My B&N: General Feedback [ Edited ]

[Kevin]

Have you set up a My B&N profile?

Let's use this thread to round up general feedback to the new features associated with My B&N, including:

• The new My B&N Profile page (naturally)
• Pen Names and avatars 
• Your Library
• Your Favorites lists and EssentiaLists
• The new expanded Wish Lists
• The new ratings and review tool (click on any product on your My B&N page to see this)
• Privacy settings
• "Share" links and "Flag" links

We'll probably find more to talk about in this thread, and we'll break out specific topics as necessary. In the meantime, we'll be sure that problem reports get into the right hands.

Message Edited by Kevin on 10-07-2008 09:26 AM

[Nelsmom]

Kevin,

I used it last night and found it very easy to navigate but I wish that you had put a Paranormal/Urban Fantasy choice one the genre section for those that want to chose that.

Toni

[Nadine]

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Nelsmom wrote:

Kevin,

I used it last night and found it very easy to navigate but I wish that you had put a Paranormal/Urban Fantasy choice one the genre section for those that want to chose that.

Toni

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Toni, how did you change your icon to an avatar? I put an avatar in my account. Nothing happened. There is nothing I can click in my club settings -- at least that I could find. I clicked on my icon and that took me to the icons. Then I thought maybe I had to set my icon to a blank, which I did. Now I have nothing and no access to icon but I have changed my account to an avatar.

[Melissa_W Moderator]

KInd of a random question, but did the BNBC user profiles roll into the new My B&N?

[Melissa_W Moderator]

Answered my own question - which is no, BTW.  But the drop-down box with the listing of book clubs doesn't have any sort of order, it's just looks random.  Maybe alphabetize or group them a different way?

Otherwise it looks pretty easy to use. 

But the avatars:  do you have any more coming? 

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pedsphleb wrote:
KInd of a random question, but did the BNBC user profiles roll into the new My B&N?

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[Everyman]

Time to nitpick!  On Avatars, you have lots of funny ones, but you really don't have any nice grandfather avatars.  The only older men you have are a pipesmoker who is scowling and looks very unfriendly, not to mention supercilious, a fisherman-looking man who from the ruddiness in his cheeks either suffers from a condition or has had way too much to drink and does not look at all like a man who reads books, a bald guy with a white military mustache and bulging eyes who is hardly a role model for a pleasant reader, and a king.  

How about just a normal nice looking grandfather of the sort who loves reading to his grandchildren?   

[Melissa_W Moderator]

The avatars all look like they fell out of the old "Where is Carmen Sandiego" game!

Side comment: does it take some time for the avatar change to upload?  I changed mine from my stack of books *tear* to the nerdy girl but the BNBC icon still shows my stack of books.

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Everyman wrote:

Time to nitpick!  On Avatars, you have lots of funny ones, but you really don't have any nice grandfather avatars.  The only older men you have are a pipesmoker who is scowling and looks very unfriendly, not to mention supercilious, a fisherman-looking man who from the ruddiness in his cheeks either suffers from a condition or has had way too much to drink and does not look at all like a man who reads books, a bald guy with a white military mustache and bulging eyes who is hardly a role model for a pleasant reader, and a king.  

How about just a normal nice looking grandfather of the sort who loves reading to his grandchildren?   

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[Kevin]

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Nadine wrote:

Toni, how did you change your icon to an avatar? I put an avatar in my account. Nothing happened. There is nothing I can click in my club settings -- at least that I could find. I clicked on my icon and that took me to the icons. Then I thought maybe I had to set my icon to a blank, which I did. Now I have nothing and no access to icon but I have changed my account to an avatar.

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Ahhh, Nadine, you stumbled on one of the little quirks. ... You can change your avatar at any time. But the change won't render out to the Book Clubs until you sign in again. Just hit that logout link on the Book Clubs link up there next to your Private Messenger link, and then sign in again. Your avatar should be updated at that point.

[Everyman]

Kevin -- I am finding that the site runs considerably slower now.  This is particularly noticeable when I click on a new messages number in the thread listing.  The site goes to the first post in that thread, then there is a noticeable delay before it moves down to the first new posting.  This didn't happen with the old site.

Also, when I go almost anywhere it flashes in big letters my name and the "if you're not ____" message before rendering the book club site.

Just mentioning these as little things your designers may want to consider tweaking now that the big job has been done.

[Nadine]

Now that is interesting but probably a good idea. I sign into my "Account" to log on to the Book Clubs. Both Account access and Book Club Access is there. I was thinking this might not be good for people (like at work) to be always logged onto their B&N account if they stayed logged on to the Book Clubs. Then I noticed that my Account log on Expires and I am no longer logged on there but I am still logged on to the Book clubs. Everything seems to work.

