ICM Forum Q&A

[PeacefulAnarchy]

Hello everyone,
It's nice to see all the new members from the imdb forums settling in and contributing, we're happy to have you join our community and help us grow with fresh ideas.

This thread has two purposes:
The first is to announce that we now have a front page on which we will be hosting our lists and make announcements about upcoming events. It will also serve as a place for updates if there is another forum downtime. In November the forum was down for a couple of days due to server problems and we didn't have a clear and easy communication mechanism. This front page will provide a place for updates should anything go wrong, it is hosted on blogspot.com so should stay up even if zetaboards goes down. We also plan to begin using our twitter, for those who use it.

Right now we have an Official Challenge index, a Poll index for the past two years, a brief summary of Season 1 of the World Cup, and our two main lists ICM Forum's 500<400 and ICM Forum's 1001 Favourite Movies. I hope to add all our lists in time, as well as the Year-by-Year polls, the Awards Game, Film of the Week, and Doubling The Canon and maybe more. But before I do that I'd like any feedback on the formatting.

Front page: http://m.icmforum.com/
Twitter: @theicmforum

The second is to provide a place to ask questions about using the forum, whether technical or otherwise, as people have been asking questions in a few threads but not everyone may see them. I will collect questions and answers in this post and the one below for an easy reference FAQ.

To answer a few I've seen:
Is this forum moderated?
Yes, the list of moderators can be found here. Generally we mostly do organizational stuff (update indexes, move/pin/unpin threads etc.). The rules here are pretty much don't be an asshole (Don't spam, don't harass or threaten other users, don't post obscene material), if you're posting something with nudity use spoiler tags. We avoid deleting posts as much as possible, generally we only remove spam and the very occasional inappropriate post.

How do I report a post?
Every post has a report button on the lower right. All moderators see reports and can act on them so if someone is being obnoxious beyond reason you can report the post and we'll take a look. You can also use the report button if you want us to move a thread to a different section, close a thread or take other similar action.

How do I ignore someone
If you find someone really annoying you can click on their profile link. On the top left there is a menu called "Profile Options" one of the options is ignore.

How do I subscribe to a topic?
At the bottom of every thread in the footer in light grey there is a link on the right called Track Topic. You can view your subscribed topics in your preferences menu accessible from the top right of every page, or at http://www.icmforum.com/home/ This is the same page where you can change your password, profile and more.

How do I reply to a specific post?
Threads on the board are flat, meaning every reply gets appended to the end of the thread. However, it is still possible to reply to people directly by using the quote button on the bottom right of a post.

Note: When using the quote button the quote appears in a separate box. This is editable in case you are quoting a long post and want to trim the part you are quoting. Your reply should not go in this box, it should go in the box above it. When posted your reply will be below the quote and automatically formatted by the forum.

If you want to quote multiple posts, you can do this in two ways: 1. Manually by using quote tags

Code: Select all

 [quote=Person quoted here] Text quoted goes here[/quote]

or 2. Using the multiquote check boxes. Check the little check box beside the quote button on all the posts you want to quote (in the order you'd like them to appear) then click "add reply." The quotes will all be put into your post with a line break between them. Be careful where you type your replies.

How do I display images in a post?
If you have an image you want to post, you put in you post inside image tags:

Code: Select all

[img]http://i.imgur.com/imagename.jpg[/img]

While not required, it is encourage that you upload your images to an image host, and if they are really big resize them, like http://imgur.com/ Imgur allows both direct uploads from your computer/phone/tablet, as well as direct links to an image from anywhere else on the web. (Some webhosts restrict where their images will load, so if you don't rehost images sometimes they will show up for you but not for anyone else) You can also upload an image as an attachment (see below), click post, copy the attachment link, click edit and use that url inside image tags instead.

Can I attach files to a post?
This is not a much used feature, but yes, when creating a post there is an option to attach a file of up to 200Kb. Click the browse button, find the file and attach.

