Wrecking the Principals and Ideology Behind Forums

[Rick Ace]

The "forum community" has accepted certain standards and principals behind running forums. Surprisingly, most of it is really untrue. This post will go through several examples, and will challenge forum admins to think twice before making a decision.

Myth: Inactive Accounts Should Be Deleted

Common forum myths have it that accounts that are rarely active should be deleted. Forum administrators that hold on to these accounts are accused of trying to falsify forum statistics. But the accusation is not only inaccurate but also ironic. By deleting inactive accounts, one is trying to show that everyone registered is active. That is clear falsification of statistics. Members who pay a visit may not even register after deciding their accounts will be deleted easily. Thus, deleting forum accounts can actually be harmful to the community.

The concept of deleting inactive accounts was probably popularized by role-playing (RP) forums that needed to use the member list to project a view of all the characters involved. Having inactive characters can cause confusion. For this reason, RP forums have often gone through cleaning periods. This works well for them for several reasons. Firstly, RP forums are rarely meant to last for a very long time. It's based on a story and plot, and eventually needs a conclusion. If the main admin is interested, he may do some cleaning and revive the community (perhaps with a new plot too).

But many forums are not RP-based. General, technology, music, design, programming, webmaster, and other forums shouldn't have to constantly delete accounts. The best practice to adapt is to delete accounts that haven't been e-mail activated after 30 days. The chances are that these are probably spam accounts. Other than cleaning out spam accounts, there is no need to delete the accounts of regular members.

Lastly, there's the question of people with zero posts. Should one delete them? The simple answer is, once again, no. Why? An active viewer is an active user of your website. It's hard to believe this, but many successful forums have many users that just actively view the forum. Everyone is different.

Promotion Forums, Graphics Forums, Webmaster Forums, and Admin Forums

I shouldn't need to say much about this. If you're going to create a forum that's directed to forum admins, you should think about your audience. How many quality forums do you see around? If there aren't many quality forums around then why create a forum about forums? You need an audience first. Would you start a celebrity fan page for someone that's lost its popularity and has little prospects of gaining it back? That's the same thing you're doing when you create a forum "about forums and forum admins".

Right now, you're browsing one of the most active advertising forums on the web. 🙂 However, how much quality to you see in the forums that are being advertised? How much dedication do you see? And how many forums do you see that are not about forums themselves? These are questions that you must ask yourself. Forum Promotion is a great place for you to see the interests of people. Ultimately, there are not many unique forums that have quality content. The number is almost close to nothing compared to the amount of forums being advertised.

Let's go back in history....6 to 7 years back... During this time there were many unique forums about many unique topics. There were forums about biking, nature, vegetables, and pretty much anything you can think about. Of course, there were many book club forums, role playing forums, and story-based forums too. At the same time, web browsing was starting to go beyond the limits of mainstream internet explorer. People began to realize that bigger things were happening outside of IE 6. You have this massive javascript support on the client side too. And design programs took new turns. GIMP rose in power. Photoshop's interface became easier to use. More tutorials for design surfaced on the web. And PHP continued to rise, especially in security. The environment was perfect for graphics and coding forums. Why? There was a huge audience- forum administrators. Thus, promotion forums and graphics/coding forums rose quickly.

But people failed to realize that this blossoming was short-lived. Many successful forum admins had abandoned their personal concepts to start a graphics, coding, and/or promotion forum. Forums slowly lost momentum, and the forums aimed at forum admins gradually lost their need.

So, what should you do? 🙂 There are still great forums that are unique here. Tip: Look at who wins forum battles. 😉 Create a forum about something you like. If you like biking, and want to create a biking forum, don't be afraid. Give it a try. Promote it here, and you might find the activity surprisingly high. :great:

 

[Migi]

Cool article, Rick! :great:

My definition of inactive accounts is accounts which are not used (they are not logged in) for ages, though. I once cleared my forum of accounts which never logged in for 2 years. Mostly this happened to accounts which were never used since the creation/activation. So I don't think it's a bad idea to delete them; after all they are not used. Of course it's a different case if an account never posts around but still regularly log in/visits the forum. I also delete spam bot accounts, I don't feel a reason to keep them.

I think it's just a matter of number in statistics. Your idea do have the points, but then again it's a bit relative.

