Less people reading CJs?

[Retep Molinari 68]

At first, I though I'd bored my audience to tears--less and less people were viewing and commenting on my CJs!

But now, looking at others in the new CJ section, it seems that this is common. I think it was normal to get around 100 views whenever a new post would go up, but that seems down to like 30 now.

If you're not checking them out, you should because you're missing some good stuff over there. And I'm not even talking about my work, but there are really cool cities and a lot to learn!

[kellydale2003 2,275]

I barely read CJs because they're not really that interesting - basically anyone could put a few photos down and write.

Nothing really interesting these days, My favs are the real life California, Edmonton, and Hong Kong CJ.

There was another one with photoshopped disasters - those are basically the only ones I pay attention too.

[(x+x 20]

yeah , most CJs are boring, but some of thjem deserve to be viewed, and commented, almost every budy think that my cities are awesom, and very cool, but, now, my cjs are barely viewed for 30 time, i think it's maybe because people are busy these times, it's not summer holiday now, maybe the ST will come back to life again in the next coming holidays, i hope so,

[TekindusT 3,809]

I think that there are less people reading CJs because the greatest ones haven't been updated in a long time. Let's take the top ten of the best rated CJs in the City Journals Section:

Republic of Alsdorf, updated 20th of October. OK.

Grand Duchy of Genevra, last updated 8th of May but still getting comments.

Soviet Black Sea Union, last updated 8th of August and still getting comments.

The Atlantopian Kingdom, last updated 9th of October.

Journey Through Paengia, last updated 26th of October. OK

Natural Growth, last updated 2nd of November. OK

United Islands of Territories, last updated 31st of October. OK.

Jargeah, last updated 25th of October, but the penultimate entry was written in 21st of September . OK

Oakwood, California, last updated 4th of September.

I really know that this CJs above need a lot of time for having upstanding quality entries (city building, making custom content, lotting, perfectioning, taking the pics, photoshopping, etc.), but these entries are the ones that attract more viewers. If there's quality, there are viewers and commentors; but quality needs time.

[sumwonyuno 42]

I've noticed the drop off of views and comments as well. I think it may have to do with the school year schedule. A lot of people in their city journals (including myself) reference at one time or another about school. So, I'm guessing when school's out sometime mid-December, there'll be at least an upshot in the number of views and comments.

I think if we're not getting as much views/comments as we'd like, we need to ask why we're not viewing/commenting other peoples' city journals. I'm not saying to comment everyone else's to just get a comment back. Whenever I look at a city journal and I have criticisms about it, I ask myself if my city journal has the same faults.

Retep Molinari and (x+x

[Retep Molinari 68]

Good points everyone! I feel so old, not being in school and all.

[Larks2242 251]

Originally posted by: (x+x²²/x

yeah , most CJs are boring, but some of thjem deserve to be viewed, and commented quote>

I don't agree, i think everyone who puts effort into a CJ  is worth a view, not everyone has time to see all the CJ's with school, work ect. and not everyone comments on them. I don't belive it is because they are "boring".

[sklis 10]

You guys are missing out on a lot of great older classics that are benchmarks of the CJ section (Nexis of Genesis, for example). Greatest does not always mean that they have to be continuously updated to the present day. It does not mean that they have to have the most resent mods or Nam or other gimics to be the greatest. Those mentioned above are fairly new and naturally will be updated because they are not finished. Not every CJ has to be updated until the moon turns to green cheese.

I may be wrong, but If you check in the forums somewhere, there is a list of All CJs made and their status etc. up to a few years ago. Check them out. You may be surprised at what you find.

[Craig-Abcvs 1,595]

Well for the first time ever last month my two active CJs...  one here and the other at Simpeg...  blew my 10 GB Photobucket bandwidth allowance out of the water...   so I have just upgraded to Photo Bucket Pro...

So... someone must be looking.

...and for those that object to the concept of pay for stuff...   well I figure that I have more than got my fair share of free bandwidth out of Photobucket over the last couple of years...  and don't mind flicking them $25 to get unlimited bandwidth and more storage than I will ever use now.