When should I use spoilers?
Use common sense, if the thread is about a movie spoilers are less necessary than in general discussion thread. Spoilers on the forum are collapsible, can be nested, and can be titled, like so:

This is a spoiler exampleShow

Surprise, but another surprise awaits you

Another one?Show

Surprise x2

This can be useful for posting long lists or big images so that people can scroll past them easily if necessary. Example code:

Code: Select all

[spoiler=Title here]Content here[/spoiler]

Can I edit/delete posts?
Posts cannot be deleted by users, but there are no restrictions on editing them, click edit on the bottom left of your post and make any changes you would like.

Is there a post size limit?
Yes It's pretty big (50000 characters, I think) so usually not a concern, but if you're running a poll or otherwise collating a lot of info in a post you can run into it.

How do PMs work
You can send someone a private message from their profile or from the pm button below their avatar on a post of theirs. You can see that you have PMs by looking at the top right of any page it'll say Inbox:# where # is the number of unread messages. You can also go in the PM settings and select "Display an alert whenever you receive a new PM" which will display a box in the bottom right on the screen when you receive a PM. This box is non-persistent. It shows up on the first page you view after the PM is received, after that the only reminder is the number beside Inbox on the top right of a page.

How do I change my avatar?
On the top right of every page under preferences there is an option to change your avatar. You can either upload an image or link one. If you link one, please upload it to an image host, and shrink it to a reasonable size. The forum will resize larger images to a max of, I think, 150x130 pixels, so anything larger isn't doing much besides sometimes causing pages to load a bit slower.

How do I change my signature?
On the top right of every page under preferences there is an option to change your signature. We don't have any rules for signatures (besides the usual nothing NSFW), but please keep them to a reasonable size. If you want signature(s) from Icheckmovies to display list progress you can go here (this link is accessible in the dropdown menu from your username on Icheckmovies.com) choose the list and click "Get the UBB code" on the one(s) you want.

[PeacefulAnarchy]

Is the forum associated with icheckmovies.com?
Not directly. The forum started off as the unofficial icheckmovies forum, many of our members are active users of icheckmovies, and most of the mods on icheckmovies post here (including myself). If you make posts in the Official lists updates or Films that need info updates on ICM threads here we will reply and take action (and possibly faster than on the icheckmovies help board). But we are a separate site, with separate registration and administration and not tied to icheckmovies in an official capacity.

How do challenge threads work?
Towards the end of the year we decide on a schedule of two official challenges for each month of the upcoming year. These official challenges will be pinned for their month. Anyone can host a challenge, to do so simply claim the challenge in this thread and start the post a day or two before the start of the month. A challenge first post should have some relevant ICM links for the challenge and the host is responsible for periodically updating the leaderboard. Unofficial challenges can be started by anyone on any reasonable subject. Feel free to start one if you'd like.

How do polls work?
We do one or two polls a month, scheduled towards the end of the year for the upcoming year. List submission is either Imdb or ICM lists, (a simple list of imdb urls is usually also acceptable). Lists can be ranked or unranked (sometimes other options like partial ranking or group ranking are allowed depending on the host). There is a java program available which can help calculate results, or you can use a spreadsheet like I do. Like challenges, if you'd like to host a poll (calculate the results, find screenshots, post the results) you can offer to do so in the Future Polls thread.

How do ranking points work in polls?
Polls use a half life system to smooth out the point differences between different rankings. This means the difference between the number one and number 10 film is bigger than the difference between number 50 and 60, which is bigger than the difference between 100 and 110, etc. How big these differences are depends on the half life, If rank A-rank B is the half life then the points for rank B are half of the points for rank A. The bigger the half life the slower the points drop, so in general, the longer the submitted lists are the bigger the half life should be to accommodate them so that lower ranked films still get some points.




Feel free to post questions/comments in this thread.

[3eyes]

Thanks, Peaceful - it all looks very helpful. I sure learned a lot I didn't know and am happy to have such a handy reference.

[xianjiro]

Q: how do I set the dimensions (downsize) when using the [img] tags?

[PeacefulAnarchy]

Q: how do I set the dimensions (downsize) when using the

you can use the code as follows

Code: Select all

[img=w,h]

Where w is the width and h is height in pixels. As far as I know there's no way specify just one dimension and have it scale proportionately, which means if you're not careful you can skew the image badly. For example

Spoiler: click to toggleShow

Original

Imperfect but ok scaling

terrible scaling

[Nathan Treadway]

This thread ought to be pinned. Potential for a lot of very useful information.

