[Ryan]

Many of you are probably already aware of the balance cap that we have been discussing.

During that discussion, we began to think of another way in which to help solve the balance issues we are having with PostFusion, but this time focusing on the large negative balances. What we are thinking about now is adding code which will automatically unsubscribe anybody who is subscribed to a forum which reaches a balance of -25. These subscribers would be sent a notification via PM and would not be able to subscribe to that forum again until it reaches -25. Once all subscribers have been unsubscribed, the owner will have a chance to rebuild his/her balance without having to worry about being drug way down.

Now, we realize that this could be a hassle for those subscribers (being unsubscribed against their will and then having to resubscribe later), so we do plan to implement something later on which will automatically subscribe you to that forum once it reaches -25 again. Because this would involve extensive work, we would need to hold it off for a later date.

As to our reasoning behind this...we have had many users complain about being knocked way down into the negatives (-100) with no hopes of coming back into the positives, and yes, it is indeed a problem. Not only does it harm those users, but it harms everybody who is in the positives. Instead of them receiving posts that they deserve, somebody who is at -100 is receiving posts. So we hope that by placing a floor into the system, both unusually low and unusually high balances are lessened. The other side of the coin is that nobody should be posting at a forum which is lower than -25 in the first place. This would prevent that.

Realize, that both the ceiling (cap) and the floor would be implemented at the same time...unless we receive a major uproar and/or a better suggestion. As before, if you are not in favor of this, speak up now - but do not make any comments about this idea being a bad one if you do not have good reasoning or a better suggestion to back it up.

[markblair]

Once again this sounds like a good idea. As I was reading this I worried that people wouldn't resubscribe but I see you have plans for that. I say go for it as it would be nice not to see too many people below -25.

[Moelman]

Would forums like mine which are past -25 be reset to -25 or left the way they are at the start of this? Either way I'm working my way back to the positive, from -200

[LarryB]

Right now there is no easy way to move folks back to -25. It has to do with the way things are recorded in the system. I'm sure we could do something to do it, but it would really take a lot of time to come up with.

[Lpspider]

Very nice improvement, in my opinion. However, I think -50 would be more reasonable. I mean, if you have an active forum you could easily get, say, 40 posts in a day. I'm not yet convinced it's good to have both a positive and negative cap, at least such limited ones...

[Ryan]

The cap (250) is not too limited, imo...the floor could possibly be a bit tight...it might be better at -30 or -50, but I still think that it is a good idea, along with the cap.

[capebretoner]

I like the idea of a floor, however there are two things that I think need to be revised. One -25 is not low enough it should be something like -50. Second is there any way to simply suspend the system from counting posts when they are below the cap instead of un-subscribing them. Just not show the forum on the subscribed page.

It would be a major hassle for people to continually re-subscribe to forums in my mind

[LarryB]

Originally Posted by capebretoner

I like the idea of a floor, however there are two things that I think need to be revised. One -25 is not low enough it should be something like -50. Second is there any way to simply suspend the system from counting posts when they are below the cap instead of un-subscribing them. Just not show the forum on the subscribed page.

It would be a major hassle for people to continually re-subscribe to forums in my mind

Simple answer is no. I could explain to you why, but it took me the better part of an hour to explain it to Ryan last night, so my fingers are tired. We are looking at a resubscribe process, but it is going to take a good bit of work that would be more suited for the next release.

[capebretoner]

Originally Posted by LarryB

Simple answer is no.

Well I will take your word for it

Maybe an option for the short term may be to drop them from the subscribed list like you do for the All Sites list when they reach -25. I always go to the Subscribed list when I sit down to do some posting, you may find that the issue will lessen just by doing that without redesigning the entire script.

Unless that is the thing that you say can't be done......

[Ryan]

That might help, yes...but it's not going to solve the problem - in no time, people would learn their way around that by bookmarking their subscribed sites instead of relying on the subscribed sites list.