[Legosim 14]

I rarely read CJ's mostly because im too busy working on my citys and I dont want to look at how awesome your cities are and makes mine look like a urban sprawl in los angeles

[Retep Molinari 68]

Originally posted by: Legosim

I rarely read CJ's mostly because im too busy working on my citys and I dont want to look at how awesome your cities are and makes mine look like a urban sprawl in los angelesquote>

Ouch.

[N106 10]

I have a CJ... it gets usually 2-4 comments per update, which is a lot better than in the past. It's kinda hard to believe comments are dropping off... until I remembered that my CJ was started after school started!

[Andeyhollawho 0]

How about some suggestions on good CJ's?  I wouldn't mind reading through some but it seems like there aren't many updates or a lot of them have dead pics and such. 

[Retep Molinari 68]

Originally posted by: Andeyhollawho

How about some suggestions on good CJ's?  I wouldn't mind reading through some but it seems like there aren't many updates or a lot of them have dead pics and such. quote>

Using that, mine count! :-p

[zahrul3 471]

Rather, just try to write your CJs in the old CJ Forums. Most people like to comment and read there, as it is faster, easier and less annoying(the new CJ section occasionally have unresponsible scripts that makes your browser(Firefox) freeze for a certain amount of time, then Firefox tells you to stop the script.). Anyways, most 'great' CJs were produced in the forums section, then re-produced in the CJ only section. That's why your regions don't have lot of commenters.

Also, great CJs don't have to be fancy, all what they need is your CJ lasting for a long time.

[tepodon 29]

I think the new format is to blame. I think I tend to view a lot more CJ's now, but I dont comment as much. Its just so much easier to flip through all the different sections now, and so much easier to just view, and then forget about it. But sometimes i see a CJ and I think "wow thats a cool city" or "Thats pretty cool editing." Its also a great place to share ideas on city building. In that sense I dont think the CJ is dead or anything.

[3dpuzzlemaster 20]

I think that it is people who are busy with school and their job. If people hate the maxis buildings, they should look into my future mod (here is the Lot Thread, maybe it would make your cj's a bit more interesting)

P.S. To Retep Molinari: Sorry that I missed those updates, I was busy with my mod that I am making.

[Retep Molinari 68]

Originally posted by: 3dpuzzlemaster

I think that it is people who are busy with school and their job. If people hate the maxis buildings, they should look into my future mod (here is the Lot Thread, maybe it would make your cj's a bit more interesting)

P.S. To Retep Molinari: Sorry that I missed those updates, I was busy with my mod that I am making.

quote>

Yeah, I hate you Catch up, darn it!

[stormlover 16]

City Journals.....sigh.

1.) Not enough documentation (mods used, etc.)

2.) Too little info on early stage development.

Recommendation: Split the category into sub-categories, i.e. (a)  towns, (b)  cities, © all stages. Then go back to #1.

Tim in Cape Fear, NC

[PlyPlay665 0]

If you ask me, all games are loosing their viewers. I dunno if it's just me, but the whole Sims community as a whole has kinda slowed down tremendously. I still read Cj's though, when I get the chance anyways.

[ecoba 28]

I personally don't like the new CJ section here at Simtropolis.

I am not on ST much anymore, I prefer forums, but they're somwhat slow too...

So, that's me...

[Hawkeye9 0]

Id say the main reason comments are in a slump is due to school. I started school a couple months ago and have had little to no chances to check out ST or even play the game. Hopefully i can get back into SC4 and return to updating my journal and commenting on others!

[SimHoTToDDy 2,938]

Originally posted by: stormlover

City Journals.....sigh.

1.) Not enough documentation (mods used, etc.)

2.) Too little info on early stage development.

Recommendation: Split the category into sub-categories, i.e. (a)  towns, (b)  cities, © all stages. Then go back to #1.

quote>

Generally you can learn very quickly what the creator used with a very simple tool, a question! I'm probably on the high end of plugins folder size, so I don't have time to list each and evey one of my 5GB of plugins As for point 2, I'm not exactly sure how or why you would split it up, I mean, its nothing the title or description could not communicate better.

