We just released an enhancement which improves the ballot functionality. For topics where your ballot extends beyond the window, your browser will now scroll automatically as you approach the edge of the screen. We also included some optimizations to the Javascript in this update.

Included in this patch:

• Deleted topics no longer appear in normal topic lists
• Added captcha to registration process to prevent bot spam (sorry!)
• Admins: Added ability to view “deleted topics” lists
• Admins: Added “NOARCHIVE” meta tag to private communities

Known issues: The “Veteran” achievement was not being updated upon Facebook Connect logins. This patch may fix that issue.

Grupthink 4.0 brings some features requested by our clients, as well as many other significant improvements to the core Grupthink experience. Here are some notable changes:

• Achievements: Get medals for doing stuff! See your profile page or vist http://grupthink.com/achievements.php5
• Better tag browsing: Instantly filter topic lists by tag with the new tag buttons
• Vastly improved group pages
• Improved image upload form
• Faster "one step" topic creation
• One-click time travel: Quickly view 30-day or 365-day topic views
• Better crumb trail navigation throughout site
• Improved form design throughout site
• New YouTube video buttons show videos instantly in answers that contain Youtube links
• Optimizations and other updates to make the site faster
• Streamlined header design
• Improved Grupie point notifications
• Many more minor fixes and visual enhancements

Grupthink Admins:

• Batch answer management (Edit Topic > Advanced > "Manage Answers" button)
• Batch topic management (click "Manage topics" in Group page header)
• Topic-specific area for custom ads/scripts
• Fixed incorrect "ballot position" values in exported voting reports
• "Overall Results" view for groups (beta) shows top 3 winners for each topic in the group
• Add custom profile fields to profile edit form
• Customizable "required fields" for new registrants
• Fixed topic results segmenting by age/gender
• Other minor fixes and improvements.

As always, let us know if you find bugs by clicking the "Report" link at the bottom of Grupthink.com. Thanks!

Stay tuned for release notes! Apologies for the downtime as we perform the upgrade.

Yes there is life here! We’re working on some nice new features requested by our clients, plus some great enhancements for all members. In the meantime, I wanted to let you know I have posted community guidelines for Grupthink.com at http://grupthink.com/pages/2.

For the first two years of Grupthink, we wanted to be purely “member moderated”. The rating features we built have worked well for many things, but there are often cases where certain content (especially spam and member abuse) needs to be dealt with promptly by a moderator or admin.

Today we posted some community guidelines which illustrate the kind of discourse we want to encourage. Also, to comply with policies of our partners, we list types of content which are not allowed in public Grupthink.com discussion, such as pornography and content promoting racial intolerance. A few topics which fell under those labels have been either deactivated or made private.

Most of our time last month was spent working on a new optional “slide” layout for topics. Some of our clients, including us, like to pose topics related to imagery, such as photo contests. The normal Grupthink layout works, but can be a little tedious when all you really want to see are the answer thumbnails. So, the new option is being released today on an experimental basis, and currently can only be set by admins. Eventually this option will be accessible to regular users. In the meantime, expect to see a few slide show topics start to pop up!

• Enhanced Youtube linking:
  • Youtube links in topic descriptions now get automatically converted to showing the embedded YouTube video when viewing the topic
  • Youtube links in answer descriptions on topic pages can now be expanded to enable watching the video without having to visit the answer page
  • Youtube links in comments can be expanded to display the video
• Fixed “delete” link not showing for comments on your profile page
• Numerous minor bug fixes and enhancements

For Grupthink Admins

• New: “Media” option to turn topics into slide-show style layout, suitable for photo contests or other topics where the “answers” are pictures. Currently, this option can only be managed by admins and moderators. Just edit a topic, go to advanced settings, and choose “Topic Type: Media”.
• New: Demographic charts showing age/gender breakdowns on answer pages
• New: Add a custom terms of service for your Grupthink-powered site

Today we applied an update with the following improvements:

• New options on main members page allows you to see leaders over the past year, month, and day, in addition to the all-time leaders.
• Added visual graphs on the main members page help indicate scores
• Fixed a bug the caused the topic embed method “1″ (html syndication) to not work in Firefox. If you are experiencing this issue, copy/paste the embed code for that topic again.
• Numerous bug fixes and minor enhancements

Grupthink Admins

• New “Member activity” charts in Admin > Reports > Site Activity
• Styling: Added “extra images” options. This allows you to upload arbitrary images for use anywhere in the site.

We’ve made a minor patch today which includes the following updates:

• New Google Images feature makes adding images to topics and answers easier than ever!
• Improved pagination and tab style for answer lists.
• Fixed issue where searches would remove white spaces between words
• Other minor fixes and improvements

For Admins:

• Setting to restrict the Google Images feature by a specified domain.

We’ve just updated Grupthink sites to address the following:

• Added new topic list to the home page for unregistered visitors.
• Improved style of pagination numbers in topics.
• Fixed issue where searches for answers inside topics would not find all matching answers.
• Speed improvement to the topic lists on the home page
• Fixes issue where Public group topics were being labeled “Panel” topics
• Fixed “No description provided” showing on profile pages
• Fixed issue where “view other maps” was showing in the topic report area, when no other maps were available
• Other minor improvements

For Admins of Grupthink-powered sites:

• Custom pages can contain javascript and other embedded code.
• Fixed: Topic merging resulted in an error

Grupthink-powered sites are currently down as we upgrade to version 3.5. We expect downtime to last a few hours and we’ll keep you posted via Grupthink tweets.

UPDATE: We’re back up, much sooner than expected! Be sure to report bugs using the “Report a Bug” link at the bottom of every page. Thanks!