Your Forum Review
First Impressions & Appearance - (Out of 20)
The thing that struck me the most was the artfully done monochromatic scheme. of blue. Everything is blue, but it never gets bland or old, it's refreshing and well detailed. Everything about it is simple, welcoming, and not trying to be overly detailed or complicated, it has a professional air of knowing how to get things done in the easiest way possible, but still doing it gracefully. Even your topic icons, the most susceptible to guest confusion, is easy to understand with a quick cursory glance at it. Everywhere I look, I see the bits that show whomever did the graphics work for the site left no stone unturned, everything there had a specific purpose and design, there's a clear effort and determination to break away from anything that may have been default, or hey, anything that has a semblance to any ordinary forum out there. From the user bars, to the ranks, to the posting backgrounds, down to the medals and PM buttons, everything comes together in a great, pleasing harmony that you can't just rightly criticize. The only thing I've found that I disliked is so small you might as well slap me for trying too hard to find something wrong. The gender icon, to the right of a user's name, looks so unrefined against the grand scheme of completeness found elsewhere, it appears as though it were spray painted in MS paint for a quick fix. But that's such an insignificant detail, it counts for nothing. Perfect merits.
(Scored 20/20)
Site Layout - (Out of 20)
Normally, I'm one who opposes long, or excessive forum indexes. My philosophy on such matters are usually that who believes less is more, simpler is better, what doesn't matter should extricated, barebones essentials are what's needed in long run. The Hazey has proven me wrong. There are over 40 forums, and upon inspection, I could honestly find myself posting in each and every one of them, just on the subject matter alone, which is a great feat for someone like me, who would rarely exceed past 100 posts on any one site. Then we have your site features. Here I've been thinking that no one could outdo Forum Promotion in this department, well, I think you've achieved yet another record, because I have never seen a site so dedicated to so great a variety of features and functions, from your rules and medals page, down to your newsletter, arcade, and user milestones, it's overwhelming how much can be going on at once, in a promotion site no less. Administrators exist to serve the people, and serve them well you have.
(Scored 20/20)
Statistics and Activity - (Out of 20)
Activity. You might as well just have put The Hazey in place of the word activity in the dictionary at this point. Just looking at it, paying no attention to anything in particular, pretty much anyone can notice that on every forum on the index, roughly 30, have been posted in in the last 5 days. Less than a
week, throughout the entire forums. If anyone reading this is still unimpressed, we may press on to further mind boggling statistics. First and foremost, the creation date. April of this year. Just to give you a time frame, some perspective, from most sites I've seen, and in some cases, have handled, they do well to get 50,000 posts a year, if they're moderately to very successful in the area of activity. Maybe in 2 years they'll have accumulated enough for 100k. With this generalization in mind, here we have your site, at 7 months old, and already 70k worth of messages. You have effectively halved the amount of time it has taken to reach a major milestone, and already three-quarters of the way there. Now the following statistics may not be as jarring, but when they're all connected, they will be. 4000+ topics is by any definition, a good deal, and for what you have, it's a great abundance for any and all members to participate in. Now here's where it only looks bad, but is actually astounding in essence. The Hazey has less than 400 members. With the amount of activity that they have, one would assume they'd harbor at least a thousand or more members, each user contributing their share of 10 or 20 posts here and there. However, where did all the 4000 and 70000 topics and messages respectively, come from? Only 400 users in 7 months have been active enough to accomplish this. This equates to 333 messages a day. This means, in 1 more year, if they continue at this rate, they'll have 200k+ posts, and the site wouldn't have even been 2 years old yet. Judge for yourself, because I already have.
(Scored 20/20)
Staff Moderation - (Out of 20)
As with other sites I have reviewed, there is a problem, being a guest, that there are permissions disallowing visitors to view the personal profiles or usergroups of members. This hinders me only slightly, but it is still something to consider in administration. I don't see how much of a threat it would pose to a site's security that a guest may see at the very least, a usergroup, however I won't question it any further, since your staff have made it easy for me due to their avid activity, it was easy to find records of their conduct. Despite not knowing how many moderators or administrators you may have hired at your site, judging only from the active ones, I've gathered that you have a decent number, roughly 3-5 moderators, and after reviewing their behavior, I'm well assured that they carry out their duties with a professionalism all staff should strive for. Beyond that, they all seem to have amassed at least more than a thousand posts each, which would only help their reputation as being dedicated contributors to the site.
(Scored 20/20)
Spelling/Grammar & Professionalism - (Out of 20)
Considering the amount of activity at your site, that's a beneficial and hindering factor in both regards. On the one hand, there's so much you can go through, one may not know how much of the whole picture they're seeing, one forum's usual conversations may be different from another's, all within the same site. However, with so much activity, all of the information garnered from it gives a more detailed and updated idea of how your members interact and communicate. With regards to their spelling and grammar structure, all of the posts I've read there have all been clear and legible, but not perfect. In more than half of the posts of normal members, I've regularly encountered abnormal capitalization and punctuation, but none of it detracted from the core message any one of them were trying to convey, and that's what matters in posts, getting an idea across. Overall, their English is basic and understandable, but it's not refined, or shall we say, it wouldn't get an A from a erudite English professor.
(Scored 18/20)
Total Score - (98 Out of 100)
Final Remarks:
What was most liked about the website/forums: The features. There's so much to do there, to see, to be apart of, it seems to never end.
What was disliked most about the website/forums: Some of the member's English could use work, but that's about all.
How could I get you (The Reviewer) to join my website? This is the first site I've reviewed that I'm actually going to join. There's nothing more you can do, I plan on registering some time tomorrow.
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