Admin Announcements

✳ [c=#004A59][big]Latest SW Release[/big][/c] 🗨

[b]Hello again SW Members! Wishing you again a great week ahead.[/b] :)

As most users have noticed, we did a significant update last week, which we had to roll-back due to some problems, as well as based on user Feedback.

Thank you very much for the feedback provided, as always, we are here to listen.

We believe we have understood what most users didn't like about the last release, and we made all possible steps to improve this for users, as well as allowed users to submit proposals on how we can better make these changes.

I will now discuss the latest release, as well as the improvements/changes we have made since the last reverted release.


[i][c=#666666]Previous Release Announcement:[/c][/i]
https://similarworlds.com/100-Admin-Announcements/1779364-Comments-in-Home-Feed

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[c=#004A59][big]• Comments in Home Feed[/big][/c]

[b]Comments from your Friends and other Relevant users to you may now appear in your Home Feed[/b], amongst the latest posts which you are used to seeing in this feed.

We understand that this change is very new and surprising to many of you, however we hope that you can give it a chance.

We will be listening attentively to your feedback, as we always do.


[b]Our idea with this change is to add more relevance to users on this site.[/b]

Previously before this change, the Home feed was filled with mostly random posts, 90% of which are not relevant or interesting to many users.

We considered (based on feedback) that many times users feel the site to be "empty" (while our stats show the opposite).
Many times users don't see and engage with their friends and acquaintances often enough, as they'd have to get through 100 other posts which may not be relevant to them.

The aim is that users will now be able to interact with their friends/acquaintances much more often, and join them in topics they would otherwise be unable to find (with the old feed layout), while we also still continue to show all the latest posts on the home feed as we always have.


[b]We have now included the option to completely disable this feature.
So, if you do not wish to see comments in your home feed, you can simply [u]Disable[/u] this.[/b]






You can also [b]adjust the Relevance Level[/b] of the comments which appear in your feed [i](if you choose to show them at all)[/i].

This is useful for example, if you find that you are seeing too many comments from users you are not close/familiar with.

○ Less Relevance (More Comments)
○ Average Relevance
○ More Relevance (Less Comments)




[c=#004A59][big]• Improvements to Header and Navigation[/big][/c]

As explained in another post of ours: https://similarworlds.com/100-Admin-Announcements/1779577-How-can-we-improve-SWs-Main-Header-Navigation

It is sometimes necessary for a website/company like ours to make adjustments from time to time, in order to accommodate new features such as those you our members have been requesting.
We do not make changes without taking our user's interests as a priority.

We have now released changes to the Main/Header Navigation again, but this time, made all links much easier accessible, by utilizing Drop-Down Menus.

Please feel free to share your feedback and let us know if this format is convenient for you.





[c=#004A59][big]Other recent improvements to Similar Worlds:[/big][/c]

• Mute or Block users directly from the post/comment feeds.

• Removed the "Relevant" Feed, as we wish to simplify our website and improve the main feed instead.

• Display "Edited: xx ago" on Posts, to prevent abuse of the Edit feature (eg: changing the original post considerably to cause misleading answers).


[b]Privacy Improvements and Bug Fixes:[/b]
○ "Online" status not showing anymore on the Blocked People list.
○ Removed showing of User Tags in Notifications of comments, if the user is blocked.
○ Fix that emails were not being sent if the user was being mentioned/tagged.

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We do understand that some users are unhappy with us making sudden changes to Similar Worlds, however we would also like users to understand that this part of the process that any company goes through during its growth.

One difference we have apart from many other companies is that we DO listen extremely closely to our members, and try our best to always accommodate and make them feel comfortable on SW.

Contrary to many comments we've read recently on SW, we have indeed constantly kept users in our development discussions, and have posted many polls and questions over these past months/years, asking for feedback and opinions regarding proposed developments for Similar Worlds.

It isn't possible for us to require feedback from members on EVERY release we are going to make, as it would stifle progress and innovation.
We are constantly releasing updates and fixes to SW, even though many may not always realize it.

As well, there are many ideas which we can only receive proper feedback after users have been able to experience it.
As always, we do react very quickly to user feedback, as we did last week.

We hope that there can be some understanding regarding our need to experiment with new updates in order to make Similar Worlds better for everyone in the long-term.

We will also make more efforts where possible to keep users more informed about plans we have for future development.


[b]Thanks again for your attention and support![/b]
[c=#005E2F]- The SW Team[/c]

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[b][c=#800000][big]Update: [/big][/c]

[u]Just Released:[/u]

[b]• Refresh Button on both Question and Story feeds.[/b]
Based on feedback, this should help users reload for new content without needing to use the new drop-menu links.

[b]• Improved the "See More »" button in feeds to allow loading of more content.[/b]

• Fixed the "Books & Literature" questions category being broken: https://similarworlds.com/questions?category=34

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[b][u]New Planned Feature:[/u][/b]

[c=#004A59][big]• Super Bookmark[/big][/c]

We will discuss adding a new "Super Bookmark" icon into the main header/navigation, which users can utilize to access their favorite page at any time in just one click.


We are still also considering having a "Regular Bookmarks" feature, whereby users can save a list of their favorite SW pages for easy access.