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Before I say anything, I apologize for posting this in the watersports forum. I know that there is a technical/site question forum, but it gets about as much traffic as the surface of Mars and I feel this is kinda an important issue so I'd like people to see it. If you insist, I don't have a problem with an admin moving it there, because it is in the wrong spot and I'm totally aware of such.
I'm going to make a suggestion, and I think it would greatly improve the quality of the site. See those little numbers next to the number of posts in each thread? That's the view count. Notice something odd? Yep, there's thousands of views for each thread but they barely get any posts in them. I only truly noticed the scope of the problem recently, when I posted a story and received hundreds of views in the first 24 hours and only a single response, but it's been ongoing for a long time. It was even an issue in the old forum, though that didn't allow you to see how many views a page had so the problem was hidden. Obviously what's happening is tons of people are showing up as guests or registering an account and only using it to lurk without ever posting a single thing.
What's my suggestion to fix it, then? Force people to post. First of all, guests don't get to view the forums. If they come to the message board and they're unregistered, all they get is the ability to register and maybe view the rules and an introduction to the board, no forum access at all until that's out of the way. Then for their first, say, five or ten posts, don't allow them any access to the image forums, only the text forums. If they want access to that part of the site, they'll have to prove that they're part of the community. If someone doesn't post within a few days of registering, delete their account. If someone posts their five or ten and then months later they've never posted again while still being an active viewer, delete their account (this can probably be a once-per-month thing, clear all the inactives at once to make it easy). If people are making shitty one or two-word posts in order to get their count up, delete the posts and make them start over. We need to quit just allowing people to come into the site and leech endlessly off the hard work of those who are willing to provide us with stories and pictures and videos and all the great stuff we love to have. There's nothing more irritating than knowing you put work into something but most of the people who enjoy it will never thank you, they'll never contribute anything for you to enjoy, and they'll probably never even register an account on the site.
Seriously, if you do this, one of two things will happen. One, there will be an explosion of activity as the lurkers realize they can't just have a free wank anymore without giving something in return (even if it's only a post saying "thanks, I liked the pics" or such). Or two, things will stay close to the same except only the people who are willing to be a part of the community will be able to see what's getting posted. I am completely fine with either of those outcomes, personally.
I'm now going to open the floor to anyone else who has an opinion on this matter. Am I completely off-base here? Is there some random major issue with this plan that I've glazed over and thus makes it unworkable? I'm 99% sure you can prevent people from viewing certain forums with this software (user groups, maybe?) and I'm all but certain you can do so for guests, so I don't imagine the technical side would be super complicated unless there's something I don't know (quite possible). The biggest issue would be admin enforcement, I think, since they'd need to be proactive in deleting lurker accounts (some of it could probably be automated, like the ones that never post at all). I'm just sick and tired of seeing thousands of people enjoy the content of this site while never so much as thanking the people who provide it, and I think something has to be done to fix the situation or nobody will even want to post their own stuff anymore.
EDIT: the more I think about it, the more I think this solution might be too complicated (or at least parts of it) just because of the amount of admin involvement required day-to-day and week-to-week when it comes to deleting accounts. Regardless, if anyone has any comments feel free to post them, particularly if you've got your own idea as to how to get people to stop endlessly lurking and post on the damn site.
I'm going to make a suggestion, and I think it would greatly improve the quality of the site. See those little numbers next to the number of posts in each thread? That's the view count. Notice something odd? Yep, there's thousands of views for each thread but they barely get any posts in them. I only truly noticed the scope of the problem recently, when I posted a story and received hundreds of views in the first 24 hours and only a single response, but it's been ongoing for a long time. It was even an issue in the old forum, though that didn't allow you to see how many views a page had so the problem was hidden. Obviously what's happening is tons of people are showing up as guests or registering an account and only using it to lurk without ever posting a single thing.
What's my suggestion to fix it, then? Force people to post. First of all, guests don't get to view the forums. If they come to the message board and they're unregistered, all they get is the ability to register and maybe view the rules and an introduction to the board, no forum access at all until that's out of the way. Then for their first, say, five or ten posts, don't allow them any access to the image forums, only the text forums. If they want access to that part of the site, they'll have to prove that they're part of the community. If someone doesn't post within a few days of registering, delete their account. If someone posts their five or ten and then months later they've never posted again while still being an active viewer, delete their account (this can probably be a once-per-month thing, clear all the inactives at once to make it easy). If people are making shitty one or two-word posts in order to get their count up, delete the posts and make them start over. We need to quit just allowing people to come into the site and leech endlessly off the hard work of those who are willing to provide us with stories and pictures and videos and all the great stuff we love to have. There's nothing more irritating than knowing you put work into something but most of the people who enjoy it will never thank you, they'll never contribute anything for you to enjoy, and they'll probably never even register an account on the site.
Seriously, if you do this, one of two things will happen. One, there will be an explosion of activity as the lurkers realize they can't just have a free wank anymore without giving something in return (even if it's only a post saying "thanks, I liked the pics" or such). Or two, things will stay close to the same except only the people who are willing to be a part of the community will be able to see what's getting posted. I am completely fine with either of those outcomes, personally.
I'm now going to open the floor to anyone else who has an opinion on this matter. Am I completely off-base here? Is there some random major issue with this plan that I've glazed over and thus makes it unworkable? I'm 99% sure you can prevent people from viewing certain forums with this software (user groups, maybe?) and I'm all but certain you can do so for guests, so I don't imagine the technical side would be super complicated unless there's something I don't know (quite possible). The biggest issue would be admin enforcement, I think, since they'd need to be proactive in deleting lurker accounts (some of it could probably be automated, like the ones that never post at all). I'm just sick and tired of seeing thousands of people enjoy the content of this site while never so much as thanking the people who provide it, and I think something has to be done to fix the situation or nobody will even want to post their own stuff anymore.
EDIT: the more I think about it, the more I think this solution might be too complicated (or at least parts of it) just because of the amount of admin involvement required day-to-day and week-to-week when it comes to deleting accounts. Regardless, if anyone has any comments feel free to post them, particularly if you've got your own idea as to how to get people to stop endlessly lurking and post on the damn site.
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