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This has been mentioned by other players but it would be really nice to have our joined dates posted under our ranks or somewhere in our avatars.

How about it PF, huh huh?

Great idea Feisty. I joined December "06, though I didn't post on the forums until last summer.

Please, we have all been wondering our start date. It's really interesting to know.

I think we should be able to create our own rank based on our favorite game. I like DD, but I much prefer Chocolatier. I'd like to be a Cacao Caretaker!

That's good thinking Alevy. I would want to be a Master Scientist based on the Virtual Villagers series.

both ideas are good in my book, though wouldn't it be hard to have different ranking levels for everyone? Then I suppose you could have someone different games as themes you choose from.

another idea could be to have different chocolatier evatars whereby we can create and customise our own thocolate squares, so maybe I could have the one with three strypes and put the cherry on it. Just like difernt backgrounds and dfferent designs to go on them. Anyone else think that's a good idea?

The customized avatars may be difficult to manage, but I'd like to see avatars with Chocolatier characters or landmarks.
And part of the reason I think we should choose our titles is because then there's less of a hierarchy. Plus, it would be fun!

These are all great ideas to me too. Would be really nice to have the Chocolatier avatars available to choose from...

There are some Chocolatier avatars already to choose from. As far as customizable avatars go, I don't mind the one's available now and they add more at times. the rankings I don't think should be customizable either because nobody would know what they meant and seeing as DD is the most recognizable game from PF, I think the ranks should stay the same. It would be nice tho to see when everyone created their accounts.

Yes and for PlayFirst to create a history page of the day they opened for business. When the forums were started. Who has been a POM. But mostly when did we join PF.

Sweet! You got it! I will raise all of these suggestions in the next Community meeting.

As the new community manager, I am very interested in rmcm's post and those that followed in OUTSIDE about the "good old days" in the Lounge, and these posts here. Those days were before my time at PlayFirst, but I've had experiences like that on forums, too. Part of my professional goal now is to create a fun, inviting atmosphere here and to encourage more people to post and all people to post more often. It sounds like the Lounge had that going authentically last summer with very little influence from PlayFirst, but I would love more suggestions on what I might be able to do from my end to give you guys the ultimate online hanging out place you deserve.

So what is the Lounge, anyway? I've defined it as the heart of the PlayFirst community, but technically what we're talking about is this little corner of cyberspace in which PlayFirst users post about non-game-related topics. At it's best, it's a place to relax, talk, fool around, share, make friends, and support one another. Maybe it can be more...?

Just to keep you in the loop, we are actively working to improve the site, and I'm currently developing some community programs -- such as creating posting rather than game-based medals to implement later in the year (don't ask any questions, I can't say more yet! Sorry!) -- meant to spark more interest in the Lounge. But really, all I can do is throw pasta at the wall and see what sticks -- only you guys know what encourages you to post and what makes one site more fun to hang out at than another.

Please keep putting some serious (and not-so-serious!) thought into what would make you come by here more often: thread topics, bells and whistles, external programs (like the Facebook pet pictures), internal programs (like Player of the Month), etc. Your input and energy is the only thing that can make the Lounge great. So, let's hear it! I'm listening.

Thanks,
Nemone

UGH, please dont create medals for posting!!! In fact, get rid of post rankings, and use medal rankings. Give medals for playing all PF trials (not sure if you do that already on all games) That way it will be fair to people who buy the games from BFG and other sites, cuz, hey, they do have good prices. Even though a lot of people dont care about rankings, which they shouldnt anyways, it would encourage people to play the darn games, even the trial versions, plus post reviews, plus Tell A Friend, etc etc etc that you get medals for. A lot of the people who cause problems on the forums actually dont contribute to PF in other ways, they aren't buying the games here because they dont have any or many games in their account, they dont post review of games, they dont post useful info about the games in the threads.....some just take up space, and sometimes cause fights. Click on a bunch of profiles and look at the medals, you'll be surprised who isnt contributing to PF site in other ways beyond the gift to gab and fight. While I understand why the rankings were created and based on posts, to encourage building a community in the forums, its also when all the junk postings started, and now we all just deal with it, or post more junk to try to quelch the arguing or to turn the tide on tensions and get the forum back to a fun place...if you give medals for it, it will get even worst than it already is!! The forum used to be more useable, when you wanted info on a game. Now you have to look thru tons of junk to find good info sometimes. Please reconsider this.

