Anyone care to comment on Poemranker's demise? Fewer comments per day than ever, it seems. The regulars mostly gone.

The inevitable demise that most instituions go through because of a lack of reinvention.

Couldn't say for sure, but it's that point in the year when we tax-dodging students actually have to do some real work...

Some theories:

1. It's spring. Everyone's outside.

2. People are busy. (I know I am.)

3. Cyclical lull? I dunno. Has this happened before to the extent it's happening now, in the time that you've been posting here?

4. Many of the regulars have since left school (thus limiting their time), have gone to other sites, or have kicked the poetry habit.

5. Creation/promotion of many other poetry sites (e.g., All Poetry) with greater participation leading to the steady, inexorable exodus from this site.

6. Lack of any kind of publicity for the site (it saw a surge in users, I believe, after Yahoo featured it as a chosen site many moons ago; stands to reason that complete lack of exposure means that no one knows of our little blue poetry site).

7. Other? Probably. I think Stephen has a point too, btw. No changes, no attempts to attract users leads to stagnancy.

Hope it turns around. Any ideas? I'm inexplicably fond of this place.

The thing is, it's not a case of no-one visiting here - people are still posting poems at a vast rate of knots. It's just that much of the time more poems are posted than comments. So really it's down to the people already here to give their share of feedback so we keep a decent ratio going. Then people will see more use in the ranker and hopefully more people will join.
That's the theory, anyway...

I warned you all months ago. The teeners are coming. They kill all the credibility of sites like these. Bramblestory was a nice site until Junior High hacks and hackers started showing up in droves. There's a kid named Gerald that at one point self voted himself into 7 of the top ten poems. I've read about this happening at numerous other sites around the web. The solution is to be cruel just like we were in the good ol' days and for those of us that have some credentials i.e. degrees in literature to admit to it more. Many really serious about writing are looking for people who are pros to give them advice.
Dovina, make some kind of outlandish statement in one of your next poems, that should bring a few of our old friends out to play.

I miss the funny conversations.

Then again, I hardly check anymore now do i?

Maybe some more social features.

Some ajax.

better design?

weeding out folks whose emails bounce?

Always happy not to meddle.

My most immediate projects outside of work are trying to complete the istockphoto application, revisiting my asteroids game (with yet another different set of libraries), and writing... well, sort of.

http://writersplanner.com/ to help me keep track of where things are being submitted... and I got my first pro fiction sale to Strange Horizons--in theory, if things go well, November.

Well, Ive posted four pieces up and got one comment/vote over the last few days, so to be honest its not enougth to keep me involved.

I have voted and where appropriate commented on as many peoples work as possible in order to try and ignite some sort of spark with people; but I think the site needs more insentive for people to vote. If the best voters were rewarded with what they are generally looking for (comments) then maybe they might vote a little more, or even have an allowance for the number of poems postable based on the number of votes given.

As for the regulars going, I used to be pretty regular but was using a different user name (cyan9, I hope I havn't broken any rules using a new name but I prefer using my initials now) a few months ago and remember zodiac and alchemy being reliable voters with high quality work, and they seem to have dissapeared which is a bit of a disaster

A problem with poemranker is actually the poemranking itself, most people (myself at times unfortunately) want to receive that little kind of compliment through a high vote and become very irritable when given a low vote for that reason. This substantially restricts a voters range of available ranks to give to the poem, unless they want a fight, I dont think information on who ranks who should be available for this reason (just a number should be given).

I think poemranker has a lot of potential and can lead to some good feedback; but I think these kind of issues may lead to its continued decline.

Perhaps the people remaining here should try being interesting and knowledgeable, instead of waiting around for British louts or actual poets to come entertain them.

I'm probably an example of why I'm not here as often and more infrequent in my comments.

Once upon a time there was gods wife, zzinnia, horus8 and his many psudonyms, tintagiles, myself and Mr Pig, hell even Ranger was around commenting on every poem entered.

The truth is though I am grateful to nentwined i think other sites copied his such as poetry tetto where the critiques are really constructive and helpful. A cople of the old school have flocked to allpoetry.com - WHY ?

Because its 2006 Dovina and they can upload art with their poems, feature them for points and feed egos as often as they like, enter limitless competitions and get awarded points to promote them.

Its pretty simple really, the apprentices have become the masters and poemranker needs a redux to compete. It used to have credibility but you cannot discriminate against the types of people who join here.

I'd love to see nentwined kick some ass but the sites old and yes the comments are few and as loads of the originals are elsewhere they like me havent the time to committ to 3 other sites for commenting.

I am a shit - yes but am here to admit it, thats business I guess, if there is something better out there people will go there.

I would love to spend the $130 a year to nentwined but its better spent elsewhere.

Where for art thou nentwined?