XF 2.3 ?

[TPerry]

IPS doesn't have @Bob .

Ding...ding...ding...ding... we have a winner. And that's one of the main reasons I stick with XF. If we didn't have him, I probably would have switched already, even if I ended up having to elect the SaaS offering from IPS.

 

[MarenLBC]

Nope.You are comparing apples with oranges. Social Media like Facebook, Instagram, Tiktok is something different than forums.

We are only comparing here different forums among each other.

No forum will be able to offer what FB et alli can offer: billions of users on one single platform. This is why people go there.

Not because social media has a better article system or social groups within a forum or a media gallery.

Social Media can not offer anything to preserve knowledge or know-how. They live from the quantity of users who are willing to answer every day the same answer, because you have no search feature worth to use.

And SM is more for the daily "nonsense", which nobody is interested in on the next day.

These are 2 different worlds and in the aspect of content, they do not compete at all with forums.

You’re creating a technical delineation that the market doesn’t follow by. For instance, users can choose to talk about let’s say music on a music forum or on social media and many music forums died off because the users chose social media.

You can call them two different things all you want but the users see them both as tools to interface and exchange ideas online. Reddit did an excellent job at blending the content discoverability enhancements that comes with social media with the archival and structure of forums to create the best of both worlds.

We have a great example in Reddit of how forums can evolve in the modern era to cater to the wider market.

Sometimes I have the feeling people always look for new features to avoid to look for the real reason why their forums do not grow.

I have forums which grow and forums which decline. All forums use Xenforo with the same settings and addons.

The drivers are the niche you are in, the content you or your members create, the quality of the moderators and the marketing you can do for your forums. I can clearly distinguish my good and my bad forums with these criteria.

No matter how many features I would add, without changing the mentioned criteria, my bad forums would not improve.

This is part of our job. Be honest with yourself and face the reality. Success does not come by accident or with features beyond what we have already with XF 2.2.13

There are many features I can think of I would like to have. In most cases to make my life or the life of my moderators easier, to leverage my marketing and of course to please my ego with fancy addons none of my users would stay or leave the forum.

All of this is you using straw man arguments to defend your points. People wanting to know if native WebP support, an updated editor, an upgraded feed system, and etc is not looking for excuses for why their forums aren’t growing.

It’s wanting to know where the platform that supports our businesses is headed. Is it headed towards the future or is this the best it is going to get? The answer to either informs the next step for your community.

 

[MarenLBC]

Once more, providing for simple forum (or even 1st party add-ons also) would not have been that difficult... the issue with forums and dedicated add-ons is the simple fact the sheer number of available add-ons that they would have to support OR restrict it to the base script and 1st party add-ons. That's where those "big social media" sites have a benefit. It's not an apples->apples comparison.

I’m aware but the end user doesn’t care. Apple just made a headset that can project your whole desktop into the ether but somehow 3rd party apps are the Mount Everest of software development.

3rd party add-ons does not prevent a forum software developer from making a native app. They can make one and clearly state that 3rd party add-on’s are not supported. Or get this, they can figure out what the top 3rd party add ons are and make a roadmap for integrating them into the native app.

 

[snoopy5]

We have a great example in Reddit of how forums can evolve in the modern era to cater to the wider market.

Yes reddit is a good comparison. I never understood how they could become successful. Each time I try to read there I hate it.

The success of reddit is a mystery for me. If this kind of forum is your target, I would rather exit the forum business than running a reddit forum. But that is just me.

It’s wanting to know where the platform that supports our businesses is headed. Is it headed towards the future or is this the best it is going to get? The answer to either informs the next step for your community.

I understand this and this is a logical thinking. But as I wrote earlier, I doubt that this will happen. History has shown, that they behave always the same.

No matter how many good suggestions we are posting, they think they know better what our users or we, the admins and at the same time the paying customer of Xenforo, would like to see.

 

[Wing]

The same reason that Reddit is more popular than the conventional forum now a days with the new generation of people, is how this world is heading. Literally nothing makes any sense anymore - and people run off emotional discourse instead of organized thoughts and building together.

People would rather seek answers on Discord than search through Forums. Instant gratification - and Reddit is no different.

 

[MarenLBC]

Yes reddit is a good comparison. I never understood how they could become successful. Each time I try to read there I hate it.

The success of reddit is a mystery for me. If this kind of forum is your target, I would rather exit the forum business than running a reddit forum. But that is just me.




I understand this and this is a logical thinking. But as I wrote earlier, I doubt that this will happen. History has shown, that they behave always the same.

No matter how many good suggestions we are posting, they think they know better what our users or we, the admins and at the same time the paying customer of Xenforo, would like to see.

The appeal of Reddit to me isn’t complex. One benefit social media has over traditional forums is content discovery which is the feed. Social media’s feed allows the platform to get relevant content in front of the user instantenously whereas traditional forums require a user to navigate to a sub forum of choice before they get to the content.