[dulcinea3]

I wish you could make the avatars appear larger on the threads.  I need a magnifying glass to see them.

BTW, I was not required to sign in today, and my old account settings are still in effect.  Later, I did log in to my B&N account, but nothing changed.

[musicangirl-x]

I was just wondering. I knew i had switch both my accounts to the same email. But somehow my old account isn't working anymore and i had to make a new one.

Is there anyway, that i could get into my old account.

Thanks.

[Kevin]

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musicangirl wrote:

I was just wondering. I knew i had switch both my accounts to the same email. But somehow my old account isn't working anymore and i had to make a new one.

Is there anyway, that i could get into my old account.

Thanks.

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musicangirl,

Send me a PM with your old User Name and email address. We'll look into what happened with your account. 

[Kevin]

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dulcinea3 wrote:

I wish you could make the avatars appear larger on the threads.  I need a magnifying glass to see them.

BTW, I was not required to sign in today, and my old account settings are still in effect.  Later, I did log in to my B&N account, but nothing changed.

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dulcinea3,

You're right. The avatars look so much better in their original My B&N size. I think we're kind of locked in for the time being, but it's something we want to look at down the road.

When you do change your avatar, you'll have to sign out of the Book Clubs and then sign back in to see it appear with your messages. Give it a try, and let us know if you have trouble.

[Kevin]

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Everyman wrote:

Kevin -- I am finding that the site runs considerably slower now.  This is particularly noticeable when I click on a new messages number in the thread listing.  The site goes to the first post in that thread, then there is a noticeable delay before it moves down to the first new posting.  This didn't happen with the old site.

Also, when I go almost anywhere it flashes in big letters my name and the "if you're not ____" message before rendering the book club site.

Just mentioning these as little things your designers may want to consider tweaking now that the big job has been done.

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Thanks for the notes, Everyman.

Some of the things we're seeing this week are bugs. Others are known issues that just haven't been fully released yet. But we'll clock them all, and report back when we have news.

[Truly]

Please be advised that this is my third post of this "issue" - twice on the tech problems board...but the posts are not appearing.  I thought I would post here with hopes it can be routed to the right people.  Thank You!

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When clicking on this link "search book clubs" you receive the following message.  I am trying to find the book clubs offered for November.

done but with errors on page

FYI only.  Thank you - nice work with the website.  This is also a second post as the first one "vanished"  pardon the duplication!

[Kevin]

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Truly wrote:

Please be advised that this is my third post of this "issue" - twice on the tech problems board...but the posts are not appearing.  I thought I would post here with hopes it can be routed to the right people.  Thank You!

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Kimmarie,

Your message is intriguing. I don't think we've had other complaints about the Book Clubs search, but we'll look to see if we can replicate the issue.

We have not posted the November schedule yet, but should be doing so very soon. We always post it in the Announcements board, so be sure to look for it there (and in the "Announcements" box in the upper right corner of all of our pages). We've allowed subscriptions to the Announcements board so that people can get an email update when we post something there.

And finally, I do see two other messages by you in the Technical Questions thread. Have a look here. If you still can't see them, let us know.

Thanks for reporting these issues.

[Melissa_W Moderator]

So My B&N is pretty fun (some of the "recommendations" are a little strange).

I assume that when My B&N opens to the general public that we can add BN Studio and BN Review content?  Right now there's no "add to favorites" link.

I had trouble getting music from my library added to my favorites.  The "add to favorites" in the pop-up worked for books and DVDs but for music I had to go into the list and edit the list to add favorite music.

There's a wierd thing with the account time-out.  I was creating an EssentiaList and after I had added most of the content the site asked me to log-in again (there was a pop-up that appeared).  I entered my email and password as asked then I was taken out of the EssentiaList page I was working on to a page that told me my session had timed-out.  I was asked to sign-on again - which logged me into my BN account.  When I finally navigated back to my EssentiaList I was working on it was empy and I had to start over.  I think this is something the developers need to look into because something similar happens when I log into the book clubs.

[Melissa_W Moderator]

To elaborate, of the recommended items 4 are SparkNotes literature guides, on is a CliffsNotes, and one is a Babar picture book.

Are the developers looking at a way to modify the recommended products by putting in a "Don't want that" option?  I think it would help tailor products to the user better - the only reason I got Babar is because one of my favorite books is Winnie-the-Pooh but I don't have children so the recommendation isn't suitable for me.

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pedsphleb wrote:

So My B&N is pretty fun (some of the "recommendations" are a little strange).

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Message Edited by pedsphleb on 10-08-2008 12:09 PM

[fordmg]

Kevin,

I have a lot of trouble finding the sign-in with this new format.  I click around until it says sign in to enter.  I think the sign in should be on the first "Book Clubs"  page like before. Can you modify?

MG