this thread is locked! Why ?!
http://steepster.com/discuss/9887-steepster-problems?post_id=159865#forum_post_159865looseTman said a day ago
Please ask all your favorite Steepster tea suppliers to encourage Jason to fix the longstanding website issues w/o further delay.
Thank you for being part of the solution! :-)
Reply
sherapop select said about 15 hours ago
But Jason is trying to sell tea, so do you think that he really cares whether his competitors continue to use the forum to promote themselves?
looseTman said about 15 hours ago
Yes, that’s true. However, if Steepster membership declines over time due to website issues, that will impact all tea suppliers on the forum including Jason. Thus, I suspect at least of some of the tea suppliers would be willing to assist Jason in making Steepster more reliable as it’s also in their own self-interest to do so.
What ideas do you have?
sherapop select said about 13 hours ago
It’s not that difficult to maintain a functional website. This one was until about six (or was it eight?) months ago. What’s missing here is only the will.
To be perfectly frank, I have no idea why anyone would have joined over the last six months. Everything that made this place fun has been compromised. Why attempt to set up a cupboard here when it is obviously broken? Why attempt to post a note or comment, when it may or may not appear? My general impression is that Jason et al. are out to lunch. As Dick Cheney would say, they have “other priorities”.
Honestly, how many times do these simple requests have to be repeated, and by whom, exactly?
I just decided to copy and open a new one.
This is my reply to looseTman and sherapop
but if people are not going to stick around, Jason will not have his current/future customers.
Jason, is there anything we can do to help with the current situation. I barely post anything, even liking someones note or making a comment is problematic.
Please come back to us with any updates of the situation
Thank you
the thread was locked this morning, guess it was then subsequently deleted.
edit: it’s here boychik but locked:
http://steepster.com/discuss/9887-steepster-problems?post_id=159865#forum_post_159865
Ok when I was looking for it I couldn’t find. Then when it appeared I cannot post anything. I can’t do likes or post comments. I don’t want to waste the time on tasting notes. It’s very sad situation !
yeah..my tasting notes have gone downhill since i’m never certain if they’ll post or if anyone will read them because the dashboard will freeze forever….notes that i wrote a while back have been eaten up and are no longer there….i can’t sort my cupboard or tasting notes so hard to figure out wishlists and reorders and swapping and such. It’s the sad :(
My tasting notes have also gone downhill. And I’ve noticed that most of my likes on others’ tasting notes often don’t stick, so I’ve found that to be a waste of my time, too. Heck, there are days when I struggle making comments on tasting notes. I just don’t do it that much anymore. It’s sad.
Yep. I hardly ever write tasting notes, i hardly ever read tasting notes. Cant like them, most people are writting less. Dasboard frozen lots of the time. Its just not the same. Cupboard issues have made swapping almost impossible. Why are we still here?
I’m thinking maybe we could set up a Tumblr community, like small private ish pages that are all friended to each other, where we post tasting notes maybe? I’ve been thinking about it. Instagram doesn’t seem right, because it’s really just for pictures, and I write a lot. I dunno.
Tumblr is nice. Easy to use. Large/multiple pictures can be posted as well as lots of text and comments can be set up. Though there’s no central forum or anything of that sort.
Yep the forum would be my concern as well. We could always move to some sort of sad temp forum (Proboards? InvisionFree? It’s been awhile) until we figured another system set up. Because the forums are SUPER useful, and Tumblr would only act as an alternative for tealogs.
However, because Tumblr is kind of a microblog set up with the ability to repost and comment on other people’s posts, I think it might work the best for a tea log alternative.
And then, the idea of having to actually take pictures of my tea to drink in my messy tiny apartment with my uninspiring teaware is also kind of scary.
EDIT: But maybe that would inspire me to clean my apartment, be better at taking pictures of my brewing practices and loose leaf, and buying more presentable teaware, so maybe it wouldn’t be a bad thing.
You are all cordially invited to post your reviews and tasting notes in the tea group I run on facebook https://www.facebook.com/groups/415399551889457/
And if the tumblr idea takes off then please post a link, I want in on this!
