I joined a couple not related to guitar I think it would work for CTC really well.
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Hmm I would say not super likely, we have our hands pretty full as it is with video production and running the forum here 
My general feeling is that a discussion forum works better for what we do, overall more conducive to long-term knowledge building, and probably easier for us to manage. I haven’t used Discord much but have used Slack a ton and it can be hard to participate if you’re not in there constantly keeping up with the firehose. Not to mention a lot more difficult to find past discussions.
That said I can definitely see the appeal of real-time chat (Discord, Slack, etc.) for certain things. Just something we prob don’t have the extra bandwidth for. What do you like in particular about using Discord / wish we had for Cracking the Code? Whatever that is maybe there’s a way to make the forum work better for that use case!
Gamers use it so It must have pretty good real time capabilities (voice/mic, video etc). I think you can play games through it, so maybe you can schedule a event and not have to worry about delays. You can mirror all the categories that are on the forum. The way it’s set up is what I like. Other Youtube channels link to it through YouTube and you can participate without the downloading the app. The software technology seems to be getting better so it might be viable.
Then again, I haven’t tried Slack or Whatsapp I’ve just been using Discord.
I’m sure there’s bot/spam issues, but if you have a mod it should be relatively easy to deal with.
It might be worth it to check it out and test it and see what it can do. Check out another Youtube channel that has one, if you think it’ll work, download the app and check it out more thoroughly.
Cool, sounds good, I’m happy to learn more about interesting ways it’s used, or specific interaction models you’d want to see for our stuff.
As one example, currently when we do live broadcasts, we have a feature on troygrady.com for people to submit questions, which Troy can then read / answer live. We actually do have a way for people to join a live call (a la Skype or Google Hangout) with no delay, and ask a question live with audio and video. This is built into the streaming software we use…but so far haven’t much used it! Seems people prefer to submit text only questions. And / or we haven’t explained well enough.
One thing we could try e.g. for live broadcasts is using a forum topic to serve as live chat for the duration of the event. This wouldn’t be something Troy is on, as it’s kind of impossible to host an interview / live workshop and follow live chat at the same time, but could be a way for the community to have a higher quality semi-private discussion space (compared to YouTube chat for example).
Other suggestions or examples for ways this kind of thing is used that give a better / different experience from how we typically use the forum? Let us know!
I remember the live broadcasts. There were some minor issues but they went well.
I suggested it because it seemed quick and easy to integrate And you’re always connected.
I’ll keep a lookout.
Sherp
Discord would be a nightmare to moderate IMO.
Are there any better ones that you are aware of?
Sorry, don’t want to seem negative, but unless you have a team of moderators monitoring a chat room 24 / 7 its too hard to keep out drama and the conversation descending into off topic constantly.
It’s not negative.
It’s practical to think about that.
Have bots/spam gotten on to this board at all?
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I haven’t seen any bots or spam here, but the team keep a good control over moderation and I’m sure there is some kind of spam controls going on behind the scenes.
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Thanks @aliendough yeah I’ve never been in an active Discord but I imagine it can get to be a lot to handle. And yes on the forum here we do have some built in anti-spammer measures; I’ve had to block/delete a handful still but nothing too bad so far.
From my perspective the setup here with the Cracking the Code forum is pretty ideal for conversation around guitar learning, which is the core of what the site is about. While we do still have space for the occasional “off topic” discussion, overall most discussion is pretty focused, which I think works well. Agree that from what I’ve seen with more live chatroom type tools there’s often a tendency towards more random / general / unfiltered convo, which can make it hard for the average use to sift through and find the useful stuff.
Anyway, bottom line, I don’t expect we’ll be adopting any new discussion/chat software anytime soon, but if anyone has suggestions for improving the experience here on the forum, we can definitely consider!
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The few Discord servers I joined had some spam/bots but they were dealt with pretty well (I thought).
I have a couple questions, as I had never heard of a Discord server until now.
What exactly is it? From reading the comments here, it sounds like a chat room but instead of having typed comments, it has people actual speaking to each other via some Skype type of technology. Is that it? Is there video so you can see who you’re talking to or is there just audio?
If that’s more or less what it is, why are people saying it would be bad because it’s hard to moderate? All typed style forums like this have moderators, but if Discord server is more or less a Skype chat room, why would you even want moderators? Maybe it’s because I’m from a generation that didn’t grow up with the internet but as an adult Ive never tried to "moderate’ any other adult person’s conversation and I wouldn’t want anyone trying to “moderate” my conversations either.
What is a spam bot? I know spam is like junk mail but what is “bot”?
Thanks.
Basically it’s a typed chatroom and you can have voice chatroom - which means you can talk to each other via microphones, just like a Skype chatroom as you mention.
In my experiences with chatrooms over the years without moderators people would be free to do and say as they please. If you have ever been on a forum and got into a heated debate with another person, just image that happening in real time in a chatroom, with no moderation and no one to step in.
A spam bot is essentially when someone writes a program on their computer to register on forums and post messages containing links to certain websites or to post messages advertising goods.
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It has a store where you can download games on it. I have Skype and I have only used it a couple of times because of the glitches with video/audio/phone calls. Discord seems to work better IMO.
Gamers have to have to connect in real time so, I thought it would be of benefit here.
The google hangouts go pretty well here, but just for the sake of having options I thought it might be good to try.
Channels usually have 3,4,5, ways to connect with them, which makes sense.