Forum
Printed From: Yachts and Yachting Online
Category: Your ideas for this website
Forum Name: Your thoughts for YachtsandYachting.com
Forum Discription: What do you think we should be featuring on YachtsandYachting.com
URL: http://www.yachtsandyachting.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=8865
Printed Date: 25 Jun 25 at 6:17pm
Software Version: Web Wiz Forums 9.665y - http://www.webwizforums.com
Topic: Forum
Posted By: AlexM
Subject: Forum
Date Posted: 05 Jan 12 at 1:57pm
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I would like to set up a forum for our club web site has anyone got any reccomendations for which free software to use? Web Wiz ? Thanks
Alex
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Replies:
Posted By: ex laser
Date Posted: 05 Jan 12 at 2:37pm
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do not do it!!!!! club forums are a no win situation. either they are moderated, people get upset, and no body posts or it free for all and people get even more upset. ( the problem with forums are you get people like us using them!  )i think your better off with a facebook page, and use it like a message board for the club. ------------- |
Posted By: winging it
Date Posted: 05 Jan 12 at 3:11pm
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yeah, we have a forum which is totally lifeless. Our facebook pages, on the other hand are great. There is an official one for proper notices and messages, then there is a random, unofficial one, which is of course more popular.People put up pics etc,a nd this week we've been posting the state of the boat park on it - all ok, thank goodness. ------------- the same, but different... |
Posted By: rogue
Date Posted: 05 Jan 12 at 3:24pm
couldn't agree more... The Draycote forum used to have some life in it, a bit of healthy banter like most active forums. But then the guys that had the onerous task of 'moderating it' (used loosely, 'manage it' would be a better descriptor of the historic role- kill spammers, reset passwords etc) were told to start over editing and deleting sections as some of the views of some of the posts were considered 'contentious' by the new committee. What this actually did was alienate some quite good content and some good ideas, if a little challenging. When this approach was later questioned, (free speech n' all that) some people were subjected to personal emails that were rude and curt from the 'powers that be'.... all for the sake of feckin' forum. all sense of perspective seemed lost and the forum's effectively tumbleweeded ever since.... clearly the signs of a healthy, active membership 
I don't bother posting on there anymore, in fact the whole sorry episode has made a number of people question whether the draconian nature of how club members's views are/were handled is really something they want to be part of in the grander scheme of things. We set up a facebook page for the windsurfers instead... which seems far more successful and channels the relevant content far more appropriately. |
Posted By: ASok
Date Posted: 05 Jan 12 at 3:54pm
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More agreement - avoid over moderated forums. Its not worth the hassle and will kill off any discussion and traffic.
Mods killed the Dart 18 class forum. It used to be a place of great discussion, knowledge sharing and banter. Yes, it had its share of trolls and haters but you could see through that! ------------- |
Posted By: ASok
Date Posted: 05 Jan 12 at 3:55pm
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...oh and we also have a club forum and it hardly gets any traffic! ------------- |
Posted By: Contender443
Date Posted: 05 Jan 12 at 4:23pm
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Well at Lancing we have a very successful and well used forum. Not moderated much to my knowledge and it works because we are a small club and everyone sees everyone each week. So nothing is said on there that would not be said face to face.
It is more of an information transfer tool rather than a discussion tool. It is backed up with a good webiste, Facebook page and regular information emails from our sailing secretary. ------------- Bonnie Lass Contender 1764 |
Posted By: AlexM
Date Posted: 05 Jan 12 at 5:55pm
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We do have a Facebook page, but it has little use, maybe some of the oldies arent on fb ;)
My plan is only allow users to register there own names as their user name. If you can't say it as yourself it's not worth saying :) Alex ------------- |
Posted By: marke
Date Posted: 05 Jan 12 at 7:45pm
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Ours seems to be a useful addition to the website - www.starcrossyc.org.uk. We use phpBB3 interfaced to Joomla using JFusion - there are other more directly integrated solutions for Joomla and WordPress has an Ok integrated BB. When you pick a BB tool - take great care to see that it has good spam protection facilities otherwise the administration becomes very tedious. The forum usage comes and goes - but when there is an issue worth debating it gets used a lot. We have a public and registered members only sections - they seem to be used appropriately without a lot of admin work. I am a moderator of our site and in 8 years I have not needed to change a single post - "play nicely" seems to work well at our club. |
Posted By: maxibuddah
Date Posted: 05 Jan 12 at 10:03pm
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We don't don't bother with a forum at our club, we use Yahoo groups which gives an email discussion thing. Very good too and you can select how you want the emails delivered. I did try with a forum for a while but nobody used it so I deleted it. For the Phantom website I use SMF 2. Easy to configure, nearly completely spam free with version 2 except with those who manually try to register. However I vet all registrations and only let those in who look like they are serious. Sure I've thrown some genuine ones out in mistake though in the past. Having run both systems, I would say that a forum is useful for organisations spread over the country, or massive clubs whereas the email system seems to work nicely at club level. ------------- Everything I say is my opinion, honest |