On the detail page is there anyway you could make the address fields mandatory???
I have some who do not put their address and phone number on their detail page..but they are still allowed to join the site.
Most website require your address & phone number to complete your sign up process.
Would that be too much to ask for?? As admins we don't have the option to require it.
Maybe other admins might want to chime in on this.
Thanx,

Hi Darlene,

Often, classmates who are viewing the site and considering signing up are wary of giving out a lot of information for any of a variety of reasons including possible strained relationships with fellow classmates, concern about abuse of their contact information (we promise that WE will not misuse the information, but it is possible that someone setting up a site on ClassCreator could use the information they collect in a way that we would not), or just general concern about privacy.

Class sites are obviously far more valuable the more use they get by members of the class, so we try to keep the requirements low in order to encourage as many as possible to join the site you've spent time and money creating. You can always plead, entreat, or otherwise sway classmates to update their contact information after they've signed up and seen how wonderful it is to have this tool available to them.

Since we don't charge classmates anything for the use of the site, and we never use their information for marketing purposes the way many websites do, requiring comprehensive contact information is unnecessary for us and minimizes obstacles to participation for ALL your classmates.

I hope that clarifies things for you!

ERIC: I disagree with you; It would be nice to have, as you are allowed to block anyone to see the information except the admin.

AS Admin individual we are trusted not to give out anyone information. If some one ask for information of another classmate I quote the

PRIVACY NOTICE:

All contact information (address, phone number, e-mail address) entered into this website will be kept confidential. It will not be shared or distributed. Your contact information is private: your street address, e-mail address, and phone number cannot be seen by the classmates unless you grant permission on your Profile. When someone clicks on your name, the only contact information they will see is your city and state and whatever information about yourself you choose to put on your Profile. Unless you explicitly grant your permission, your email address is not visible, although an email can be sent to you using the contact box at the bottom of your Profile page. Note, however, if you send a message to someone through their Profile page, the Classmate will see your email address so that they can respond.

I agree with Darlene; as it would help doing a reunion time.

P.S. Where is your MUG Shot so we know what you look like

By requiring an address, you can more easily determine if you have an actual classmate. We've weeded out a couple of people who gave false addresses, and I know our own website committee folk agree with this! Most of us put lots of personal information on our profiles, and we'd like to think we are only sharing with classmates. We also remind classmates to check their own security settings, explain what each setting means and how to do it, as well as reminding them WHY they should do this.
I'm appreciative of the security that the site provides us and requiring addresses is just another part of that as well.

I was going to reply that I believe there would be classmates who would not register/sign up on the site if it was a requirement. Then I read William and Laurene's replies... now I am on the fence.

So my thinking is... making it an option of the admin not mandatory over all sites.

@William & Laurene...Thanx for agreeing with me!!!
I think we need more site admins to chime in.
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Quote copied from Eric's reply to me.

Class sites are obviously far more valuable the more use they get by members of the class, so we try to keep the requirements low in order to encourage as many as possible to join the site you've spent time and money creating. You can always plead, entreat, or otherwise sway classmates to update their contact information after they've signed up and seen how wonderful it is to have this tool available to them.

My Comment.

It is not CC's job to encourage classmates to join my website. That is the job of the Webmaster & Site admins of my site plus the Reunion Committee. I am in not in the business of pleading or entreating classmates to update their contact information. We already encourage them to do that automatically thru the 2 site emails. Those are sent 6 mos after joining and the other on New Year's Day.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Quote copied from Eric's reply to me.

Since we don't charge classmates anything for the use of the site, and we never use their information for marketing purposes the way many websites do, requiring comprehensive contact information is unnecessary for us and minimizes obstacles to participation for ALL your classmates.

My Comment.

It's true CC does not charge the classmates to join my website and use the information on our individual sites for marketing purposes...but CC does charge a yearly fee to host my website and give me all the tools I need to have a successful site. Requiring comprehensive contact information maybe unnecessary to CC..but it is necessary for us to be able to have this information for helping us to successfully plan our yearly events and at reunion time. And also to help verify if the classmate is legit.
If requiring a classmate to enter his address and phone is an obstacle to participate on my site, then so be it. Shouldn't that be up to the paying subscriber of CC's??
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I hope that clarifies where I am coming from!!!

Interesting and thoughtful comments.

I'll have to come down on the side of the option to make addresses mandatory. The Neighborhood web site I manage requires that a person be a resident now, but it's up to me to verify. If a person does not enter an address, I do not know whether they are a resident without either a visit to their home or a search of the public real estate records (which may take a month to update).

Although I would still verify the occasional person who does not leave a phone number or any profile information, making the address field mandatory at the option of the user would make life easier for me.

