Since you level 3’ers are the seasoned veterans on AF, I wanted to ask you a question about forum organization. As part of the site re-design that I recently starting working on I’m considering adding sub-forums to each level to make the site more useful for candidates. For example, the Level 3 forums would look something like this: Exam Discussion and Strategies Test Prep Solutions Ethical and Professional Standards Investment Tools: - Corporate Finance - Economics - Financial Reporting and Analysis - Quantitative Methods Asset Classes: - Alternative Investments - Derivatives - Equity Investments - Fixed Income Portfolio Management and Wealth Planning Results What do you think about this new approach to the Level 3 forum? Do you prefer this structure or the current format where all level 3 discussion is in one category? Thanks, Chad
Your idea is very good. But the topics mentioned seem to be for Level 3 (no Financial Reporting and and Analysis - Quantitative Methods in Level 3). If possible, “by reading” may be preferred. (one sub-forum for each reading.e.g., R36 is one sub-forum and R37 is another sub-forum). In this way, it is easy/convenient for candidates to find the sub-forums for each topic)
***Correction to my previous message*** Your idea is very good. But the topics mentioned seem to be “not” for Level 3 (no Financial Reporting and and Analysis - Quantitative Methods in Level 3).
Good catch on the topic list. Here is a revised list with the excluded level 3 topics: Exam Discussion and Strategies Test Prep Solutions Ethical and Professional Standards Asset Classes: - Alternative Investments - Derivatives - Equity Investments - Fixed Income Portfolio Management and Wealth Planning Results
Another way : By Study Session (Total : 18 Sessions)
Great Idea !! Also besides new postings, it would be great if even the past postings and discussions could be allocated to the above categories.
Very good idea. Of course “Search” should offer either a choice of the category/topic section or the entire database . Kind of like Wilmott Forums.
I think organizing it by study session would be the most efficient, since the institute can add/delete readings each year. I also think the hook up forum should be broken out by level since it looks pretty cluttered as-is.
18 is too many subforums. I would break them into the text books so that there are only 4-6 forums and you dont have to click on everyone to see where the material is. In other words, one L3 forum is too little, what you listed is too many. Slim it down and it should be juuuuuust riiiiight.
also would make sense to create a specific subforum/forum heading for folks looking towards test prep material / efficacy of cfai vs. other providers /etc. etc and move the forum notes pertaining to this into that subforum directly… otherwise there is too much of is schweser better/stalla better/finquiz better/qbank better questions going on up until the day the exam happens - and this repeats each forum/each year…
Chad, it’s great to see that you are thinking of ways to improve the AF viewing experience. However, in my opinion, the current forum organization is optimal given the frequency of posts on AF. Introducing multiple sub categories in the L3 forum would dilute the number of posts in each forum. I would rather have one general L3 forum with five to ten new threads a day then many smaller forums with zero to one new posts a day. As AF’s viewership grows and the frequency of posts increases, it might eventually make sense to subdivide the forums. At present, however, this is not necessary.
ohai Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Chad, it’s great to see that you are thinking of > ways to improve the AF viewing experience. > However, in my opinion, the current forum > organization is optimal given the frequency of > posts on AF. Introducing multiple sub categories > in the L3 forum would dilute the number of posts > in each forum. I would rather have one general L3 > forum with five to ten new threads a day then many > smaller forums with zero to one new posts a day. > > As AF’s viewership grows and the frequency of > posts increases, it might eventually make sense to > subdivide the forums. At present, however, this is > not necessary. Agreed many times over. It’s good to see the various topics - you may come in with a Fixed Income question, see an Equity topic and realize you learned something by opening a thread you otherwise wouldn’t have. As ohai says, clutter doesn’t seem to be an issue, there’s just not enough content/people.
“CFA vs MBA” should have its own forum
ohai Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Chad, it’s great to see that you are thinking of > ways to improve the AF viewing experience. > However, in my opinion, the current forum > organization is optimal given the frequency of > posts on AF. Introducing multiple sub categories > in the L3 forum would dilute the number of posts > in each forum. I would rather have one general L3 > forum with five to ten new threads a day then many > smaller forums with zero to one new posts a day. > > As AF’s viewership grows and the frequency of > posts increases, it might eventually make sense to > subdivide the forums. At present, however, this is > not necessary. good point, but over time it may be nice to see how people addressed the hard topics/books/subjects year after year. it may be slow posting for now, but come May and June the traffic would pick up and then over time you have a database of people encountering similar specific roadblocks and how they overcame them IMHO i still believe 1 L3 forum is too little and what Chad posted was too many
Chad, can we have analystforum T-shirts since we have been here the longest?
What about maintaing the current structure, but being able to tag posts with one of either the topics Chad mentioned or by Study Session? That way you still only have one forum but it can be segmented by searching against the tags.
“I like you just the way you are” …just use GOOD DESCRIPTIONS in the subject…not “question” or “please help”
IDK… This site doesn’t get as much traffic as it used to. I think if you make people click on a dozen different links in order to view the 5-10 new threads that get posted every day you might lose some interest. This idea may have worked back in 2009 when there were 30+ threads posted on the L3 forum every day… but not anymore.
I think this would be a horrible idea. Nothing is worse than a million separate subforums.
I agree with the above poster. I like that I only have to come to one spot to go through everything. Besides, for the most part there aren’t enough posts to warrant splitting it up into a dozen different forums. If anything, improve the search function so users that do want to drill down to one topic can find the information that way. If it aint broke don’t fix it!