Profile Posts?

[Pipsi 14]

I think XenForo, phpBB, and IPB are the biggest softwares that in some aspect or another, support profile posts. My question, however, is why? What is the point of profile posts? Do they actually do anything to contribute to the community?

[Thomasss 210]

I've debated disabling the profile posts all together. Even on the big forums I have seen, it's rarely used.

[s3_gunzel 295]

My question, however, is why?

To make your site more... social networking

[Thomasss 210]

To make your site more... social networking

 

This ^

 

Unless your site uses it to say "hello!" or "how are you?! Haven't seen you in a while. " type of posts, it's more useless than anything. :p It's like your timeline on Facebook. :P

[Lammchen 6]

To make your site more... social networking

 

Yep, this would be the reason. It's also just a different way to connect to people kind of an open side discussion.

[Esmee 17]

I remember a lot of users in VB and the Xenforo forums requested this feature in order to compete with the social media sites. But that did not worked well considering the social media has feeds and the profile posts works differently for it. I think on that point the feature looks pretty much underused as well. Hopefully we may see changes on that near future.

[Alexander 16]

All together, I've removed the profile post add-on on my discussion board. Considering your question, the point of profile posts in my opinion is to make your forum more of a social networking community where others can engage more easily. The risk here is that you may notice less users participate in discussions across your board because their talking through this feature.

[Azareal 11]

The risk here is that you may notice less users participate in discussions across your board because their talking through this feature.

Conversations that are profile post sensitive tend to be personal or low quality.

[Alexander 16]

Conversations that are profile post sensitive tend to be personal or low quality.

 

I couldn't of said it better myself, I completely agree with what you said. A chat box or a discord server would have the same low quality level in contrast, to profile posts. Sometimes low quality profile comments can progress further into what's considered as spam and then you would be forced to take action as it goes against your T&C's.

[Puppuccino 50]

I don't like profile posts. They always attract low quality discussion and detract away from the actual forum itself.

[Paanda 9]

I don't like profile posts. They always attract low quality discussion and detract away from the actual forum itself.

 

Agreed.

 

I suppose they come in handy to say a quick hello to someone, but publicly advertising (as in a widget) just drowns the forum in pointless content.

[Puppuccino 50]

Even so, saying hello to someone might be better done in a DM. I just think they generally water down the value of content.

 

If you don't want it public in an actual forum, move it into a DM in my opinion.

 

In my experience I've only seen profile comments used in a gossip-y way which often turns to trouble.

[Ash 7]

I don't mind it, to be honest. It's just a nice way to quickly say hello to the user. It usually doesn't take that much away from the forum itself so it's not a huge problem to keep it enabled.