[Lonewolf2003]

Cool, that we have a front page now with an overview of all our lists and such.

[joachimt]

Can you put a link to the frontpage somewhere on the homepage of the forum. Maybe in the header?

[bal3x]

Good work!

[rnilsson19]

Q: What is KG?

[sol]

Awesome thread -- even if I can't help but think that this comes partially as a reaction to sol derailing the weekly thread with an embedding image fiasco. ;)

It is possible for a further expansion on how the lives and half lives of polls work? I'm having trouble working out whether the films that I liked a lot would have performance much better in the sci-fi poll had I submitted a far shorter list.

[Lonewolf2003]

Awesome thread -- even if I can't help but think that this comes partially as a reaction to sol derailing the weekly thread with an embedding image fiasco. ;)

It is possible for a further expansion on how the lives and half lives of polls work? I'm having trouble working out whether the films that I liked a lot would have performance much better in the sci-fi poll had I submitted a far shorter list.

As far as I understand your personal list length doesn't matter as long as the same halflife is used. For example your #20 wil get the same amount of point even if your list is 25 or 250 movies long.
The formula for the amount of points is: points = 100*(0.5^((X-1)/halflife))

What can matter is that when a lot of users submit very short list, another lower half life is chosen often. Most often the half life used in polls is 50. But with polls with a lot of shorter lists the half life some times is lower. With a half life of 50 the #50 in your list gets 50 points, with a half life of 25 the #25 gets 50 points and the #50 25 points.

It does work a bit different when the list is unranked, since then all movies in the list get the same amount of points based on [total amount of points of all movies]/[amount of movies].

(That's how far I understand it. Correct me if I'm wrong PA of joachim)

[PeacefulAnarchy]

Awesome thread -- even if I can't help but think that this comes partially as a reaction to sol derailing the weekly thread with an embedding image fiasco. ;)

It is possible for a further expansion on how the lives and half lives of polls work? I'm having trouble working out whether the films that I liked a lot would have performance much better in the sci-fi poll had I submitted a far shorter list.

As far as I understand your personal list length doesn't matter as long as the same halflife is used. For example your #20 wil get the same amount of point even if your list is 25 or 250 movies long.
The formula for the amount of points is: points = 100*(0.5^((X-1)/halflife))

Right, rank x of every list gets the same points so longer lists never directly hurt the films higher up on your list. ( They might indirectly hurt them in the sense that you're giving some points to other films that might jump over them, But that's true of any points system).

I can expand more later if anyone wants.

[PeacefulAnarchy]

Can you put a link to the frontpage somewhere on the homepage of the forum. Maybe in the header?

We probably should, I can't do that though. Probably in a couple of days

Q: What is KG?

KG is a torrent site many people use. The policy on that is a kind of don't ask don't tell kind of thing. People will mention such things in an offhand manner (like I saw movie x from KG) and that's ok, but discussing the site is not allowed.

Awesome thread -- even if I can't help but think that this comes partially as a reaction to sol derailing the weekly thread with an embedding image fiasco. ;)

Don't worry, not just you. It was actually Old Aussie's post a few days back that gave me the idea, plus it fits with the front page announcement that we've been preparing for

From the other thread:

I wish it had a nest function, I find this way of creating replies (and ever more, of finding them) hard work. It's geared to people who read every word of everything, and I admit I'm a skimmer - though I usually read every initial post on this thread, I don't necessarily want to read all the replies on films I know nothing about ...

But if I never have to go near Photobucket again my life will be (admittedly slightly) improved!

Oh, one more logistics question (sorry, I should probably put these elsewhere) - how do you delete a post completely?

You don't need to read everything, the quote boxes stand out so if you prefer to skim you'll get used to skimming for the quote boxes, film title, your username etc.

And as I wrote above you can't delete posts, but you can edit them which is the preferred way to fix something. You accidentally make a double post you can blank your post.

[Lonewolf2003]

Will al other older polls also be added to the poll index? I hope so.

[XxXApathy420XxX]

Q: What is KG?