Thanks for listening,

I have big concerns about requiring personal information on web-based media. The requesters may all have good intentions, but there are way too many potential weak points where such information can move beyond our control. Address and phone number may sound innocent enough. However, how about requiring blood type? social security number? auto license plate number? etc. You may be starting something that will be hard to stop. As lawyers are want to say - "it's a slippery slope". We have a responsibility to offer a service (through the CC website) that serves the needs of our client group. Our needs must come secondary.

Joe

I believe what we're asking for is for each administrator to have the ability to require certain infomation which identifies prospective members as a member of a class. A high school or college class, a church, a neighborhood, etc...

In my case for example, to become a member of the Homeowner's site you must live in the neighborhood so your address is critical.

I'm not interested in requiring information beyond that. If the required information becomes too ornerous, the administrator will know because the ratio of members to class will be small.

Oh..please.. Asking for blood type, SS #'s and license #'s...now that really is way over the top and ridiculous.
If requiring your address and phone number in order to sign up on a website is so worrisome, why do some websites require it??? Geesh...people will post there address and phone numbers on social networking websites..and think nothing of it. I don't have a problem giving my address and phone numbers to a legit website.
How do you communicate with your classmates on a site if you have no address or phone number when it comes to a reunion, event or other type of function??? You can't always rely on email addresses..people change them all the time and forget to go to all the websites they have joined and change them. I know I have done that many times myself. Also..you must take into consideration the people who don't have internet access and/or are not computer savvy. We have many of those..I put there info in manually...then lock down their profiles. They have the choice to allow classmates to see their personal info.
How do you address that type of situation on your website??

S Joseph (Joe) Levine wrote:

Right on Woody..that's all we are asking!!!

Hi Darlene,
I'm in full agreement with you. The root administrator owns the site and we have about 16 links we work on/update regularly. To require a valid address and telephone # with registration is within your rights; it enhances the value of the membership,plus there's also the matter of security and I don't mean the homeless, you know...
Just my opinion.

@ Thelma...thanx for the support. I own the domain name and website...I get all the emails from the site..I should have something to say about it.

I'm with Eric on this one. I myself did not initially supply that information until I knew our CC site was legit. Some classmates have a P.O. Box. How can that verify them?

Many of us have unlisted phone numbers. Why would we risk exposing that just to join a site?

One has to consider outside concerns and not be so concerned about control. We are happy with just getting a valid email address. Anything past that should be considered a bonus.

At one time we had an admin who got upset because people were not filling in much on their profile. It's a similar issue. Those people are not comfortable do so. As time goes on and they see what people post, they are slowly adding tidbits.

But if some want to risk getting fewer people to join, admins probably should have the option to force an address or phone number. It's like some other things that are done that I disagree with. It's not my site, so it's none of my business. All I can do is give some reasons to support my view (as Eric did).

FWIW sites that force me to supply information where I see no need for that sort of information never get real data That is MY right.

(and we've had no problems with security)

In short, I can see the advantage of the Root Admin. being able to set what information is mandatory.

I see both sides of the fence as well.
I do have these thoughts however:

If a person really wants to join, and doesn’t want to give their address, they could always give a non-existent one –
So, do you have a way of verifying the address is valid? – ESPECIALLY one that is ‘out of town or out of state?’
I have one 'pending approval' person who refuses so far to reply to emails, asking for a little more information on themselves, as no one on the committee remembers him.
I won’t allow him access to the site until I am reasonably sure he some how is associated with our class!

You may think I am stubborn, but I like to think I am ‘protecting’ my fellow classmates.

I would agree that address information ought to be an option that an admin or a reunion committee could either require or not. I'm usually on the side of having options on things like this.

Coming from an all-school site where we have nearly 30,000 alums listed, have mailing addresses for over 16,000, and have email addresses for about 5,600 of them, we'd really rather have the email address. We don't have the time to check the validity of each classmate that enrolls and we haven't had any problems so far with nearly 3,000 who have enrolled. We've made two US Mailings and even with bulk mail the costs were high for us. Much much easier to deal with an email address. Nearly everyone provides a valid one as their user login.

Even if given the option, in our experience, we won't require a street address though nearly all provide it.

Hi Darlene -

After reading all the comments, I decided to chime in.
I think requiring an address and phone number would be very beneficial to maintaining an accurate contact database of our classmates. And as you pointed out, many people have no problem putting this information on lots of social network sites. And placing the privacy notice supplied in William's response also reassures the member of the privacy concern of administrators as well as the hosting organization. So, CC has the capability of making we administrators look like great web designers, how about giving us one more tool to help us behind the scenes. They have already given each member of any site the right to keep that information from view by fellow members excluding administrators. And I believe the day CC expands that "slippery slope" to include blood type and social security number will be the day that their business will probably drop to zero websites. I know that Napa-Ca-1960 would shut down in a heartbeat.

