Anyone use a different term other than forums or community?

Yep. Had one of those. The C64 was considered quite the advanced machine at the time.
It was. Fairly good graphics and sound chips for its time. Good day-to-day computer that got me through my last year and a half of high school and a four year BA but also made a pretty sweet gaming console.
 
My first system was an HP with NO disk drive (not a personal computer but a desktop computer for the lab at at work). It used cassette tapes as the storage medium, for backup, and for chunks of BASIC code which by swapping in and out of RAM allowed us to actually run statistical analyses like analysis of variance. :D
Oh, the 8086XT Vendex Headstart shipped with 2 360 floppies... It was the 888 Turbo XT model. I had to buy the hard drive separately.
My very first computer was a Color Computer from TRS with the hyper efficient cassette deck.
CSAVE or CLOAD anyone? And you better be danged sure you reset your tape deck counter each time.
 
Tandy TRS80 MKII with twin 8 inch floppy drives (the disks were floppy) and CRT green screen - inc. an 8MB SCSI drive that was the size of a large modern-day PC with a thick, wide cable that could double as a hammock. 😉

By comparison, my slim, pocket-sized phone computer has 256GB and plays HD videos over the mobile network.

Technology eh? 😁
 
Tandy TRS80 MKII with twin 8 inch floppy drives (the disks were floppy) and CRT green screen - inc. an 8MB SCSI drive that was the size of a large modern-day PC with a thick, wide cable that could double as a hammock. 😉
Ah, the good old "Trash-80". Crossed paths with them a couple times but never had to use them. A friend, the first of us to have a computer in their home, had an Apple II or maybe II+. Save using a PET once, that's oldest PC I have used.
 
depends on your niche and audience.

my younger readers wouldn't know what forum meant if it was spelled out to them, but the word social/chat makes sense. my older audience would like a forum, but sometimes find it much easier to post on social.

both of these reasons combined is prob why I always stunk at making forums :D my older audience figured out how to use facebook and twitter, so now they want that. my younger readers are like "what do you mean I have to read or can't immediately post without doing anything else, ever?"

and all the female readers I ever had are probably too busy on OF now. That's 2022 for ya! LOL
 
I think the best option is to not use sub-directory, instead put the forum in the web root.

I agree with that, thats exactly what I did.

Entrance pages are so yesterday, I like getting straight down to business, directly to the forum.
 
I agree with that, thats exactly what I did.

Entrance pages are so yesterday, I like getting straight down to business, directly to the forum.
I used to have the articles page as the home page, but there's not enough content being generated for that, so I reverted it to the forum list default which is working quite well.

The idea had been that the front page content would drive conversation, but it's hard coming up with articles every day, so all people end up seeing are an almost static articles page, making the site look dead. As it is now, there's movement every single day, even if it's just me creating a new thread or two, or replying, which has succeeded in me having a small, but dedicated community. Note that this is purely a hobby project and has no ads, so this level of activity is a success for me, if modest.

I've had the odd troll join too and start causing trouble with rants and unpleasantness, but they didn't last long. I don't want activity at any cost, that's for sure. NerdZone is a pleasant and welcoming place for everyone and will stay that way.
 
I used to have the articles page as the home page, but there's not enough content being generated for that, so I reverted it to the forum list default which is working quite well.

The idea had been that the front page content would drive conversation, but it's hard coming up with articles every day, so all people end up seeing are an almost static articles page, making the site look dead. As it is now, there's movement every single day, even if it's just me creating a new thread or two, or replying, which has succeeded in me having a small, but dedicated community. Note that this is purely a hobby project and has no ads, so this level of activity is a success for me, if modest.

I've had the odd troll join too and start causing trouble with rants and unpleasantness, but they didn't last long. I don't want activity at any cost, that's for sure. NerdZone is a pleasant and welcoming place for everyone and will stay that way.
Have you thought about looking for bloggers? This is something we are working on. Eventually I also want to check for some bloggers that I could hire for 3 articles every two weeks or so.

It is quite important tho to make sure that you have some high quality articles. I have been checking some AI generated posts and well, they are pretty good... but yeah, it is not completely the same as when a human would write it.

Or maybe you could reach out to bloggers and do an exchange!
 
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I agree with that, thats exactly what I did.

Entrance pages are so yesterday, I like getting straight down to business, directly to the forum.
We tried this. We used to have a landing page, but it impacted the amount of registrations quite a lot. So I removed it.
Looks like straight down to business is indeed the most effective way, especially if you lock down certain features where you "force" users to create an account.
 
Have you thought about looking for bloggers? This is something we are working on. Eventually I also want to check for some bloggers that I could hire for 3 articles every two weeks or so.

It is quite important tho to make sure that you have some high quality articles. I have been checking some AI generated posts and well, they are pretty good... but yeah, it is not completely the same as when a human would write it.

Or maybe you could reach out to bloggers and do an exchange!
That's a good idea, but I'm running NZ on a shoestring budget - but without skimping on the critical hosting that underpins it - and with the cost of living crisis here in Brexit Blighty, I'm looking to keep costs down at the moment.

It's an idea to keep in mind for the future, though.
 
That's a good idea, but I'm running NZ on a shoestring budget - but without skimping on the critical hosting that underpins it - and with the cost of living crisis here in Brexit Blighty, I'm looking to keep costs down at the moment.

It's an idea to keep in mind for the future, though.
Sorry to hear that! I think for now the best (and free!) solution is to just reach out to bloggers that match with your niche and ask them for a kind of post exchange, as in; They write an article and mention your forum, and you also post some of their articles on your forum, or either a redirect.

Just thinking out loud here!
 
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Yeah, I've thought of a post exchange like that, but it means a lot of activity from me on other forums to keep up activity on mine, which I don't have the time or inclination for. Thanks for the suggestion, anyway.

I do appreciate your supportive comments today and the other week too, so if you'd like to join my forum, you'd be very welcome. 🙂 We've got a small, but very friendly community on there I'm sure you'd feel right at home with.

 
Yeah, I've thought of a post exchange like that, but it means a lot of activity from me on other forums to keep up activity on mine, which I don't have the time or inclination for. Thanks for the suggestion, anyway.

I do appreciate your supportive comments today and the other week too, so if you'd like to join my forum, you'd be very welcome. 🙂 We've got a small, but very friendly community on there I'm sure you'd feel right at home with.

Thank you for the invitation!
I just created an account, waiting for approval. Forum looks indeed interesting, definitely going to be active there! 😄
 
Thankyou very much! I've activated your account now and turned off the spam premoderation so you can post at will. 🙂
 
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