A Discord

Hi everyone!

I've been popping back in here and there after a long absence, and I had posted about this on the feedback & suggestions thread a while back, but figured I might get more visibility here.

I haven't written anything, or finished anything anyway, in years and I've been feeling it calling back to me. This site was a haven for me during a great deal of years that were important to my development, and it was great to see it's still here to revisit! Unfortunately it seems like much of the life here has moved on, and I think it would help if it were easier for the community to connect in real time.

To this end, I suggested a Discord server as a partner for the site. For the uninitiated, Discord is a service where you can host your own chat server (think AIM and yahoo instant messenger, with multiple rooms, or "channels" for different purposes, but only members of our server can access them), including voice channels if desired.
I'm a member of quite a few servers dedicated to things I enjoy, and I find it's a great way to connect and grow communities. This way it's easier for everyone to chat, no personal info need be shared, and maybe cross-posting our Discord invite elsewhere would breathe new life into the main website!

I'm interested in trying to build out a community via Discord myself to meet other poets and writers, so I have created the beginnings of a server. Of course it is in no way associated with PnQ, unless you all would like it to be, in which case I will gladly grant admin control to the Mods here. If not, anyone who wants to join whatever else it becomes is free to message me for the invite link, I won't post it publicly without prior permission.

I hope you are all well in these uncertain times, and I can't wait to catch up on some of the reading I've missed while I was away

-Nevi <3

Nevi, good to see you again! Such an awesome idea. I know we spoke about it months ago. I still don't see myself using discord much, and I haven't used in the past few months, but I will consider it. It seems it could be a good tool to connect those all around the world. Glad you posted here :)

I'm for one, like you said it could help expose the site to other members :) Messaged!

I'm interested! I've never heard of Discord, but it sounds like it's a real-time chat server? We had a chat room on PnQ for many years when I first joined the site. It was wonderful and I loved it. We had rules and a moderator's presence was required for the chat to function. Joe (Italian Stallion) was usually the mod overseeing discussion. We would need to discuss how the chat would function this time around, and I'm assuming we'd need to be flexible as issues arise. I'd love for the other members and mods to chime in.

Yeah, it's a real time chat server. It's completely free to join, you just need to make an account, and there's a mobile app too, as well as a desktop client, and you can also login from the website as well. It also supports voice and video as well, people have watched YouTube/movies together, there's also a on of bots you can add to a server, some are written to help with writing, by letting you track how many words you've written/give you prompts, etc. There's also moderation bots that help simplify moderation, you can make it so that only certain people can post images (this is to prevent new members from joining and posting NSFW content to troll), or certain people can post links (to prevent spam). There's also so many discords you can join for different interests, discords for your city, and so much more.

You can set it up so there's channels for whatever, and organize those channels by category. As for moderation, you can set it up so there's chat mods, mods who will mod just on the discord, and then the site mods who mod on both platforms, if there's ever an issue with having to remove a member from the discord, can run it by the site mods and stuff. Also, I've run discords in the past, if you need any help setting up or whatever, I can help!

Mark, amazing! Thank you for all of this useful information. I'm very keen on the concept and think it could breathe fresh life into PnQ.

I think it's a great Idea!

I just opened a Discord Account under Larry2225

Hey everyone! I'm glad I cross-posted (I know that can be annoying, sorry) it sounds like there's a reasonable amount of interest, and I'll be replying to those of you who PM'ed me shortly.

With permission from the Mod team, I can post a public invitation link here for anyone to see.

Nevi! Hey, man!

We started using Discord at work instead of Microsoft Teams, because it’s more fun. I’m up to join you.

I messaged you a link!

So Mods, can he post a link here for everyone to see it? Or not?

Hey Nevi. Incase you want, you may share a link here for everyone interested if it makes the process easier for you and the other members. Whatever works best for the set up.

Great! Here's a non-expiring version of the link. Can't wait to see everyone there

https://discord.gg/VZdT8bSCXE

Links.
If poems are automatically posted then there should be a link back to their place on PNQ.
Likewise there should be a link allowing people to sign up for PNQ membership.

I replied to this on the Discord server as well, but hiraeth created a bot that references PnQ and creates a log of the most recent poems posted, so those will all automatically link back to their respective pages. We can definitely have a link put up as well so that anyone who may join from outside PnQ can easily register on the site as well!

Perhaps we can also promote the site by showing that comments and contest participation requires PnQ membership

For sure! I was wondering if we wanted to make PnQ membership a requirement after a certain amount of time, but maybe a system with some limitations would be friendlier.

I'll get to work

Edit: should it also be a rule that the server names and PnQ names match?

Hard to enforce, make it a guideline

Like Parlay

;8-)

We actually have the ability on Discord to change someone's nickname on the server, so it would be kind of enforceable, at least on one side.

I am in a Facebook group which allows each person to create their own nickname for everyone else in the group. Is that what you’re talking about?

Not exactly. On Discord you can change your nickname from server to server, and that is the name you would be displayed as on that server. For example, my Discord ID is Crystal_Lizzard#2628 but you will see me on the PnQ server as Nevi. On a gaming server, I would use my gaming screen name.

On our server, we have the option to manually go in and change someone's displayed name if it went against rules/guidelines

Got it. If the mod changes a member's name, what control can they assert?

We can limit permissions based on what roles you have, so we could make it that only Mods can change nicknames.

Great idea guys