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Add a Giveaway channel in chat

Add a Giveaway channel in chat
Posted 2021-11-01 07:37:55
I don't often chat in the Main chat channel, but when I do I notice that the conversation is often interrupted by "anyone want this wolf before I chase it?"-posts. It's lovely that people are generous and want to give away stuff, but too many posts like that  makes conversations hard to follow.
  My suggestion is to add a Giveaway channel in the chat room where people can post about wolves and items they are giving away for free. This would make it easier for people to have a conversation in the Main chat channel, and easier for people to find offers of free wolves/items. :)
Eelai
#1355

Posted 2021-11-01 16:18:18
No support for a couple reasons.

1) A lot of giveaways arise organically from conversation. Like a newbie will ask "How do I raise the survival of my pups?" and it turns out they have six pups on one sitter, and someone will offer a spare pupsitter. Or someone will say "uggh winter is kicking my hunters' ass" and someone will offer them food. Main chat is a really generous place and I like that.

2) For more standard-type giveaways ("Anyone want any of the pups in this den?"), I don't feel they overwhelm conversation, and I like them in main chat so they can find a wider audience. If they were required to be in a giveaway channel I feel like nobody would read that channel except other people posting giveaways, and it'd be a lot harder to find homes for extra pups. (ofc I'm biased because I do this in main, but I don't mind seeing other people's giveaways either)

Lionel
#34199

Posted 2021-11-07 15:21:38
Support.

The giveaways make the main chat hard to read, and, from a perspective of a person who was a Moderator on another game - hard to moderate and make sure no one is actually begging/breaking other rules while a giveaway is going and making chat go fast.

As for Lionel's points:

1) The tutorial is here for a reason. Users could benefit from reading through it, and, if they do need some wolves - check the Giveaway channel in chat for any giveaways happening. As for the "uggh, winter is kicking my hunters' ass"... Sad to say it, but most of the time it's veiled begging and people who don't actually even have hunters or who don't send them to hunt. I have seen situations when someone would say that, get food and then go "Oh, I don't send them hunting/I sell the food I get", which, well, is pretty unfair on person gifting. And people can be generous on forums or in a specifically made for it chat channel. No one says they cannot gift someone saying in main that they struggling or anything - just don't have to announce it in that exact channel.

2) Such giveaways tend to go very fast into 5-10 people asking about all kinds of pups from the person, flooding the main chat and pushing other users out of the conversation. As for the "no one will look" - have you ever seen any of the freebies forums or chats in different games? People literally stalk them, just to nab a good giveaway find. For years, since the very early days of neopets and other early pet sim games if they had ANY kind of freebie place going - people went apeshit for it and trust me, we kept tabs, we kept timers, we set alarms and would camp our asses in front of our dial-up internet pc in order to get this shit. And gods save you if anyone dared to call at that time because you would miss out - the net would just poof.
So please, do not tell me no one will check it. People will flock to it, like always with free stuff. Slap a sticker with big FREE on it and you have the whole area concentrated on you - basic principle of business, people love freebies and will seek them out.

And, a bit more on the Moderating bit. Having channel dedicated to only one thing will free the other channel, make it easier to read and catch anyone begging, veiled begging or breaking any of the other rules in CoC and will also make it easier for users to feel included. Many users avoid Main chat now because of the giveaways and feeling that whatever they say will be lost in the giveaway jungle. Some of them are my very close friends I talk to on the daily, who said it clearly - they avoid Main because of the giveaways and the begging they enable, and because they fear their messages will be flooded out by that.

TL;DR: I support a separate channel for Giveaways for the sake of both players and Moderators who have to keep all that in check.

Khajiit
#2754

Posted 2021-11-08 02:01:03
Huge support! I don't drop in chat very often, because when I do most of what I see is essentially this: someone giving away stuff (and it is lovely too see how generous people are, don't get me wrong) but it gets tiresome to see the chorus of pings asking for the thing, the awws when it's only one thing and so it can only go to one player, and then the rows of people commenting on how nice it is, how lucky, how jealous, ect. And it's often contagious, it'd not be the first time I see someone randomly sharing a wolf to give away and then someone else does, too. A channel exclusive to giveaways would be a perfect addition. Anyone who's interested in that kind of thing can keep an eye on it, and leave Main chat for others to talk :)

Plus, I imagine if a giveaway is born form a "natural conversation flow" the one giving away can always say "hey check giveaways" and leave it at that.

Berenos
#2759

Posted 2021-11-08 02:09:14
Yes, yes, yes, please! I hate the giveaways so much because they clutter up every single chatroom and make it impossible to look for trades (art or otherwise). I really wish the feature was never implemented, that's how annoying it is.