I actually like the new CJ section much more since it is much easier to navigate and doesn't have the same slow speeds a forum page with 100 images on it would. I love being able to rate things (despite the occasional abuse) because it helps filter out the things I would rather spend my time looking at. Things will pick up around the holidays when people have more time, but it doesn't mean that CJers should stop updating until then. If anything, views should be going up, we just passed 350k members (remember 300k was not too long ago?) and as those members slowly become more active... well you get the idea.

Speaking of which, I should probably go work on my CJ,

-Todd

[Retep Molinari 68]

@ SimHoTToDDy: Yeah, get back to work. I wanna see an update!

[jigsaw 227]

i think some of the CJ's are getting out of hand.

most are more about the story than about the art of building the city itself. i personally prefer more region shots, and transit maps instead of a closeup of a house.

[Mikeaut1 261]

I have noticed the drop off in comments and views and I've been around since 2004. I've seen really good journals like Sculpting Columbia River, Digby, Mandursuro to name a few. And the amount of comments and views have been very down. This is one of the main reasons why I kind of hold off on updating my city journal - if people aren't going to view it and/or comment it, then who are you showcasing your stuff to? I know there could be many lurkers out there and I've seen journals that have had lurkers > comments win Trixies. I don't think the lack of views and comments  has a lot to do with the schoolyear, because if that were the case, overall attendance on ST would be low. However it's pretty normal. So I think its just a lack of interest in CJs now.  

[GreekMan 246]

well where do I begin. this has been one my mind for a while

1. Yes you can say school is somewhat to blame. I am busy with school but I do come here every few nights. School does somewhat come into the mix.

2. There are WAY TO MANY CJs out. Back in the old days there weren't a lot of cjs so you had higher viewership a few years ago. If you go to the wayback machine you will se what i am talking about. you could have one cj with 200 comments and like 10,000 views. now you have 100 comments and 600 views or something like that.  I think that people are randomly posting cjs and quality had dropped a lot. I am not trying to bash anyone but this is the fact.

3. Years ago you had quality city journalists who made great cjs. you had people who took a lot of time to build these cities.Now more people are creating cjs that was unfortunatly subpar. once again i am sorry i am saying this but it is a fact. i will not mention any names because there are way to many. please don't misunderstand me in anyway. I believe that everyone should create a Cj but i want to see something realistic. Once in a while you have a good cj. for me there are onle 5 or so that I track out of the hundreds of cjs.

If any modd thinks this is flamming or whatever, i am sorry but i had to get this off my chest....

EDIT: cjs on my list are and still are the greatest out there. those cjs i love and it's sad that some of those people have left st....

[newyorkrunaway1 110]

i take it as a compliment, im in there... lol

anyways... i think the new cj section has a lot to do with it. less need to comment, you can just flip through without really thinking about it.

i think the new cj section isnt that good. i prefer the forum cj section, but update the new cj section because people tend to look at one section or the other.

[WillG_75 19]

I agree with a lot of people here, just not as much interesting content right now. I am partial to realistic and replication CJ's, and there aren't as many of those as there used to be. I remember when there was Edmonton, Omaha, LA, San Fran, NYC, Chicago, etc, but now I think the only recreation CJ's are the SFBA and mine.

[Jillybean86 38]

Have no fear, CJ section, Jill is back!

Just kidding though. I have to agree with GreekMan and sumwonyuno here. It takes a lot of work to create a great CJ, and when you spend 10x the time others do making a quality update only to have it bumped off the front page by 20 other CJs that have nothing more than a tiny Maxis-only town that a 3-year-old could make.

The problem with having only Maxis stuff in your city is that anyone with the game can make it. People want to see something unique; something they've never seen before. SC4 and ST by extension has been around for long enough now that it's hard to wow people with something new. A CJ is there to show off your skill, your uniqueness, and (with few exceptions) your custom content.

Id say the main reason comments are in a slump is due to schoolquote>

I have to completely and respectfully disagree. In my time here, the school year has been the busiest time. It's been slow lately in the summer too, and the excuse has always been "it's summer and no one wants to sit inside on the computer". Without turning this into another "ST is dying" thread, I'd say traffic is down in general - at least across the SC4 areas of the site.

I'll finish by saying this: make in a CJ what you'd want to see in a CJ. Literally - "if you build it, they will come".