August ReadaThing Feedback Needed

Now, I would "like" to have feedback on what YOU thought about this ReadaThing event.

Good. Bad. Indifferent. Everything.

What can be done to make it better?
What shouldn't be included anymore?

and, yes, I really want to know!

(If you don't want to post publicly here, you can PM me on my profile page.)

If we don't know what you liked or didn't like, how can we make the ReadaThings better?

Later on, I'll post what I tried to do & what I chose not to do...

Speak UP!! Even if it only to say that there should have been more time zones on the time zone chart!

Suggestions:

I liked these:

I didn't like these:

These things don't matter to me or bother me:

Things to consider adding or doing:

First, skittles, serious kudos for your role in organizing! You did a great job!

All - feel free to add in your comments other things LT can do to help promote, &c.

I think it went quite well!

Perhaps having a separate thread for what you're *going* to read as opposed to what you *did* read is not necessary, but lots of people posted, so maybe I'm wrong.

Having the table to help with time zones was absolutely brilliant :-D

Thank you, jbd1 & staffordcastle.

What I wanted:
*A more welcoming international feel, not so US-centric.
*Better Clearer Communication & "Instructions."
*A longer RaT so there could be a full day of reading for everyone, not just half a day because someone lives on the other side of the big marble.
*A chance to participate for those LTers who can't schedule their reading time, but still want to be reading "with the group."

What I didn't want:
*I didn't want a last-minute, hurriedly cobbled together, no publicity, ReadaThing event.
*A messy wiki page. (got help with that & learned stuff, too)
*Didn't want people to feel left out, but didn't want to be too pushy about it either.

What I tried to do (with input):
*Not make all decisions myself. I asked for input & got some.
*Not do everything myself. I asked for help & got it.
*Tried to give RaT "structure, but complete freedom within that structure." (paraphrased from a favorite book)
*Tried to make it Welcoming.
*Tried to keep an eye on the Wiki Page signups. Fixed stuff when needed.

What I think should be continued or improved:
*The longer weekend, perhaps going to 60 hours from 48.
*Emphasize & encourage the International. You sleep, I'll read. I sleep, You'll read. Keep the thought that we keep the reading going continually through the weekend.
*Encourage "checking in" before & after reading when possible, so the group "mind" is reading together.
*A name. I tried to "title" this event, The August First Weekend ReadaThing, but that didn't really grab the way I hoped. Reading in Public was a good idea. Another group on LT had a Summer Doldrums Readathon. Good Idea!!
**Planning needs to start 2 months beforehand. Spontaneous is fun, too, and will work sometimes, but planning is better..... usually.

Now, tell us what YOU THINK!! Disagreeing is fine, but politely, please.

Forgive me if these things are typical of RaTs, for I am mostly new to the experience.

I liked:
Being able to participate in the process somewhat.
Being able to pick the date was handy too
The idea of a theme. Shame it didn't catch on.
Making it global. That was awesome. I think when you say you want to do a 24/48 hour read, it should be 24/48 hours from /any/ country, stretching the read a thing out for the whole globe, just as we did.

I didn't like:
For some reason I had a hard time keeping up with some of the threads. Maybe that's because I was new to the planning process and on a very tight schedule at times... That and my "inbox" around here is constantly stuffed...

Things that don't matter to me or bother me:
Having all the threads and ways to interact. Though I felt like I couldn't participate in that process fully, it was nice to know that was there if I could manage it.

Things to consider adding or doing:
Themes are cool... Even if you say to people that the theme is a challenge theme, where they read a book for some other challenge. I don't know about anyone else, but I'm part of many challenges and that woulda been cool, to see what books people were reading for what challenges. Wouldn't have to be for librarything either. Maybe there's a local book club doing a challenge. That's good too, it'd give others more ideas for challenges. :)
A catchy name would travel fast among readers and make it easy to work out what's going on.
I personally need to work on getting into my message board more so that I can keep up with these things, so I can't really say that it should be easier to keep up with things like the threads for what you are reading, will read, plans for the RaT itself and so on... I'd reach the end of a thread and think.. well, where to now? You might have made it very obvious and I just couldn't follow because of time constraints. If so, ignore this. :)

Finally, AWESOME job. This was such a well organized event with all the tables and things. Way to go! Can't wait for the next one!

ditto on the kudos to skittles . . . I ♥ well-organized events!

