new forums
ive suggested this before but it seems to have
been ignored so heres another try
(or maybe the thread was lost during conversion)
lets get 2 new forums online
1.Gaming
2.Developers
mods....think carefully about this before dissmissing it...the idea is to attract new people
with fresh ideas otherwise the whole point of a forum is moot when theres no healthy discussion.
to see what i mean goto forums.gentoo.org
its one of the best forums i have ever used & the
discussion is always lively & worth following.
thanks for reading
been ignored so heres another try
(or maybe the thread was lost during conversion)
lets get 2 new forums online
1.Gaming
2.Developers
mods....think carefully about this before dissmissing it...the idea is to attract new people
with fresh ideas otherwise the whole point of a forum is moot when theres no healthy discussion.
to see what i mean goto forums.gentoo.org
its one of the best forums i have ever used & the
discussion is always lively & worth following.
thanks for reading
Comments
<strong>nothing against your idea, but I think there aren't that much developers around here...</strong><hr></blockquote>
True, but then if we had a forum, it might attract some. <img src="graemlins/hmmm.gif" border="0" alt="[Hmmm]" />
<strong>
True, but then if we had a forum, it might attract some. <img src="graemlins/hmmm.gif" border="0" alt="[Hmmm]" /> </strong><hr></blockquote>
that's true too <img src="graemlins/hmmm.gif" border="0" alt="[Hmmm]" />
it doesnt really cost anything to create 2 new
forums.
Posting from a wintel machine at school (one of two total that the school has.) Windows 98...just spent the last half hour getting this thing to connect.
The problem is that when people think "Gaming" or "Developers", they don't think "AppleInsider.com". You can argue that if we had these two forums, that maybe people would. However, the problem is that we don't really have the 'community' to support these either.
Think about it, how do we even attract new users? I honestly have no idea, and I'd really like to know. When AI had a front page and was publishing rumors, this in and of itself attracted more members, because we had content on the site to "support" that. Ever since front end content stopped, the forums have lived on, but they haven't really changed much, and continue to attract similar types of people that they did before.
That said, were I to go somewhere for "Developers", I'd probably start with a newsgroup, or go to a more technical site like Ars. In terms of gaming, well, there are plenty of good mac gaming sites that cover this, not to mention that fact that the mac gaming market is so minute these days. Sure, it doesn't cost us anything to add two new forums, but if they don't get posted in often (and I have a hard time believing that these two will) members will complain, those forums won't get a lot of traffic, etceteras, and that raises a host of other issues... like if nobody is using these new forums, why have them? Why not remove them to make the other forums stand out more in the list? And so on...
I think it would be an excellent idea if we had the community resources available to back it up with. The fact of the matter is that we don't, and even when the new front page comes online, it will only aide in attracting more rumor mongers to the community.
it's not that we just don't think about your suggestions and decide to dismiss them out of principle (although Jonathan might, he is ruling dictator). A lot of the things you guys suggest have been tossed around before. We really do think about these things, so don't assume that we don't
That said, if you still feel strongly about adding those two forums, and you can make a strong case as to why this community would benefit from them, and why you think those forums would even get enough traffic to sustain themselves even in six months time, I'm all ears. Convince us, and we'll experiment, but we need more than a, "Hey, this would be pretty neat" proposal
ok well im a systems engineer /dba so os's & db's are my area of interest hence the suggestion
games is something everyone plays or atleast
i hope they do.the state of mac gaming sucks
so they more people participate the better the
chance that the gaming companies will take note.
out of all the mac boards ive seen ever since
buying one this one seems to be the least anti pc.
but it also seems slightly overmoderated...
also noticed a significant % of people are gfx guys/girls so if you want the platform to be widespread you need to open up.
true people can go elsewhere for info, but its precisely this "elitist" perception that makes good developers shy away from osx.
i code on linux & theres a wealth of info & help available. for the mac currently oreilly's making a great effort.
like i said earlier...doesnt cost a dime to test
new forums. & while we are at it why not have a
musicians forum too so people who make music
can pitch in with help & patches.
the forum is stagnating (or its my eyesight
i've run a forum before & its incredibly hard to
keep it fresh so people keep coming back.
eventually people just leave when theres no new
infusion of ideas...
thus endeth my 2c rant
<strong>...When AI had a front page... </strong><hr></blockquote>
Whadda ya mean, when AI had a front page? Dincha hear? <a href="http://www.appleinsider.com/"; target="_blank">It's back!</a> Read about it on AtAT, meself.
Anyways, personally, I like the thought. As a wanna-be dev, I'd spend time both seeking answers and offering advice to others, if a Developers forum existed. In fact, if such a board existed, there are a couple questions regarding Java, and Apples Dev Tools, that I could ask. Hell, couldn't be any worse than Apple's own KB. I've posted there before with little or no effect. And one more place for budding Apple developers to seek advice from can't be all that bad an idea.
Just my opinion on the matter, for what it's worth.
(tig)
[ 10-27-2002: Message edited by: The Grimace ]</p>
<strong>not to mention the longest post award
ok well im a systems engineer /dba so os's & db's are my area of interest hence the suggestion
games is something everyone plays or atleast
i hope they do.the state of mac gaming sucks
so they more people participate the better the
chance that the gaming companies will take note.</strong><hr></blockquote>
True, but we had a gaming forum, back when this board was doing a lot better (it's amazing what a front page and a working, stable board will do for that...). There was nothing much going on in it. To the extent that any game developer sizes up the market by looking for gaming forums, an empty one isn't going to look much better than no forum at all.
