Major Additions - Synergy by Zoints - A system like Digg integrated into forums.

Index

Installation and Upgrading
FAQ, Changelog and Troubleshooting
Pre-written threads

This plugin is not currently available for vBulletin 3.7.x. Several users have reported serious incompatibilities, and we would not suggest attempting to install it on a forum running 3.7.x at this time.

Foreward

Awhile back, two visionaries by the names of Sal Collaziano and George B realized that a Digg-like system for forums could be highly beneficial. Kudos to those two for their understanding that by working together, we can all benefit.

What is Synergy?

How often does this happen to you? You or a member write a great thread, Google indexes it a week later, but it is buried in the search results so the masses never end up reading it. Frustrating, isn't it? Zoints solves this by taking a system like Digg, then integrating and mirroring in across all forums in a manner that allows great threads to be read by the masses. Synergy is designed to bring you more traffic and inspire your members to create higher quality content in order to obtain "Top Author" status.

Demos (with forums like these using Synergy, you're sure to get some traffic)

You'll notice all the demos look virtually the same except for the skins. This is due to the system mirroring itself across the forums. When a link is clicked, it takes the reader to the originating forum.

Ubuntu Forums
NASIOC
ThumperTalk
LWS


How Synergy Works

You have a lot of high quality threads on your forum. When you (or a trusted usergroup member you permission via the admincp options) decides a thread is worthy of Synergy, you select the "Add to Synergy" link as seen below.




During the next step, you write a short description for the thread and select which category it should go into.




Your thread is then added to a queue on your forum. Once every X hours, the top thread in your queue is added to Synergy.




When your thread is added to Synergy, the system distributes the link and description you wrote to all participating forums. If someone on any forum around the net clicks on your thread link, they are redirected back to your forum to the actual thread so they can read it. If people like your thread, they can vote on it which ranks it higher. Higher ranked threads, especially those that make it to the front page will in turn bring you more traffic.




The admincp settings are as follows:




Proof of Traffic

If you submit good content to Synergy that gets to the front page, you WILL get a lot of traffic. The following screenshot is from a small forum early in our testing. Guess which day it got a thread on the front page?



As more forums join Synergy, more and more people will be reading your threads. Let's work together to remove our reliance on search engines to send us traffic. Our communities are full of great content, it's time for it to be read!

[TTG]

Originally Posted by Artificial_Alex

I can't get the token.."You do not have sufficient privileges to view this page."

and when I try registering my forum again, it says its already exsists.

Yet..I submitted it OVER a week ago..

:/

Just installed and having same problem. Submitted a ticket to Zoints.

[TTG]

Clicked un-install .. last thread added to Synergy was 02-02-2007 04:18 PM.

Looks like a dying idea / hack.

[Tygerwoody]

I am now fully registered and setup.

However, I have a question. Why on earth did I make a forum section call "Synergy" on my site? I'm not getting why or what its used for.

[RvG2]

works fine on 3.6.7 pl1.

you have to create a forum called "synergy" and link it up to your zoints.

[Strike3ForumsMH]

If anyone ever has trouble registering, the fastest way to get that resolved and your forum in the Synergy network is to open a ticket up at network.zoints.com. Just FYI as I know a few have had troubles with this.

Originally Posted by aj8690

Is there any way to remove the synergy forum from the archive???

It makes tons of blank pages in there and it's annoying.

TIA.

Hey aj8690,

I am not aware of a way to remove Synergy from the archives, but I do know the engineers realize this is a pretty big bug so hopefully it will be corrected with the next release.

Originally Posted by TTG

Clicked un-install .. last thread added to Synergy was 02-02-2007 04:18 PM.

Looks like a dying idea / hack.

Hi TTG,

Synergy isn't near as active as it could be, but I really think that must of been an error you saw. For instance if you click on the newest links section, you would see that all links have been added in August.

Originally Posted by Tygerwoody

I am now fully registered and setup.

However, I have a question. Why on earth did I make a forum section call "Synergy" on my site? I'm not getting why or what its used for.

The forum called Synergy is to integrate you and your forum into the content sharing network that is Zoints. It's a system that works with forums scratching one another's backs if you will; ala a forum member from elsewhere may see a thread on Synergy that interests him from your site, just like a member from your site could see a thread elsewhere that interests him and checks it out, it's a give and take system with forums working with each other to showcase their content versus letting it get buried.

- Reid

[0tolerance]

I think this is an excellent modification!!
*installed*

[rpainter]

I am getting this error randomly on my site. It did not start until I installed Synergy. It will happen when I try to click on any link on my forum (forums, PM, Synergy, doesn't matter what link). Any idea?

Data returned from Zoints:

HTTP/1.0 403 Forbidden
Content-Type: text/html
Connection: close




VIRUS DETECTED

Access Blocked


* Access blocked by anti-virus filter


The anti-virus system has detected an attempt to download a virus-infected file.

[Strike3ForumsMH]

Originally Posted by 0tolerance

I think this is an excellent modification!!
*installed*

Thank you 0tolerance, we appreciate it!

Originally Posted by rpainter

I am getting this error randomly on my site. It did not start until I installed Synergy. It will happen when I try to click on any link on my forum (forums, PM, Synergy, doesn't matter what link). Any idea?

Hmmm, I have never seen something like that with Synergy but I believe your ticket was picked up by one of our engineers at network.zoints.com so hopefully they can figure that out with you rpainter.

- Reid

[Tygerwoody]

Originally Posted by RvG2

works fine on 3.6.7 pl1.

you have to create a forum called "synergy" and link it up to your zoints.

How do i link it up to my Zoints? The directions just said "create a forum called Synergy". It did not say anything else.

http://www.guildclan.com as you can see, my Synergy forum is just a normal section

[0tolerance]

I got this modification working perfectly on my 3.6.2 board(my main forum)

So every one! tell your friends about synergy and benefits it brings to your forum.
I'm finding alot of my members are very interested in the content that is being posted.

For people experiencing errors... disable all hacks and slowly enable them and test synergy and when you discover the hack that is conflicting let the staff know, so they can look into a fix for all the people who use that mod.