This is the room update feedback spot
Hi there-
If you have positive or critical feedback about last week's room change, this is the place to post it. We will respond to feedback and questions that are professional and kind as best we can and with the info we have.
As such, complaining or providing feedback in the rooms will no longer be acceptable. The rooms are for support and support programming and not about site feedback. This is also the forum area for feedback. Moving forward everyone will be directed here if you would like to discuss room updates.
The paid mods, the ambassadors, and anyone else in the community did not make this room decision. It is inappropriate and unfair to take out your frustrations on them. This room plan has been in the planning stages for most of the year. Many options and ideas were considered, many staff teams were involved. Based on the existing site and on the needs of the community (safety, focus on support, etc) this is the plan that was moved forward. Do not take your frustrations out on volunteers and on the mods.
To everyone who is accepting of this change thank you. We appreciate the messages and feedback of support. Especially from those who aren't sure about the change but are willing to give it a try.
And to those of you who are unhappy about it, we hear you. We know it was sudden and a large scale change. Please give it a chance knowing we are focused on improving the long term experiences here.
Enough from me, post your feedback below!
I am supportive of trying all changes made to 7Cups, and honestly, I have witnessed a lot from the member part.
Trying it is important, but also evaluating issues that everyone has is important to me. I think that with the changes being so sudden to the feed and chat rooms it is leaving a lot of individuals that have been part of 7Cups for quite a bit of time reeling. They aren't used to this drastic of a change. And it can be hard to imagine how new changes that are yet to be implemented will be better. Or imagine anything that will compete with the feed. Or where they will feel supported when their specific topic group support room is closed.
I understand why and can't wait to see how these new changes may help.
But everyone should stay aware of why this is happening. And perhaps a bit more organization given to those who are feeling the negatives of these being taken away.
Again this is just an opinion - not mad at anyone - just the situation as I see it as one of the long-time members here.
This would be the time to acknowledge you have pulled the rug under many people.
This room plan has been in the planning stages for most of the year. Many options and ideas were considered, many staff teams were involved. Based on the existing site and on the needs of the community (safety, focus on support, etc) this is the plan that was moved forward.
The support communities that have evolved within the live peer group support are irreplaceable. This website has now essentially become less of a support resource. Even the communities that have a strong supportive culture have been punished. And now that people are dealing with the emotions of their support network has been taken away from them, you ban talking about it at the remaining chats. Looking for support for this loss is banned.
It does not seem to me you have done a sufficient job thinking this through. We are, after all, at a mental healt peer support platform.
Hi, am i correct in thinking that there will be no more room chats ,if so i really think its for the best i would go on and most of the time people were arguing / being insulting / bad language / using it has a dating site, so i never used it . I think the idea of it is good if used respectfully
@Dollym
Hi,
Yes, Did you go check the 7cups message board for advance notices?
Oh, sorry, 7cups doesnt have one 😲
@humorousDay8793
Hi no i havent 🙂
@Dollym
Im seeing 7 chat rooms are open right now
Cheers
Thankyou
@Dollym
There are still group support rooms, but there have been some changes:
1) Only 2 rooms will be open 24/7: Member Community Room and a Support Room
2) All other topic rooms will be pop-up: they will only open when a mod is present
3) As a member, you must have two badges to enter the group support rooms: one for 50 compassion hearts and one for completing 5 chats with 5 listeners (1 chat per listener, 5 chats total)
4) Access to the lgbtq+ and disability rooms is restricted through a form
@MonB
I will take a look sounds good
Thankyou
@Jill7Cups Hello! I don't mind the scaling back of rooms. It's something that will eventually be gotten used to. My issue is the requirements needed for members to access them. Compassion hearts are most commonly given in group chats and the amount of chats needed to access the rooms is very excessive. I've had quite a few members that have told me they've been here for months and can't access the group chat anymore because of the high requirement. I believe I understand the call for the requirements as it takes away new account creation with trolls but I feel the requirement is excessive.
