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Ideas for these forums

Pauline

Forums Admin
I was talking to Doru via email and talking about the closing down of ST and he suggested we do something here that gives people a reason to visit each day.

What about "Photo of the Day"? I could start a thread and pin it to the top of the Travel Talk forum and anyone who wanted could post a photo and some explanation if they wish. I currently post a photo most days on Instagram and share it from there to my Facebook page for Slow Europe. I enjoy doing that.

And maybe a "Group Blog" like we did on ST? It could be in this forum too.

What do you think? Any other suggestions?

We also need to get new people to the forums. It is great that a lot of the ST regulars are here, but new people and their questions will keep the forums lively. I will do some advertising on Facebook, and a post about the forums that anyone on Facebook can share. I will post on Instagram too. We did this a few years ago when the forums were started and it is time to do it again.
 
Great ideas Pauline. I like the Photo of the Day and Group Blog Ideas.

To expand on the photo idea...we all take tons of photos of our travels. Borrowing this idea from others, maybe a Travel Photo Hunt weekly theme. For example this week's Photo Travel theme is dessert. People can post a photo of maybe a delicious dessert they tried (I would totally post that amazing chocolate cake in Lisbon that Jonathan recommended to me) and liked or their favorite dessert and give a brief description of where it was shot and something about that location, how it came about that they visited, maybe a unique and quirky travel story behind the photo. It would be a great way for people to hunt through their photos and share not only the photos but where they were taken and something about the location or a special/funny story behind it. It might give people possible ideas for their future travel ideas. I'm always looking for travel inspiration. Other themes, could be cafe, bar, colors, architecture, music, favorite drink, church, pet/animal, ocean view, mountain view, automobile, shapes, etc. I think this be cool as a weekly thing rather than a daily thing though.

Maybe doing some topic threads, best smart device travel apps you use, favorite small town in Italy-France-Spain-etc., walking/biking trips, solo travel, best packing tips, taking trains in Italy, favorite travel bag/purse/shoes/luggage, favorite beach town travel, favorite big city, etc. This might be fun because we can share our experiences/favorites and it could be helpful getting ideas from others. Can't think of any more ideas for now.

I'll share a tweet and post on my blog too.

Thanks so much Pauline for having these forums.
 
Hi Pauline
Linked to my post on the use of 'spoiler' feature - a simple weekly quiz question (or questions for the enthusiastic), I'd be keen to run one or two to get us started. This might work better as a weekly thing, rather than daily?

Ideally someone chirps in on the current quiz, to say they'll do the following week's quiz, to enable it to flow from week to week.

regards
Ian
 
@Kathy (Trekcapri) is the Travel Photo Hunt something you did on ST or is it a web-wide thing? I never understood where the hunt topics came from. I like the idea. I can start a post each week if you tell me how to find the topic. If we have to make up the topics, I will need some help.

@Ian Sutton , I like that idea too. I tried your quiz but I don't drink wine or know anything about it, so failed miserably. Would you like to start doing a weekly quiz and then we can get other volunteers. Back in the old ST days, we did quizzes. Steve (my husband) remembers doing a quiz by email - that must have been back around 2000 - 2001.

It would be best, I think, to have these topics here in the Travel Talk forum.

Other ideas?

If the forums get busy enough, maybe one time we can have a real contest like the ones we had before. This time I would do it differently. I think there are still some mods not talking to me because of how time-consuming it was to do all that judging.
 
I'd like to see a feature that was started on the Slow Travel forum, but didn't get much input, and sort of petered out. It was given the name "Slow Masters", and the idea was that members post information about various quality small-scale artisans that they encountered on their travels. This was a way to share information/recommendations about local craftsmen of any type - gastronomy, carpentry, fabrics, whatever - and also to help spotlight them as a way of perhaps bringing them a few more customers and support them. We did this only for Italian artisans - the initiative was of Letizia from Umbria - but this could be expanded here to all of Europe. You might still see the feature here :
http://www.slowtrav.com/italy/stores/artisans/index.htm

This could be quite unique, as sites like TA cover accommodations, dining, and some sorts of businesses, but do not have specific input in this area. There are good regional resources that supply lists of artisans, but it's always good to read the experiences that other travelers have had with these small-scale producers, and always nice to relate about them. Also, not all these resources are in English, and sometimes are hard to come by. Nowadays there are even apps that cover this subject - but again, hearing and telling about an experience adds another dimension.

I think that as the emphasis here is on slow travel, and many of us go looking for this type of activity, this could be a useful feature.

And as a newcomer this is an opportunity for me to thank Pauline for the lovely site.
 
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Pauline, as I recall, the photo hunts were just started by moderators in each forum, who came up with topics, which were usually pretty general. Some of those I remember were colors -- Red, Blue, Green, etc. -- shapes like Lines or Circles, descriptive words like Scary or Tradition, or sometimes more specific topics like Shopping or Trees or Sunsets. It was fun to see how creative people often were in finding photos to fit the category. I believe we required people to use their own photos, not something they'd found online, and for those photos to write a little description of where they were taken, memories associated with the photo, etc.

