Oh yes, I should have been more clear. As Greg stated in his "Upcoming Site Upgrades" announcement, NSN is working on a pretty intensive overhaul that has been in the works for a while. NSN has many moving parts (just check out the navigation menu), and we are taking the redesign one step at a time. The galleries themselves have not been started, and my comment was based on other areas that have been being worked on.

Keep the ideas coming!

Thank you for considering it

Two things I would love to see:

1) The ability to replace a photo rather than having to delete and re-upload.

2) The ability of the gallery software to read the EXIF and IPTC metadata and transfer the info in the the appropriate fields for viewing purposes.

Just a thought and hoping for some discussion on it. One of the things that happens at every photography forum is the "you scratch my back, I'll scratch your back" syndrome. So I was thinking what would it matter if the comments on images were anonymous? At first I thought no way they would go for this, but the more I think about it, I cannot really see any reason why it shouldn't work, nor why we need to know who comments on an image. For me this would create a much more open and honest critic forum. What do others think about this? Would it be worth trying for a short trial period, say one month?

It's an interesting thought; I wonder, however, about the law of unintended consequences. One of the main reasons attributed to the (more than) occasional obnoxious behavior on the broader Internet is the relative anonymity of it. People feel emboldened to offer thoughts, the thinking goes, that they'd never offer in a real, face-to-face setting. That's obviously a double-edged sword. As you stated, it's likely to result in more honest feedback. But is it also more likely to result in thoughtless responses? Would the benefits outweigh the costs? I don't know, of course, I'm just throwing it out there. An experimental period, as you've suggested, would be quite instructive.

Yes, but the anonymity would only be to the members reading the thread. All of the management team would know who they are and could police or talk to anyone who was posting to cause problems or outside of the forum rules. I have spoken to a few people about this idea, and most feel that it would work better and could be done. Having been here at NSN for quite sometime now, I know of many great people and photographers who have either left NSN, or post way less now, and this is one of the main reasons for it.

Tim, that's out-of-the-box thinking, and although I'm not sure if/how well it would work in practice, I definitely think it's a good idea worth exploring. Maybe there are other ideas out there to reduce the 'problem'.
Cheers,
Neil.

Tim. I don't know if there is an answer to that. I see it on all the photography forums, Heck, that was one of Artie's big gripes and yet it is also very prevalent on his site also.

Yes, it is prevalent on all forums, and not just photography forums. No one knows if there is an answer to it, but I am suggesting a possible answer that may just work. Only way to know for sure is to try it. I'm sure there will be lots of speculation as to why it won't work, but I honestly cannot see any reason why it would be worse than how it is now, and could actually be a lot better. Let's ask these questions then - why do we need to know who is commenting on our image? Isn't the main purpose of the forums to receive and give honest open friendly critic? I think this would work and would take NSN to the next level beyond and above all the other forums where this is so prevalent.

I'm sure people place more importance on comments they get from artists whose work they admire, and less on those they don't. I think this is perfectly valid and alows different styles to develop.
Another idea; what about limiting the max number of comments an image can recieve? Would this encourage more even comment distribution?

How about having feeds turned on. It's a feature of phpBB, and although it would be overwhelming to try to subscribe to the whole site, I'd find it very usefull for monitoring the regional forums, and if there was a dedicated industry announcements forum as suggested earlier, it would be great to subscribe to it with a feed aggregator (e.g. a phone).

With the thought Tim has suggested it could be applied to the posters as well ! That is the posters remain anonymous (assuming no watermark on photo).
Is that what we really want?

Huh? How is that the same in any way at all? I never once suggested that the posters be anonymous, and to suggest that they do is just not going to help this discussion. I suspected people would come out against this idea because it goes against the grain, but if you really think about it, it will work and would make things better IMHO. Without giving specifics, all someone has to do is post a "great image" for every image on the page, and I guarantee you they will get a "great image" response back from most of them. Especially if you do that day in day out for 6 months or so. It is already happening on the BIRD forum. I personally (as do others I know of) find it insulting and inappropriate when a great photographer will post an awesome image and get 10 or so comments, then a below average image will get 25 to 30 comments simply because they have made lots of friends. What has happened is that people also feel obligated to comment on a friend's post, or people who have commented on their image(s) even if they don't really think it is that great. Plus, there are WAY MORE patting the back comments than really helpful honest critic comments due to this situation. You all know this happens here and at other forums, so why is so wrong to suggest a possible way to improve this and improve the comments and critiquing at the forum. If all you want is a "you scratch my back and I'll scratch your back" type of critic forum, where gaining the most friends and getting the most comments boosts your ego and makes you a great photographer, then by all means leave it the way it is. I was hoping we could put our heads together and come up with a way to defeat that and make it a true and fair critic forum.