@ErinKay
I agree with your point on compassion hearts. It is much easier to get them as a listener than a member, especially since last I checked, you can only receive up to 10 compassion hearts from 1 person. Hopefully if this is a barrier for legitimate users, we'll find a way to mitigate it either through increasing the means that member can receive compassion hearts outside of group chats or modifying the requirement in some way.
@MonBon - (Your use of the word legitimate here bothers me. It implies some of us are illegitimate and do not belong.)
@wontwakewontsleep
That was the intent. We are trying to prevent users who only use the site to harass others rather than for its purpose of support and community. If you are here to seek or offer emotional support, then you belong here <3 But otherwise yes, I am saying that those users do not belong.
@Jill7Cups my discussions are a lot more active, and guided discussions/support sessions vent very well and even increased participation, but the open chats was more challenging, I had to manage a lot of people who was just complaining about the updates, and while i tried to redirect the chat and gave them the appropriate thread for giving feedback, i had to use my mod tools, which is very rare, then people complaining even harder. continued to delete the comments related to it, and the chatroom got dead, i closed it. im questionning myself the pertinence of open chats and thinking focussing on guided discussions for now, take advantage of the higher participation in them.
@Jill7Cups
Hello,
1) Is all those people's Feed data retreivable? Can you some how fix this by reinstating feeds and rooms and postpone the changes until members have had a chance to make the needed adjustments? And so they can save their feed data they are so upset about thinking its gone forever?
2) Is it also possible to have a message board page for future announcements so 7cups can avoid major upsets like this from ever happening again?
We should all have been notified.
3) Is it possible to find a way to get out an applogoy to all members so they feel like they matter?
These changes affected moods, and emotions, and was intrusive and unexpected. That's why it bothered me and was upsetting and affected so many negatively.
I hope some good eventually happens on the site.
Im upset though because some lives are as fragile as one sentence delivered badly.
Research shows that huge numbers of the mental health community suffers from fears, and change.
I hope we didnt loose anybody for real, but we may never know for sure why so many people closed their accounts.
Thank you
@humorousDay8793 - We are already in the message board where these updates would theoretically be posted in advance. ):
@wontwakewontsleep
True, true, but how can they make sure everybody sees a big change coming if tgey dont go searching for something they dont know exists? It would/could help to be given a chat reminder to all members to go read a certain thread.
Thank you 😊
I think the way it was handled could have been done much better, but I have shared specific things on that already.
I have seen many people say the comm mods don't seem to be around much. The little I have hung out in the Support & MCR rooms does match with that. I have told others maybe there are just busy on the teen side. They do come in quickly when called too, so I have encouraged people to do that. With the limited number of rooms though I am surprised I'm not seeing them in on or the other when I have both open.
I'm also confused as to who does what room now. A comm mod told me they do not have access to the Support Key rooms, so does this mean that these are only modded by volunteers now? Or is this just an oversight? Can they enter the popup rooms?
What are the badges needed? For example, is it possible for people to have access to the Support Key rooms without access to the Support & MCR rooms. Or are Support & MCR badges like prerequisits to get the other 24/7 rooms? What about the popup rooms?
@AffyAvo - Agreed with these observations and questions
I would like to add I also have seen the same community mod in both rooms. I wonder how effective they are moderating the rooms when they have to switch between both. I'm worried that puts unwarranted strain on the moderator when that situation exists.
Just curious as to how many negative or critical complaints it will take for someone who reads the feed back to understand that it was a giant mistake to change the rooms like they have been. an also kudos to the passive aggresive original notification on the room changes. It is obvious 7cups admin don't really care that much , perhaps when the donations start to dwindle things will go back to normal.
also maybe what would of been a bigger help is changing the moderator rules so they are basically not begging people to behave properly and allow them to use common sense on when to kick people out. The rooms are now a cluster bomb, during peek hours, too many conversations going on at once. People I looked forward to talking to and getting support from are gone.
Want to make a real change, put the rooms back to normal, stop recruiting non trained listeners for volunteers and same for moderators, start reaching out to colleges and universities an recruit their psychological study students to volunteer as listeners or request and advertise to actual licensed mental health professionals to volunteer as a listener / moderator. on top of allowing moderators to use common sense while moderating.
other than that, great job at ticking off a majority of people on here.
