Quote:
Originally Posted by DMRyan
In Peerson's defense, I think he's doing an incredible job at representing his city on here. Some of the photo updates of projects that haven't had a lot of work done since the last update are a little repetitive, but this thread clearly demonstrates how much work has been put into showcasing his city and I hope he keeps up the good work.
He's far from the only one that posts non-development photographs in their city development thread. I also commend the SLC poster(s) for their hard work, which recently had some great spring eye candy shots in between development posts. While I certainly don't discourage anyone from posting updates or photos from their cities, the only one I don't personally prefer is some of the non-development related posts in the Winston-Salem thread, which otherwise looks like a cool city that I would be interested in following. It's cumbersome to load even with a high-speed internet connection, and looking at the furniture of a new coffee shop or 2'X4's being installed on the interior of someone's office space isn't for me and unfortunately discourages me from looking at that one more often.
To each their own though.
I wish there weren't discussions spread among three similar websites so someone could more cohesively get a quick rundown of projects in every city in one place. It really is a handy format.
|
It's interesting to see my
Winston-Salem update thread discussed when looking for updates on other cities. I often think only a few people are looking at it. It must have more people looking at it than I think? I do want to say I visit this thread often and have no complaints. It looks good as-is.
The building DMRyan is calling a coffee shop is actually a now-completed beer brewery. I guess brewery/brewing/brew house is coffee in the Midwest, but it's beer in the Southeast/Mid-Atlantic. It's a conversion of an old furniture factory into a craft beer brewery and event space. In the future, I will add beer to the breweries to be more clear. We followed it from construction until finish and when projects are completed, I try to show it inside-and-out, including FFE (Furniture - Finishings - Equipment), and encourage everyone to visit and try it. I also love showing interior progress. I think the office building showing 2'x4's is Efird Block, which is an Ohio developer combining a few historic buildings to create one large Nationwide Insurance office building with two floors of retail? With these adaptive-reuse projects, it's common for the exterior to look the same for months, as most of the action happens inside. This building looks exactly the same on the outside as it did a decade ago, but the inside is rapidly taking shape. I'll post an exterior view on the next update, so everyone can see this. Again, I like seeing the inside and won't change this.
This is something that could help others: I think the biggest problem with my thread is... I assemble each update post over roughly two weeks (14-18 days), with very few replies to reduce photographs-per-page (the problem when the city you post on has its own forum), and some projects that are better photographed than others will become massive collections of photographs. Much of this is due to me wanting to stay out of everyone's way and just make two update posts a month instead of several smaller updates. It can lead to 30-40 active projects appearing in one massive post and, with few replies, it adds-up. I'm now trying to limit it to 30 projects-per-post. I don't bump and I post during times when I think everyone else has posted most of their updates and I can be out-of-their-way. Something else that could help someone: I ask my wife and friends for ideas. I'll admit I'm bad at this and want help. For me, I was told to allow my personality to show and add music, which my wife Lauren often helps select. Other things I do: Make it easy to find projects and know what is new and what is completed; Try to keep paragraphs short, which isn't always easy to do; I won't add all of the restaurants/retail projects, unless they are part of a larger project, could attract visitors, or are significant/noteworthy (famous interior architect, something fun and unusual, a noteworthy building, etc.); Off-subject material is posted with the construction updates and clearly labeled and easy to skip-over, if someone doesn't care. I called the thread a "Guide" and this is because I try to educate/show people a city not everyone knows about. It is the all-in-one thread on the city. I try to limit Off-Subject to five images, but sometimes it's a little more or less. I think these threads work better when there are several people sharing updates and not just one person doing it all, but some of us don't have that option. I would recommend doing it your way and trying to be unique. There is no one correct way to do these threads. Overwhelming, with too many photographs, is my biggest problem and I could work on that. Others also do this, creating threads that take all day/night to read and can lead to skimming for those of us without a large amount of time to look through it all. Yes, I do it too and will do this roughly a week from now, in the next update. Like forum member llamaorama, above, I also enjoy photographs.
Again, please continue updating this. People are looking at it, including me. With a young family and job and home ownership, etc., I don't always have time to tell everyone I enjoy their hard work on these threads and I know it's hard work. It's so hard I've wanted to quit for the past five years, but always allow someone to talk me out-of-it. Be supportive of those investing the time and effort, which is very true of the threads with only one person doing most of the work.