If I'm looking to trade with someone, I'm looking to trade with someone. If I'm looking to commission art, I'm looking to commission art. In neither of these situations am I looking for a giveaway and they keep pushing down threads and links I'd otherwise love to see in the trade/art chats. Likewise, interactions in the main channel will no longer be interrupted by "do you want (X)?" because there will now be a space to ask exactly that!

It's just disruptive to have giveaways pop up in the other channels, there's no way around it.

Flower
#3196

Posted 2021-11-08 07:39:41
I'm surprised that people dislike the giveaways so much! As someone who hangs out in main chat a lot, I've never found giveaways to be disruptive or to impede the flow of conversation. It's a lively place; there are often several conversational threads going at once (sometimes giveaway-related, sometimes not), and it's easy to continue an existing conversation while other things are going on at the same time.

I also like the atmosphere that frequent giveaways create. Main chat is a very generous, open place and I like that. It makes it a cozy space to interact. It gives new players a good impression of the site: "wow, people are nice here." Conversely it would be pretty un-cozy if mods stepped in to warn anyone trying to be generous to take it elsewhere. And if it were all shunted to a giveaway channel, I doubt I'd check that channel except to post my own advertisements (kinda like sales chat, a space for advertisements to die unnoticed).

Lionel
#34199

Posted 2021-11-08 07:58:49
Yeah, I'm sorry but "cozy" isn't really an atmosphere I care about. I can sort of understand why it appeals to you but from my perspective, it's genuinely just disruptive to the flow of conversation and in the case of the other two channels, pushes down legitimate advertisements trying to trade goods or hard work for goodies.

In my ignorance I offered up a wolf in main chat only once like that and never again because instantly the conversation shifted to that individual wolf, burying other people's conversations and not allowing them to continue without constant pinging. I can't help but see it as rude to interrupt everyone's conversations like that and it does make main chat difficult to follow if you're uninterested in those. I really don't feel like the site becomes any less giving if there's a separate plate for advertisements like those and they are advertisements! They shouldn't clutter up other chats, including the main chat.

Presently, they also make the trade and art chats nearly unusable. I've stopped browsing those entirely, it's just too much wading through muck and mud to find something of value because I'm not looking for what is effectively gambling disguised as charity because unless people make up for the price of the item with tickets and then some, they can just cancel the giveaway. I'm sorry but none of this is "cozy" through my point of view, it's just an annoyance. Kind of like walking through a store to be offered scratch tickets or someone's unwanted dog. Yeah, cool, they're nice, but I'm not here for them. There should be a time and place for getting them and it shouldn't be all the time, everywhere.

Flower
#3196

Posted 2021-11-08 08:19:35
I agree with Flower there. Main chat is not supposed to be "cozy". Do you know what "cozy" leads to? Oversharing lots of information. And, I understand that kids and younger people these days do not know it, because they feel safe on the internet - but it would take me less than 5 minutes to pinpoint their country, state, school and even exact location in which they live just from that "cozy and generous" chat. And use that against them. Because they will want to talk to the person who gifted them/was hosting a giveaway in Main, and you never know who may be lurking and reading from the side without taking part in it.
It also brings in beggars who destroy the whole "generous" feel and makes it annoying. It also brings people who giveaway things not because they want to help someone/make them happy, but just want to brag that "Ooooh, look at me, I give away so much stuff, love me now". Both are highly unfair to those who actually want to be generous. Having a channel for giveaways would curb both of those behaviors.

I want to go to main to discuss things, talk to friends, help users with their questions, not to be buried under giveaways. Because giveaways make Main hostile to newbies for the most part. Their questions about the game get buried under that, just like the answers of other users.

There is a time and place for giveaways, and the place is definitely not the Main chat.

Khajiit
#2754

Posted 2021-11-08 08:23:19
Presently, they also make the trade and art chats nearly unusable. I've stopped browsing those entirely, it's just too much wading through muck and mud to find something of value because I'm not looking for what is effectively gambling disguised as charity because unless people make up for the price of the item with tickets and then some, they can just cancel the giveaway.

That sounds like raffles, which already aren't allowed in main chat. If they're making trade/art chat unusable, I would totally support making a dedicated raffle channel for all raffle advertisements (which I think may already be a suggestion on here).

Lionel
#34199

Posted 2021-11-26 16:14:41 (edited)
If Giveaway chat was added, giveaways wouldn't be less frequent in Main chat as they currently are. It'd be similar to Help chat - some users ask questions there but most of them ask in Main chat instead because it's the default chat and they'd be quickly given answers. Most of users don't even check the other channels until they're instructed, such as first advertisements by new players occur in Main chat until they're told to go to Sales. And giveaways will be mentioned in Main chat to encourage the most players. All topics that are allowed in Main chat will be raised in Main chat.

Dżanek
#24018

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