I liked these:
the advanced planning and PR
the clear instructions
the emphasis on inclusion and "the more the merrier"
the option to "read whenever you can if you can't commit to a time"

I didn't like these:
I also had trouble keeping track of all the threads and the different parts of the wiki.
I wish there had been more "chatting" during the RT, but I'm guessing people were busy reading!

These things don't matter to me or bother me:
The participation list (alphabetized!) in the WIKI . . . using touchstones in a thread works fine for me (but I realize that making a participation wiki can give a more permanent record).
Themes . . . I'm ornery, so I'm likely to read what I want with or without a theme :) but if other people want to come up with one I'll try to make one of my books fit.
Knowing what people are planning on reading before the day . . . that comes out in the planning somewhat, not sure it needs a separate thread . . . unless there is a theme and people are wondering how to make a book fit.

Things to consider adding or doing:
not sure if it's possible to force the participation thread to the top of the RT thread list on the day of the event (similar to how some discussion forum sites have certain "sticky" threads) but it might help people locate and keep track of the relevant place to post things; ditto for the planning thread during the planning period

Once again, thanks so much for the advanced planning and publicity. We should do this more often :) (Take a few days to relax and then start planning the next one! *kidding*)

I'm a new member, joining when I learned of the weekend. I enjoyed it. I had some things I had to do that were already scheduled, but I got lots of reading done, and got on LT to see what others were reading. I think I'm going to enjoy this group.

#6: The Participation/Booklist Wiki was something that Sonya wanted for ReadaThing to keep track of what books were read & she asked that we tag them, too. It gave her a way to track how much was read. Makes goals easier. I don't need it, but I don't know if Jeremy(jbd1) needs it. We have the signup page. That gives good numbers! (WOW, did it show we had a good group!!)

Personally, I'm the type that may plan a book or two to read, but will get pulled away for some unplanned reading. This happened for me this time. I didn't post any of my books on the participation wiki or tag them. I did mention one of them on the Log Book thread.

If others want that wiki, great. Then it will continue. But, for now, I think it is more than we need. Books can always be listed in the Log Book (or whatever we decide to call it).

#5: I like your idea of a challenge read & perhaps we can use that idea in a future ReadaThing.

To all: As far as I'm concerned, a theme will NEVER be mandatory or preferred. It would always be voluntary and FUN!!!

Please, Keep the comments coming!

My Pluses of the weekend:

First of all, I loved the Read-a-Thing. My R/L did get in the way a bit but I always love a Read-a-Thon or Read-a-Thing!
2. I loved that it was so well organized and that it was touted on other groups & threads. I so appreciated all of the time and effort you put into it, skittles and I love how you tried so hard to give people who posted positive feed back.
3. I really like the Log idea. It makes good sense to me.
4. I love all the threads and along with the Log as I loved keeping up with what everyone was reading.

My Negatives of the weekend:

1. I know you tried to do this but it didn't seem to happen. I really like to read the check-ins and see what people say about:
where they read, what they munched on or had to drink, what was going on around them in the household or whatever, etc.
2. I would like to see a longer read as you suggested above. That would really help when R/L gets in the way and help us make up that reading time.
3. Not a negative, but I would love to see these happen more often.
4. Again, not a negative but I would like to see we, L.T.ers, take the initiative to perhaps form teams. Say just for example myself, Soupdragon, elliepotten, laytonwoman3rd, wookiebender, europhile, romain, & gocubsgo form a reading team; call ourselves 'The Weekly Readers'; there are 8 of us so as a team we decide which 3 hour slot per 24 hours each one of us will take; so there is one person from each team reading at all times. Just like 'Relay for Life' and walk-a-thons. Someone from each team is on the track at all times. I think that would be a lot of fun.
5. This one is a negative for me.....the wiki thing....I simply cannot wiki and I so appreciate you going behind me and fixing everything for me as I really goobered it up.

But I think it was a great success, people enjoyed themselves and got some great reads in.

