Rob Long · November 3, 2010 at 6:58am

Tonight -- or last night, depending on when you see this -- we tried a little experiment. We live-blogged, with everyone who wanted, the midterm elections.

From my perspective, it was a great success. But what do you think? Should we do more of them? Any adjustments you'd like us to make?

Comments:


Melanie Graham

All I can say is... it was SO much fun. Especially for a lazy lazy person like me who doesn't contribute nearly enough to this site. Thanks Rob and all who put it together.

Whiskey Sam
Joined
Jul '10
Whiskey Sam

Would liked to have done more than drop in a few times, but what I saw looked like it went well. Definitely something you should do more of!

Jules
Joined
May '10
Anang

Fell deeds awake! spear shall be shaken, shields shall be splintered, a sword-day, a red day, & the sun rises!

EJHill
Joined
May '10
EJHill

It was dizzying at times. Comments are added very quickly. Maybe a Ricochet 2 room. The Twitter feeds add little. But, all in all, a good first one out of the gate.

Pseudodionysius
Joined
Sep '10
Pseudodionysius

I had a blast. I will pay for it in a few hours when work starts, but hey who cares. It only means my family will be out on the street.

Pseudodionysius
Joined
Sep '10
Pseudodionysius

Will be hysterical to meet you all in person some day.

Pseudodionysius
Joined
Sep '10
Pseudodionysius

Oh, ya, and definitely do more often, but on a weekend would be best of all. I really enjoyed it. Agree with EJ Hill on Twitter feeds.

Cas Balicki
Joined
Jun '10
Cas Balicki

I had fun following as best I could. The posts came up very fast, but half the fun was trying to keep up. It was like being at a cocktail party with dozens of guests speaking at the same time, and me trying to keep up with all the conversations. Of course, at a cocktail party you're going to miss a lot, especially when you're checking out the decolletage. So my vote is to keep it fast and furious. But if you could just add a soupcon of the aforementioned decolletage and bar service, I think we have a real winner.

Edited on November 3, 2010 at 8:24am
Mark Lewis
Joined
Jun '10
Mark Lewis

The best idea I heard was that we could have a chat during the live podcast, which would be not only fun, but great energy for podcast spreading...


Joined
Oct '10
Grant Casteel

I agree with EJHill; the comments come too fast. Assuming Ricochet continues to grow, multiple chat rooms will be a must. Perhaps you could advertise the list of contributors currently signed in to each room.

Ursula Hennessey

I loved it. And Rob? I hope you knew I was only kidding with my mock-horror at your (mild) Barney Frank joke. I was so thrilled and entertained by the whole process, which did move at lightning speed, that I got a bit silly at times. I was dying to do a quick poll asking about Mounds and Almond Joy, but I thought the Powers That Be might frown upon that. Anyway, I do think it was a hit. I'd love to be part of more.

Michael Tee
Joined
Jul '10
Michael Tee

The comments coming so fast kept me sober...sober-ish.

I had a <Tony the Tiger>great</Tony the Tiger> time.

More please.

The Other Diane
Joined
May '10
Diane

I signed on from about 8 to 11pm Eastern time so I got a good sense of it. Loved it!! Felt privileged to be in the room with so many great minds. Was supervising my 15 y.o.'s homework as we chatted about the races we were watching on TV so I couldn't focus on the feed enough to make comments, but was content to just read others' updates. Agree that the twitter feed was just extra noise we didn't need.

Sometimes the conversation went so fast that I had to scroll up to see an original comment, but it was easy to do and wouldn't recommend any changes to the chat room format. As Ricochet grows a "B" chat room could be opened, and it would help if a link to chat FAQ's was always visible on the screen, and if the heavy hitters could let us know what other sites they're monitoring so we could open those windows too. Sometimes links were posted but once they'd disappeared off the screen new people who came in the room wouldn't know they'd been recommended. Wonderful evening, Rob! Thanks for inviting us!

Pilgrim
Joined
Jun '10
Pilgrim

Great - fast and furious fun. Agree on the tweeter feeds. The interweb was sluggish (I have cable broadband). Does anybody know what "moderated slots" were and what did the little dialog ballon beside a member's comment indicate? Let's do it again for the State of the Union speech

Edited on November 3, 2010 at 12:39pm
ConcernedCanadien
Joined
Sep '10
ConcernedCanadien

It was a success. I greatly enjoyed it.

Like others, I thought the Twitter feeds were extra because they weren't part of the dialogue. They were just extra information. Good information, but it was one way

If I had my druthers, there would have been a second window open just for the twitter feeds. And maybe there could have been others that were targeted ahead of time.

Scrolling backwards through the comments to see what you missed was h3ll on my laptop and sometimes it just froze. Not sure if that was just me or the site.

cdor
Joined
Jun '10
cdor

I watched but couldn't participate. It was fun even just to watch. I am a one armed typist while recovering from rotator cuff surgery so the pace was a bit dizzying for me. Cas's description of a chatty cocktail party was pretty darn good. The level of guests was quite a bit higher than many parties that I attend.

To the meat of the night, we did great in the House and the Governors. The last minute expectations were, as I feared, a bit too high. The Senate wasn't to be. Hopefully 2012 will be the tolling bell.

Pilgrim
Joined
Jun '10
Pilgrim

ConcernedCanadien: It.

Scrolling backwards through the comments to see what you missed was h3ll on my laptop and sometimes it just froze. Not sure if that was just me or the site. · Nov 3 at 4:40am

Yes, that's what I mean by sluggish in my comment. Too slow to go back and try to find the antecedent of what looked to be a good quip or response, and then get back to current feed without being buried.

Frozen Chosen
Joined
Aug '10
Frozen Chosen

Had a blast on the election chat. Cool technology although the limit of 25 real-time contributors was a bit of a drag. I know Yeti did the best he could.

Seemed like about half the posts were about alcohol; tedious for us non-drinkers. Let's do it again real soon.

Pseudodionysius
Joined
Sep '10
Pseudodionysius

Frozen Chosen: Had a blast on the election chat. Cool technology although the limit of 25 real-time contributors was a bit of a drag. I know Yeti did the best he could.

Seemed like about half the posts were about alcohol; tedious for us non-drinkers. Let's do it again real soon. · Nov 3 at 4:59am

Understood, but it was the quickest way I knew to get a non political chatter going while the political chatter was going if you know what I mean. That, and I got to pick on Bourbon drinkers, which is always fun.

Pseudodionysius
Joined
Sep '10
Pseudodionysius

Only technical glitch from my end (fast internet, fast computer, firefox browser) was right at the end my serious goodbyes got squelched (an old cb radio term) and instead of actual thanks I've immortalized Rocky's plaintive wail of Adrianne. Thank goodness I don't use my real name.

Edited on November 19, 2010 at 1:47pm

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