[Suggestions] Thanks & Like buttons
 

Let me start by saying up front that neither one of these buttons that I'm suggesting have anything to do with social web sites. They are specific to this forum only and do not link anywhere.

Id like to recommend two forum plugins/addons. One adds a "Thanks" button to each persons post, and the Like button is pretty much the same only it sits kind of within a post. I'm seeing a ton of vBulletin forums using these two plugins/addons so I'm guessing they are available for download and install.

People would hit the Thanks button on a post where the poster has helped them in some way. Once the Thanks button has been clicked it adds a small extra area under the post that shows the name of the person who has Thanked them. A number list is kept on the left hand side (under the Avatar) that shows how many times you've thanked and how many thanks you've received. You can also unthank if you change your mind.

The Like button is clicked when people agree with what the poster is saying, so if you agree with what they've said you simply click on Like. The forum keeps track of how many Likes you get on the persons profile page.

I would really love to see them implemented here at Wow Interface. I've included screenshots from an Android forum that I am a Guide on so that you can get a better idea of what they look like. I'm pretty sure they can be customized to fit in with the design of this forum. Also, I'm pretty sure I can get the links for these if you need them.

Thanks for considering my request!

Thanks for the suggestions Petrah. I'll take a look at those plugins for vBulletin. :)

I'd like to cast my vote for not adding these features. WoWI is not Facebook or Reddit. We don't need liking, voting, karma, thumbs up, agree, or other social spam junk here. It's bad enough that vBulletin has a "friends" system and I randomly get "friend requests" from people I've never talked to. These features just waste time and don't actually add anything useful.

Thanks for considering this, Dolby! I think these will go over quite well as they've been huge successes on the forums I've been on that implemented them. Even when you already have a supportive community, seeing that you've been thanked is an awesome feeling, and in some cases promotes more helpful postings. Can't tell you how many times I've read a helpful post and just been in too much of a rush to reply and say thank you. A Thanks or a Like button will come in handy for those times!

I'm with Phanx here. If you like or enjoy something posted on here you can just post your feedback. Only sites I've been to that have this type of thing on them are warez and I can understand the use for them but, not on something like this. Next suggestion will be a ThankYou Bot where everyone that hits thanks or like the bot will post everyone that did. WoWInterface really doesn't need features like these.

In my opinion, I think this would be a nifty idea, but you should be able to opt out of seeing those "user has thanked" post footers.

Seconded. While I appreciate the happy juju-magumbo behind such an idea, the WoW Interface site is very clean and hosts one of the nicest internet communities I've been a part of. I don't see these types of social features as being beneficial to the site or the community.

I'm also against for pretty much the same reasons stated by others, but I'm all for a modified version of this system.

When patches with major changes hit PTR, or Live, several huge topics often spring up. I'd like to see a system similar to the official forums where what are considered the most important parts of large topics can be highlighted. It gets difficult wading through a 10+ page post to try to find the posts with workarounds to new issues brought about by new patches/expansions. This could potentially make it far easier.

On the other hand, it would probably take more effort putting something like this into effect than a typical like/thanks plugin that would clutter topics up.

I'd say the problem there is that people are making mega threads in the first place. Instead of making a single thread for patch 5.2, for example, people should be making a separate thread about each specific issue or change they want to talk about. Moderators could facilitate this by keeping on top of moving off topic or tangentially related posts to new threads.