All films for the directory used to have to be approved by the review panel but it's impossible to keep up with then insane quantity of films being made these days, we could make a system that auto hid films under 30 seconds that could be disabled people browsing the directory clicks a unhide ultra shorts or something, things like this are not really supposed to be in the directory regardless of the quality.

I think also embedding the video in the form post itself for the directory would also be a nice update. But I'm not sure how everyone feels about that.

Noted.  In my OP I suggest that films are added by default and then excluded manually - a reverse of the previous system where films were excluded automatically and added manually.  In other words, the directory can be manually moderated to knock out films under x seconds long and screen tests.  That's an extra workload on mods but more mods can be found.

And since we're asking for features that are probably impossible to implement, a "report this" button would help the community apply some moderation as well.

I agree with you (togfox) on the problem, though I think the solution will be need to be more complex than just going off of ratings. Many films receive few ratings. I'm very much hoping to rework the directory so that it's more searchable in the future and more useful in general, and we have some ideas about how to accomplish this, but I am open to more suggestions.

Keep ideas coming. I'm not convinced that the improvements we've come up with so far will go far enough, but we do need a solution that can be automated as opposed to requiring a panel of curators, which would never be able to keep up.

Better search tools are one of the things we're planning on. I think the big hurdle will be making the directory relevant to the rest of the site.

There's not a compelling motive to post good reviews, give real but cordial feedback, etc. right now, so the releases forum and the directory have both declined in quality.

One thing we've considered is adding an upvote feature to posts only in the releases forum, with top-voted reviews showing up on the directory pages. There'd be a checkbox when you post in that forum so that only review-style posts are considered for this.

What if the film was called something like, "The Big Test" and was actually a film?

Hmm - I see the challenge.  This could be complex if you're not careful.  You have multiple intertwined objectives:

- reward good reviewers
- prevent rubbish from hitting the directory
- prevent rubbish from hitting the release forum (noting this is different to the directory)
- providing a means of empirical peer review

Reward good reviewers
Rewarding ANY reviewer is as simple as providing a post count for the review forum.  Easy.  That is no guarantee of quality.

Rewarding GOOD reviews must come from peers, meaning a LIKE button or forum rep points for the review forum only.

Preventing WIPs/tests from hitting the directory
Two options: community moderated or moderator moderated (pun intended)

I believe we've tried moderator moderated and that didn't work, therefore, community moderated is the next step.  This implies a gate of some sort that each film must hurdle prior to getting on the directory.  Debate begin!  It can be x reviews, x positive reviews, x likes (assuming there will be likes), an average of 2.5/5 bricks with at least 3 votes, at least one vote of 3 bricks or more etc etc.  The gate can be debated till a decision is reached.

Preventing rubbish from hitting the release forum
A simple "report this post" function would suffice.

Providing a means of empirical peer review
Well, we have this already - the brick system.  Ppl give a rating out of 5 against either the review post or the directory film.  Allowing votes on the directory only will mean less films will get votes as less films will actually make it to the directory (assuming they need x number of reviews).

Allowing votes on the forum is probably less draconian and lets films that don't have reviews to still get a score out of 5, which I think is more membership friendly.

Anyway - I've had a slow night but now I'm going to kill some zombies.