Forum thoughts
We have used the same forum system for a long time
The discussion forum on GFF is not the busiest place on the planet and has never been.
Personally I have no problems with that. One one hand I'd love to see the forum be a real visitor magnet, but on the other hand not all forum content is gold--and there's a lot of forum spamming going on these days.
So basically I'm quite happy with things as they are (apart from the fact that some pretty odd sites run off with all the forum traffic).
Well, we have been thinking about updating the forum software, and have a few alternatives. I'd like to have a few more facilities and the partners and some users want to be able to upload images to the forum.
But updating software is a menace.
I hate it!
Particularly when things work OK as they are. New web software means layout-adaption, database work, attempts to move over data and work with keeping the new stuff integrated with the old.
So in stead I fiddled a bit with the old system and added some functions to the forum front page, which I myself find a lot better now.
Check it out yourself
I also tried to enable image uploads, which is supported by the existing software, but to no avail. For some reason it doesn't work. I may give it another shot tomorrow, but as far as I can see I have done everything right. It just doesn't work.
Under all circumstances: let's have your comments. Do you want a snazzy new forum system and are you interested in a hing-volume forum, or should we just leave it as it is and keep on producing great content in stead?
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Comments
Martin, I agree t
Martin,
I agree that the forum content isn't always golden and I have my doubts about a forum being anything than a suplement to an actual community. But, the forum does have its place, but only when there is enough interaction between users to really share/interact with each other. The changes that you've displayed are ok but I am afraid you'd lose some of the real "meaty" content by only showing the most recent posts? Your website is "huge" on quality and layout, I would focus on creating a forum thats practical for both user and owner, that offers really well thought out but basic functions that really mean something to the user and avoid all the bells and whistles. Do what works to create some traffic with really user friendly options.