Communication options for members and for administrator

My understanding is that messages can only be sent by regular member A to regular member B if B has already decided to follow A.

If A wants to send a message to B, then A must follow B and then hope that B responds in kind, despite not having any means of knowing exactly why A has become a follower.

Administrators have a better range of options:

1. As Admin, to send a specific member a private message, I can follow that member, and hope that they follow me despite not knowing why I chose to follow them (just like a regular member of the network).

2. As Admin., I can copy and paste individual email addresses from the Data Browser in Dashboard in order to build a mailing list.

3. As Admin., I can go to ACP, and find the Email Newsletter module, open that, and create a new email newsletter using the Create Newsletter button. This allows me to send multiple emails to all profiles in each quota. The most useful is likely to be the quota for "regular" or standard members as that is the default category for all members joining the network.

4. Clicking on the email newsletter "Newsletter Stats" button leads to a page called "Newsletter Browser" which is just a table with Stats. I cannot actually browse the old newsletters. Is there an archive of old newsletters that I can browse?

FURTHER QUESTIONS

1. Is it possible for regular members to tell other members why they want to follow them (e.g. to exchange private messages), and to explain a request to be followed in return?

2. Is it possible for regular members to communicate with each other without being mutual followers?

I know there has been some discussion of why it is not good to allow unrestricted private messaging between members, but can members control the messages they receive (block senders) if a problem arises? Or can this only be done by 'unfollowing' them?



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PJ Matthews, Kyoto
Migrated from Ning 2.0. Now at Jamroom 6 beta and using Jamroom Hosting for The Research Cooperative (researchcooperative.org)
updated by @researchcooperative: 08/26/15 07:02:47AM

In ACP, we can find the "Private Communication" module in the sections for Communication.

After opening the module, we can go to the "Quota Configuration" tab, and control permissions from there. One permission is for allowing access (use of the module) for profiles in a particular quota, and a second permission is a check box for "Followers only". The default is "on", which means that unless we change the setting, we can only send messages to our followers, as described in the original message above.

After changing this for all member categories, it should be possible for all members to communicate directly with each other without having to go public with follow requests.

However, this raises the question of how users or members themselves can block unwanted senders.

Is it possible for individual ordinary network members to over-ride the administration settings and block:
(a) specific sources of private messages, or
(b) all private messages, or
(c) all private messages from people who are not being 'followed'?


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PJ Matthews, Kyoto
Migrated from Ning 2.0. Now at Jamroom 6 beta and using Jamroom Hosting for The Research Cooperative (researchcooperative.org)
updated by @researchcooperative: 07/25/15 01:01:17AM

It follows the twitter model.

Communication is in the open via public messages posted to the timeline. If a message is for someone in particular, use their @ name @researchcooperative so is shows up in their MENTIONS list.

After the public communication if both parties are following each other, private notes can be exchanged if that module is active in the system.

I wonder is it time for this to change though Michael, an option for users to choose whether they want to allow anyone one to message them, not just followers?

I don't use twitter... it would be good to have a jamroom-specific explanation of how this works...

This is my current understanding, written as an explanation for an ordinary network member:


Every Jamroom profile has a unique @Name which appears under their profile image.

If you find "private messages" option in the main menu under your name, after login, then you can send a private message to anyone if the network owner has allowed unrestricted private messaging for all member profiles.

If you can only send messages to followers of your profile (the default setting for a network), then you can alert the other person using their @Name address in a public comment (e.g. via a Timeline entry on your profile page, or a forum message or forum reply).

Here is an example:

@garymoncrieff, @michael - happy to send and receive private messages (please follow me - the default restriction is used here at Jamroom).

Of course, public messaging is usually best here the support forums!

Thanks.

PS @garymoncrieff, @michael

One reason to separate the function of following from the function of messaging is that following allows us to more easily observe the actvity of another member before we decide whether to try making direct contact.

There might be many situations where we want to follow someone's public activities, without opening the channel for private communication.

Which leads me to another thought... when profiles represent a a commercial entity, private messaging might be a valuable tool for commercial promotion.

Network members might want to discriminate between allowing private messages from individuals in a network, and commercial entities in the same network.

To genralise from this, if a network has multiple member categories, users might want different privacy/communication options for different member categories.

At publishscience.net, I am considering three member categories:

Free:
1. Regular member (for all work and social purposes, with full access to work forums and social focus group discussion threads).
2. Social member (for social purposes only, access limited to discussion threads in topic focus groups).

Subscription:
3. Special member - with ability to set up a business shopfront and redirect URL.


