Agreed. I run the victims of psychopaths group and we had over 1000 members and were a very active group with posts usually every single day and a lot of responses. Since the switchover, there's been virtually no activity at all.

The only thing i can this is what we make it!

I don't hold out much hope for ds. I've had to curtail my activity here by 70%. Too bad, even w/all it's issues before the switch, it was a helluva lot better and waaaaay easier to use than it is now.

Hate to say it but in the interest of the well-being of those who are in crisis, it seems like we/DS should make contact with external groups who refer people to DS......And tell them to refer to other websites.

It's been over 6 months and frankly I don't hold hope for improvement at DS.

This is such a simple website to design.....By professional web designers. I hate to be critical, but......

Sad to say, I agree! When feeling down support of friends is needed but also a site needs the design and ease of use plays an important part, too. The world is depressing enough so a website should be cheerful and an inviting place for someone to feel good at, a place you want to come back to. That's the way DS use to be.

A large numbers of the boards are now dead. They were perhaps going downhill before as DS was affected by the rise of Facebook.

I have asked DS what their plan is and other than the technical fixes and enhancements that are usually posted here before we are told they have declined to comment. I had asked them about the stats I had seen and they say they don't recognise them. However they say they cannot share what they have. Nor have they confirmed whether their stats are in contradiction to the ones I've seen or merely a variation from the theme.

This is what I've seen. You don't need to be a student of such things to get the gist. Figures for December are likely to be out in a few days. I would expect an upturn over November as Christmas is a busy time on many of the boards.

http://www.easycounter.com/report/dailystrength.org

apart from the graphs it's worth looking at what countries the traffic comes from. Note also there is a sizable chunk missing from the percentages - perhaps that is coming out of China.

I've been posting here since '08.

Balancing out the three
things that are an improvement
in my experience of the site are
twenty-five things (no exaggeration)
that took a hit to either a small
or a major degree.

I'm happy D.S. is still here
but it's a shadow of what
it used to be. The "upgrade"
may have been fun for
the people playing designer
but as a means of support
to those in need. . . . . . . . .

it was a dark, dark day.

And since many of
us here have expressed
our thoughts and requests
to the people running D.S.
and virtually nothing has
changed, it doesn't seem
like what we share with
them is of much interest.

To their credit, when I've
reported abuse of the site,
they've responded by
deleting the thread.
Afterward they send a
request to hear how
I felt about the service
they provided.

That's where their
customer service
begins and ends.

Ah well.

I'm considering setting
up a support group for
victims and survivors
of abuse on Facebook
(which I don't currently
use but may soon).

That's where I sit on
the issue of D.S.'s
so-called upgrade.

Happy New Year
to the members
still here. Hope
2017 brings you
both satisfaction
and JOY.

I want to Thank you for all your replies.

AgentSmith I want to personally thank you for all the time and effort you put into your group I know how much work that has been for you to invest all that time and energy into helping others and how dissapointing it must be to see it all fall apart now.

Suchaslife, You make a good point Thank you.

MyTrue Colors, I totally understand why you can nolonger spend as much time here as you did before I have heard that alot from other members as well. But Thank you for still hanging in there. I am sure there is still alot of people here who need your support.

Californialynn, I totally agree with you we no longer deserve these referrals from these crisis hotlines. Were not hepling these people like we once were and that is a scary thought as to what is happening to them after they leave here. These organizations should be contacted Thank you for your comment. And yes the design of this new website is terrible. I don't know what they were thinking...

CountryGal22, again I totally agree with you. When you logged into the old DS website you truly felt like you had come "Home" it was a cheerful and inviting place to come back to and it felt like it was always there for you when you needed to be there. Very important point Thank you

Regarding Facebook, I know it's very popular (believe it or not I am not on Facebook lol) but so many hacks there, so much ridiculing and belittling people, and posting truthful information can be taken down if Facebook don't agree (these are the things I hear/read from others) so I won't do Facebook but a few ladies and myself stay in contact on palacechat. If you decide to check out PalaceChat make sure to check out the rules of each palace before you chat there as each has their own rules and some of them are VERY adult LOL Where I chat at is very G rated.
As for DS I keep thinking what a wonderful surprise it would be if I logged on and it was the old DS returned. Guess that won't happen.