Thank you so much for a weekend of great fun.
hugs,
~belva

I thought the concept was terrific and enjoyed it greatly. The only improvement I can think of is more naviagtional prompts on the main thread connecting to all the discussions and wiki entries. Sometimes I wasn't sure where to look for them. So if you had one place to put all that so everyone would know to go there, that would be awesome.

Otherwise, fantastic job!

First off, Skittles you did a fantastic job organizing this whole event.

I loved the organization and the P/R of the whole event. I think us getting the word out ahead of time really helped with so many people participating this time.

I would love to see a longer read-a-thing. R/L got in my way which I hadn't expected. I did get a lot of reading done just couldn't get real life to stop for me.

I don't really care if there is a theme. If I can make a book fit I will try to read it.

I think that is all for now. If I think of anything else I will either add it here or post again.

>6 LucindaLibri: gocubsgo
The idea of sticky threads has been suggested several times, but we don't have a way to do it at this time. Best we can do is "bump" the thread periodically.

Actually we might have missed one of the ways to make things a bit more ordered - the group description can contain links to the appropriate pages/threads so people can find everything easier.

And yeah - never crossed my mind in the last weeks.

Feedback:

Let's make it a week next time -- should allow more people to participate AND some more discussions. Besides - if something interested is read at the beginning of the week, it might be interesting to see how many people will pick it up by the end of the week :) Especially the non-timeline reading - that can be extended into a week easy and Readathing is technically not a readathon :)

In Theory, the next ReadaThing would be in November... but IMO, it is too close to the holidays for a full week. (originally, it was thought that RaT's would be three or four times a year.)

The holidays that I know about are Guy Fawkes & Thanksgiving. I'm sure that there are others... there's also a lot of pre-holiday shopping....

So, if we were to do a weekend to weekend ReadaThing, it should be in February. or a longer weekend one then... Late Thursday to Monday night?? (I'm thinking the second weekend, but I'm open to suggestions when we start the planning thread... next month???) (or perhaps wait until February for the next one??)

My "suggestion" (& dissension is fine) is that we plan another weekend ReadaThing for November & a longer one (pending consensus) for February. Personally, I don't think we are ready for a week long RaT, but I don't mind being proven wrong... or convinced to other point of view.

- - - - - - - -

Thread "stickies" & postings ...

For clarity, I think that we should stick to 3 or 4 threads & close them out when necessary.

PLANNING

ANNOUNCEMENT (can include what people are planning, etc.)

LOG BOOK

FEEDBACK (or whatever a post event discussion should be called)

- - - - - -

Other thoughts....

I think the fact that there were two other Reading Groups the same weekend took away some of the postings to the Log Book thread. That's fine. The more the merrier...

I didn't want a committee or a group to "run" this ReadaThing weekend. I hoped that people would post stuff on their own... that didn't happen, but that just means that we come up with a better idea...

I don't like the thought of "thread monitors" & cheerleaders sounds too.... not right for LibraryThing... but we might want to have some people volunteer to keep the thread moving... keep bumping it when they take a reading break.... (and I didn't want to do everything... supposedly, I have a life, but I might need to get a refill soon)

And I do understand the pull of other groups' reading events. Those are people that you are familiar with & with whom you have common interests. I lurk on the Green Dragon & I invited members there to join in. Some did. I also heard about the Readathon at the 75 book thread. I lurked there & watched without posting. There were people in both groups who mentioned the ReadaThing weekend. I didn't have to do it.

I think that next time, I'm going to encourage people to post "I sat. I read. It was good." I tried to encourage by giving some questions... I think that I asked the wrong ones.

- - - - - - -

Finally, I think that almost everyone had a good time. And I think that this was the largest group for a ReadaThing event, but I'll have to check the previous sign-ups.

and for all the people who thanked me, I say, "THANK YOU FOR MAKING IT GREAT, TOO!!"

It wasn't just me, either!! I want to thank AnnieMod & Jeremy/jbd1, too!!

PS: keep the ideas & comments coming, please!!!

I think I posted just once for ReadaThing because, as I've found in the past, people post what they are doing or answer the questions but don't actually interact with each other. I don't know what to do to fix that but I found that as a co-host of the Green Dragon read-a-thon, that the more *I* interacted the more other people did too.

