Because of a massive influx of people to the community we have been forced to enable Hold For Review on new member...
Because of a massive influx of people to the community we have been forced to enable Hold For Review on new member posts.
• Do not be alarmed if your post is held for review. We are not censoring for bias, rather attempting to keep the amount of repeated content to a minimum.
• This community is an order of magnitude larger than was originally scoped for, as a result, we do not have enough mods. If you wish to become a mod, contact me privately.
• There is a lot of information available in links on the left side of this comment. Please consider consulting these links before asking a question. In particular, the FAQs (both mini and normal size) contain most answers to questions we've been seeing from newcomers.
• We're more or less done with the research phase. At this point, there isn't time to investigate some new site or offering. The spreadsheet of options exists and the owner of that spreadsheet takes requests for additions. The wiki is a wiki. Aside from that, your countdown began awhile ago. Time to choose.
• Do not be alarmed if your post is held for review. We are not censoring for bias, rather attempting to keep the amount of repeated content to a minimum.
• This community is an order of magnitude larger than was originally scoped for, as a result, we do not have enough mods. If you wish to become a mod, contact me privately.
• There is a lot of information available in links on the left side of this comment. Please consider consulting these links before asking a question. In particular, the FAQs (both mini and normal size) contain most answers to questions we've been seeing from newcomers.
• We're more or less done with the research phase. At this point, there isn't time to investigate some new site or offering. The spreadsheet of options exists and the owner of that spreadsheet takes requests for additions. The wiki is a wiki. Aside from that, your countdown began awhile ago. Time to choose.
Thank you for all your efforts to inform people about the shutdown and what our options are. We should all be downloading our content, deciding where we will go from here and letting our G+ friends know.
ReplyDeleteAlso adding: one of the key uses of FAQs isn't that people ask fewer questions because they've read them. But responders can answer more quickly and consistently by using them.
ReplyDeleteThe answers can also be tuned and improved with time.
So: if you're seeing questions show up, and you know there's a FAQ on it, feel free to past the answer and the link as a response.
John Lewis, Cindy Brown, and I (the three active mods at this point) have also been discussing answering but not approving frequently-asked, low-value questions.
If you want to understand the why of this, take a look at the Google+ Help community right now. Over the past day, it's probably seen over 200 posts, the vast majority of which are some variation of "what is G+", "how do I know if I have a G+ account" (asked ... on G+), and when the shutdown date is or what other products will be shut down at the same time (NONE!!!) or affected (... a few, we've FAQd this).
The G+H mods are exhibiting a truly staggering degree of patience in light of this.
We don't think that onslaught of questions serves a key function of this Community: providing a useful information repository to others. That is, yes, we want to answer questions as they come in, but if the question has already been answered multiple times, there's little value in posting that publicly again.
So: policy change will be that FAQd questions won't be approved for posting, and instead will be answered but removed from the Community. That serves the user, but doesn't flood the forum.
(G+H are constrained in what they can do by operating under Google's own rules and procedures. I've suggested they operate similarly, but their hands are tied.)
Having a few additional mods on board could help at this. I've had a few people in mind for a while, though I've mostly wanted to not suck up their time with moderation because it's far more usefully spent elsewhere.
We will also be posting the main FAQs to the Community frequently. The Short FAQ will probably go up about daily, and we'll link in the long one fairly regularly as well. Given a general lack of ways of presenting information on G+ in persistent ways, repetition is our best outreach mechanism.
We should also generally discourage new entries (or repetitions) in the "Sites and Platforms" category. At this point you should already have chosen and be in the process of migrating. New options don't assist that process, with a few exceptions.
The most notable of those is development of G+ content migration, especially for Communities. There've been a few of these turning up over the past few days, and these are both impressive and very much appreciated.
How much time is required to review a post for approval? I just attempted to post a question regarding the availability of means for restoring the banner (which I just mistakenly removed) announcing the April 2, 2019 sunsetting of Google+; however, my post is apparently being held for review, and I would rather have a quick response before I forget the fact that I asked the question in the first place (I tend to be extremely absent-minded). (It is extremely difficult to maintain a good memory when one is sleep-deprived.)
ReplyDeleteJust now, I discovered a URL for the page referenced by the April 2, 2019, sunset banner: support.google.com - 一般ユーザー（個人）向け Google+ は 2019 年 4 月 2 日にサービスを終了します - Google+ ヘルプ .
ReplyDeleteWhile it may not be possible to restore the banner per se, it is possible to keep a browser/tab pointed to this page.
(Of course, that is no guarantee that the URL cannot also be lost, and this reference not also lost/forgotten.)
Benjamin Russell You're grandfathered on G+MM, there is no review..
ReplyDeletePresently: A few minutes to a few hours. Shorter with more mods on watch.
Edward Morbius > You're
ReplyDelete> grandfathered.
Yes; I know. My purpose was to ascertain whether any progress had been made in finding a way to restore that banner.
Edward Morbius
ReplyDeleteAn EXCELLENT decision! I'm surprised the G+ Help community doesn't do likewise.
Benjamin Russell logout of G+ and the banner is always there.
ReplyDeleteDiana Studer This wasn't the case a few days ago, when I use Firefox to view plus.google.com incognito, the top banner is not there today either.
ReplyDeleteI use Google Chrome.
ReplyDeleteI was secretly hoping the group would get to 5000 before shutdown. Just a little game in my head...
ReplyDeleteDiana Studer FWIW, I'm not seeing the banner under either Chrome (Android) or Firefox (OSX), whilst logged out.
ReplyDeleteEdward Morbius for you I logged out. I use 2 Gmail accounts.
ReplyDelete1 for blogging with no G+ profile ... that one still shows the banner when I login. If you are not yet a ghost you will see the banner. Weird. Since the message is meaningless in that context.
Another active on G+ ... and that banner is dismissed.
I wanted to include #signalflare as another means to find Plussers in the Google Plus Meetup on fb.
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately, I found relaying this hashtag only directed members of the group to whatever fb posts use it...and it wasn't directing them to find any plussers.
Any suggestions?
Also, I'd like to request Edward Morbius?? include YouMe.social to be included with possible landing sites on the Wiki.
ReplyDeleteMy apologies if my above query and this suggestion aren't relevant to this post :)
al m It's a Wiki. You can (and are strongly encouraged) to add it yourself.
ReplyDeleteEdward Morbius Of course, thanks :)
ReplyDelete