Boards competing with the Shoutbox

We installed a shoutbox on our 2.0.11 forum not too long ago. It seems to be wildly popular; in fact, if you ask me, I think it might be a little too much so. Activity seems to have dropped a bit as far as posting goes, and it seems that people have taken their conversations to the box instead.

(It's worth noting that our community is hardly in ideal circumstances as it is; the forum we're on was set up as a temporary replacement for a company's official forum (which this forum's staff also ran). That forum has had a lot of trouble staying up, and right now it's looking like our "temporary" forum may be around a lot longer than we had initially hoped.

The official forum never had a shout box. At the time we talked about it (back in 2011), we all agreed that it would be too hard to moderate (given that our community is trying to be very family-friendly). With the forum going down, though, the administrator suggested that if we were ever going to try it out, the backup forum would be a good place to do it.)

We've asked our members what it is that they like about the shoutbox. The consensus is that it's easier to keep up with new stuff (given that it updates automatically with AJAX), it's quicker to post there, and it's very easily accessible to everyone, being at the top of every page.

I'm considering what to do about this. On the one hand, I (and some more cynical members ) are concerned it might be hurting the community's atmosphere. On the other hand, if we could make the regular forum experience better in other ways, maybe this "infatuation" with the shoutbox would be balanced out. I've considered psychological, but relatively minor changes like moving the shoutbox to the bottom of the screen instead of the top. We might end up doing that anyway, but I was curious if any other, more experienced admins had any other ideas that could help with this.

I've wondered whether it would be feasible to make the whole page AJAX, like the shoutbox... as this idea doesn't seem to have been implemented anywhere in the SMF community that I can tell, I'm guessing there must be a good reason for not doing it, but not being adept with the technical side of things, I'm not sure why that is; if anybody's willing to clue a newbie into that, I'd appreciate that, too.

(On the side: I did give ENotify a run. The users, and I both thought it was a little too "busy".)

Thanks in advance for any tips y'all have to offer.

So.. burn the shoutbox!!

Those are good points brought on about the shoutbox.


I think right now, people like the novelty of it as you've said. I think immediate action would be rash. Wait a few days more to see if the activity is the same or is less.


A question about the shoutbox: is there a time limit between posts? Maybe you could extend it so in between they could comment in threads instead. The spirit of the community is very important, but it can evolve it


I think it's a good idea for the shoutbox to stay, but be used more about news and announcements with occasional chatting. So this are my two cents!

It is just a more convenient way to keep a conversation going.  I know that it will never replace the post element in the forums for me, just because that is the bread and butter so to say, if you ask me.  I do like the Shoutbox feature though, and I like the look of it too.

I prefer the Forums.

Hmmm... I think the Shoutbox is a nice way of engaging users to stay since it's easier to communicate with the other members through it. But like you said, it can also be bad for the forums because they end up posting on the Shoutbox instead of the forum.

One solution I can think of is limiting the posting abilities per day of each member in the Shoutbox. Is there even a plugin for this? That's what I don't know of. Although I do know that a member's page access can be "seen" by the Shoutbox and so it's not impossible to limit their posts in it.

Another thing you could do is limit the posters to your admin or staff members only. This can be too restrictive though.

I think the forum is way better. IN shoutbox type, the older chats will get lost easily in the chatroom and may take time finding a specific part of a conversation.

remove the box

i dont agree with the shoutbox because this is a forum and not a WhatsApp chat.


it takes away from encouraging proper discourse on the forum about various topics.

The Chairman : hey guys who know code and has vision.


Big Cat , starter of this thread : Chair looking for you !