What to do when a forum is demolished?

[superluser]

So there's some webcomics forum drama going on today.  Without warning, the Halfpixel forums for Scott Kurtz's PvP were taken down, and now the members of the community are trying to start a forum to house the fan community without having to worry if Kurtz will move the forum again.

We've got a website up and running (the site for which should be easy enough to find, so I won't bother spamming it here--PM me if you can't find it), but I thought it might be helpful to ask some people here for advice, since I know that some of you have had similar issues setting up forums after moving from different Castlevania forums or the Nice.  Does anyone have any advice on how to administer a forum, how to wrangle old forum members, or just plain stories of forum moves?

Thanks.

[llearch n'n'daCorna]

... You want advice from us?

Hehehehehehe. You poor, benighted soul. You poor, poor fool.


Slightly more seriously - on the subject of administering: expect it to be a whole shitpot of work for no reward. Expect people to complain about what you do, even if you do nothing. Expect anything you do to be subject to criticism and complain from all and sundry. Set up a list of rules, and stick to them. Expect people to complain that they aren't visible, that they never saw them, even if they had to click past them to log in. Expect people to deliberately break the rules to see how far they can get away with. Don't let anyone get away with anything, even if they are your friends; it's far easier to keep everyone in line if everyone gets the same treatment.

As far as moves go, people will complain that the new forum isn't as good as the old one, and not turn up. *shrug* It's a new forum, you have no control over the old one, and it's a whole new community. Just because it happens to be the same people as the old community doesn't mean it's all the same.

Pick a group to administer it, try to spread the list of admins in login time, and try to make sure there's pretty much always at least one admin on. If you're spreading the posts around into areas, one admin per area at all times, so you might want a larger group of sub-admins or something, depending on how many posts you run up.

Be aware that larger forums suck up time like nothing on earth, for administration.

Set up an admin area that only the admins can see, for discussing administrative actions; that way you can all be aware of what each other are doing, who's screwing up, and when they've brought the hammer down on misbehaviour. You can also talk about how big a hammer you're going to bring down, and notify each other about having warned particular people about things.


As for old forum members: This is not the old forum. This is our forum. Here are the rules. Stick to them, or you will be excluded. If you stick to the rules, then you're welcome.


That about what you wanted?

[superluser]

That about what you wanted?

Honestly?  No.

I'm looking for any and all sorts of advice from all comers, so there is no real concept of ``what I want,'' other than whatever you want to give me.

[llearch n'n'daCorna]

Let me rephrase - is that the sort of advice you were after, or would you like some specifics? ;-]

[superluser]

Let me rephrase - is that the sort of advice you were after, or would you like some specifics? ;-]

I was kind of looking for specifics, but in the interest of keeping this interesting for other people, I certainly don't begrudge generalities.

[rt]

Wrangle up old members?

If the forum has its old address a simple change in the DNS redirect gets everyone. Else a link on the pvp comic web page gets most people.
And If the forum server is still up change forum to a webpage with a link gets all but the lurkers. If all else fails hopefully they have a friend to tell them, or can use google.

From experiance, all that works.

Setup/Servers/Software/Money?

No Idea. Hopefully some people at the forum know enough if it is going to be fan run

Admin Stuff/Running A forum

Quote -Everything llearch said-
Especially the parts about complaining

*complains* Why do you have to be so right llearch?

[llearch n'n'daCorna]

Experience.

[superluser]

Any advice on how many subforums to have?

Right now, they're leaning towards one big forum, but every other forum I've been on has had multiple forums.  I really can't say much about it other than multiple forums seems like a better way to go.

Anybody have more intimate experience?

[llearch n'n'daCorna]

If you have one big forum, then any individual types of threads that get a lot of attention - RPs, for example - will flood out anything else.

Or, say, comments about the day's comic.

If you have it split up, it makes it easier to say "ok, in the daily strips, don't talk in last week's thread" whereas your RP might be quiet for a fortnight when the GM goes on holiday. Having separate areas makes it clear where the line lies, which means when it comes to monitoring, it's much easier.


It's like the difference between 30 small rooms with 4-5 people each, and, say, having the same 150 people in The Zoo at AC. The latter is much noisier, and any single conversation is harder to track, but you can see what everyone is doing. In the former, you can only listen to one at a time, but it's much much easier to keep track of what that conversation is doing.

Some prefer the former, some the latter. I'm not telling you which to use, merely trying to list the differences - since we've had both, the old "one big bucket" approach back at The Nice, and the split approach here. I definitely prefer the split option, but depending on who you have, you may find the single option works better for you.

[superluser]

Some prefer the former, some the latter. I'm not telling you which to use, merely trying to list the differences - since we've had both, the old "one big bucket" approach back at The Nice, and the split approach here. I definitely prefer the split option, but depending on who you have, you may find the single option works better for you.

I definitely prefer the split option, too.  I seem to have managed to convince the administrator to use a separate board for dead topics, but I wanted to see if there were any other compelling reasons for split boards.

Nothing more annoying than going into a board where the first five threads are the ``say something about the person above you'' games, I totally agree.

[RobbieThe1st]

So there's some webcomics forum drama going on today.  Without warning, the Halfpixel forums for Scott Kurtz's PvP were taken down, and now the members of the community are trying to start a forum to house the fan community without having to worry if Kurtz will move the forum again.

So, these forums were hosted by one of those free forum hosts? If they were not, and were hosted on the guys webhost... Um... It shouldn't be a big problem - Take the last backup(preferably from the night before), upload a copy of the software, do a little work, and away you go.

Free forum hosts... you still *might* be able to get backups, and/or some of the hosts have automated backup setups.

Still, if they have to create a new forum from scratch... I see it as negligence.

Now, if Scott wanted to "restart" the forum and clean things up, that's different... but it doesn't sound like that happened.


-RobbieThe1st

[DarkAudit]

It was more than just shutting down the forums. There was a blog post, since revised multiple times then eventually deleted, that was taken by some (lots), as a big f-you to a large group of supporters. I did not find out the existence of said post (which had already been removed) until the next morning when I eventually found my way to the new home, and the main thread discussing the Great Sundering. Much venom was being spewed on both sides of the dispute.

The short version is that Kurtz has decided to wash his hands of a chunk of his fan base. A number of fans, who were on the front lines on the night think Kurtz should get bent himself. It's died down some, but there is still poo-flinging going on both ways, and each side using the other's behavior to justify their actions.

[llearch n'n'daCorna]

Oh, wonderful.

Do me a favour and see if you can keep that sort of misbehaviour out of our nice, clean forum, mmkay? ;-] Muchly appreciated...

[RobbieThe1st]

Oh, wonderful.

Do me a favour and see if you can keep that sort of misbehaviour out of our nice, clean forum, mmkay? ;-] Muchly appreciated...

But... But... what will we do for entertainment then? I mean... laughing at people getting banned is one of the most interesting things to do here! 

[llearch n'n'daCorna]

But... But... what will we do for entertainment then? I mean... laughing at people getting banned is one of the most interesting things to do here! 

I can ban you, if you like. No problem at all... ;-]

[RobbieThe1st]

But... But... what will we do for entertainment then? I mean... laughing at people getting banned is one of the most interesting things to do here! 

I can ban you, if you like. No problem at all... ;-]

Nah, I think I will politely turn down that offer - It isn't so funny when it happens to you.

[superluser]

Nah, I think I will politely turn down that offer - It isn't so funny when it happens to you.

Tragedy is when I cut my finger . Comedy is when you fall into an open sewer and die
--Mel Brooks

[Azlan]

Outsource to India...