# Offical company forums like in KVR



## gsilbers (Oct 15, 2019)

It be nice if VI had official company forums like u-he has at KVR. 
to me KVR is a clusterfuk and rather deal w the VI crowd


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## wst3 (Oct 15, 2019)

Interesting thought, and I would agree that dealing with official company forums on KVR is less than fun.

However, the impetus for such fora would need to come from the developers, I don't think we can require them to embrace yet another support channel.

There is also the issue of too many sub-fora, but in this case I think it could be managed.

Let's see what others think...


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## gsilbers (Oct 15, 2019)

oh for sure. i mean for my company pulsesetter-sounds and im guessing realitone and so on. something company dependent for filmscoring or media composing companies, if they want to do it. that way i dont get emails or read comments about the same issue 40,000 times if they can just go to support>forum and links here under the specific brand. 
but i see your point. the kvraudio official company forum is inmense and having to scrool down through so many is not user friendly. i guess VI could just have a "official company forum" thats just one link for users under Sants cafe or something like that. and when pressed then it goes into all the participating companies and THEN you have the long scroll down if too many sign up  otherwise maybe just a few.


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## S.M Hassani (Oct 15, 2019)

I'm all for it.

We would love to have a space where we can share some good content, beyond promotional material. We can post design tips and provide general support for our clients.

It can also be a good forum where clients and colleagues exchange ideas, and give us valuable product feedback.


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## gsilbers (Oct 16, 2019)

that is also cool. id like to see some random content of developers thats not spread thin in facebook or instagram in my feed.


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## kgdrum (Oct 16, 2019)

wst3 said:


> Interesting thought, and I would agree that dealing with official company forums on KVR is less than fun.




KVR can be and is often a strange forum but I love the presence U-he,Orange Tree,Impact Soundworks and a few other developers have established there and it’s the main reason I’ll go to KVR.Urs and his team;Greg,Andrew and a few other companies have an active, helpful,transparent presence that for me is refreshing and builds trust and loyalty that for a customer can’t be underestimated.
I’d love to see companies develop the same sort of platform here beyond the sales and promotional model that thrives here.What a boost for VI-C and the community if developers like Spitfire,Orchestral Tools,Sonokinetic and several other developers created a platform that offered support and goes beyond sales and marketing.

👍


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## chillbot (Oct 16, 2019)

OK it seems like there is a ton of demand for a botdog samples subforum so we see what we can do to accommodate.


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## kgdrum (Oct 16, 2019)

Now I’m excited!!! 😜


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## Mike Greene (Oct 17, 2019)

We've gotten a few requests for this, and I like the idea (both from the VI-Control POV and the Realitone POV), but there are a few things we'd have to figure out, which is why I've delayed actually doing it.

The biggest issue is the Latest Posts feed. Unless we can figure out a way in Xenforo (the forum platform) for people to be able to customize which sub-forums appear in their Latest Posts feed, then we'd have to make it so these company sub-forums are all excluded. Otherwise, there would be way too much clutter in the Latest Posts. (Nobody wants to keep seeing updates to a "_How do I decompress my RealiDrums RAR files?"_ thread on their front page.)

So these sub-forums would have to be excluded from Latest Posts, which means they wouldn't be a great place for announcements, since no one will see them unless they go specifically to that sub-forum. They could still be handy for tech support and tips and stuff, though, and it looks like that's what those of us here in this thread would be most interested in, so it's probably worth it.

The other challenge, as Bill mentioned, is keeping the number small enough so it doesn't look the KVR list. Everybody would want to see top tier companies like OT, Spitfire, PulseSetter and of course, Realitone, but I'm not sure how we would prevent loser companies like Botdog Samples from requesting a subforum. I mean, we want to _keep_ members, not chase them away, right?

