Looking Forward Fall 2016 Survey

[Looking Forward]

If you have a spare moment, please considering filling out this short survey (https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/BBPBW6X) regarding Looking Forward. Depending on the answers to certain questions, there may be another follow up survey prior to the new competition season. Any other discussion of improvements to LF or questions about the survey can be posted in this thread, PM'd to the Looking Forward chief delphi account, or sent via e-mail (see account details for e-mail address).

Thank you!

[MrForbes]

problem with the survey, or my browser or something...when I answer all the parts of question 8, it complains that I didn't answer them all...a few are blank...I play whack-a-mole for a little while, watching the ones I just answered maybe or maybe not disappear, and others go blank. then I give up.

[AlexanderLuke]

problem with the survey, or my browser or something...when I answer all the parts of question 8, it complains that I didn't answer them all...a few are blank...I play whack-a-mole for a little while, watching the ones I just answered maybe or maybe not disappear, and others go blank. then I give up.

It was a ranking question, so rather than rating each of the nine items on a scale of 1 through 9, it is a system where you can list in what order you found each item to be important, from what was most important (rank 1) to least important (rank 9). If you completed it as if it were a rating scale, then it probably made the prior selection of the same number blank, so that there were not two things ranked the same way.

That was my experience at least. Hope what I said makes sense.

[Looking Forward]

problem with the survey, or my browser or something...when I answer all the parts of question 8, it complains that I didn't answer them all...a few are blank...I play whack-a-mole for a little while, watching the ones I just answered maybe or maybe not disappear, and others go blank. then I give up.

Q8 has been redesigned to hopefully avoid this issue

[XaulZan11]

problem with the survey, or my browser or something...when I answer all the parts of question 8, it complains that I didn't answer them all...a few are blank...I play whack-a-mole for a little while, watching the ones I just answered maybe or maybe not disappear, and others go blank. then I give up.

I was able to answer that question without issue using Chrome.

I think LF should continue to drift away from event predictions and more toward big picture concepts and trends. I remember when LF was the only one doing event predictions and recaps of every regional, but now there are a ton of events and a lot of other more regional accounts doing similar predictions. I haven't seen anyone, however, match LF on analyzing the big picture evolution of game play.

Instead of trying to preview a majority of the events (which is getting extremely hard to provide anything more than "these 4 teams are good" for some districts), I would prefer a couple of paragraphs on the major trends, a preview of the one or two most exciting events, and then an MMQB style "10 Things I Think" (http://mmqb.si.com/column/10-things-i-think-i-think) with random insights/thoughts/predictions/info about events or robots.

[MrForbes]

Perhaps I didn't read the instructions well enough? I'll give it another try....

edit: It saved the previous page, that was nice. Still seems like too much work to answer question 8, having to rank all of the criteria, but the new layout is much easier to deal with, thanks!

[WCBC]

Looking Forward to hearing from you!

[Looking Forward]

Perhaps I didn't read the instructions well enough? I'll give it another try....

edit: It saved the previous page, that was nice. Still seems like too much work to answer question 8, having to rank all of the criteria, but the new layout is much easier to deal with, thanks!

FWIW, that question was basically reused from the 2014 survey. In 2014, each category was allowed an independent ranking. As a result, there ended up being pretty heavy clumping of responses (apparently everything is important). The hope was that a ranking system would force more spread of the responses to see what readers valued most. Sorry that the question is somewhat cumbersome.

[Looking Forward]

Reminder that this survey is still open.

[frcguy]

Looking Forward to hearing from you!


Oh boy...

[Foster]

I did the survey. I love reading about whats going on at other regionals and districts and it's one of my favorite things to read during the week.

There was one question about reading on other sites. I'm good with LF being other places to give it coverage, but I'd hate to see it be dropped from CD to be at some place like Reddit.

[itsjustjon]

I did the survey. I love reading about whats going on at other regionals and districts and it's one of my favorite things to read during the week.

There was one question about reading on other sites. I'm good with LF being other places to give it coverage, but I'd hate to see it be dropped from CD to be at some place like Reddit.

I don't believe they'd ever actually drop CD coverage merely because more FRC people view CD than the /r/FRC subreddit. Organizations typically go where they can get the most support.

