Lets face it, most forums are stuggling to compete with users inrenet time.
FaceBook, Reddit, Tik Tok, Whats App, Instagram.
Forums offer so many advantges for long temr discussion and stoege of information.
The problem is that so many people just want to post a meme or a quick one liner.
If hundreds of forum owners cannot come up with a way of comepteing with all the ssiclal media, then how do you expect that two guys in Xenforo can?
We just have to make our forums as useful as we can, and hope that pople will get bored with Social Media over time.
That said it would be nice if XF gave us a heads up on any plans or asked for ideas, or even acted on some of the suggestions on the list.
I think it's crucial to update the whats-new page, or create something new...
people today are looking for fast paced updates, immediate responses.
The forum setup is less popular as it can only be that much active.
A page with the latest content (latest threads (rather than posts) that have been posted in, latest resources, latest articles etc.) would be great with a button to display the replies (jump to new replies) in same page rather than in separate page.
Sort of similar to the facebook feed.
The interesting thing would be to be able to use Telegram or WhatsApp as a complement to the forum. Use these platforms as a user alert system that is linked to the forum.
WhatsApp and Telegram are not the same type of content as a forum; if you are losing activity to that, then there was an issue with the content you were offering.
Presumably so they could get out their baseball bat and search the are for the dastardly scallywag.
I did not understand why a WhatsApp alert would be any more instant than a forum email alert. However quite a few people id suggest having a WhatsApp group for the neighbourhood watch. probably because they are familiar but also with no concept of how useful it is to have the forum archive - you can serach to find certain patterns of crime etc...
I pointed out that fine, they could start a WhatsApp, but it it mean ditching the forum - I don't see how the two could work together as some people would use one, some people use the other.
The interesting thing would be to be able to use Telegram or WhatsApp as a complement to the forum. Use these platforms as a user alert system that is linked to the forum.
Loss of activity is generally a sign of lacking content, and that there is an issue with the community itself. What reasons does your community have to be active? Do you have people who are pushing activity, and engaging others to join the conversations.
Although I find agreement with what you're saying.
It appears you've also entirely missed the OPs actual inquiry.
"Competition from Whatsapp, Telegram and Facebook" "It is undeniable that with the advent of messaging systems such as Whatsapp or Telegram, but also Facebook with groups, the activity on forums has decreased significantly."
"Yet forums have incredible advantages over both messaging systems and Facebook groups where finding something, for example, is impossible."
"I would like to understand from the development team, what are the next moves to face the competition of these systems and make a medium like the forum always current and usable."
WhatsApp and Telegram are not the same type of content as a forum; if you are losing activity to that, then there was an issue with the content you were offering.
How does one find out the necessary tracking information to identify where members may frequent?
Does it involve cookies tracking everyone? &/or the Google Analytics thing?
No doubt many would be quite interested to learn how to achieve as you've suggested here, so we may all monitor, track and precisely identify just where it is our errant former captives scampered off.
As we all know, it quickly becomes rather tedious hunting down each individual escapee, but then luring them back is the most time exhausting, automating things would more readily facilitate cutting to the chase.
Oh, also...
"WhatsApp and Telegram are not the same type of content as a forum;"
...does this mean: of how these different platforms vary in content presentation?...or?
Facebook is hit and miss; if you have a lot of people who are active on Facebook, and they decide to setup a group on Facebook they are less inclined to go to your site as they are already active on Facebook . Finding ways to keep your community engaged and giving them a reason for activity will often help with this, but it depends on the subject matter and focus of your forum.
There is nothing XenForo (or other forum software) can do to make every community compete against x, y and z platform. In just the last year I have seen people want XenForo to be more like Reddit, more like Facebook, more like Twitter, and more like Discord. It is literally an impossible task to expect a single software to compete against every other competing platform, especially when those platforms are not even of the same focus or type of content.
Well, I don't know but it seems like Xenforo is actually designed as a vehicle that may enable fulfillment of all of this, and a good deal more too.
I still haven't seen a single site pull any of this off successfully yet and the strangest thing is that well established communal defeatist belief thing.
Ya know the one.
It's like when dad drops a doom fart in the car.
Everyones a bit upset.
Dad's laughing.
Mom's dry wretchin'.
Little sisters are cryin'.
Everyone's clawin' at the windows in futile desperation.
Dad's laughing harder, already disabling window controls and locking the doors.
No escape.
After a decade trapped, everyone's fairly depressed about it all.
Everyone seems to have given up, even encouraging each other to accept defeat when we could simply either kick the windows out or overwhelm dad with our vastly superior numbers.
Or another way to put it is how almost everyone here seems to be actively pretending we've already thoroughly explored beyond just the teenie tiny tippy top of the XenForiceberg... even someone as severely retarded as myself can see we have barely begun exploring.
The issue I see with voice recordings is they don't add to a searchable database of information which in my opinion is what forums are all about.
The information built up by the communities is what sets apart forums from the social media platforms. Try searching on FB for example re a certain topic or issue, then try the same search in a forum. The two are pole apart.
Yes that is all fair and good, but perhaps not all see things this same way.
Others may prioritize differently.
I wonder how well provisioned for sight challenged individuals may be who might wish to participate with and contribute to our precious data storage silo's?, fora?
Of course as I regard all others as mere objects, I imagine the sight impaired are perfectly capable of reading & writing text...and if they can't, well, who cares.
We could simply provide an audio option for paying customers who may require such support technologies as text-to-speech/speech-to-text as well as basic audio messaging.
This would achieve unlocking an entire new potential customer base and additionally enables optional drastic competitive modernization relative to social media.
However, we shan't, as our precious data is all that matters isn't it.
. Finding ways to keep your community engaged and giving them a reason for activity will often help with this, but it depends on the subject matter and focus of your forum.
even someone as severely retarded as myself can see we have barely begun exploring.