@aVeryoriginalScreenname listeners and voluntenteer mods are very much trained theirs the pre training to become a listener and continuous training after that as for mod training its extensive so they are very mucgh trained if you find a mod isnt doing what they should mod review form could be used to give them feedback
@CaringBrit oh you mean the extensive 5 min training program ? That program ? the one that anyone can click through with their eyes closed . because that is all it is. I've been both a listener and a moderator. that " training " is a joke.
@aVeryoriginalScreenname their isnt just that training you know theirs topical trainings . 4 active listening courses and specific role related trainings
@CaringBrit
pft come on stop making excuses the topics training is a joke too, the entire idea is to create open ended questions that wont trigger anyone into a spell of a dizzy. an to be inclusive.
@aVeryoriginalScreenname
They just want us to get tired and forget!
[MonBon edited at author request]
@aVeryoriginalScreenname
I have never agreed to a statement more.
@aVeryoriginalScreenname
No one will get it
It's just new person in charge trying to justify their job.
Guessing it's an underwialjfied 22 year old who couldn't land a job in real world so playing dress up on 7cups without any real knowledge
@Jill7Cups
I understand that the room changes are "easier to manage", but I feel like having specific chats for specific problems was extremely helpful. Some people feel more comfortable with people who understand what they go through on a daily basis, instead of being shoved in a room with people with no understanding. It's uncomfortable. And if this room change was in planning for most of the year, why weren't we at all warned or told about this? I feel like we should have been given a chance to prepare or say our feedback earlier than this. That would have been a lot better. Though I won't yell and scream at anyone, I am very frustrated about this and I am slowly losing faith in 7Cups. First feeds, now the chats? I haven't spoken to a listener at all because they are never available, and I felt more comfortable talking with members in a specific chat. I just hope 7Cups makes better choices with planning before they throw these extreme changes in our faces. You threw these changes at us harshly, so of course, people are going to come back at you harshly. Disappointed, but I'll see where this leads the site.
@ImprovingPanda My guess is that, whatever amount of planning it had, the actual changes were rushed out on an emergency basis, before they were ready with proper announcements or accurate documentation. There are still some posts out there with inaccurate information. I'd love to get some confirmation of that guess, but I don't expect it.
@ImprovingPanda
"And if this room change was in planning for most of the year, why weren't we at all warned or told about this? I feel like we should have been given a chance to prepare or say our feedback earlier than this." (Quoted from your post.)
The reason--put simply--is that the people who make the decisions don't care. Actions speak louder than words.
If they cared, they would not have done what they did in such an irresponsible way, with no regard for the safety of vulnerable people who relied on things that are now gone. If they cared, they would've given more warning and would've made changes more slowly, in order to give people time to find new support before it was removed.
They don't want our feedback. The only reason these threads exist is so they can banish all of us "complainers" to the forum, where our complaints can be easily ignored.
I suspect that soon there will be no chat at all. And when it happens they will most likely blame us, even though it was probably also part of the plan they had in the works for most of the year. I hope I am wrong about that, but looking at their actions thus far does not inspire any confidence.
@DarkSquirrel
As sad as it is it's the truth. They would rather shrug us off and blame us for being concerned and unhappy instead of just do what's right and give us more time to adapt to your "changes". How many of these posts must be made until someone turns on their brain and realizes this entire chatroom change was a giant mistake? They are practically ruining their own site and trying to blame us for reacting. I hope they won't be surprised when people stop using it this site.
@Jill7Cups
I don't understand why you have to apply to enter the rooms. Not only is it preventing new members from getting support, but people can also lie on the forms.
@SnailPurple
The application only applies to specific rooms. The idea is that people who cause trouble will have their access removed from those specific rooms, but this time it won't be as easy as just making a new account. They'll have to meet the criteria, fill out the form, and wait a few days before they can even enter the room again. We know this also puts a greater burden on legitimate users, but ideally the legitimate users will only have to go through this process once, whereas a user here to harass others will have a much harder time.
@MonBon
I understand now, thanks for the clarification.
