The Demise Of Forums

[slotmadmac]

 

Yep I'm happy to contribute also.

 

Drifter

 

Me too.

[BEEJAY7]

I contribute very little to the Forum these days in way of content but would be happy to help a fund to update the Forum software even though I live in the UK. Direct linking of photos must be the way forward.

i find the exchange of information on here refreshing and you have some excellent contributors. Always great to see what is happening around the World, from people I consider to be friends.

 

Regards

 

Alan

[SlotsNZ]

Kind words Alan - especially after you have had the misfortune to meet so many of us as you toured about

 

Was through your way a couple of weeks back, but it was a miserable afternoon, someone had left the shower running in the sky, so we "did the baths at Bath" and retreated to Corsham for food and bed, then headed up to "Downton Abbey" the next morning. [for the wife you understand]

[branco]

Happy to pay, without this forum i'd have to go outside and take part in life, please save me!!!

[Vinno]

Hi guys.

 

The offer to pay is generous and it's encouraging to see that social media really doesn't cut it for the type of information required. From the comments in this thread it appears it is time to look at what we can do to bring the forum up to date without losing the key areas that have made this place successful. We have had our fair share of issues over the years but we definitely have a place and there are some who have been here from the start who we are indebted to for their support. We will get back to you on this.

 

Vinno.

[Benno]

**without this forum i'd have to go outside and take part in life, please save me!!!**

 

You my friend win the internet :D

[Pedro51]

Happy to pay, without this forum i'd have to go outside and take part in life, please save me!!!

 

ditto, happy to chip in.

[SlotsNZ]

I think many of us regulars would.... hand up as well.

 

The only downside to that being, that if the "system" was simply a subscription fee to enable you to access online storage, then we could become a shrinking, aging community, as new people, or those less regular or generally committed, many of those wouldn't want to pay to begin posting pics, so simply wouldn't get into the habit of posting.

There are also undoubtedly some regulars here who are on fixed incomes, and would like to contribute, but are unable to do so - we sure don't want to leave them out in the cold.

 

So it seems to me, any members contribution needs to be a donation towards the forum costs per se, distanced from the service of hosting, so that the forum can then provide an open photo hosting service available to all.

 

The amount of space required for forum hosting would be drastically decreased if photo sizes for forum hosted pics were restricted to say 960 x 640 or 1280 x 720 pixels

For the less techy, that means you need to be able to shrink your pictures with some (freebie) software if you want to host on the forum.

As example typical iPhone 6 picture or one from an average digital camera for instance is between 2 and 3 megabytes

A photo as the above pixels is only about say 1/4 of a mb - 250k.

i found and have tried this one. http://download.cnet...4-10319476.html

 

Unlike my flash photo software, once you choose your parameters, it is easy to resize a whole batch of pictures in about 10 seconds flat. It is free, and seems not to be a time limited demo.

 

But people who have other means of hosting pics still need to be able to post on that basis.

[BEEJAY7]

Mark I thought most clever software driven Forums automatically size your photo's and compress the data size. If so it would't matter what size your photos were.

May well be wrong of course, but isn't this what Ebay does?..

 

Regards

 

Alan

 

PS why didn't you let me know you were in the UK.....

[SlotsNZ]

Hi Alan

 

not sure if this software is that sophisticated - Jacob is the expert.

 

I did message you through here back in May. But we were on a pretty tight schedule around that bit of country, and Glenda has already had to put up with me running off two weekends, another one I dragged her up to Reggio - and about 30 model shops across Europe so far..... I only have a limited number of brownie points credit.....

 

So I didn't really like to suggest another detour.

- Hey - that little one way bridge over the river heading north out of town is a killer, took us half an hour to get across and we had to pay the vigilante's in yellow macs in roman gold coins . . seemed a bit dodgy to me.........

[munter]

Cameras have "size" settings....so use those and forget about your phone....oh no, that would be leaving out a large section of the community ie phone zombies.

 

Sometimes low tech is good tech

[dangermouse]

You can get free apps to resize images on your iPhone, however a simple way to resize photos on the iPhone is to email them to yourself - there is an option to change the size.

I prefer to upload to the forum from my computer rather than my phone anyway - easier to type messages in so no big deal to email the photos to myself.

[munter]

I am not so sure that forums will die out...its just that there is a change happening.

[aussieslotter]

The ultimate would be a cross between FB and forum. Best of both worlds. Trouble with forums ( not this one) is MODERATORS who over moderate.

