Topic: Twitter and Facebook in the Discussion forum

We are playing with a new feature in the discussion forum that is similar to the blogs area, with twitter and facebook share buttons. But we aren't sure about the actual design. Right now, we have the links shown on every post within the thread, but as you can see, that means it duplicates as you go down the page. Any thoughts on whether this works well or where might be a better placement?

Thanks!

Looks interesting Brent--thanks for continuing to work on site enhancements. I appreciate all the work you do.

Thanks Jonathan - I really appreciate that!

Brent, this seems redundant to me in several ways. Aren't the new discussion posts already being tweeted out by the MFInsiders account? I suppose this new feature allows other readers to share the conversation, which is probably a good thing. However, the share buttons on each comment seem like overkill -- even socially-focused comment systems like Disqus don't clutter up pages like this. It's probably just me, and I'm picky about this kind of thing ... I second Jonathan's appreciation for the work you're putting in on this!

Thanks for the comments, Mike. As for the first part, yes, they are already being tweeted by @mfinsiders. But like you said, allowing others to share is definitely a good thing.

But I agree with you 100% on the look/feel. We can put it in several areas of the page, but as you can tell from my first post, we weren't quite sure where that should be. The biggest challenge is that the discussions system works differently than the blogs with multiple pages, and more focus on each subsequent post beyond the original topic. Therefore, the majority of the focus is often with the last post rather than the overall thread. So I was thinking about another option of putting it below the last post in the thread. What do you think about that?

(I definitely appreciate your comments - it's exactly what I was hoping for!)

I think in discussions it should all be able to share as one thread. Even if someone posted on twitter "I love what Mike said in Discussion ABC" I'd most likely click over to the discussion and read from the beginning so I'd get the full context. The sharing features shouldn't be the focus of the visual aspects of a discussion forum. People share because they like the content, not because there's a big blue button there that says share. IMHO.

I agree, Elysa, but the buttons are important in that it makes it simple to share. But let's say we had one set of buttons, where would you suggest we put them on the page?

(And thanks for the feedback, Elysa!)