Why is Twitter a good place to poll opinions but not the forum nor Reddit?

[heliostellar]

Just something that kind of irked me about the whole Twitter vote for fabricate being unlocked later in diplo tech poll. I'm glad there was asking for community feedback. Less thrilled by the fact that we have constantly heard in the past how Reddit and the forums don't amount to enough users to justify basing game design decisions off of their popular opinions. Why is Twitter different? I understand this particular poll was post across all three communities, but why would the poll be hosted on Twitter rather than the forums? Logic dictates to me that if someone is following Johan on Twitter or gets the game updates via Reddit, it's probably likely that they also have a paradox plaza account. If not, it's a lot more intuitive to register your account here than it is to make a Twitter or Reddit account for the sake of a single poll.

Not intending to bash or anything and I don't want the take away to be "don't interact with the community". Just kind of boggles my mind on the logic behind this since I'd imagine for EU4 players you probably would get the most accurate results by doing it on these forums, where the overlap between the three is probably the greatest. And for something as radical of a change as was proposed, seems like you'd want a more representative poll. This forum from my experience is where most of your committed fans/players are.

Well, in the CK2 forum, they didn't get the response they wanted on the DD on the forum about completely ahistoric HOI-style global coalitions being added to CK2.

Maybe they're trying to go to other outlets to game the results and still appear democratic?

 

[heliostellar]

Paradox has claimed in the past that they don't consider feedback from the forums nor reddit to be representative of the community. Yet by making the poll on twitter it shows that they consider twitter to be representative of the community.

See the problem and the reason for the question now?

They've also said that Steam reviews are also not representative. I think whatever is "representative" to them is whatever gives them the answer they already want.

 

[justin6477]

They've also said that Steam reviews are also not representative.

Given that Steam is required to {legally} obtain EUIV, even if it can be launched independently, you'd think Steam would be considered the most representative community platform. It even has a verification system to show whether someone (officially) owns the game or not. Which brings me to another point, the Steam forums. Now, I don't really care for them, but if Paradox wanted to be as accessible as possible, you think they'd make more use of them. Instead, almost all official posts are little more than footnotes and links back to these official forums.

 

[Reverend Belial]

They've also said that Steam reviews are also not representative. I think whatever is "representative" to them is whatever gives them the answer they already want.

Yeah, in the time I've been on this forum it's been very clear that the only feedback that actually matters to them is the kind that comes from their own development team.


But yeah if you're going to take a player opinion poll you do it on your official forums, not the social media equivalent of the co-worker who never shuts up.

 

[Wagonlitz]

On Twitter Johan has 6,000 followers. I'll spare you the marketing degree and just tell you outright that it's a legitimate route and doesn't 'disrespect' anyone.

I am pretty sure there are more than 6000 EU4 owners who regularly visit the forums.

I also have no desire to share my personal information with a third party in order to interact with the devs.

You could always use a fake name. But I completely understand not wanting to make an account for a single poll.

I do not, nor will I ever likely have a Twitter account. However as a person who's given a good $400 to Paradox and is pretty active on the forums, I'd like to be able to participate in polls.

I might be wrong, but I would guess that the average amount of money people have used is higher on the forums than on twitter.

They put the poll up on Twitter because they wanted to get a wider sample then the 9% of the total player base that's on the forum.

Have we any knowledge about twitter making up more than 9% of the playerbase? I would be skeptical about that.

They've also said that Steam reviews are also not representative. I think whatever is "representative" to them is whatever gives them the answer they already want.

Seriously? That is the only place you can be certain to get to every player.

 

[Nazarow]

Yup, I regularly check the forums but don't have twitter, and suspect I never will.

 

[generalolaf]

I have a Twitter and use it regularly, and I voted on the poll. But why not use the launcher for this kind of thing? There have been plenty of announcements on it, so it's probably not a huge leap to put a poll there. And it would catch a representative sample of players - i.e. people who look at the launcher.

 

[Nikolaz72]

I have a Twitter and use it regularly, and I voted on the poll. But why not use the launcher for this kind of thing? There have been plenty of announcements on it, so it's probably not a huge leap to put a poll there. And it would catch a representative sample of players - i.e. people who look at the launcher.

generalolaf makes a good point, we have a launcher with game news and stuff on it. what better way to reach players than have the information that they can vote on stuff in the game in the launcher for said game.

 

[ABookshelf]

Twitters not a good place for a poll but neither are this forum or reddit. Johan said in another topic that only ~5% of EU players have even been to the forum, nevermind how many of those 5% even check the forums with any regularity. If you're going to conduct a poll, you should put integrate it with the launcher where all players have a chance to see it.

 

[Xinkc]

Actually I believe in this case hipsters are the ones not using Twitter

Loudly proclaiming that you'll never have a twitter account because Twitter is pointless and anyone who uses it for any reason is an idiot, is exactly what a hipster does. Making a habit of loudly proclaiming your dislike of something most people have some level of involvement in the minute anyone brings it up, is total hipsterism.

They put the poll up on Twitter because they wanted to get a wider sample then the 9% of the total player base that's on the forum.