Glenn Ellen

You are not being stubborn..you are being cautious. And I like your style!!!
We do the same thing..people ask to be guests from other classes all the time. We get a little information from them and check them out in the yearbook before adding them to the database. Some never graduated from our school..but they went to grammar school with some of the alumni. We add them as guests only. We have one year in particular '67 that has woken up and want access to our site. We have been considering adding them for about a year now. We can't find anyone who will step up and be the site admin for that year. We just may add them anyway next year.
The more the merrier.
STEVE STEIN wrote:

Profile Visibility: Allow only fellow Classmates to view my Profile details. This will block the public and search engines from accessing your Profile. Leave this box unchecked if you wish to allow the public (friends, co-workers, family members, etc.) to view your Profile details.


Contact Details: Allow logged-in Classmates to see my address and phone number (this information is hidden from your Classmates unless you check this box). This information is never available to the general public or search engines even if this box is checked.


Birthday: Allow Classmates to view my Birthday. This option allows Classmates to see your Date of Birth in your Profile and on the home page 30 days prior to your Birthday.


Classmate Comments: Allow Classmates to enter comments under my Profile. (Most users opt to leave this feature on. You have the ability to edit or delete any comments left under your Profile.)


Instant Messages: Allow other Classmates to send me Instant Messages through the web site (recommended).

When a check is placed by any one of the above it will allow or not allow.

As an administrator, allowance has to be made for persons in sensitive situations. If a person does not supply detailed information, I respect their opinions for not doing so. My Classmates are involved in law inforcement, IRS inforcement, Secret Service and the list goes on, and they may have many reasons for not making information public. If I have a need for addresses and telephone numbers that are not entered on the Web Site voluntarily, that information that I need personally (Cell Phones etc.) is entered in my personal address book, an excel work sheet, and not on the Web Site. Additionally, some people have extensive resumes and if they make this information public, they feel it is a way of bragging about their accomplishments, and they just want to fit in without a splash. When new members join, I tell them that Classmates will be able to contact them via email over the web site without knowing telephone numbers, email adresses, and it is their option if they want to supply the information. The only time that I beleive detailed information is required is if they are not a registered member on the Web Site. I have a form letter on Microsoft Word for each Classmate, if they are not registered on the Web Site. One of the greatest incentives that I had originally for joining this site at my own expence was the reduction in postage costs, and the email the class feature, and that is a real winner. I plan to use this site for family reunions and other business ventures at a future date, where membership rosters are required.

As an administrator, allowance has to be made for persons in sensitive situations. If a person does not supply detailed information, I respect their opinions for not doing so. My Classmates are involved in law inforcement, IRS inforcement, Secret Service and the list goes on, and they may have many reasons for not making information public. If I have a need for addresses and telephone numbers that are not entered on the Web Site voluntarily, that information that I need personally (Cell Phones etc.) is entered in my personal address book, an excel work sheet, and not on the Web Site. Additionally, some people have extensive resumes and if they make this information public, they feel it is a way of bragging about their accomplishments, and they just want to fit in without a splash. When new members join, I tell them that Classmates will be able to contact them via email over the web site without knowing telephone numbers, email adresses, and it is their option if they want to supply the information. The only time that I beleive detailed information is required is if they are not a registered member on the Web Site. I have a form letter on Microsoft Word for each Classmate, if they are not registered on the Web Site. One of the greatest incentives that I had originally for joining this site at my own expence was the reduction in postage costs, and the email the class feature, and that is a real winner. I plan to use this site for family reunions and other business ventures at a future date, where membership rosters are required.

Ronald Goodwin wrote:

I forgot about that one. We have several like that. There's not even a photo for them. Answer now should be obvious

Jack Vermeulen wrote:

I have the same situation with people who work in law enforcement, etc etc. Some will give information some will not. For those situations we have a form that we mail to them...they fill it out giving us the information we need to communicate. On that form we have check boxes telling us if they want their address & phone # on the site or not. Those people who work in such areas are in the minority. We also explain the Privacy Notice and what the check boxes at the end of your profile page mean like William pointed out in his above posts.
What more do these people need??? You want the people to choose what is seen of their information. They have that choice now, if people choose not to put that little check in the check box that locks their profile..it's their problem. I tell all people to make sure the lock is showing on their profiles.
My job here is done!

