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Input on the 4/11/20 Forums Upgrade
Hi folks,
The decision to upgrade our forum software was not an easy one. We've been discussing it for several years, as our old platform was getting dusty and was no longer capable of meeting some of the needs of our community. One of the biggest was its inability to work with smartphones and tablet devices, none of which existed when the software was written. As a result, many of you began using apps that reformatted the content to fit your device. This created an issue for our members, who had to download a third-party app just to interact with our forums. It also created an issue for the site itself, as these apps strip out some of the advertising content. Ads are one of our primary ways to keep the site up and running, and they don’t produce if our readers don’t see them. This is a known issue for sites where the community is accustomed to free content. The solutions to it are complex.
One of our solutions was to shift some of the burden to our members; the people who consume the content on the site and who use our platform for communicating. We began the Supporting Member program, to give our members the opportunity to participate in supporting the site. We thank you for that, and it has resulted in us shifting to more targeted advertising and less bulk. This has allowed us to create ad products that have greater value to our advertisers.
Meanwhile, the forum software was becoming a liability, and something needed to be done. We held out as long as possible, but finally were forced into making a significant change when VBulletin discontinued support for our platform.
We had two choices; move up to the next level with VBulletin or move to another platform. We came close to moving to a completely different platform, but we discovered that the negatives outweighed the positives, especially when it came to the impact on our community. In the end, we opted to continue with upgrading the existing platform.
As you have seen, the new platform is different in many ways. There is also a lot under the hood that we have yet to unpack. Our plan is to keep it as similar to the old site as we can, while rolling out new features as we can. At the same time, it has a familiar feel, and users should not be too negatively impacted. The upgraded platform is also responsive, which means that it plays well with your phone and your tablet device. That should be a plus for our mobile users.
All that is to say that we value your experience here, and we are interested in the pros and cons you are seeing as you explore the new interface. Please use this thread to list your issues and concerns of a technical or practical nature, and we will evaluate those as we go along. I can’t promise that we will do everything you request, but this community is very important to all of us. We appreciate every one of you.
Thanks in advance for your thoughts, concerns, and issues.
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The decision to upgrade our forum software was not an easy one. We've been discussing it for several years, as our old platform was getting dusty and was no longer capable of meeting some of the needs of our community. One of the biggest was its inability to work with smartphones and tablet devices, none of which existed when the software was written. As a result, many of you began using apps that reformatted the content to fit your device. This created an issue for our members, who had to download a third-party app just to interact with our forums. It also created an issue for the site itself, as these apps strip out some of the advertising content. Ads are one of our primary ways to keep the site up and running, and they don’t produce if our readers don’t see them. This is a known issue for sites where the community is accustomed to free content. The solutions to it are complex.
One of our solutions was to shift some of the burden to our members; the people who consume the content on the site and who use our platform for communicating. We began the Supporting Member program, to give our members the opportunity to participate in supporting the site. We thank you for that, and it has resulted in us shifting to more targeted advertising and less bulk. This has allowed us to create ad products that have greater value to our advertisers.
Meanwhile, the forum software was becoming a liability, and something needed to be done. We held out as long as possible, but finally were forced into making a significant change when VBulletin discontinued support for our platform.
We had two choices; move up to the next level with VBulletin or move to another platform. We came close to moving to a completely different platform, but we discovered that the negatives outweighed the positives, especially when it came to the impact on our community. In the end, we opted to continue with upgrading the existing platform.
As you have seen, the new platform is different in many ways. There is also a lot under the hood that we have yet to unpack. Our plan is to keep it as similar to the old site as we can, while rolling out new features as we can. At the same time, it has a familiar feel, and users should not be too negatively impacted. The upgraded platform is also responsive, which means that it plays well with your phone and your tablet device. That should be a plus for our mobile users.
All that is to say that we value your experience here, and we are interested in the pros and cons you are seeing as you explore the new interface. Please use this thread to list your issues and concerns of a technical or practical nature, and we will evaluate those as we go along. I can’t promise that we will do everything you request, but this community is very important to all of us. We appreciate every one of you.
Thanks in advance for your thoughts, concerns, and issues.
×
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