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PJ Matthews, Kyoto
Migrated from Ning 2.0. Now at Jamroom 6 beta and using Jamroom Hosting for The Research Cooperative (researchcooperative.org)
updated by @researchcooperative: 07/25/15 06:05:05AM

"1. Is it possible for regular members to tell other members why they want to follow them (e.g. to exchange private messages), and to explain a request to be followed in return?"

I feel there is a BIG need for this particular thing to be made clearer to members without they themselves having to continually explain the follow/privatemessage sequence of steps to each other.
This could be very easily solved, by merely changing the notification language for following.
Currently a member receives a notification that says:

"@ strumelia - you have a new fotmd.com follower!
JohnDoe is now following you:
(url here)....
You can view or delete this follower by clicking the following URL
(or cut and paste it into your browser):
(another URL here)"

Instead it could say something more explanatory, like:
"@strumelia - you have a new fotmd.com follower!
JohnDoe is now following you:
(url here)....
You can view or delete this follower by clicking the following URL
(or cut and paste it into your browser):
(another URL here)
NOTE- Aside from just keeping up with posts and activities of 'followed' members, by default our site is set so that once two members are both 'following' each other, it allows the sending of private messages between them. If you choose to reciprocate 'following' this person by clicking the 'Follow' button on their profile page as well, private message exchange will be possible between you and them. A one-way 'follow' does not enable messaging. To use private messaging, hover over your member name in the top navigation links bar, and find the drop down menu link for "Private Messages".

This would go a long way towards avoiding repeated explanations. Many members do not read through the help forum Q&As and threads.


--
...just another satisfied Jamroom customer.
Migrated from Ning to Jamroom June 2015

All emails are templates in Jamroom - you can modify them to suit your needs.


--
Brian Johnson
Founder and Lead Developer - Jamroom
https://www.jamroom.net

Ah! I should have known! The email_approve_message.tpl in the Profile Followers Module! Will try to remember this about 'all emails' in the future...thanks.

DONE. Yay! this will help a lot of my more confusally-type members.



--
...just another satisfied Jamroom customer.
Migrated from Ning to Jamroom June 2015
updated by @strumelia: 07/25/15 10:21:42AM

Thanks all...

The email templates related to following consist of "pending approval" and then "you have a new follower". In both places it should be helpful to explain the significance of following. It may also be useful to reiterate the explanation in the "email-follower-approved-message"


A. Pending approval message

1. - you have a new {$system_name} follower awaiting approval! Your options are explained in this message.

2. - ...
You can approve or delete this follower by clicking the following URL
(or cut and paste it into your browser):

{$approve_follower_url}

If you are following (or choose to follow) this new follower, then you and the other person will be able to exchange private notes.

***

B. After approval

1. New follower email subject:

you have a new {$system_name} follower! Your options are explained again in this message.

2. New follower email content:

- you have a new {$system_name} follower!

{$follower_name} is now following you:

...

If you are happy about this, no action is needed. You can view or delete this follower by clicking the following URL (or cut and paste it into your browser):

{$follower_browse_url}

If you are following (or choose to follow) your new follower, then you and the other person can exchange private notes. Note their username, and use the "Private notes" tab under your own name in the main menu.


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PJ Matthews, Kyoto
Migrated from Ning 2.0. Now at Jamroom 6 beta and using Jamroom Hosting for The Research Cooperative (researchcooperative.org)

I am gonna jump in here and say it is extremely important for anyone building a social network or community to sign up at twitter, facebook, google plus, myspace etc. Those are the biggest social networks and it really helps to understand how they work and why people love them, so much in order to really grasp how to build your own, what to mimic and what to change. Jamroom is very much a mixture of myspace and twitter IMO

The private notes its so hidden i dont think many people will use it besides admin. A good idea i think would be to have a "send me a message" button on every profile and then let the users control who to get messages from just like how facebook give you settings.

Agree with the last comment... following to monitor activity is one thing. Sending messages is another.

They can be linked, but making the latter dependent on the former freezes up the system.


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PJ Matthews, Kyoto
Migrated from Ning 2.0. Now at Jamroom 6 beta and using Jamroom Hosting for The Research Cooperative (researchcooperative.org)
updated by @researchcooperative: 07/26/15 06:42:23AM

I believe Curtis ("DerrickHand") was working on doing this, but now I can't find the thread. He may be willing to share how, if he did it.


--
...just another satisfied Jamroom customer.
Migrated from Ning to Jamroom June 2015