I think we've drifted from the original start of this topic

Quote:

So if you made it mandatory, these same people could not register. I had no idea who these people were in the beginning for contact in any other way.

I also think that making it OUR problem, not the classmates, is the appropriate way to approach this. Many do not realize they didn't lock it down. The wording is not exactly the best in this area.

My job is never done since I don't expect people to have the same level of expertise I have. It's no different from any other profession where there is a lot of detail that is not obvious to the "customer". That's how I consider my classmates - customers. I want to make them happy.

(P.S. FYI: No information on the web is secure. In the intelligence field, locks are rated in how long it takes to break in, not that they can't be broken.)

@ Jack...you got that right about the web being secure. It's secure until a hacker breaks in!!!
Thanx for bringing this topic back on track. We all have a tendency to drift off the subject.

Another two cents from the peanut gallery of my simple mind...which is often easily confused...I will try with great effort not to digress...
It sounds like Darlene is asking for an option to make some questions mandatory for sign up. It also sounds as if the results are mixed, for as many reasons.
The individual "control" seems to be at issue...I can see both sides of the argument however. Our site would not have many of the sign-ups if I chose to require this. Because I must choose my battles in every stage of life, I would choose to have classmates sign in. We have many how are already superstitions of everything on the internet, and some who seem to be in the witness protection program, because they have actually told me that they prefer "not to be found" geographically, but can be contacted via e-mail. Their choice...we also have some "domestic" situations which I hope to respect, privacy is vital and my respect of such is great. These situations range from abuse, ugly divorces or breakups, to homelessness,among many other things. So far, there are no real problems, but our class would simply rebel against such a requirement. Many, to my surprise have given lots of point of contact information that I never used, as it was not my intention to use it. I am glad that it is there though, because in hindsight, it has been great!
And I am also thankful that we have such an excellent tool for our Reunion planning, as well as "emailing the class"!

I like Eric's response, and as a CC "new recruit", he deserves great applause and kudos for venturing into this forum family! Thanks for the great answer, Eric. Perhaps Darlene's request can be considered for future "wish lists"!
Have a great day anyway!

Quote:

Yes where is Eric? have not seen him back on this subject

We let Eric sneak away for the day Friday. As he's new he has a few commitments he's still wrapping up before we get to see his pretty face 8 hours a day.

All right, so we simply make this optional for the Admin. Some want it, some don't, so simply allowing the Admin to toggle the address field to required would do the trick. Somebody who doesn't want to answer the question might put in fake info just to get past it, so you could easily wind up with fake info on your class list. But, at least the admin had the right to make the decision. I certainly have no problem with that.

Brad; Thank You

William Leggett wrote:

Brad; Thank You

Ditto from me!!!

Wow! I didn't think this was a "stir up the hornet's nest" kind of question. Thank you to all the admins here for the food for thought and the great suggestions! I'm working on getting my mugshot to show up, but I'm still learning the systems here and I'm prioritizing trying to be helpful over scaring small children who may stumble into the forums.

Eric.
We admins are passionate about our sites!!! You got a good breakin' in!!!

Jack Vermeulen wrote:

Also, and I may have missed it, but as trustworthy as we all are, we may not be the admins forever and is the person who takes over going to be as trustworthy or have a grudge against anyone???

ps: great discussion

Eric B Bassey wrote:

Wow! I didn't think this was a "stir up the hornet's nest" kind of question. Thank you to all the admins here for the food for thought and the great suggestions! I'm working on getting my mugshot to show up, but I'm still learning the systems here and I'm prioritizing trying to be helpful over scaring small children who may stumble into the forums.

Until Brad posted I thought you went in witness protection program

@Wiliiam ...that's way to funny!!!
I kinda thought we scared Eric away!!!
Glad he hung in there!!!

PROFILE GENERATOR will now have these fields if you edit the RESIDING IN field:
Do not require any Address fields
Require that if any Address field is entered, all must be entered
Require all Address fields be entered

PROFILE GENERATOR will now have these fields if you edit the TELEPHONE field:
Require a Telephone or Cell Phone

Remember that even though these fields can now be required, that doesn't mean that the classmate can't enter fake data in these fields.

Kyle Erickson wrote:

Is this information still current? I'm looking at my Profile Generator page, and I don't see an option to "Edit" the RESIDING IN field, nor do I see the various address requirement options described above.

Question 2 just shows a big empty box containing the text "Residing In:" and which I have set as active.

What am I missing here?

Whoops. This information was moved to the Preferences page under COLLECTION OF PERSONAL INFORMATION.

Aha!... sure enough there it is! No worries; you're bound to miss something at least once in a while!
Thank you Brad!