In my experience hipsters generally identified by not liking mainstream things because they're mainstream.

However, there are legitimate reasons for not liking Twitter and not wanting to interact with it. Things like how inane it is and how the character limit is not generally conducive to proper communication. Also, hash tags are horrendous.

 

[Johan]

The forum thread had about 100 people commenting about it.. 20% of the replies was by the 5 people who had the most replies. Pageviews on a forumthread is not related to have many viewed it, as they add up everytime anyone reads 1 page, and if you participate like some did, you accumulate alot of views..

We can disregard the 36,000 people reached by my poll, as most were not interested it.. But 3493 votes is rather huge compared to an average forum poll..

 

[Wagonlitz]

The forum thread had about 100 people commenting about it.. 20% of the replies was by the 5 people who had the most replies. Pageviews on a forumthread is not related to have many viewed it, as they add up everytime anyone reads 1 page, and if you participate like some did, you accumulate alot of views..

We can disregard the 36,000 people reached by my poll, as most were not interested it.. But 3493 votes is rather huge compared to an average forum poll..

Interesting that a forum poll attracts less than 3500 replies (does that also apply for an actual poll and not just a thread?). Have you guys considered doing a poll through the launcher another time as somebody proposed?

 

[Nikolaz72]

Not necessarily voting, advertising it over the launcher would be good. Even with a link to twitter if necessary.

 

[zorkman]

The forum thread had about 100 people commenting about it.. 20% of the replies was by the 5 people who had the most replies. Pageviews on a forumthread is not related to have many viewed it, as they add up everytime anyone reads 1 page, and if you participate like some did, you accumulate alot of views..

We can disregard the 36,000 people reached by my poll, as most were not interested it.. But 3493 votes is rather huge compared to an average forum poll..

How many of these people regularly play the game? People have a tendency to vote on things, even if it is not something they have a real interest in.

 

[Tavior]

The forum thread had about 100 people commenting about it.. 20% of the replies was by the 5 people who had the most replies. Pageviews on a forumthread is not related to have many viewed it, as they add up everytime anyone reads 1 page, and if you participate like some did, you accumulate alot of views..

We can disregard the 36,000 people reached by my poll, as most were not interested it.. But 3493 votes is rather huge compared to an average forum poll..

The problem isn't representation numbers or percent of participation.

What if I don't want to use tweeter but still want to vote? You miss some voter that way which indirectly and unintended create a bias associated with the platform of where the vote happens. Every time you do another poll the same thing happens.

The same can be said of paradox forum to a greater extend.

Just for YOUR reference I have 2400 hours under my belt spend on EU4 and spend like all of 30 second on tweet for a contest and quit right afterward.

I have a good reason to be upset that my vote couldn't be counted nevermind the bias associated with requirement of own a tweet account.

So I will re-iterated what I said earlier. Find a better venue for voting.

 

[Frogbait]

The forum thread had about 100 people commenting about it.. 20% of the replies was by the 5 people who had the most replies. Pageviews on a forumthread is not related to have many viewed it, as they add up everytime anyone reads 1 page, and if you participate like some did, you accumulate alot of views..

We can disregard the 36,000 people reached by my poll, as most were not interested it.. But 3493 votes is rather huge compared to an average forum poll..

Thanks for the response Johan.

What about making a Twitter post linking back to a thread on the forums for voting purposes and sample how that does in relation to a Twitter only vote? Could do the same with Reddit.

Combine that above with what has been mentioned here by putting it in the launcher. Will probably have the highest turn out and as a plus all voting will be done in a test environment you control.

 

[atwix]

do what most websites do: add a popup survey/poll to the launcher when starting the game.

And an option to ban these popups, or to deny one time, etc.

Maybe THEN people will vote who actually play the game. Because on twitter, how can you be sure?

 

[MiniaAr]

I wanted to vote on the polls, but I don't want to get a twitter account. Thus, my opinion has been disgarded (I wanted those claim fabrication at tech 16!).

I really like the suggestion of polls using the Launcher, you'll get the opinion of actual players this way.

 

[heliostellar]

Seriously? That is the only place you can be certain to get to every player.

It's been reviewed by 216 people total, but ~13,000 people play CK2 every day, so you can't really say it's the majority opinion. Player numbers have remained higher post Conclave than before it, so you could say the true silent majority don't post on the forum OR on steam reviews.

^^No response to my question about how many of those players are playing a rolled back patch rather than the abortion that is the current one, but still... his words.
NOTE: This is in reference to CK2 and NOT EU4.

 

[generalolaf]

The forum thread had about 100 people commenting about it.. 20% of the replies was by the 5 people who had the most replies. Pageviews on a forumthread is not related to have many viewed it, as they add up everytime anyone reads 1 page, and if you participate like some did, you accumulate alot of views..

We can disregard the 36,000 people reached by my poll, as most were not interested it.. But 3493 votes is rather huge compared to an average forum poll..

Thoughts on using the launcher to run polls like this @Johan? With a disclaimer that results won't necessarily be implemented, I can see it working really well.