The other thing that was popular there for a while were the "Name that Village" quizzes. Someone would post a photo from a village in the forum country (France, Italy, etc.). Then whoever named the location correctly would post the next photo for people to identify. Sometimes people had to give extra clues if the location was a bit obscure.

One thing that just occurred to me -- I know a lot of phones and cameras now attach GPS info to photos. Do you know if your forum software displays that? If so, it would sort of negate that last type of quiz.
 
Great ideas!

I am looking into an add on for the forum software that will let us post articles, similar to the Media add on where it is a tab and has its own categories. We could post Slow Masters there as @joe suggested.
 
@Kathy (Trekcapri) is the Travel Photo Hunt something you did on ST or is it a web-wide thing? I never understood where the hunt topics came from. I like the idea. I can start a post each week if you tell me how to find the topic. If we have to make up the topics, I will need some help.

If the forums get busy enough, maybe one time we can have a real contest like the ones we had before. This time I would do it differently. I think there are still some mods not talking to me because of how time-consuming it was to do all that judging.

Hi Pauline, sorry for the delay in my response. Sometimes I forget to check back on the threads I reply to. I believe the PhotoHunt idea first started from a blogger (non travel related). A few ST members participated and then it started on Slowtalk but I'm not sure who make up the weekly themes. It could've been one of the moderators. The weekly theme would be posted each week and people would post their photos throughout the week. As a weekly theme, it would be pretty easy to come up with 52 theme ideas.

We could totally help you with the topics. First, a thread could be started asking for ideas (I think it would be cool to get input) and then a final list from those wonderful ideas, and then from that list, the theme can be posted weekly. Edited to add: For simplicity sake, rather than making a list per se, you can just pick a theme from the ideas thread, and Post, This week's theme is Coffee from member XXXXX.

I remember it being fun and people were very creative, plus we got to see and learn about some cool places. A topic could be humor, mist, menu, it could literally be a lot of different, fun and interesting themes that Travel photos can produce.
 
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Oh, this is all sounding very exciting and fun!! I miss the daily interaction and comaraderie from the good old days on ST and look forward to participating in these activities.
 
@Kathy (Trekcapri) do you want to run the weekly photo hunt? If not, maybe you could get us started then I could take over? I think it is a great idea but have never participated in one before.

Hi Pauline, sure I can get us started on it. Let me start with a thread asking for some themes from everyone and then I can post our first Photo A week Thread. Where should I start it in? I was guessing in the Travel Talk category? Is that okay?
 
The photo hunt was such fun! Glad to see it revived here. I also almost started the alphabet photo weekly post but never had the time once I found it. I am not sure who or how it got started. Each week, people who participated posted a picture starting with the letter of the week (the letters went in alphabetical order) so it is pretty easy to run. I guess just a thread would be started or a photo album??

I always enjoyed the guess this photo posts where a photo from somewhere was posted and everyone had to guess where. Whoever guessed posted the next photo. If no one could figure it out, clues would then be given. It's probably similar to "name that village" although sometimes if I recall it was a specific building, tourist spot, etc. Of course, this could all just be made up in my mind!

I also like the idea of a photo of the day. This would be a cool idea to share with everyone things happening all over the world - or where you happen to be at the moment.
 
I, too, have enjoyed ST's photo hunts, and would be glad to see them here. Roz's makes a good point about the geolocation info that's attached to all smartphone (and many camera) photos these days. However, there must be a way of stripping out this data before publishing on SE (people will have all sorts of reasons, both legitimate and less so, for needing to do this in other situations!). Maybe you could ask on the Xenforo forums, @Pauline - if you get time, between processing all these new members :garlicman: ?
 
One thing that just occurred to me -- I know a lot of phones and cameras now attach GPS info to photos. Do you know if your forum software displays that? If so, it would sort of negate that last type of quiz.

Good point. I'll look into it.
 
I always enjoyed the guess this photo posts where a photo from somewhere was posted and everyone had to guess where. Whoever guessed posted the next photo. If no one could figure it out, clues would then be given.

I like that idea. @Susan (Girasoli) would you like to start that? You could post in this forum, Travel Talk, and do the first photo, then it would continue on from there.

I'll start a photo of the day thread. I don't expect everyone to post every day, but it would be nice if at least a few people did each day.

I am installing software this weekend that will let us publish articles on the forums. It is similar to the Media Gallery, with a tab up there and when you go in there are categories and you post an article to a category.

I haven't looked into the GPS info on photos yet, but will.
 
This may be too difficult to maintain. What about an FAQ for logistics, at the top of each country forum? For example:

  • How to buy train tickets.
  • How to get from airport x to city x.
  • How to buy metro/tube/subway tickets in namethatcity.
  • How to transfer from airport x to airport y.
  • How to store luggage -- train station, city or airport.
This would require knowledgeable contributions from experienced travelers. There will be multiple answers on some logistics, such as buying train tickets in-country, or before the trip.

On the old ST forum, I'd see the same questions repeated, and answered, in many threads, regardless of a good search tool. This may help organize/eliminate so many repeats.

Would the benefits outweigh the time/effort to maintain?

Thanks!
 

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