As I said in my previous article, most of my investment commentary is now posted to Small Caps Live, a Discord chat server. In the last week or so we’ve made some major improvements which means I can now recommend as a place that all UK Smallcap investors would benefit from by addressing the two issues people have raised with me.
Set up an email
The first problem is people who have joined by following an invite link, but then find they can’t get back in afterwards. Where I’ve followed this up this is because they joined without giving an email or setting up a password. That works fine on one device until cookies are deleted (which can happen for a variety of reasons), but after that the account is lost. The good news is that you can just set up another account with the same name and this time set up login details. Of course then you can save the password in your password manager and recover the account via email if required.
Small Caps Live is now set up to require a verified account to post messages so this should happen much less in future.
If you are still having problems logging in then please direct message me on twitter or leave a comment at the bottom of this article.
Set up notifications / muting
The second issue raised is concerns over too much “noise” / time commitment.
The default for a server like Small Caps Live on Discord is to notify the user every time a message is sent, typically causing a noise and some kind of pop-up. Clearly this is madness, especially on a mobile phone and usually results in people muting the server or leaving the server entirely.
We’ve now corrected this setting and you will only get notifications if somebody replies to your message, mentions you by name, or for key announcements (typically once a month). Still, you may wish to make notifications silent – on a mobile this is an option on the notification and on desktop this is in your account settings accessed by clicking on the cog near bottom [1].
Similarly, many people avoid all social media to avoid getting sucked into time consuming conversations they don’t have time for. We think we have a great community on Small Caps Live, but if you don’t want to discuss politics, or pet dogs, or macro economics, or large cap banks, or even particular small caps you can mute them [2] so there is no indication of new messages. You can even hide [3] them altogether and pretend they don’t exist. A team of moderators now ensure conversations are kept on topic.
On the other hand, if you have a large holding in one of our more discussed shares then you can set up notifications [4] on that channel so you never miss anything.
Tip
If you want to tell at glance which channels have new messages are then you can collapse [5] the category (such as UK SMALLCAPS) by clicking on it. Only channels which have new messages (and you have not muted) will be shown. Before posting a message on a new topic you then expand the category to show all of the channels there are to choose from.
Detailed Instructions
[1] Disable notification sound
The following is for desktop or browser. For mobile you change this in the same way as for any notification, typically as an option on a notification.
Choose “Notifications”:
The noise you probably want to switch off is for “Message”:
[2] Mute a single channel or whole category
Right Click or (on mobile / touchscreen) long tap on the channel or category name and click / tap “Mute Category” then “Until I turn it back on”.
For example to mute all off-topic (i.e. non share investing) conversation:
You can also mute individual channels. Perhaps CAPD isn’t for you?
Muted categories or channels are shown in light type (shown collapsed [5] here):
[3] Hide muted channels
Right Click or (on mobile / touchscreen) long tap on the Small Caps Live server icon and click / tap “Hide Muted Channels”.
Channels that have been specifically muted will be entirely hidden as if they never existed. Muted categories will remain – you must mute channels separately to hide them.
[4] Enable notifications
Right Click or (on mobile / touchscreen) long tap on the channel name, choose “Notification Settings” and then “All Messages”.
Too many notifications can be a distraction, but the temporary mute [2] can be useful here.
[5] Collapse Categories
By clicking / tapping on a category you can collapse it (or open it if already collapsed). But collapsed categories will still show channels with new messages in, unless of course you have muted them. Here the “other-uk-smallcaps” channel has a new message, but none of the other channels under “UK SMALLCAPS” do and so are hidden:
This is a great way to quickly see which channels have new messages, especially on smaller screens. But please open the category before posting to make sure you’re in the best channel for what you have to say.
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