Or even a forum where you can choose what subjects and members you wish to ignore.

[Vinno]

The ultimate would be a cross between FB and forum. Best of both worlds. Trouble with forums ( not this one) is MODERATORS who over moderate.

Or even a forum where you can choose what subjects and members you wish to ignore.

 

I think threads sometimes go a little far sometimes but it is always the should we do something or should we leave it problem? You don't want to get involved as sometimes healthy debate needs to be let go but when offence is taken it gets to that point that you need to do something.

 

By the way we are discussing what we can do in regards to making some changes so don't think we are sweeping it under the carpet.

[aussieslotter]

Gazza (and Vinno too) you guys do an amazing job and as you say as a moderator to keep things balanced is not easy. I reckon you guys have the perfect balance of freedom of speech and not being a nanny forum like the other one is turning into. Best but not biggest is Auslot for that reason.

 

Content, it's up to us.

 

Rick

Edited August 10, 2017 by aussieslotter

[Wat44]

I’ve been on various fora since the late 1990s. When I began on the internet, it was mainly message boards. But who uses those now?

 

FB is useless. Instagram is great for photos, short videos but not good for keeping things organised like a forum.

 

Every forum I’ve seen suffers from regulars dominating and new members feeling intimidated. It’s hard to keep them going. I think the best is insta for day to day with a forum that isn’t all that busy as a repository, and less of a club.

Edited January 13, 2018 by Wat44

[Wat44]

https://www.newstatesman.com/science-tech/internet/2017/02/someone-would-always-answer-sad-death-internet-message-board

[Slotspeed]

Interesting thread. I work in media and that industry is also changing with the way that people "consume content". I guess slot cars are a niche and will always have a following on forums in some way since it is a technical pursuit. One way to promote is to diversify the way you deliver your content (multiplatform, fragmentation etc) including linking to your site from facebook and other platforms. But obviously regular social media updates are required to generate traffic to your site. This topic is huge and I'll stop before it becomes a ramble. Facebook and other social media platforms have an advantage in audience share (my opinion here) because it taps into and strengthens the part of people's brain that is looking for instant passive stimulation... Interesting (but often fairly meaningless) but very addictive as it requires very little effort to consume it. Do I sound like an old bugger?

[SlotsNZ]

.......... Do I sound like an old bugger?

 

No, you sound like a clever one. Makes sense to strengthen the mix

https://www.facebook.com/auslot/

 

Except I lost track of who leads the way on updating FB now, as the moderator who used to make sure it was current, wandered off into culinary pursuits.

 

Does Twitter actually work in this part of the world? My personal status is "don't need nothing stuffed down my throat, I want 'pull' not 'pushed' information."

But the celebrity worshipers seem to soak it up like aussie jokers do beer on a hot day.

 

I just don't know many people who use it.

[Vinno]

I have been doing a bit of updating on the Facebook page recently but I still prefer the forum as a reference tool. Facebook posts get buried and it is too hard to find stuff. Biggest issue is photo posting on forums as it costs money to buy space to host photos as the free ones are becoming pretty useless.

 

You know we actually started this place as we bought some photo hosting space and Jacob and his cousin Michael set up the forum for a bit of fun one night while myself and Bo were racing cars in the garage.

[GAS41T]

That’s no good for people that don’t have Facebook

[Wat44]

Posting pics and vids to Instagram could be useful especially is we use a hashtag we all know eg #auslot

[Peter Gunn]

As a dim one is it because of the pictures issue that according to some forums like Auslot are loosing out, i do Slotforum sometimes but more so now you can put pictures straight onto your tag dead easy even for ole geezers like me.

[Ember]

Hi kids. Just dropped by for a quick hello from a 'deserter'

 

Yup. I hit a wall, burned up and then life got in the way. Still trying to get the mojo back. I do try to keep dropping some stuff on the Auslot FB page, but it all tends to look the same after a while.

 

SFI has direct photo uploading on most forums now.

 

SFI has been a commercial entity for at least 5 or 6 years now. They have always asked for subscriptions which allowed them to provide some storage space for members. However, the space that they currently offer for image hosting is because they are owned lock stock and barrel by a media company. Hosting your own image base takes a hullova load of space and bandwidth. That take a bucket load of cash.

 

SlotsNZ, your images posted from Facebook don't display from here, but that may be due to the pith-poor internet connection that I suffer in the boondocks.

 

For anyone that's interested Hopetoun track is still alive, although they were touch and go there for a while, and they're expanding their track repertoire.