The cons of owning a large website

[Ravenfreak]

Right now there's a few issues going on over on Sonic and Sega Retro. Their mediawiki installations are running into issues, and there's not enough staff members online to fix the problems going on. Having a large site is quite a feat for any webmaster, but having one as large as this can become a headache at times. There's multiple Mediawiki installs for a few different websites. Sega Retro covers topics regarding Sega as a whole, Sonic Retro covers everything Sonic related and there's a few other websites that are sister sites called NEC Retro, and Retro CDN that are all on the same server. What happens when there's only a few technical Admins and the Wiki Sysops don't have backend access to Mediawiki? Things break, servers become overloaded and overall it's not a good time for the users trying to edit the site. What can be a good solution for this problem? Hire technical admins to focus on specific sites at a time. I know lots of us talk about wanting to own a large site, but are you actually prepared for situations like this? I have been a member on Sonic Retro for almost 16 years, and was always under the impression that Wiki Sysops were able to access the backend of Mediawiki but it seems they only have full editing permissions and that's it. It's so bad that one of the wiki sysops are actually hinting at one of the Admins to possibly promote a few Tech members to help out. (Note tech members are those with profecient knowledge of how various Sonic and Sega games work. They're not staff members.) Have you ever came across this on any of the websites you browse? Have you ever ran into this problem before on your own websites?

 

[Bryn]

One other forum I'm on has suffered from frequent downtimes, as well an increased volume of spam. Plus, for any other large forum, the prevalence of any trolls, scammers and general chancers going about is much greater too.

 

[Katrina]

I used to be an admin of a HUGE forum and one thing I remember is that they had so many rules! Rules upon rules. Not only were there global forum rules, but some of the separate forums had their own distinct set of rules, so newbies struggled when they tried to post and would receive a warning. It was ridiculous.

 

[cpvr]

Since the servers are being overloaded, then they need to be upgraded to handle more load. I’ve run into issues in the past where my sites would slow down, and I knew it was time for a new server or an upgrade, which included more RAM, a stronger processor, and a better hard drive.


More technical staff members should be brought in to manage the technical side of the site.

A cache system could also be implemented if there isn’t one already in place. NGINX could help with this.

 

[Krissycakes09]

I used to be an admin of a HUGE forum and one thing I remember is that they had so many rules! Rules upon rules. Not only were there global forum rules, but some of the separate forums had their own distinct set of rules, so newbies struggled when they tried to post and would receive a warning. It was ridiculous.

Christianforums?

 

[Shawn Gossman]

I like smaller communities because it feels more like a community.

You can get to know everyone and everyone knows each other.

My biggest forum was 10K users. Some people on there have never even talked to me.

I have a Facebook group with right under 50K members. There is a lot of stuff going on there that I don't even ever see unless it's reported.

Big communities are nice but a smaller one feels more personal.

 

[Baw$e]

It's hard to keep track of all the activity on a larger community, but I don't look at it as a con.

It's a good thing if your forum is doing well, you might need a bigger team to maintain it.

 

[Page]

More work, More costs, MOre people to control, More staff members to need to use.

It's like a small website but double of everything XD