Morphidae, I noticed that, too, and so, I think that is something that we need to look at doing.

Originally, that's all that was done with ReadaThing, posting what we read, where, & opinion. We may need to expand that, but we need to know if that is what the group wants.

I have done read-a-thons in the 75 group (didn't even know there was one going on at the same time as this one. And I couldn't find the thread when I did find out about it.), and I notice that some people interact with the same members each time and some try to comment on everything. I have tried to comment on all the posts but sometimes when there are like 30 posts after my last one that is difficult to do.

I love the idea of a week long readathing. Some may like the idea of doing it in November just so that they have a reason to sit down and try to relax. Personally I really don't care either way because I have so much personal stuff going on I don't know how the holidays will be this year.

I know of the 75ers read-a-thons some will do opening memes and questions and let people log how much they have read, how long they have read etc. I know that myself I have done that in the past and have noticed I spend more time posting then actually reading. (because I posted every hour).

I try to interact but sometimes I don't recognize the books people are reading and don't know what I think about them. I do like it when people will say positive things to everyone. I know that I sometimes feel I need that for some extra boost when I am feeling the boredom setting in from reading for too long.

I am willing to help in any way possible for the next readathing. I do work during the week and would be limited to just nights and weekends to helping but would try my best to help if needed.

Maybe to get people interacting would could have a questions or something that require you to interact with other members.

I believe that is all for now.

Not so many November holidays outside of the States. Why don't we just select a week - it is a Read-a-thing after all - anyone can read whatever they want :)

Some super ideas coming out of you all.
Now that I know, I wish to thank AnnieMod & jbd1 too for all of your time and efforts. I loved the Read-a-Thing. Now that I know it is not the same as a Read-a-Thon, I can look for and see many differences. But I loved it and I too, would be willing to help in any small way that I am able. (not computer skilled as skittles well knows...lol!~!) But I am retired so if I can be of service please let me know. I am good for both days or nights. Personally, I just know that I love taking part in anything that gets my head in a book and makes it a social happening at the same time.
You kids did great job and so I send you many kudos.
~belva

Working on my catalog today I noticed that for one of the earlier ReadaThings we all agreed to tag the books we were reading with LTreadathonbeta. I think we've moved beyond "beta" but I would like to recommend that in the future we tag the books we read with something like "LTReadaThingMonthYear" Perhaps others have already been doing that, but I didn't see it in the instructions and it totally slipped my mind.
I'm now going off to add "LTReadaThingAug2011" tags to the books I read last weekend.

I also forgot about doing that. I will just do it later. I think it is a good idea.

I had a great time reading with everyone during our last ReadaThing. Thank you again to everyone who made it happen!

I liked how it all turned out. I like the idea of it being in a weekend because I feel like we're a stream of readers connected around the world. As soon as I stop, someone out there is picking up where I left off.

I'm also one of the theme lovers on here. I enjoy seeing what other readers select to fit in the theme and challenging myself to pick a book matching the theme from my tbr pile that I keep passing up. It should remain optional as it always has.

I'm up for a ReadaThing in November. I read every weekend whether it's busy or not!

PbP; Could you please explain to me about the 'theme lovers' option and how that works? Thanx.

I think that PbP means that if a theme is chosen, then the participants choose their books related to that theme.

My concern with a theme is that the group is international & multicultural and it is important to me that we allow & encourage everyone to participate. If we do seasonal, there are two seasons going on, north & south of the equator.... holidays are mostly national or cultural...

But if the themes were more on a subject basis... business books: fiction or non-fiction... or history: fiction or non-fiction.... books on time, including time travel or how time affects people... or books on books.... or books on a subject (like politics) or fiction where a character is a political figure or a biography of a political figure or a political event....

I also must insist that the option of reading on a theme be OPTIONAL. That anyone can participate without adhering to the theme.

I'm going to start the November 2011 Planning thread with a link to this thread.... let's take the discussion there & get things started....

Here is the link to the new thread for the next Read-A-Thing. We are looking to do it in November so start making suggestions for when to have it start etc. So head on over and start making suggestions. :)