12 Years of Forums. What have you learned?

[AjayJunkies]

Hi everyone,

I've recently taken over and become the owner of a forum admin site, which merged in some prior and legacy forum admin sites. There are over 12 years of forum admin conversations.

When I go back and look at some of the earliest conversations, I'm both surprised and taken aback at how little the conversations have changed.

We're still asking about how to get members to our forums. We're still figuring out expectations by admins. We're still figuring out newsletters and mass mailings.

What have we collectively learned in the last 12 years? Are we elevating the standards and knowledge practices of community management, or are we still figuring out the same things we asked over a decade ago?

 

[Ivancas]

I've learned no matter how hard you try, there are always errors:

Cloudflare Ray ID: 887f94c34a057a0e

 

[AjayJunkies]

Too true, staying online is a hard thing to do!

Hopefully Xenforo's status was a temporary thing for you. The site is online and working for me

 

[woody]

20+ years for me, and many of my moderators have been around since the very beginning.

The Admin discussions don't change since everything evolves....continually seeking new and improved answers.

 

[philmckrackon]

Started with VB2 a long time ago and many forums ago. I'm still amazed @ no matter how much testing is done, someone still finds a way to break something.

 

[BassMan]

Never give up (even after 15+ years), forums are a marathon, moderation is important, good staff is nice to have, don't bring the vibe and format of social media to the forum, etc.

 

[Mr Lucky]

don't bring the vibe and format of social media to the forum

Absolutely agree with that. I see people say try to make it look like social media. Why?

 

[BassMan]

I don't know. I never understood that. Forums should remain different and unique. Social media is not popular because of its format. I think there is something else behind it, but I don't want to go off-topic now.

 

[Suzanne O]

22 years for me started with proboards.
Then moved to forumer then to VB 3.
Had vb 4.2.5 for a while.
Went to xenforo stayed with them until i experiemented with smf, phpbb2, createaforum, and vb5 and vb 6..
Still with vb and xenforo

Learned that you can get a heap of meaningless trolls on your site and you can aggressively reset the whole board.

 

[bennylava]

22 years for me started with proboards.
Then moved to forumer then to VB 3.
Had vb 4.2.5 for a while.
Went to xenforo stayed with them until i experiemented with smf, phpbb2, createaforum, and vb5 and vb 6..
Still with vb and xenforo

Learned that you can get a heap of meaningless trolls on your site and you can aggressively reset the whole board.

How do you differentiate a "troll" from someone who is just consistently negative? Maybe they're not actively trolling, but their posts are seldom positive.

 

[Suzanne O]

How do you differentiate a "troll" from someone who is just consistently negative? Maybe they're not actively trolling, but their posts are seldom positive.

They start a serious thread and then do the opposite to what's being asked generally targeting the web master (person that runs the forum) for reactions.

 

[Wing]

They start a serious thread and then do the opposite to what's being asked generally targeting the web master (person that runs the forum) for reactions.

If I remember right @Suzanne O , you went out on your own accord to create threads for various members here at Xenforo.com just to rant and bash them on your site. Without even the awareness of said users until people went to check out your forum last year. Some would say that’s the master of all trolling

 

[James]

If I remember right @Suzanne O , you went out on your own accord to create threads for various members here at Xenforo.com just to rant and bash them on your site. Without even the awareness of said users until people went to check out your forum last year. Some would say that’s the master of all trolling

 

[CedricV]

If I remember right @Suzanne O , you went out on your own accord to create threads for various members here at Xenforo.com just to rant and bash them on your site. Without even the awareness of said users until people went to check out your forum last year. Some would say that’s the master of all trolling

You sow what you reap.

 

[RandallC]

Advertising is still the hardest part, keeping members active beyond that core group. Keeping it relevant in a volatile niche.

 

[MentaL]

22 years.

Don't take anything said personally. People are fickle.

 

[Digital Doctor]

Advertising is still the hardest part, keeping members active beyond that core group. Keeping it relevant in a volatile niche.

I just started using my first widescreen monitor. I have lots, put I use them in portrait mode (taller than wider).
(i'm getting rid of it)(well actually putting two on top of each other and spreading windows over 2 monitors.)

I remember your site ! I thought it was great. I had to give up golf (not enough time) and i've switched to tennis.

Here's my standard size monitor 1920 x 1080 (most common size) view of your site

I literally see no threads.

Pretty graphic. Is it too big ?

The same thing happens when I click a thread.
I cant see anything without scrolling (and that's with getting rid of the broswer bookmarks bar.

 

[PrettyPixels]

Social media is not popular because of its format. I think there is something else behind it, but I don't want to go off-topic now.

@BassMan - I'm actually interested to hear your thoughts on this, but agree with not wanting to take this thread too far off topic. Maybe start a new thread to discuss?

 

[Mendalla]

keeping members active beyond that core group

This. We have had precisely one new active member join this calendar year and I am still not 100% convinced it isn't a banned member sneaking back and just doing a good job of not tipping their hand. As long as they remain well-behaved, I'm not fussing too much. All other active posters are people who date back to the founding a decade ago and most were active on the original site that we more or less replaced.

 

[AjayJunkies]

20+ years for me, and many of my moderators have been around since the very beginning.

The Admin discussions don't change since everything evolves....continually seeking new and improved answers.

Are we making it easier to identify, surface, and organize helpful answers?

Are we making it easier for new members to answer their easy questions? Are we making it easier for members to answer their advanced questions, or at least give them resources to other parts of the site that might help them out? Are we making it easier to empower members with media - whether its smartphone images, screenshots, voice recordings - to document their questions?

22 years for me started with proboards.

Wow, kudos to you for staying the course over 22 years.

Several of our members also started with ProBoards.