 

[Anorak]

Thanks for the article! Very interesting and intrigued to hear this is one of the most active webmaster forums!

 

[Geoffrey]

There are still forums about all of those things you mentioned were around 6-7 years ago, and plenty more about many more topics. Look around, google, don't just rely on FP to tell you what exists and what doesn't.

 

[Kaynil]

Very interesting points, it is nice to have your views challenged and consider new things. Even if my views are different I really enjoyed the read and that is what moves me to express my views.

The titles are not summarizing my opinion but what I understood of the article, followed by my opinion on the issue.


1. Inactive Accounts should not be deleted

Some time ago I ranted my take on the dilemma of pruning accounts in my blog. I never thought on the RPG forums but that was a very nice insight that I think it is spot on, as well as the irony of the manually editing your ratio. However I still think it is unfair to have this black and white idea about this. Yes=wrong. No=right.

Like I've expressed in other occasions there are different reasons that may trigger people the desire to prune and may actually work for them regardless their niche not being a roleplaying one. I personally resisted to take this 'approach' until I was plagued with spam and other measures in my forumotion.
It is the case, especially in big communities, they harvest spam accounts that come back after half a year just to spam generic advs many times in a row across your forums. I think it makes sense that to prevent these zombie fake accounts they do try to have the members at least make ONE, just one solid post that proves they are not a generic human advertiser or a bot.

I do not think it should be a trendy decision but one made with care, also if you do this kind of thing make sure you make clear it is in effect and how often or what conditions so real members can protect themselves. You might not agree with it but unless certain admins can find an alternative to pruning it is a tad far saying it is not necessary.

I personally find it to be one of the last resorts and I really rather have their accounts readily instead of catching them in the crossfire but admittedly my communities have been small to have spam be a great issue and I never cared of ratio even if I get somewhat bothered when the generic obvious bot names in a row of most of my registered users are obviously spammy accounts. I am sure not everyone blindly prune everyone and not everyone does purely because they want to appear more active. I think there is a gray area and you can still be fair and polite with your members even if you apply prunning in your community.


2. Saturated niches with little audience
I think admin forums can still make it because now more than ever new admins make forums and it is a demand to get resources and learn the ropes. Where you see low quality forums formed about the same genres other seen opportunities to shape them and help them along the way.

I think the problem is not so much how much competition is there with similar niche forums, or if the trend is fading or not, but this whole attitude to take the forum building as a business first and most sacrificing the bonding with your members and building a community. So more and more people is trying to make it a sustainable income ingress without being willing to commit in effort, time and learning new skills. "I make the graphics forum because it is what it is trending, as opposed because it is what I want to do"... I guess in a way we're on the same page about the saddening thing of them living other less popular things that they may be passionate about to recycle a generic form that they think will give them instant-success.

I am trying to keep Zelda Sanctuary alive because it is one of the few Zelda Forums around that have put effort, has members that I know from years passionate about the saga and haven't been yet sunk to the pressure of the Three main huge dominant communities about it. Compared to five-seven years ago, this niche is not doing that great. Yes, general gaming is booming but specific franchise ones are kind of hard to find active, usually it is a extreme between the dominant ones and the lil ones struggling to get noticed.

I have my own Spanish zelda community and I've had more than a few raising an eyebrow because, why in Spanish? There are way more zelda fans in English and stuff. Regardless if their comments are accurate or not, Spanish is my first language and Zelda my favourite saga, while online communities one of my favourite hobbies. Right here we have a combination of three motivators in one that so far have turned into a great community. We may not be huge but the members that have arrived have introduced themselves and expressed positive impression, as well as having people sticking with me in good and bad times. It wasn't an overnight success and I won over with time, effort and taking leaps of faith. I moved them from forumotion to MyBB, from MyBB to Xenforo. We've been together now for a few years and it has been a wonderful journey because there has been people reacting to my efforts which in turn re-motivates me. Even if it is not the most discussed topic or niche, if you love talking about it that will make a huge difference during tough times, which is what many of the recent communities fail. Unexpected adversity and they sell their places or put a down forever new. Many with potential or with a small community already starting to form. Sad.

 

[master412160]

Can I share your guide mate on the forum in my sig?