i do agree with you latte, please no one take offence to this but there is so many people on here who post topics which are of no meaning and seem to do it for the rank title, which in my view is very unfair and it should be stopped. This is my personnel view and it might not be of others view, but we are entitled to an opinion sometimes. If the ranks were stopped then we wouldnt get the boring topics which are present on the forums to date. As i stated before i do not mean to offend any one this is my personnel view and i know not everyone will agree, sorry,
Also it is good to maybe keep having medals or some sort for actually playing the games, and not ranks for writting in the forum

sorry and it is a good idea about the starting date being shown, maybe you could have medals for howmany years or months you have been with playfirst and after say 5 years you get a free game or some sort of credit system where you get tokens after 5 years and can redeam them on a game,
So say every five years or even less you get a reward for loyalty.That is one way to keep people at playfirst and interested in games

I wish you could tell us more Nemone about the idea of posting medal. As it stands right now, there is already a reward for posting and it's called rankings. Why give medals for it too. Like Latte said, there are people here with no or few games or medals in their profiles. Why should they get something for not supporting the PF site. I don't think that playing demos for free should get medals.

I wholeheartedly agree! I suggested "name your own title" as a way to escape the "gotta get my posts up!" & other junk. And medals for posts? Talk about junk! Even if you award a medal for answering someone's question, that would just lead to people posting the exact same info found earlier in a thread, as people are already doing in the DC2 forum.

I think the pointless topics are where some of the most fun is to be had on playfirst. The stories, the funny restuarants etc. With some posts like that some of the things you come across can be quite funny, and in my opinion that, to an extent is what the PlayFirst lounge is there for. It doesn't have to be postings about anything particularly relevent since it has no real definition. I am all for getting rid of ranks though, cos they do cause higherarchy, and admittedly i'm as guilty as anyone else for letting this happen, since I got excited and posted a thread to tell everyone I was a head honcho. To build on the idea of personalised ranks I think an extended profle would be good, where you have more oppertunity to say about likes, dislikes, phrases, maybe upload a picture of yourself too. Instead of the rank displaying, have the option to display a phrase instead. Also, personal messages would be quite good to save postings in the PF lounge when people want to post to just one person.

There's a few ideas to be thinking about. Thanks Nemone

Go easy on yourself, Euro. I think we all post when we hit Head Honcho. But posting when you hit a rank is a far cry from posting in order to obtain a rank.

A thought for the PF Lounge.

Would it be possible under the PF Lounge Forum to have additonal "general topic" forums?

I think the PF Lounge is popular mainly because it's not just about the games we're playing. It's about getting to know each other, sharing fun, sharing jokes, sometimes sharing hardships everyone goes thru at times, helping our cyber friends laugh, destress and sometimes just be there to listen when they need to vent, cry or just share.

For me, it's sometimes annoying to be looking for a thread that may have just been posted the previous day but so many other threads have been posted you have to go back a couple of pages to find it.

My thoughts on the some of the "general topic" sub-forums:

-- Hot Topics (the ones with the Tamales by them - and they would go into the sub-forums when they are not hot topics any longer).
-- Music
-- Food (sharing recipes, favorite foods, etc)
-- Lounge Games
-- Pets
-- Jokes
-- CyberFriends (couldn't think of a good sub-forum name for this .. but an area where people could post/share more serious items such as medical, family losses, job stresses, prayers)
-- Hodgepodge (anything that doesn't fit in the sub-forum topics)

I just wanted to say thanks for giving all of us the opportunity to share ideas that will help make the PF Forums even better.

It really does make it more fun when you PF Staff take an interactive role in the forums.