acuriousfish, I too felt DS took a hit with the rise of Facebook and other social media sites before the switch over to the new website. But now we seem totally doomed and beyond repair. Thank you for confonting them on this and letting us know how they are responding to all of this. Which in my opinion is very negative. Since it appears they don't like this level of communication with their members. And Thank you for the link as well

h.e.a.l. Yes I am happy that DS is still hear. For myself I really don't know where to go if DS folds up completely. But yes it has become a very dark day here. And DS doesn't seem to have a vested interest in their members feedback. I believe you will have much success on Facebook should you decide to open your group there Thank you

CountryGal22, I'm not on facebook either. True I did make an account many years ago. But I never took the time to really set it up well and then I never used it. I don't even know if I would still be able to log in at this point. And I hear Facebook has alot of drama on it and can be very Triggering for some people so I know it's not for me. Thank you for the information on palacechat I will keep it in mind. And yes it would be like a dream come true if DS would decide one day to scrap this new site and suprise us with the old site again! That would be really cool! But I think it is only a dream :(

I would never share on FB the way I share on DS because I don't trust their privacy policies - after all, their business is data, not support. Maybe I'm deluded about DS but I feel more private here. It is a shame that DS isn't what it used to be, but for myself and the groups I belong to, I still find it to be vital.

donnawanda, Very valid comment I'm glad to here you feel safe on DS. It is very encouraging to hear that DS still has value to many of it's members. Thank you

Well, while I'm not a fan of the DS changes at all, I'm not going anywhere. I've been here since 2007 and continue to participate, post regularly on my boards and try to respond to everyone who is looking for support. I can say I've not had the amount of glitches some others report regularly and so I do understand if the site is difficult to use, it's hard to want to stay here.

I've been accused of being pollyannish because I try not to commiserate on how awful it all is, and that's fine, I'll take that if that makes others feel better. But it's not really for me a matter of being in denial about DS. Quite the opposite. It's about being realistic. In my humble opinion, this is as good as it's going to get with DS. I choose to accept that, since to do otherwise would be kind of an awful state of mind to be in day in and day out. And if I accept it, I can then only be pleasantly surprised if it improves. It's disappointing that these changes have forced some people to leave or use the site less. I do not count on DS being moved by that however. That's part of being a realist as well. I know it feels personal, because we wear our hearts on our sleeves here, we've built relationships, we've said things here we'd never be able to say anywhere else. But as soon as you take DS' decisions personally, you will forever feel hurt and angry.

So I tend to think if it's truly not working for people, finding an alternative, like FB or some other means, is a good idea, for peace of mind, to not feel so stressed and burdened. Because I do agree that some people are likely falling through the cracks here if they don't have the wherewithal or the means to adapt or manage the new site.

I doubt this is about wherewithal. I think its more about 1. not being able to easily maneuver the site any more. This really does cause many of us physical pain. And whether you believe it or not, it causes a much HIGHER level of UNNECESSARY repetitive motion for everyone. It's been medically known for decades that using computers and laptops caused this and much focus has been placed on proper ergonomic use of these two devices. And now with the addition of cell phones and tablets, the medical community has already realized the physical damage using these additional devices has caused and is causing and will continue to cause. They have already named one issue, "text neck." Simply using these devices causes issues with the neck, head, shoulders, back, arms, hands and/or fingers.

Then there is the added mental frustration which I realize is up to each one of us as to how we choose to see what's happened and not happened in terms of the design and execution of this site.

Finally there is the emotional effect. It is much more difficult to connect with each other (mostly due to the site not consistently working properly AND, mostly the navigation issues (excessive scrolling, swiping, etc. AND not being able to find groups, etc.) In addition, there is the loss of friends and serious drop in activity within the groups. Hell, we can't even know when someone has commented on a friend's journal. That doesn't show up ANYWHERE. So we have to go to the journal and keep checking if we want to follow that conversation. And that's something many of us used to do.

Then there's the part that we don't talk about here. I'll use the analogy of giving a dog a bone. You give a dog a bone and it becomes the dog's. The dog doesn't expect, nor will it let anyone take that bone away. DS gave us a great bone and then it yanked it out from under us. Of course people are upset, just like the dog would get upset. (Sorry, I don't mean to compare us to dogs, but it just seems like a good analogy.)

So many of us depended on this site for support. In many cases, the is the ONLY support some members have access to!!!

I've been here since 07 and imho, its downright cruel and inhuman to take a site for peer to peer support and f' it up to the point its barely usable.