"Global pin" (currently) does not really mean "global."

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I’ve noticed I’m not alone in my thinking on this one: When you go to pin something “globally,” the expected behavior for some of us at least is that the post will appear globally across all categories.

The team pushback to this has largely been “there is no point.” I’m not sure I agree. A few points …

  1. For our site, for example, we have some users who lurk/post only in their own preferred categories. They would have no reason to view posts across all categories. So they’d miss site-wide announcements that don’t meet the level of a Banner topic.
  2. “Global” has a connotation here because the regular, non-global pin is associated deliberately for the category upon which it’s posted. “Global” then seems to imply, logically, that it would be pinned atop all categories. Again, I don’t seem to be alone in interpreting “global” in this manner (You could make the argument that “global” is poor nomenclature here, but either way, it’d be handy to have this as an option)
  3. When users go to customize their notifications, sidebar, emails, etc., they can do so with Categories and Tags. You can even set specific moderators for specific Categories. You can even BRAND categories differently if you want. So why wouldn’t we have a way to pin a single topic across all Categories, if there appears to be an internal understanding that some users are going to stick to certain categories?

If not “Global,” then can we at least add a “Cross-Category” pin or something similar?

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Under the “pin topic globally” option there’s another option to make a “banner topic” which will be displayed at the top of every page and across all categories. Is there a reason a banner topic wouldn’t work in your case?

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I would wager that most users would not recognize a “banner topic” as they would a topic that lives within the feed. In fact, it’s not really a “topic” at all, it’s more of a notification bar. It feels … like a promotional tactic.

Communicating something to the community through the feed takes on a level of value that the banner option simply doesn’t provide.

Finally, when you’re communicating as an admin within the feed (especially on a site in which that admin is known and respected), there’s a certain amount of weight you carry site-wide—that is all lost in the banner topic.

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So, quickly following up on this. Does Discourse have any opinion on this, or should I bring this to a custom plugin?

Thanks again!

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If you’re looking for a quick-turnaround, I’d say a custom plugin would be the route to go. :+1:

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