like the change to team game round limits) but oppose it for anything else.

That would defeat the primary purpose. The purpose of this suggestion is to build the community by letting people who only play games on the site know about all the other things there are to do. Get them involved in the contests and the forums and the newsletter and the foundry and so on and so forth. Especially the non-game related contests that it might not even occur to them to look for unless someone tells them about it.

[spiesr]

I would support this for announcement of things that directly affect games (stuff like the change to team game round limits) but oppose it for anything else.

That would defeat the primary purpose. The purpose of this suggestion is to build the community by letting people who only play games on the site know about all the other things there are to do. Get them involved in the contests and the forums and the newsletter and the foundry and so on and so forth. Especially the non-game related contests that it might not even occur to them to look for unless someone tells them about it.

And I am of the opinion that the value that that could add is would not be worth the having the see that sort of announcements in the game chat.

[chapcrap]

Duke, on pogo, are those casual style games like this site or real time games?

Are the chat announcements in pogo about real time happenings/events/contests or are they about general site information?

[Dukasaur]

Duke, on pogo, are those casual style games like this site or real time games?

Are the chat announcements in pogo about real time happenings/events/contests or are they about general site information?

Most of the games are real-time. The announcements are everything under the sun. Pretty much every time someone wins a prize of some kind it is announced site wide. I'm not suggesting we go to any such trivial level -- I'm only suggesting those announcements which are considered important enough to headline.

[DoomYoshi]

I like it, and understand the leeriness of spam. However, if you approach this from the mindset that many legitimately don't know about what is going on in the community, then it is a valid use of 'spam'.

It's not like we are trying to sell people on things they don't care about. They want to play RISK competitively and are on this site effectively opting in.

[agentcom]

As just one example, there was/is an autotournament that allowed freemiums to play polymorphic games. Things like that would be great to feed through. Which makes me wonder if this should be designed with an eye toward marketing to specific users. Freemiums come immediately to mind.

HOWEVER, the problem with putting things in chat is that so, so, so many people don't check chat. I do wonder how much "clickthrough" you'd actually get, and how many people would even see the announcements. You could argue though that once this becomes common practice it might entice people to regularly check the game chat, which would be a good thing in so many ways.

Pogo takes it to the extreme, as has been noted. We'd want to avoid that level of spam. But one nice thing about Pogo is the obviousness of the chat box. Perhaps if the site thought the chat box was useful (by promoting events, etc.), it would encourage them to elevate it to a more prominent location. That, too, would be a nice consequence.

In the end, I'd say I support this, not only on its own merits but because I think that it could be complementary to a lot of other things that I would favor.

[chapcrap]

I've thought about this some more.

I do support this fully. All announcements go to every game chat.

[Foxglove]

I like this!!

Maybe it will also get more people involved in the forums.

[BigBallinStalin]

Awesome. Spam in all my games. Gonna read the same thing 20 times.


Can't CC simply put some flashing counter within the top frame or nearby the time? It would highlight the headline of some new improvement, while even providing a direct link to it.

Anyway, if the OP wants his method to be effective, I wonder how many people will bother searching for the new event. Obviously, mentioning a new map won't need to rely on a link, but if the spam is something like "CC Dispatch Issue 107 -- Merch313antilism," how many would actually care to go through the fora and find it? I don't think many,* so many of the announcements/spam should be filtered in accord with this standard.

e.g. if I mention "Monthly Challenges Begin!", are you more likely to use the clunky CC search bar to find it? I think most would ignore it, so in marketing they do simple tactics which lower such costs, e.g. "Monthly Challenges Begin!. Of course, you can't do this in game chat, so either add that [url] feature into gamechat, or at least reappraise the imagined effectiveness of this suggestion in order to (a) use a substitute or (b) filter out certain announcements.

[Dukasaur]

e.g. if I mention "Monthly Challenges Begin!", are you more likely to use the clunky CC search bar to find it? I think most would ignore it, so in marketing they do simple tactics which lower such costs, e.g. "Monthly Challenges Begin!. Of course, you can't do this in game chat, so either add that [url] feature into gamechat, or at least reappraise the imagined effectiveness of this suggestion in order to (a) use a substitute or (b) filter out certain announcements.

Yes, a clickable link is part of the proposal.

[BigBallinStalin]

Well, at least users can make their own clickable links in game chat. It doesn't offset the spam...

Could you make the announcements optional (somehow)?
--e.g. have some check box which states "Reveal/hide announcements".

[IcePack]

I would hope somehow this could be turned off. Frankly, i dont want to read the same announcement(s) in every single game or continuing to skip lines in the middle of a intense game chat about something unrelated.

[Dukasaur]

Well, at least users can make their own clickable links in game chat. It doesn't offset the spam...

Could you make the announcements optional (somehow)?
--e.g. have some check box which states "Reveal/hide announcements".

I would hope somehow this could be turned off. Frankly, i dont want to read the same announcement(s) in every single game or continuing to skip lines in the middle of a intense game chat about something unrelated.

Yeah, that makes sense. Perhaps, like the original Conquer Cup widgets that went away after you viewed them once, there can be a way to make it invisible after you've clicked on it once. The techies can weigh in here, but it seems do-able from my non-techie vantage point.