I have mixed feelings on instagram, I spend so much time on my computer and don’t have a good phone, so I am unable to use it. But being tired of feeling left out I am going to ughhh buy a phone for Christmas and start using it.
I miss the Steepster of old
Locking that thread without any comment just proves that Jason and the team dont care about the community’s opinion. This was clearly illistrated after the last major update when they asked for opinions and bug reports – then told us why our opinions were wrong (or didn’t fit their vision) – and most of the bugs were never fixed.
What made this site great was not the features on tbe web site but the community. Witnout a community this is nothing. Lots of people are spending less and less time here. Comments here indicate that people are participating less because of the ste issues.
They are loosing their users and dont care.
This is just how I feel about Steepster community. There is no tea site that offers so much help and support to each other. It’s hard for me to understand why Jason and his team are refusing our help and support we offered many times. It’s especially sad that its happening now during holiday season.
Wooow this is crazy. Well, in my experience on the good ole world wide web, moderators usually leave threads be until they start to get heated, rude responses, mud slinging, etc. Basically if you want to be heard, the way you say things plays a big part. We have to express our concerns calmly and with tact. But on the other hand, 6 months in it seems that patience has almost completely run out.
The thing is, I thought the thread was pretty reasonable. I think that’s why I find it concerning that it was locked. It never reached the point where I thought it had veered into unproductively. It was negative, yes, but it wasn’t that bad in the scheme of things.
I find the whole thing concerning, and I think we might want to start establishing a community elsewhere, which is really painful for me to say. I just came back, and I missed the worst of it, which I think is probably a good thing, but I’ve been thinking that and I’ve been really hesitant to say it.
And I don’t mean that to be like super harsh criticism, because I think realizing that a site isn’t working out for financial or practical reasons is valid, but I wish there was some transparency with the situation so the users of the site can find another way to build a community would be appreciated.
I was so excited to come back and talk tea with everyone, too.
EDIT: and I fully expect this thread to be locked, too, and that makes me anxious even posting in it.
I hope that this is some sort of mistake or something. I would hate to think it was locked on purpose. :(
Hi all,
Sorry I haven’t been able to get to this sooner. I locked the thread last night so that I could respond to the comments before any more speculation took place. Unfortunately, I’ve been traveling the past couple days with limited access so haven’t been able to respond to the questions you all asked as soon as I would have liked.
I do want to quickly clarify though that we do care very deeply about steepster and the community that has gathered here. Any issues the site has are just technical issues that need to be fixed, but are not a reflection of our feelings about the site.
I will be responding at length to the other thread to answer your questions and clarify our situation. In the mean time, any and all patience is (and always has been) very appreciated.
I am so happy to hear this, and I really appreciate the update. It is very helpful for me (and I think everyone else) to know that the admins are still involved and engaged and willing to listen to our problems in a constructive way.
EDIT: although a post that said this when you locked the thread, would have been much appreciated.
Hello Jason,
We’re very glad to read that you all, “… do care very deeply about steepster and the community that has gathered here.”
“Any issues the site has are just technical issues that need to be fixed, but are not a reflection of our feelings about the site.”
Are you familiar with the following concept?
“The medium is the message” by Marshall McLuhan:
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_medium_is_the_message
- http://www.amazon.com/The-Medium-Massage-Marshall-McLuhan/dp/B00112DMA6
- http://marshallmcluhan.com/common-questions/
Website issues that have been unresolved for months significantly impacts member perception, motivation, and morale on many levels.
“In the mean time, any and all patience is (and always has been) very appreciated.”
Requests for indefinite patience are unrealistic. We are eager to hear about a specific and credible action plan to resolve the website issues. We look forward to learning when Steepster will be a reliable forum for tea lovers once again.
Thank you!
I have generally been able, lately to post tasting notes and comments. Some people are having more trouble than others, I wonder why.
I generally only have issues when the site is running slowly or the dashboard/explore is frozen.
Otherwise it usually lets me post notes and like/comment just fine.
Thank you for running a great website, I will continue to post tasting notes here.
I also joined the FB group because I just happened to be browsing for FB tea groups earlier anyway, looks great.
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