Any interest in a new ToJ Facebook Group?

Tek7

Tek7

CGA President, Tribe of Judah Founder & President
Staff member
It seems Facebook has overhauled its Groups. You can read the details on the changes here.

Is there any interest in starting a new ToJ Facebook Group or upgrading our archived Group to the new format?

If so, who's willing to serve as an admin to help moderate the group?
 
Is this: http://www.facebook.com/tojcc the "archived group" or is it a page? Hasn't been used much I notice. What is envisioned that the group page would be used for?

Seems like individual groups for individual chapters might be more appropriate and useful. Just my thoughts.

I'm kind of new to TOJ, but have managed several groups in the past, I'd be willing to pitch in as an admin if needed.
 
Zippy said:
Is this: http://www.facebook.com/tojcc the "archived group" or is it a page?
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It's a page. Since our former Facebook group wasn't seeing much activity, I archived it and created a FB page instead.

We already have forums, a Ventrilo server, channels on the CGA TeamSpeak Server, and a (rarely used) IRC channel (#toj on irc.us.gamesurge.net), so I don't know if a Facebook Group, which includes a group chat feature, would be a benefit or only detract from other group communication options.
 
We already have forums, a Ventrilo server, channels on the CGA TeamSpeak Server, and a (rarely used) IRC channel (#toj on irc.us.gamesurge.net), so I don't know if a Facebook Group, which includes a group chat feature, would be a benefit or only detract from other group communication options.
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I use the forums and love them. :D

A Ventrilo server - didn't know about it, looked it up and don't know what it's for or what to do with it.

I just found out about TeamSpeak and am using it when I can. Makes game play and talking much easier.

Didn't know about the IRC Channel either, and never used one, but do know what it is for.

Our minecraft group has a facebook and I find it invaluable. Reason being is that forums take time. There is so much here and a variety of topics covered. I check the forums when I have some time to look through everything. Even in the chapter section, there is a mishmash of information, discussions, etc. However, facebook, I pretty much have up all the time, as do many people. Also, people check it from their phones etc. You get instant notification of stuff if you want it too. Say the server is down, or there are updates going on, it's great to know. It's also cool cause we can share pictures of our projects, or accomplishments, or video's of things. I don't foresee using the group chat feature much tho, given the other things available.

Facebook is different than the forums. I think each of those options serve a different purpose all together. But, that's just my opinion. I'm curious how many other chapter's already have facebook groups? If no one is using those, then the odds are they wouldn't use a TOJ one either. I guess if you looked at it in relation to the church, the TOJ page would be like the over all church page and the chapter pages would be like the youth group, men's group, children's ministry, etc, pages? Usually, the individual group pages have much more interaction than the main church page. I administered our main church page for most of last year. The only time there as interaction is if I initiated it with a status. It is a page, not a group, so I'm not sure how that would affect the usage (other than chat).

Still trying to figure out what the activity would be on a TOJ facebook group. What ideas are you thinking of for it's use? Group Chat might be cool, but still think I would tend to chat with those people I interact on games with, more than TOJ as a whole. But then again, may give us a reason to do just that. :D
 
One perk of Facebook group is its IRC-like feature. True, IRC isn't often used last I checked, but (as for me) I would certainly use a Facebook chat option more often just because of the convenience.
 
Well, it's free to set up, so I'll look into updating our old group to the new format and we can see how much activity we draw.
 
Well, I posted an update to the old Tribe of Judah Facebook Group and there's still no option to upgrade to the new format.

This is all I see at the top of the page:
Over the next few months, Facebook will be archiving all groups created using the old groups format. When this group is archived, its wall posts, photos and discussion threads will move to the new groups format, but group members will need to be re-added.
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But it sounds like the new Groups aren't designed for organizations, anyway:
Keep in mind that the new groups format was designed to help you share with the small groups of people in your life. If you’ve been using your old group to promote your business, we recommend you create a Page instead.
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So I'm inclined to skip it for now and promote the real-time communication resources we already have (Facebook Page, TeamSpeak Server channels, IRC chat).
 
I would say wait because they are supposed to do a big update soon...not sure what it involves or when but it is supposed to be another overhaul.
 
I would LOVE an updated Facebook group. I appreciate the level of depth of these forums but it seems a little overwhelming to me at times. I need simplicity. :) A Facebook group to me is more visually appealing and easy to navigate. Just my humble opinion...
 
The issue with introducing a new communication medium is adding to the workload of a staff already stretched thin. We wouldn't be able to have an official ToJ Facebook Group without staff members dedicated to moderating activity.

There's also the issue of spreading our community too thin over too many media. We don't see much activity in the IRC channels (unfortunately, since it offers real-time communication whereas the forums offer staggered communication), but we already have forums, TeamSpeak, and Steam instant messaging. Even amongst the forums users, individual guilds and chapters tend to keep to their own "corner."

I'm not opposed to creating a ToJ Facebook Group, but I don't want to invest the time and effort to get it running just to see activity dwindle in rapid order like our IRC channel. Yes, Facebook is more popular, but we barely see any activity on our Facebook page. Maybe if we saw more activity there first, I'd be more inclined to support creating a FB Group.