So Reddit took that concept, added it ontop of the forum concept, and gave the best of both worlds. In addition it gave everyone the ability to create their own sub forum which widened the appeal tremendously. Reddit put the content first and forum second where as traditional forums put the forum first and content second.

 

[Suzanne O]

My members hated XenForo when we changed from vbulletin. But they learned to appreciate it and in the end were very happy. My members actually asked me to migrate to IPS because they found it much easier to use on mobile. But I declined as I dread another migration and IPS doesn't have @Bob .

We had a choice of going to different places. on the old forum i put a poll up and asked where to next.
Majority wanted me to go to xf.
So i did.
i ended up having mainly some ratbags join it to drive others away.
i'm still with xf. I have other forums with other software.
None of our nominations went with ips because at the time it wasn't that great. You still have to pay a large amount of money every 6 months which is not on.
Hence the reason why we're with xf.
I literally followed a mate over to xf.
he has one of the biggest sites out there. Bigfooty is his site.

 

[Suzanne O]

Yes reddit is a good comparison. I never understood how they could become successful. Each time I try to read there I hate it.

The success of reddit is a mystery for me. If this kind of forum is your target, I would rather exit the forum business than running a reddit forum. But that is just me.




I understand this and this is a logical thinking. But as I wrote earlier, I doubt that this will happen. History has shown, that they behave always the same.

No matter how many good suggestions we are posting, they think they know better what our users or we, the admins and at the same time the paying customer of Xenforo, would like to see.

Reddit's a load of garbage.
Try it yourself @NobleMan considering you spend time laughing at my posts. Go and give reddit a try. Wait you don't like it? Oh good then you know it's a load of rubbish.
Reddit's an overmoderated heap of garbage.

 

[TPerry]

I’m aware but the end user doesn’t care. Apple just made a headset that can project your whole desktop into the ether but somehow 3rd party apps are the Mount Everest of software development.

Well....let's see... a company worth $2.82 TRILLION and roughly 164K employees compared to companies that MAY be worth a few million and have between 4-15 employees.... and you want to talk about straw men?

They can make one and clearly state that 3rd party add-on’s are not supported. Or get this, they can figure out what the top 3rd party add ons are and make a roadmap for integrating them into the native app.

Already been done and it failed. Do you seem to remember what ForumRunner turned into and who purchased them. Didn't work for them, and pretty sure that was around a decade ago.

In fact one competitor was looking at creating their own app. From what I understand it died on the vine, one part being due to the cost and issues of admins to get those apps into the appropriate app stores. Apparently no money to be made.
Same "success" with TapaCrap..... but the point is, why do you want to give your users the stick and the weiner and leave the batter off the corn dog?

 

[TPerry]

None of our nominations went with ips because at the time it wasn't that great. You still have to pay a large amount of money every 6 months which is not on.

By the time I count the cost of the add-ons in, the renewal for XF and the 1st party add-ons... it's pretty much a wash for me.
And without looking at the bottom to see what script is in use, the majority of users don’t know.

 

[MarenLBC]

Well....let's see... a company worth $2.82 TRILLION and roughly 164K employees compared to companies that MAY be worth a few million and have between 4-15 employees.... and you want to talk about straw men?


Already been done and it failed. Do you seem to remember what ForumRunner turned into and who purchased them. Didn't work for them, and pretty sure that was around a decade ago.

In fact one competitor was looking at creating their own app. From what I understand it died on the vine, one part being due to the cost and issues of admins to get those apps into the appropriate app stores. Apparently no money to be made.
Same "success" with TapaCrap..... but the point is, why do you want to give your users the stick and the weiner and leave the batter off the corn dog?

Well I’m biased because I have a native app for my xenforo forum with feeds and etc so I know it can be done and done well.

 

[Suzanne O]

Well I’m biased because I have a native app for my xenforo forum with feeds and etc so I know it can be done and done well.

It's also a very good one. Tried and tested and could rival the PWA one that these guys are trialing.

I still use tapatalk too. Why? Because PWA has issues with both android and apple software.
It's also free.

 

[Grant]

Reddit's a load of garbage.
Try it yourself @NobleMan considering you spend time laughing at my posts. Go and give reddit a try. Wait you don't like it? Oh good then you know it's a load of rubbish.
Reddit's an overmoderated heap of garbage.

430 million people don’t think that Reddit is garbage.

I read various Reddit forums every day. There’s a lot Reddit does right that traditional forums could take note of. (Eg, feed, upvoting, awards, user created forums )

 

[Mr Lucky]

430 million people don’t think that Reddit is garbage.

