The Official Thread on official/megathreads

It seems there is a general trend for deals on CAG to move to official threads or megathreads. It makes a lot of sense in some cases. Target has a neverending and constantly revolving clearance that is also highly YMMV so it makes sense to contain the updates in one thread rather than individual posts. But some of the useful deal highlights can get lost or buried in megathreads or require a person to check each official thread to make sure nothing pops up that they are interested in. If you don’t typically look at the kmart thread because kmart isn’t nearby you might not know about the big Arkham City promotion with a $30 coupon that is worth going out of your way for unless somebody creates a separate forum thread. If you don’t check the Steam thread religiously you might not know that a game you are really interested in is on sale today only. The other problem with official threads is that it often relies on person to keep the deals updated. This has partially been solved with wikithreads, but if a thread isn’t a wiki, it can take time to find the most current deals. It seems like there has been some bickering back and forth when a specific deal does get its own thread and the information is already in a megathread. But for many people these specific posts often turn out to be helpful. I’d like to get other CAG’s opinions on this.

One semi-solution I thought of. Part of the problem with knowing when a thread is useful is the limitation on thread titles. You can only fit so much information about a sale, the relevant dates, etc. For megathreads, it usually only says the store and official thread in the title. When you mouse over a thread it pops up a partial first sentence, but that usually turns out to be useless, people usually use the first sentence to announce themselves. What if that pop up showed 5-10 highlighted deals and upcoming deals? So if I moused over the XBLA thread it would show the 4-5 deals that week, the steam thread would show the daily deal the weekend deal and any other big deals, and the kmart thread could show the current coupon deals + the upcoming deals. It seems like people try to fit this into the current titles, but the character limit makes they title cryptic and undreadable. These popups could be wikis so anyone could add the current deals.

Anybody else have ideas?

To me, keeping things as they are is just fine with me. If folks want to be a member of a community, they have to want to interact and be an ACTIVE part of that community. Besides which, even if you have a really detailed OP for a thread it's pretty clear that many people don't even take the time to read it.

I see far too many repeated questions(sometimes by the same people within a very short time span) in threads where those questions have already been answered a ton of times before. Instead of skimming back a page(or nine), these folks will ask and re-ask the question every hour or so until someone finds the answer for them. To me that's just plain lazy.

Moreover, there are far, far too many lurkers on here. To find out how many, you only need to go to one of the code drop threads to see how half or more of the codes are used without so much as a thank you from the folks who grabbed them.

tl;dr version: I prefer the mega threads and having to skim through them to find the deals since it only rewards CAG's who wanna put some effort into finding/getting the deals. To me, a true CAG is one who actively participates in the community and tries to contribute something to the community other than 'zomg I can't find the deals cuz of all of the OT banter'.

I agree with IATCG....I wikified the Target Clearance Thread back in April figuring it would take care of itself...there was one CAG who did most of the work adding new finds and what-not, but for the most part the OP became a wasteland....you would literally have to scan the last several pages of posts to find any of the new drops so I decided to un-WIKIFY the thread and take over the daily updating as I couldn't follow it anymore....

I was wondering what the heck happened to the OP, as it seems like there's sparse listings for clearance items right now on there.

[quote name='IAmTheCheapestGamer']To me, keeping things as they are is just fine with me. If folks want to be a member of a community, they have to want to interact and be an ACTIVE part of that community. Besides which, even if you have a really detailed OP for a thread it's pretty clear that many people don't even take the time to read it.

I see far too many repeated questions(sometimes by the same people within a very short time span) in threads where those questions have already been answered a ton of times before. Instead of skimming back a page(or nine), these folks will ask and re-ask the question every hour or so until someone finds the answer for them. To me that's just plain lazy.

Moreover, there are far, far too many lurkers on here. To find out how many, you only need to go to one of the code drop threads to see how half or more of the codes are used without so much as a thank you from the folks who grabbed them.

tl;dr version: I prefer the mega threads and having to skim through them to find the deals since it only rewards CAG's who wanna put some effort into finding/getting the deals. To me, a true CAG is one who actively participates in the community and tries to contribute something to the community other than 'zomg I can't find the deals cuz of all of the OT banter'.[/QUOTE]

It just seems like this creates a walled garden approach to the deals and maybe that's what some CAG's want. But I would prefer the efficiency of easy access to the information, rather than burying the information so you need to go searching for it.

I'm not trying to get rid of megathreads, I think there are ways to keep what we have, but highlight the deals so that nobody in the community misses them. Even if you are a contributing member of the community it's easy to miss information in a megathread that you are unfamiliar with.

[quote name='msdmoney']It just seems like this creates a walled garden approach to the deals and maybe that's what some CAG's want. But I would prefer the efficiency of easy access to the information, rather than burying the information so you need to go searching for it.

I'm not trying to get rid of megathreads, I think there are ways to keep what we have, but highlight the deals so that nobody in the community misses them. Even if you are a contributing member of the community it's easy to miss information in a megathread that you are unfamiliar with.[/QUOTE]
But therein lies my issue with highlighting deals for EVERY CAG to be able to find quickly, as there are a crapton of lurkers on here.

I found the stats for CAG(total number of users vs. total number of ACTIVE users) the one night and the numbers were just staggering to me.

From this page I found the following: http://www.cheapassgamer.com/forums/index.php

Registered CAGs: 327,230, Active Members: 29,464

Click to expand...

So basically 90% of the users who have actually taken the time to register are most likely lurkers who do not actively participate in either helping to find new deals or giving back to the community one bit.

That is why I think the mega threads have to stay as-is, since we shouldn't reward those who refuse to participate in this community.

As of right now there are 808 registered users and over 1700 guests on CAG...
Megathreads stay...you want the deals? put a lilttle time and effort in and you will get your just reward...

I'm with IATG too. The megathreads do a nice job of consolidating, and if people refuse to read what is typically summarized on the first page of the megathread, they shouldn't get to clutter the entire forum for a specific deal that is already spelled out in great details elsewhere.