[Official] Upcoming changes to the library. Discuss.

[ladym0d]

I'm fairly new and I think that the rules are reasonable. Be a member and make at least one post a week that contributes to the value of the forums? Pay $3.99 for access to half a TB of occult books?

 

[Zelator2148]

I came here for the conversation and the opportunity to contribute. I do all my occult reading on my Kindle while on my treadmill in the morning, and Kindle only does Kindle books. I could switch to my iPad but it would be no better, just different with Apple books. Anyway,these days I mostly write and my reading feeds that (I have five published books myself). I don't have a lot of interest in the library because I can afford to buy books, but I appreciate its existence and support rational rules for its use.

 

[Judas_aurelius]

I skipped to the very end after getting side-tracked reading. I'd like to say I agree with the Library rule completely. If I had just gotten access to the book I was looking for I would of thrown this site out the window. Well, since I couldn't I read how and completely agree. This place would be great for me among my journey and although there was some disagreements I saw. For what the vision I grasped was, I don't doubt one bit that this was perfectly lenient and efficient in setting boundaries.

Also to the disagreement, quite frankly if you just had access to the library most likely your not going to stay. Also, IMO if your walking an occult pathway and cannot wait a week to gain access to knowledge. Then I feel as if you're only betraying yourself.

 

[Morell]

You know, maybe posting these new rules in new threat: "conditions to access the Library" might be kinda more foundable.. or adding them to official rules. Here they are kinda aside.
Pinned threat among the books themselves could also be good.

Just thinking about keeping it organized

 

[briang]

I'm going to outline an upcoming change to the library. Sometime in the near future, I will be changing the access requirements for the library section. Feel free to discuss and share your thoughts in this thread.

What will change​

There will be minimum post/account age requirements to post in the library, and rather than give a text wall to explain it, here's how the system will check to see if you can access the library:

1. Are you a Benefactor? If yes, you have access to the library, if no:
2. Have you ever posted a book share? If yes, you have access to the library, if no:
3. Have you made 10 [increased to 50] posts in the occult sections (“The Order”)? If yes, you have access to the library, if no:
4. Have you been registered on WF for at least one week? If yes:
   1. Have you made at least 1 post in the occult sections (“The Order”) in the last week? If yes, you have access to the library, if no:
5. If you have none of the above, you do not have access to the library.

So essentially, you need to either have posted at least one book share, made 50 posts in total in the occult sections (“The Order”), been registered for at least one week and made 1 post in an occult section, or be Benefactor in order to access the library.

The individual details may be fine tuned over time.

Why is this happening?​

Two main reasons, firstly, I simply don't want WF to be a file share focused site. It's nice to have the library as a supplement to out discussions, and as a service to help spread as much awareness and knowledge of the occult as possible, but the primary goal is to do that via discussions as a forum. I can see that there are thousands of people per year just joining WF to download books and contribute nothing. While I have no hard feelings about that, the concern is that WF will end up primarily being used as a file sharing site, which it is not, and was never intended to be.

Secondly, I want to encourage more active discussion about occult topics rather than just pointing people towards books. Yes, I understand the concern that this will lead to a spike in low quality posting from people who just join the site and want to spam out the post requirement ASAP to get to the book they want to download, but I strongly believe we can counteract this with measures such as requiring a minimum character count in posts made in the occult section (which is something I've been thinking about doing for a while anyway). Not to mention, we have an extremely competent staff roster, who if they express such a desire, can be expanded with new staff members. I also personally believe that a lot of the people coming on WF looking for specific books are people who are already dabbling in or experienced in the occult, and who aren't contributing because they simply don't have to. I've been made aware by some that we could potentially lose out on some members who would contribute much later on of their own free will after downloading a book from WF, but there isn't strong evidence of that in the metrics (that it would outweigh the amount of people who are introverted or lazy who would contribute if they had to).

Also, if it turns out that this ends up causing more trouble than it's worth, it would be easy to undo and go back to business as usual.

Why allow Benefactors to access the library? Is this a cash grab?​

I assure you no one is going to be paying $4 to download one PDF. This is simply because it would be unethical to bar parts of the site from people who are actually paying to keep WF running.

Is this the makings of a plan to remove the library from WF?​

No, there is no such plan. I love having the library on WF - but to help our members educate themselves on the occult so that we can have more in-depth and meaningful discussions about occult topics to further WF's ultimate goal of being a community that focuses on bringing more people into the occult, and bringing more occult knowledge to as many people as possible. WF is not a library, WF is a forum with a library.

Hi,
I myself have a 2TB library of both pdf and Word Books, Documents, Pamphlets etc that I have gathered over 49 years of being involved within the occult, I am 62 years old and I share this Library within another format (Discord) and I have to agree that yes there are those that come get a book and are never seen again but 90% of library users do partake within the various forums within the server due to gaining the knowledge from the books from within the Library, so I agree with your "metrics evidence" that it would not just become a file sharing site but a very viable Forum Discussion site with an added bonus of a Library to back up those discussions.
Brian (Bane Athane)

 

[SkullTraill]

You know, maybe posting these new rules in new threat: "conditions to access the Library" might be kinda more foundable.. or adding them to official rules. Here they are kinda aside.
Pinned threat among the books themselves could also be good.

Just thinking about keeping it organized

A notice containing the conditions is the only thing visible to members who view the Book Shares section and don't yet have access to it. There is nothing more to be done. It is painfully obvious as it is.