I read various Reddit forums every day. There’s a lot Reddit does right that traditional forums could take note of. (Eg, feed, upvoting, awards, user created forums )

• Feed: isn't that New Posts, Latest Activity etc?
• Upvoting: As we have on xenForo suggestion and question threads/forums?
• Awards: Trophies? (although I and my users see no point)
• User created forums: Sounds like mayhem. Of course we listen to our members (via a poll sometimes) and if they suggest a new forum or subform we would take note and add them

 

[TPerry]

Well I’m biased because I have a native app for my xenforo forum with feeds and etc so I know it can be done and done well.

And exactly how many of these base functions would translate across?

 

[snoopy5]

This discussion is getting now constructive. I do think we should talk about the success drivers of Reddit, because in my view, that is the best comparison to a normal forum and it is extremely successful.

Without tons of features, without great templates. Nevertheless, they are the most successful forum I am aware of. They grew fast while social media like FB etc. was already there.

Social media’s feed allows the platform to get relevant content in front of the user instantenously whereas traditional forums require a user to navigate to a sub forum of choice before they get to the content.

FB etc do this with algorythms. But this is not the case with reddit. So why did reddit succeed nevertheless?

So Reddit took that concept, added it ontop of the forum concept, and gave the best of both worlds

I am not sure about this. Can you elaborate? If a user types reddit into the browser, does he gets an individual front page? Only with content that is relevant for him? I do not see this. For me it looks like a normal forum index page, but with a better layout.



On the left you have the subforums, in the middle you have a mini FB or Twitter. The user has to decide for a subforum and then he only gets to see what we would call "whats new" or "new posts". But in reality it is only the title of a thread and not the post itself.



The only "new idea" is on the left side at the top (the link to popular feeds) and on the right side the link to other communities.

BUT if you click on the title of a thread (which they call "posts"), you get at the very first posting of a thread and have suddenly a layout similar to Facebook and Twitter.

Reddit's a load of garbage.

Does not matter. I do not like reddit neither and would never participate in it. But if users do go there in masses, we have to analyse what reddit is doing better than we do.

Well I’m biased because I have a native app for my xenforo forum with feeds and etc

Can you post a link?

430 million people don’t think that Reddit is garbage.

Exactly.

• Feed: isn't that New Posts, Latest Activity etc?
• Upvoting: As we have on xenForo suggestion and question threads/forums?
• Awards: Trophies? (although I and my users see no point)
• User created forums: Sounds like mayhem. Of course we listen to our members (via a poll sometimes) and if they suggest a new forum or subform we would take note and add them

This is what I try to find out.

There are other new forum software out there who try to simulate a little bit reddit. I do not remember the name anymore. It did not seem successful the last time I looked at it a couple of years ago.

 

[Grant]

• Feed: isn't that New Posts, Latest Activity etc?

Kind of, but more orientated to what the user wants to see. What's New / Latest Activity could be made so much better

• Upvoting: As we have on xenForo suggestion and question threads/forums?

I'll give you that!

• Awards: Trophies? (although I and my users see no point)

Members can buy awards other members for insightful posts

• User created forums: Sounds like mayhem. Of course we listen to our members (via a poll sometimes) and if they suggest a new forum or subform we would take note and add them

Yes it sounds like mayhem, but something like a group functionality has been requested for a long while (and there's two add-ons for it). Members could create sub-groups outside of the default forum structure for really niche element of the hobby or whatever your board is about (local chapters, sub genres) - perhaps if a user group becomes popular it could easily be made into one of the default boards

 

[snoopy5]

Kind of, but more orientated to what the user wants to see.

No. It is not oriented what the user wants to see. It is randomly the most popular postings. See my screenshots above. The headlines are "trending today" and "popular posts"

Members can buy awards other members for insightful posts

This should be easily possible with an addon.

Members could create sub-groups outside of the default forum structure for really niche element of the hobby or whatever your board is about

For me the question is: Did reddit had this feature right from the beginning or did they introduce this only after they became so big, that it was impossible to handle this otherwise?

 

[Grant]

No. It is not oriented what the user wants to see. It is randomly the most popular postings. See my screenshots above. The headlines are "trending today" and "popular posts"

It is if you're a member. It shows you posts from the forums you are subscribed to, people you follow, and occasionally posts outside of these it thinks you might be interested in.

If you are not logged in, it shows you things that are currently popular.

This should be easily possible with an addon.

When VB3 was at its peak, you could essentially trust most third party add-on writers would be sticking around and updating stuff.Today for XF, outside of a few core add-on writers, I don't feel able to rely on third party addons to stick around.

For me the question is: Did reddit had this feature right from the beginning or did they introduce this only after they became so big, that it was impossible to handle this otherwise?

Not at the beginning, but in 2008, three years after it launched. They have got a lot bigger since that.

 

[Grant]

Reddit is probaby everyones biggest competitor in the forum space right now. It is essentially a massive forum for every subject imaginable. Whether you like reddit or don't like it, it really makes sense for forum owners to spend a decent amount of time there and find out what makes it tick.

There's a lot of things that trad forums do better than Reddit too - don't get me wrong, but dismissing it completely is shortsighted.