That being said, Reddit is still a great place for LF because its nested comment structure is better for discussion than CD's direct reply system.

[Abdul Compton]

There was one question about reading on other sites. I'm good with LF being other places to give it coverage, but I'd hate to see it be dropped from CD to be at some place like Reddit.

Pardon me, however I disagree with such an opinion. Although I personally prefer neither over the other, what makes reddit a lower alternative than CD?

Multiple Advantages:

-Cleaner UI: easier to organize and respond to certain comments
-Anonymous: allows for the "truth" and minority opinions to be heard
-Student Input: obviously more kids prefer reddit so you get input and coverage from the kids who benefit from LF

Not saying that your opinion is invalid, just wondering why you have such a strong stance against reddit?

-Abdul

[FrisbeeFunTime]

With regards to the sharing scouting info question you may want to have a "Not my decision" option for those who do not control what happens with scouting which is likely most of the individuals completing the survey. Anyway excited to see the Looking Forward name reaching out to the community to see what they want to see from it.

[Foster]

Pardon me, however I disagree with such an opinion. Although I personally prefer neither over the other, what makes reddit a lower alternative than CD?

Multiple Advantages:

-Cleaner UI: easier to organize and respond to certain comments
-Anonymous: allows for the "truth" and minority opinions to be heard
-Student Input: obviously more kids prefer reddit so you get input and coverage from the kids who benefit from LF

Not saying that your opinion is invalid, just wondering why you have such a strong stance against reddit?

-Abdul

Vast, vast levels of snark. I've been to more than a few sites where the firewall blocks Reddit. There are a few places that are well moderated, but lots more are not.

[SoftwareBug2.0]

-Cleaner UI: easier to organize and respond to certain comments

Did CD get rid of the tree-view mode?

[Hallry]

Did CD get rid of the tree-view mode?

Nope. (https://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/showthread.php?p=1609933&mode=threaded)

[frcguy]

Nope. (https://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/showthread.php?p=1609933&mode=threaded)

Additionally, to anyone who wants to see that normally you can enable it in the Edit Options section of the User Control Panel.

[Chris is me]

-Anonymous: allows for the "truth" and minority opinions to be heard

...

Not saying that your opinion is invalid, just wondering why you have such a strong stance against reddit?

This is why, really. Reddit is very easy for trolling - anonymous accounts are tolerated, "unpopular" (actually popular) opinions can be heavily upvoted, bad technical advice can rise to the top while good technical advice can be downvoted to the point of being invisible, etc.

On CD, there's less anonymity, equal visibility given to all posts, and accountability for going out of line. Not even a comparison for me.

[Richard Wallace]

...
-Anonymous: allows for the "truth" and minority opinions to be heard
-Student Input: obviously more kids prefer reddit so you get input and coverage from the kids who benefit from LF

This is why, really. Reddit is very easy for trolling - anonymous accounts are tolerated, "unpopular" (actually popular) opinions can be heavily upvoted, bad technical advice can rise to the top while good technical advice can be downvoted to the point of being invisible, etc.

On CD, there's less anonymity, equal visibility given to all posts, and accountability for going out of line. Not even a comparison for me.

I am fascinated by this discussion.

Being a grey-hair, my view of informed discussion is based on the model of the Royal Society, which was founded by 17th century Natural Philosophers, before the word "Scientist" had been invented. They are still one of the world's most respected societies for advancing knowledge. The quote below is from their History site:
The Royal Society's motto 'Nullius in verba' is taken to mean 'take nobody's word for it'. It is an expression of the determination of Fellows to withstand the domination of authority and to verify all statements by an appeal to facts determined by experiment.

"Taking nobody's word for it" is a pillar of scholarship and inquiry -- it is the reason that papers submitted for publication are often given to peer reviewers without their author's name(s) on them. That is one side of the anonymity argument -- ideas stand on their own merit, not on a person's reputation.

However, when anonymous contributors vastly outnumber capable reviewers, the result can be useless (or worse than useless) noise generated by an uninformed, unaccountable rabble.

[NEforecast]

Looking Forward to hearing from you!

No I'm pretty sure everyone Looks Forward to your posts.

#nocoolhashtagsforthecoldcoast