KG is a torrent site many people use. The policy on that is a kind of don't ask don't tell kind of thing. People will mention such things in an offhand manner (like I saw movie x from KG) and that's ok, but discussing the site is not allowed.

INVITE PLEASE

[PeacefulAnarchy]

Will al other older polls also be added to the poll index? I hope so.

Yes, but the way they're listed in the index thread means it's more work to make sure I don't miss any. It'll get done. I wanted to see if there was any feedback to consider before I spend more time on putting stuff up.

[PeacefulAnarchy]

Q: What is KG?

KG is a torrent site many people use. The policy on that is a kind of don't ask don't tell kind of thing. People will mention such things in an offhand manner (like I saw movie x from KG) and that's ok, but discussing the site is not allowed.

INVITE PLEASE

Present this at the door, don't be late:

[Lonewolf2003]

Will al other older polls also be added to the poll index? I hope so.

Yes, but the way they're listed in the index thread means it's more work to make sure I don't miss any. It'll get done. I wanted to see if there was any feedback to consider before I spend more time on putting stuff up.

Personally I feel the host dates are interesting info to have but not the most important info and best way to sort them. I rather have the list ordered by sort; genre, country, decade. The last could be sorted chronologically. The others could be just alphabetical. That will make it more accessible, I think.

Simply said kind of like the list index topic already was. The only thing wrong with that topic, was that mighty hasn't been updating it anymore since she suddenly got a life.

Another merit is that the different annual versions of unual polls are nicely stuffed together that way.

Also links to ICM lists are essential to me.

[frbrown]

Perhaps the info from this post (about how to link to a post within its thread, and not just to the post by itself) could be added to the OP? I've been here for years, and I can never remember how to do it.

Another useful thing I always forget how to do is how to open just one member's posts in a thread.

[PeacefulAnarchy]

@Lonewolf Yes, I agree the polls should also be organized by subject, I'll work on getting a table by subject up in the next week or two. I also agree about ICM links, I had that on my list for the template but I guess I missed it with all my playing around with the formatting, I'll see about collecting the links this weekend.

@frbrown a good idea, I'll get on that.

Just updated a new post on http://m.icmforum.com Still working out what I should include, and how frequently we should make a post (right now my plan is the beginning of every month, but I could do once a week if there's interest). Let me know if you think there's anything more I should include.

I plan to work on the page a bit more this weekend.

[SkilledLunatic]

This thread ought to be pinned. Potential for a lot of very useful information.

Why is this not pinned? Seems like somwthing essential.




Is it because of we know what?

[PeacefulAnarchy]

I don't know what? It wasn't pinned when I made it because sometimes people tend to gloss over pinned threads. And then I forgot.

[SkilledLunatic]

I don't know what?

Forget it then.

It wasn't pinned when I made it because sometimes people tend to gloss over pinned threads. And then I forgot.

True but you know people mostly just check active topics, so might as well pin this. It's really useful, specially to newcomers.

[PeacefulAnarchy]

But I don't support active topics Is that really how most people browse

[SkilledLunatic]

But I don't support active topics Is that really how most people browse

I know you hate them hehehe

Spoiler: click to toggleShow

I honestly don't know how other forum users browse this site

Spoiler: click to toggleShow

Although I do just use active topics sometimes

Spoiler: click to toggleShow

Maybe Monty should create a poll?

[Cippenham]

But I don't support active topics Is that really how most people browse

Mostly but sometimes search

[joachimt]

But I don't support active topics Is that really how most people browse

Mostly but sometimes search

Indeed. Always use Active Topics, unless......
......I search for a specific topic.
......I've been away longer than what this board uses to call something "active".

How long is a topic "active" anyway? My guess is 24 hours after the last post. Sometimes I feel like it could be a little longer. Don't mind if "active" means last post in 48 hours.

[PeacefulAnarchy]

Yeah it's 24 hours. It's just such a disorganized way of viewing threads, and makes it easy to miss relevant things.

[joachimt]

Yeah it's 24 hours. It's just such a disorganized way of viewing threads, and makes it easy to miss relevant things.

To me it's a way to not miss anything.
Unless I've been away for more than 24 hours, but that just happens a few times a year at the most.

[joachimt]

Speaking of disorganized...

