simplification

Isn't there some blurring of lines in that the articles can all be commented apon? So breaking items into categories of articles and dialogue becomes somewhat trickier?

Devision of subject matter into articles and guides might perhaps be better? The definition being a difference between research and actual instructions.

Comments to posts are a bit of a grey area, but I can't help but feel open discussion should sit on it's own in forums, or else articles risk getting off-topic. Forum however could fall under the heading of "Community" along with more personal items like blog, audio and visual posts?

I think cidvicious expressed it well. Before reading his post I had imagined something similar. With information overload a problem today and simplicity as a desired feature of any easy to use interface I would love to see the metadata idea implemented. I would love to have one link to post content on the left and then a pull-down menu allowing me to label it appropriately as a skill, a blog post, an idea. I would love to see forum posting only done within the forum.

I've noticed just now on the left in the branch below the "doable action task list" there's another seperate branch called Create Content which has some duplicates from the branch above it (eg skill, quiz, etc.) I would love to see a single button that allows me to get to a Content Posting form, where I could simply tag it as a news article, an idea, a blog post, etc.

Also, maybe this is just a pie in the sky, but how easy would it be to give users the ability to customize the list on the left? I like it but do not use 90% of the options.

since everything can be commented on, prehaps something along the lines of the intended audience and level of discussion should be considered.

1. Personal

i.e. blogs Anything that is essentially about you, what you feel or believe.

2. Discussion

anything that requires discussion to have meaning e.e. forums , polls, etc. This is defferent from personal in that the goal is that the post should lead to a colaborative action.

3. Encyclopedia

if we limit the content of book pages to finished, polished, colaborative products, then we can isolate a lot of the clutter. For example, we could develop guides and how to's in forums or individually, and not post them into the book pages until they are ready for non-contributing members to benefit from.

Most a/v content would be the same

And i still stick by my earlier statement that we have way too many content types.

When you get right down to it, forums are really nothing more than comments about other comments, stacked to form a discussion.  The forum model has been around long enough to develop tools like threading and threshold hiding which become very necessary on large/popular topics, but whether the discussion stems from a forum post, a blog entry, an image, a link, or whatever, the format still holds true. 

By being able to control when/where/how discussions (dialogue) are displayed it gives us the option to conveniently have two-way multi-party discussions about any piece of content anywhere on the site, without becoming a nuisance.  

My line of thinking with the divisions I outlined earlier is this--when we post something to this site, we are doing one of two things--saying something, or saying something about something.  

If I wanna write a blog post, or upload a media file, post a link to a cool site/resource/news story, or whatever, it is still just me saying something.  Now, like I mentioned earlier, comments and forums are basically two methods for the exact same thing.  Anything at all can provoke discussion, and by using controls to keep the discussion from spilling over where it would be in the way (controls meaning:  threading, thresholds, collapsing/hiding, user moderation, etc.)  we can provide a whole new level of depth without compromising the quality/ease of the rest of the site.  

So, in other words, comments are just a forum thread and can be attached to anything on the site.  Each content node can have its own thread(s) which aren't visible unless you access it.  Kind of like a behind the scenes discussion about anything on the site at all.  And since it's all done by database anyhow, there's absolutely no reason why things can't show up in more than one place.  

Okay, lemme try an lay out an example.....  

Let's use my blog post about the Android platform and my fears about Google (turning into Skynet).  The basic piece of content is a block of text--me ranting about Google--which is flagged as a blog post (which creates an insertion point on the site--my blog).  Attached to this node are all the links I used (each of which is a child node), and a discussion/comment thread.  Now, the comments and links can be displayed anywhere we want, so not only does it show up at the end of my post, but it could also have an insertion point in the forums (or in a sub-forum for clarity's sake), and each link can automagically be given an insertion point into a list of all-time links, or all of cid's links. 

Each new thing is a node of its own (even if it is a child node) so each link node attached to my initial post could potentially host a micro-discussion or ratings of its own.  If somebody has something new to add, it can be attached directly to the link itself.  

This is right where metadata comes in.  For building relationships between content, I imagine something like Boolean tagging.  Very much like the supporting/opposing ideas thing, but not relegated to the idea content type.  Anything could be linked to anything else.  And by adding Boolean operators along with the tag method, we can achieve more accuracy in the represented relationships.  So, things like Google AND Microsoft, Google NOT Microsoft, and on and on.  

This would allow us to build more accurate relationships between our content/users than I've ever seen done before.  It would also make the system much more machine-readable.  

Any piece of content could be host to a discussion, and related to/against any other piece(s).   

For clarity/accessiblity/ease we'll need to find a way to streamline the presentation.  I was thinking maybe two methods--a DHTML interactive method, and a link-based simple/oldschool interface for older/slower/mobile platforms, etc.  For instance, you could have a 'View Rich Content' link which would take you to a separate page listing relationship tags, discussion/comment links, etc.  

Drupal seems perfect for this also.  As I understand it, everything was pretty much thrown together from existing modules so far, and at some point we're going to need to code our own custom module anyway, so I'm trying to hash out some good ideas to get a clear idea of where we want to go from here.  

Incidentally, I appreciate the feedback.  The more this discussion progresses, the more these ideas are beginning to take shape.  

A thought just occured. Do we have any psychology experts yet?

This is, afterall, a website for people. We don't need to be worrying over how information needs to be aranged semanticly, but how it should be arranged naturally.

How should things be arranged to allow the easiest path between all the points?

As each broad section is so information dense, perhaps we need to impliment a series of portals? Enter one section, and only have the index for that section visible, with the master links for the other section shown.

Since the sidebar indexes already collapse, I wouldn't have thought it would be hard to enforce it so only one menu was expanded at a time? 

I have noticed considerably faster page loads recently. Also, the menu bar on the left looks better, and our personal profiles are kick ass.

This site no longer gives me a headache!

Infact, I just noticed for the first time that the empowerment logo has no ears. Poor guy.

I think that the menu could be cleaned up a bit more. Also, do those nifty thumbs up and thumbs down buttons do anything? It would be nice if they had an affect on gold stars. Incorperating gold stars and a rating system would make it much easier to impliment meaningfull thresholds.