M3D Jack made a good point: This forum has succeeded to the extent that it has by being relatively focused. People come here for particular things, and we provide those things with a minimum of distraction. One thing I can tell you for certain is that, if there isn't much discussion, fragmenting it into smaller pieces doesn't help. There has to be a critical mass of people in the same place before you get a robust discussion forum going. I've seen a lot of would-be communities die because they started out with as many topics as MacNN now has, and not enough members to keep one of those topics going.
Ordinarily, we create new forums the same way USENET creates new (non-alt) newsgroups: Once the number of threads on a particular subtopic threatens to drown out all the other subthreads, we look to see if it should get its own forum. This doesn't happen often, and frankly there aren't enough posts about either development or gaming to justify forums dedicated to those topics. Even MacNN's developer forums are relatively slow, and that board is much bigger than ours. On the other hand, the Apple and Omni and StepWise mailing lists are busy.
[quote]<strong>out of all the mac boards ive seen ever since buying one this one seems to be the least anti pc. but it also seems slightly overmoderated...</strong><hr></blockquote>
AI has always prided itself on being relatively temperate, articulate and clean. That was Mark's vision for it. There have been some recent exceptions, but basically this place has never been a free for all, by design. If you have a particular, concrete complaint about moderation, feel free to PM me, or Jonathan, or the moderator in question. We're all reasonable people volunteering our time to make this forum helpful and enjoyable.
[quote]<strong>also noticed a significant % of people are gfx guys/girls so if you want the platform to be widespread you need to open up.
true people can go elsewhere for info, but its precisely this "elitist" perception that makes good developers shy away from osx.</strong><hr></blockquote>
There's nothing elitist about that, frankly, anymore than there's something elitist about the paucity of graphics people on the Omni OS X developer list. Kickaha, M3D Jack, myself, Brad and Belle have all done development work, or are full time developers, so we're not at all hostile to the subject. It's just that there aren't enough other people here to keep a development forum alive.
[quote]<strong>i code on linux & theres a wealth of info & help available. for the mac currently oreilly's making a great effort.</strong><hr></blockquote>
There is for the Mac as well. You just have to look in the right places. This isn't one of the right places.
[quote]<strong>like i said earlier...doesnt cost a dime to test new forums. & while we are at it why not have a musicians forum too so people who make music can pitch in with help & patches.</strong><hr></blockquote>
It does cost to create new forums: They add clutter and break up discussion groups that might already be small. There are <a href="http://www.osxaudio.com/forums/index.php?maddi=b845548db09f562a7e643b915782b51e"; target="_blank">other forums</a> that handle that need better than we can.
You identify the real problem here:
[quote]<strong>i've run a forum before & its incredibly hard to keep it fresh so people keep coming back. eventually people just leave when theres no new infusion of ideas...</strong><hr></blockquote>
This is true. So, there has to be a way to infuse ideas. OSXAudio.com has its front page, with plenty of articles and reviews to fuel a (small) forum. AI has published rumors now and again, and fortunately it was able to generate a community large enough (and well-connected enough) to continue after the articles stopped coming. We've had other problems, like a long period of instability followed by a months-long blackout, followed by not being linked from MacNN at the same time that we couldn't accept new registrations, etc. Now we have a new owner, a front page, and new users can register again. The front page will (try to
If you were a developer interested in OS X, would you come to "AppleInsider" to do your research? Or at all? As opposed to any of the (very nice) resources targeted specifically at developers by the likes of Apple, OmniGroup, Stepwise, O'Reilly, iDevGames, MacDevCenter, and the venerable comp.sys.mac.programmer.* hierarchy on USENET?
All that said, keep in mind that if there's a need, we will create a forum. We are not ideologically opposed to there being a Developers forum here. So, post development-related topics in OS X or Software as appropriate, and see if you can't get something going.
gimme that award ! James gets him now !
no, don't cry ! I said no ! ah ! stop it ! the people are already looking ! <img src="graemlins/lol.gif" border="0" alt="[Laughing]" />
thanks amorph for taking the time to explain this to us. thank you.
Aka: we could make a 'gaming' subforum inside Software.
Might be something to look into, if there were enough threads to fill it.
Again, Amorph really articulated it far better than I ever could have.
Regarding a forum specifically for gaming, we first should look at the number of threads already spread about for gaming. Currently, I see only 4 threads in the past 20 days about games. Is that enough to really warrant making a new forum?
The same goes for a Developers forum. Many of us have developed software for Mac OS and Mac OS X. Yet, there are other far better sites which specialize specifically in addressing developers.
couldn't general talk and outsider be in the same?
<strong>couldn't general talk and outsider be in the same?</strong><hr></blockquote>I don't think so. General Discussion and AppleOutsider serve two very different purposes. The former is for general tech industry discussion whereas the latter is anything *except* tech, but rather the "real world" subjects.
AppleOutsider and Fireside chat, on the other hand, could easily be merged back together.
[ 10-28-2002: Message edited by: Brad ]</p>
<hr></blockquote>
NOOOOOOOOO!!!! please no....i love appleoutsider and visit it often....i loathe fireside chat and avoid it like the plague it is.....now i know you as mods will make all the decision, but for the sake of my very shaky sanity, please please please do not merge these two forums....g