Jokes aside (Botdog would definitely be welcome), keeping that number small is a big concern. I thought about charging, but the truth is that company subforums would probably be _good_ for VI-Control, so I wouldn't feel right about that. A number of developers are my friends, so I'd prefer to be _"that nice guy from Realitone"_ rather than _"that guy from VI-C who keeps finding new ways to take my money."_

Plus some companies are huge and would get tons of use from a sub-forum, while other companies are much smaller and would see less action in a subforum, so they shouldn't pay the same rate as the huge company. But figuring out a sliding scale would be really hard. _Everybody_ thinks they're a small company, so I don't anticipate those negotiations going well.

Maybe what we do is start a few company sub-forums and see how it goes. (Emphasis on "maybe") We all know which companies would be appropriate, so the early stages should be easy, since only companies who actually visit the forum would know that subforums are even an option. Plus, I believe it's possible to give moderator status targeted to just their sub-forum, so admin stuff should be easy.


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## X-Bassist (Oct 17, 2019)

chillbot said:


> OK it seems like there is a ton of demand for a botdog samples subforum so we see what we can do to accommodate.


Umm... I assume that was what this whole thread is all about. I mean, who are those elusive, evasive people at botdog anyway? Up in their ivory (or is it golden?) towers... shesh. Must be nice.

If it means dragging their sorry butts out into the light of day, I’m all for it.


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## Jaap (Oct 17, 2019)

Mike Greene said:


> loser companies like Botdog Samples



Sent in the Guiros Chillbot, make him regret this sentence for the rest of his life, take over the reigns here!

But seriously, a guiro forum would be cool!


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## wst3 (Oct 17, 2019)

So all y'all beat me to the Botdog gags - ok!

I do think it can be really good for smaller developers, and for the users, and for the forum as a whole. I agree that we need a way to manage the traffic that appears in the latest feed, and as one option perhaps we exclude the developer sub-forums entirely, and suggest that they make their announcements in the regular and customary fashion, unless they don't want the publicity.

Yeah, I think this could be cool.

The other thing that springs to mind is that any developer that started a sub-forum would need to commit to supporting it. I think 24 hours is a reasonable window for replies, but there would have to be something in place.

The good news is that this is the internet, and if someone asks how to install a library there will be half a dozen folks answering, which should take some of the load off the developers.

Anyway, cool idea!


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## rrichard63 (Oct 17, 2019)

wst3 said:


> The other thing that springs to mind is that any developer that started a sub-forum would need to commit to supporting it.


This is my only real gripe about KVR. I've bookmarked the support forums of some developers who literally never respond there even though they started their respective forums in the first place. I've remarked multiple times at KVR that I wish developers who stop providing support there (which is their right) would announce the fact in a sticky post.

From the developer's point of view, I think the main issue is multiple support channels. Some of the largest run their own forums (NI, IK Multimedia). Some others are well-established at KVR (OTS, Acousticsamples). They might not want to move, and almost certainly wouldn't want to keep up with partially overlapping sets of issues and questions in two (or more) places.


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## gsilbers (Oct 17, 2019)

I’d be ok w it doesn’t appear on the latest post. 
As long as someone can go inside the dev’s forum and see the threads of specific products , promos, extra content etc. but yeah, I’d be annoying if everyone do those troubleshooting posts appeared on the latest post.


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## gsilbers (Oct 17, 2019)

rrichard63 said:


> This is my only real gripe about KVR. I've bookmarked the support forums of some developers who literally never respond there even though they started their respective forums in the first place. I've remarked multiple times at KVR that I wish developers who stop providing support there (which is their right) would announce the fact in a sticky post.
> 
> From the developer's point of view, I think the main issue is multiple support channels. Some of the largest run their own forums (NI, IK Multimedia). Some others are well-established at KVR (OTS, Acousticsamples). They might not want to move, and almost certainly wouldn't want to keep up with partially overlapping sets of issues and questions in two (or more) places.



True. That’s why our Facebook direct messages is auto reply to send ya an email and to see faq. We don’t check every single social media stuff or forum etc. someone might be taking shiat due to an issue in a cakewalk forum and we wouldn’t ever know.

