I was tossing some things around the other day, because it's something I've thought about before, but I don't really have anything that I'm not skeptical of implementing at this time because of time/effort/return... some ways in the future, though, I was thinking we might be better off with keeping LORE as it is, and doing something like Blizzard's blue posts if we ended up with those kind of forum capabilities.
Basically, the someday ability for an admin to flag his posts or the posts of someone else as 'official'. Posts flagged in this way could be a filter option for easier searching, offer another choice besides 'get new posts' in 'get new official posts' ... Possibly toss to a repository of sorts as something to consider editing current information with.
I feel like it should be an on-posting function that is turned on rather than always on, because...
[INDENT]*Devs can post without automatically being official. Contributing to a discussion and giving an opinion is different from saying "this is so." Also, if they just want to post a silly comment on a youtube video, it doesn't need to clutter up a search.
*So that if someone makes a post that lays it down in a way the admin fully supports, they can just tag that post rather than having to messy quote it or rewrite it or anything else.
*It's not something that is dependent on someone being timely with that kind of update... and can just be examined whenever in case there is new information that could be integrated with existing content on LORE, rather than having a separate anything for "decisions" or official sounding posts. Information is information, you know? And that seems like where it is all going to end up, anyway.
*If you add tags to posts marked for this, it doesn't really matter where they fall in the forums, whether a new thread or buried in a 30-page one - with a better search (in another forum, far far away) you can just search the whole forum for the word "Rofirein" in flagged posts. [/INDENT]
It's sort of irrelevant because I'm not sure we can make it work like that right now, anyway, but I just kind of cringe at the thought of the indexing upkeep administrative work of doing it any kind of manually. It seems like something that should be done "all the way" so that it can be useful in the longterm, or something short-term useful that does not take very much effort... not a temporary lot-of-effort thing. I am of course all for limiting information loss (duh), but I have a pretty good memory and do have a degree in Internet Archaeology. *nod*
I'm not suggesting that that's ideal and so forget about it... just that I know we don't have a lot of people in either area. I'm wondering how often this comes up, and how much of it is related more to the issue of information in general being finished or released, than it is to a specific post being lost, you know? Not to be a downer. I am interested in the topic, and also am hopeful of suggestions that seem less a mass-hire of administrative assistants but more plausible than adding new search functions. ;) The "how" is kind of important, I guess.
If it does end up something like the forum stickies and links bit, I think rather than someone taking "ownership" of it, that it should be done in a way that anyone can report, however that is possible. This index, its folder titles and linked threads, could be added and updated by GM's and Players gradually.
I feel like the "and players" is important. If Gulnyr suggested that Knights should have the ability to dispense justice and Ed makes a ruling for all Rofireinites that clearly states otherwise, Gulnyr should be able to take Ed's post and put it in the appropriate section without too many steps. Not as an official position or responsibility, but as a player that sees a decision and just marks it for other people so it doesn't get lost... and so that if he doesn't, someone else will. Anything relying on someone owning it as a project seems temporary at best.
(In other words, I did not really add anything helpful - just to summarize, there. *sad* Carry on. )