I think the forum could really use some makeover in the way things are organized. Some things don't make sense at all. World Cup is in the list discussion section. Some games we play are in "Polls & Games" under list discussion, others are in off-topic. We also need a subforum for some returning stuff. Etc...

I just took the time to make a list of how things could be organized.

Film Discussion
Subsections:
- Awards Game
- Film of the Week
- World Cup
- Short of the day
- Film Logs
- Last week (I mean all the "which films did you see last week"-topics)
- Challenges (or maybe this should remain as own section)
- Film games (stuff like "name that movie", similar title game, all PdA-screenshot-quizzez, etc...)

+ all other film discussion stuff...


iCM + List Discussion
Subsections:
- Forum Lists
- Year by Year Polls

+ all other icm and list discussion stuff...


Music, Games, Books, TV
(no subsections)

Off-Topic
Subsections:
- Games (all non-film-related games like "guess the word", "one", "guess the song", etc...)
- Polls (all non-film-related polls like silly monty-polls)

+ all other off-topic stuff...


Any thoughts?

[PeacefulAnarchy]

That's way too many subsections and you would realize that if you didn't use active topics
But yes, a (small scale) reorganization will probably come in the next couple of months when we figure out the best way to balance the number of subsections with navigability and how to group certain topics.

[joachimt]

That's way too many subsections...

I realized that. Too many in the Film Discussion section. The alternative is that (for example) all FotW's and SofD's remain outside their own subsection. That's probably fine as long as there's a topic with a list of links to all the separate topics. I maintain a schedule with links for the FotW's (which is pinned). Maybe PdA would be willing to do the same for the SofD's.
If Challenges will remain as own section, that's also another subsection less in Film Discussion.

[xianjiro]

But I don't support active topics Is that really how most people browse

it's the only way I use the forum - if I'm looking for something that doesn't come up on Active Topics, I search

almost never navigate down the tree

[xianjiro]

Yeah it's 24 hours. It's just such a disorganized way of viewing threads, and makes it easy to miss relevant things.

maybe for some people

[sol]

Is there anyway to change the 'Active' period from 24 to 48 hours? I use 'Active Topics' myself.

[Lonewolf2003]

But I don't support active topics Is that really how most people browse

Mostly but sometimes search

Indeed. Always use Active Topics, unless......
......I search for a specific topic.
......I've been away longer than what this board uses to call something "active".

How long is a topic "active" anyway? My guess is 24 hours after the last post. Sometimes I feel like it could be a little longer. Don't mind if "active" means last post in 48 hours.

That's the way I use it also.
I really don't get the critique about how one can miss relevant topics with active topics this way, since every topic somebody post in appears this way, so it's impossible to miss them. (Of course I'm speaking about somebody that checks this forum at least every day)

[xianjiro]

and since so many of us 'regular users' are on multiple times during a 24 hour period.

second extending it to 48 hours (though that will at least double the number of pages/entries), especially if that would help those 'regular users' who are in the 'every day or two' category, but much more than that and the Active Users listing would be as long and gangly as the sub-forum pages

[AdamH]

I don't think it is possible to extend it to 48 hours. I would if I could and I've looked before. I will check again.

I use active topics but the big problem with it is that topics die because they haven't been posted in recently and people aren't looking at the individual sections.

[Perception de Ambiguity]

I think it would make sense to put "Film of the Week", "World Cup" and "Short of the Day" together into one new forum.

Getting all the most regular topics out of "General Film Discussion" might encourage some random film discussion topics getting made more often, but just stuffing it (or any other forum) with subforums I think won't do any good.

Keeping "Film of the Week", "Top First Viewings of the Month", and "Last Movie Seen" on "General Film Discussion" seems fine to me, but putting them into a subforum seems OK too.

Don't know about film-related games, I'm fine with whatever, but having them be lumped together with polls like right now certainly is odd.

I maintain a schedule with links for the FotW's (which is pinned). Maybe PdA would be willing to do the same for the SofD's.

I don't announce the next shorts in advance because it goes against the idea of the project for me (and I usually receive the suggestions just one or two days in advance, so there is little announcing I could do even if I wanted to), but I'm currently keeping an index of all the previously discussed shorts in the introduction thread.