And Kvr in general is more like a clusterfuk of things put together back in the 90s that somehow stuck. Every product launch I’ve had and try to do the new release it’s always wrong and someone changes it without our consent... and every advertising also gone wrong. They do have a massive amount of users there so it’s a must but still... maybe it’s for the best if vi-c stayed more media scoring oriented and not hiphop and EDM pirated kids And hence have the media style developers forums here.


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## wst3 (Oct 17, 2019)

rrichard63 said:


> From the developer's point of view, I think the main issue is multiple support channels.


I think the point here is an alternative for developers that do not want to build their own forum.

As a consumer I prefer a direct connection - an answer from the horse's mouth. Forums are great, however, for collaborating with other users.

I think this idea could grow legs!!


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## Mike Greene (Dec 6, 2019)

I'm going to go ahead and do this. Any developers wanting to be involved, let me know. This is obviously going to be an evolving situation, so who knows what changes may happen along the way, but for now, I'm thinking these are the basics:

1. Threads in these subforums will not appear in the Latest Posts feed.

2. Since these posts won't appear in the Latest Posts feed, then of course you can also post regular announcements in the usual Commercial Announcements or Deals sections, as usual, so those announcements can be seen by the whole forum.

3. I _think_ we can give you moderator privileges for your sub-forum. So you can moderate, as well as make posts stickies, and whatever other handy things you can think of.

3b. Normally, I'm opposed to deleting threads or posts, but in subforums like this, where there will likely be a lot of redundant questions, you may want to do some trimming to keep things neat and easy to find. Or not. It's totally your call how you want to handle that.

4. You can post as little or as much as you want, but you do have to check in often enough to respond to questions in a reasonable time.


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## SergeD (Dec 6, 2019)

And what about musicians helping musicians? Remember why this forum has been created? Remember the dead northernsounds forum where a developers war destroyed friendship between people?

This forum should remain the home of musicians, just my .02 cents.


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## S.M Hassani (Dec 6, 2019)

Hi Mike,

That sounds awesome! I’ll make sure it is a good source of value for all our colleagues.
Thank you for making it possible!


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## Mike Greene (Dec 6, 2019)

SergeD said:


> And what about musicians helping musicians? Remember why this forum has been created? Remember the dead northernsounds forum where a developers war destroyed friendship between people?
> 
> This forum should remain the home of musicians, just my .02 cents.


Absolutely! This won't change that.

These subforums aren't intended to draw people away from the main parts of the forum. Instead, they're handy places for a company to host FAQ and other very specific company content that's not appropriate or too spammy for the main forum.

For example, with my own company, Realitone, we get a ton of emails asking how to drag and drop MIDI files in Hip Hop Creator. So if I had my own forum, I could make a post about that and make it a sticky. Customers could read and respond, ask further questions, give suggestions to each other, etc. Or I could direct common tech support questions that we get to the forum.

In a perfect world, I would create my own forum for exactly those purposes. In fact, companies like AudioBro do exactly that. But Realitone is too small of a company to put something like that together, so since VI-Control is already set up and can host sub-forums to do the same thing, it's a nice solution.

If anything, this will bring _more_ people to the forum.


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## gsilbers (Dec 6, 2019)

awesome!


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## SBK (Dec 11, 2019)

Nice Idea! Also , make the ads shorter in height than shorter in width like lately happened, it looks weird. I know is a new thing and you have to ask all companies, but in either way I think the old size worked better. Now the ads seem like "tiny ants" trying to speak to you! It was better before for me, just look at this (2560x1440) . The ads are so squeezed right now and the text on left side is overpowering.


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## Mike Greene (Dec 11, 2019)

I must admit, _"The ads should be wider, so the text isn't so overpowering"_ is not a request we get very often. 

The ad dimension used to be 468x180, which is a very uncommon size, and given that most developers don't have ad or art departments, it's a PIA for them (including me) to create that ad. So I'm changing the Portal page ads to 300x250, which is a more standard size.

The existing 468x180 ads are being shrunk to a 300x105 size, which can be a bit weird, but after we finish tweaking, we'll let the advertisers know, and they can send us updated art, which should look better.


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