Again, not opposed to the idea. I just don't want to squander what little time I have these days on tasks that yield no results.
 
Might I make a suggestion? Is there a way to post All the groups/guilds/chapters/whatever that have a facebook page/group and the link to it here on the forums? Another great thing would be to post a note on the Tribe of Judah page with the same information.

I am a HUGE facebook user, and I have "liked" the Tribe of Judah community page, but I never see anything coming up about it on my home page. If it's one of those pages that you have to visit in order to know what is happening on it, it will never be used the way you would want it to be, the activity will remain low. Given the right set up, it might be used more frequently. Right now it is a Page - it's designed to be similar to an individual profile. And just like an individual's profile, it will not have that much interaction unless the status creates some. With a Community Page - it's too much effort to use it, it doesn't engage me in anyway, and it has very low visibility. It's not really designed to be interactive, it's designed to be informational.

The reasons I like a group page is because it shows up on the right side of my facebook screen, it shows when something was posted with a little number (similar to the inbox), and anytime I want to check it out, I just click on it and BOOM, I'm there. I can also be updated via my email if I choose to be. There are some down sides to it as well, but that's just my thoughts from a user side.

Another thing about using facebook, some people that won't use the forums will use it. I know of three people right now that do not use the forums, but would interact on facebook. I think it's a preference and one probably wouldn't take away from the other. They server two different kinds of people. Some want to give information and interact with others (forums) and others just want to get information or share in a quick way (facebook). It is also much easier to share pictures and stuff on facebook than it is here. In addition, facebook is a quick look thing, for instance, I've been working a number of days, long hours, I haven't had time to go through the forums as much as I want, but I would take a few minutes to check out a facebook page to see what might be happening quickly.

I'm really not for or against a page - just pointing out some thoughts about one. Again, I'm still trying to figure out what a group would be used for that would create an interaction on a daily basis? The current community page seems to be used as a sort of bulletin announcements, such as deals, new games, etc - not so much as interaction - twitter would be better for that.

One thing that could be done to encourage of both the facebook page and the forums is the daily scripture could be posted with a link to the forum thread. It wouldn't require too much time on the writers part, as it's just copying the scripture and a link onto the facebook page. It would bring the activity level up on the facebook page, thus making it appear on more people's home pages - as well as drive traffic to the forums.

If there is something unusual or cool happening in one of the games, a little blurp with the link to the thread about it here on the forums could be posted on facebook. This might encourage a little bit of cross interaction. I have no reason to look at the games I don't play, but maybe someone is posting about a cool achievement, or like in Terrari or Minecraft it could be a big project. Since I'm not familiar with the other games, I'm not sure what could be posted. Again, the main person for that game could easily make this posting without much added work. If this is done frequently enough, people may start to make such posts on their own. This would also create traffic both on the facebook page and the forums.

Just some quick ideas and thoughts off the top of my head. :)

If you should decided to put one up, I'd be willing to help out with moderating the page. I've done several of them. I do work, so I couldn't monitor it all the time.
 
The main issue with managing a new communication medium is that I'll need staff members to update those media and do so consistently. So far, that hasn't worked out--not for Twitter, not for IRC, not for Facebook.

With ToJ members willing to join our staff and update our Facebook Page regularly as well as manage the administrative backend, we could definitely generate more activity and interest. But the person who does it isn't going to be me. I can't afford the time to take on any additional projects now. :(

If anyone is interested in posting to the ToJ Facebook Page regularly, please send a PM to Elihu and copy me on the message.

Zippy: Since you've already expressed an interest in helping, I'll send you a PM and copy Elihu on it.

Zippy said:
Might I make a suggestion? Is there a way to post All the groups/guilds/chapters/whatever that have a facebook page/group and the link to it here on the forums? Another great thing would be to post a note on the Tribe of Judah page with the same information.
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Both great ideas. :)

It would be simple enough to update our Tribe of Judah on Facebook and Twitter thread with links to all relevant Facebook Pages and Groups and Twitter feeds.

Now when you say "post a note on the Tribe of Judah page," do you mean our Facebook Page or our web site? I ask because work on the web site is all but on hold until we build and make the transition to a new web site. But posting a few links on the Facebook Page would be simple enough.
 
I also recommend making a meetup group. I don't have any recommendations on who could lead it, but perhaps we could make a "3rd party" team, where the team updates various 3rd party sites, as opposed to individuals maintaining one site each.
 
Bowser said:
I also recommend making a meetup group. I don't have any recommendations on who could lead it
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If I remember correctly, it costs money to start a group on meetup.com.

Bowser said:
perhaps we could make a "3rd party" team, where the team updates various 3rd party sites, as opposed to individuals maintaining one site each.
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I would want to organize our efforts on Facebook and Twitter before branching out to other social networking sites as they're the most popular at the moment. If we gain some momentum on those sites, we can look at expanding further.
 
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