If the posters are made anonymous then there won't be any 'pat on the back' comments, no?
Someone care to comment can use their name as of now. Just a thought.

I think KK Hui is saying strip the author data block (currently on the right of the post) from the post.

I think that this has escalated way beyond what Tim has intended. If you make the posters anonymous, then you take away the ability to look at portfolios, send a PM, and check out the poster's website, all of which are very worthwhile. The idea of critiques being anonymous is an interesting one that is worth exploring for the reasons already mentioned, in my opinion. There is another benefit to anonymous critiquing beyond more honest input that avoids the "scratch my back" syndrome. There are times when I would like to post an image, but don't have the time to comment on a dozen or so images, which I feel obligated to do before I post mine. When that happens, I will delay my post until I do have time, which results in my posting fewer images. Another thought...how about making the ability to post anonymously optional? Anyway, depending on how much effort it is to set this up, it could be worth trying it for a month or so to see how it works.

Same applies to anyone who took the effort to comment/critique and you make it anonymous, isn't it?

Quite true, KK, but I don't see anonymity as an all or none situation. Life is full of compromises. It boils down to how many members would favour anonymous critiquing, or, perhaps more to the point, whether or not the NSN management feel that this is an idea worth exploring.

The anonymity suggestions are all interesting and I don't profess to know whether any of the recommended changes would improve things or not (begging the question of what constitutes an "improvement" in the first place...but I digress). The only thing I'd state is that just because an idea SEEMS--pre-implementation--like a flawless one doesn't necessarily make it so. The law of unintended consequences is powerful and relatively unpredictable.

A few years ago, another photo site that I frequent introduced an anonymous gallery. Post were made with the identity of the poster unknown. Folks on the site had clamored for this. The idea was that it would reduce the amount of "great shot" comments that were solely connected to the reputation of the person posting and vastly increase the honesty of the image critiques that were made. It was a good idea. After a very brief period, activity in that particular forum decreased to almost nothing. In the end, almost no one posted there and after a year or two the gallery was shut down, to little fanfare. There was much speculation as to why the idea had failed, but nothing approaching a systematic analysis (understandably--that would have taken time and effort that no one was really interested in expending on behalf of something that had demonstrably flopped; it didn't work, time to move on...that was the attitude).

I mention the above experience not as proof that anything that's been suggested in this thread is doomed to failure; this is a different site, with a different set of participants and the suggestions as to how to implement the idea are somewhat--perhaps substantially--different as well. A change here, carefully established and modified as necessary might work. The reason I related the story is to illustrate how difficult it can be to predict real world behavior based almost solely on an idea that seems, intuitively, like a good one. I'm not saying "don't try to make things better"; I'm not saying "nothing should change"; I'm not saying, all other things being equal, it's not worth taking a shot and seeing how it goes. What I am saying is "take care." Line your ducks up. Make sure that, at the very least, there's a firm reason to believe that a majority of the folks who post in the critique galleries on this site are amenable to a change as potentially significant as what's being suggested. That's minimally what I would do if I was in charge of making this decision (which I am not). That's all I'm saying.

KK and Kerry, you guys are obviously either not reading what I am writing, or you simply do not understand what I am saying. I never suggested, nor would I, that the ORIGINAL POSTER, i.e the person who posts an image, be anonymous. I am only suggesting that consideration be given to a trial period where the people WHO COMMENT on an image are anonymous. This way, everyone who posts an image still has all of their contact info, website, etc visible and useable. I really can't see this as much of a change at all, other than the poster of an image will now not know who is placing the comments/critic. I do not see this as any reason that things would get out of hand, but I do believe it will offer a more open and honest critic forum, and will also be far more representative of an images quality and popularity, since it removes the "pat on the back" syndrome. Maybe my out of the box thinking is too much for people to digest at this time, so I will leave it alone, but still feel it was a worthwhile proposal for a worthwhile cause.