Reenergising the forum / fans section

[Razors left peg]

The only real input I'd have to this that mods are often too quick to shut down a conversation it it veers off topic. There are times there is a conversation going and all of a sudden posts are moved to a different thread and it kills the engagement. So what if there's 10 pages of conversation about something not particularly related to a certain thread, if people are engaged it keeps them coming back to the conversation. If it gets moved that often shuts down all chat

[dahamsta]

Just a note to add that Gmail had already been removed from the registration blocklist, which was the major problem in the past. I removed it a good while back, I think a couple of years. The vast majority of the remaining blocks are single-use email accounts, which will remain blocked in perpetuity, because they're used almost exclusively by trolls and spammers. The remainder are explict blocks of trolls and spammers.

I'm going to put this in an announcement or notice to draw the attention of the rest of the forum, and let it run until the end of August. Then I'll summarise the changes that need to happen and I'll reorganise the forums since that seems a cert. In the meantime I'm going to work on finding someone to migrate the forum to another platform like Vanilla, because vB is very outdated and it can't possibly be secure at this point.

[osarusan]

Anything but Vanilla...look what it did to Boards...

[John83]

I don't think that was the platform so much as the very poorly handled switchover. They had broken features for quite a while afterwards and it ****ed off half their userbase.

[pineapple stu]

Yeah, I get the feeling they tried to make the new site look and feel just like old boards, which Vanilla couldn't really do. So they've made a right hames of it - for moderators too I believe.

I think Digital Spy uses Vanilla so it's not completely inept as a platform. Definitely worth learning from the boards errors though! There's still functionality that just doesn't work properly

Is phpBB the same thing as vBulletin? I see gubu.ie uses it and the layout is similar to here, which gives a nice feel

Didn't realise Gmail was unblacklisted - that's good

Thanks Adam!

[ger121]

https://youtu.be/oKjY87UXKWw?si=-yr1yRagYh8OK0Ha

There is a big difference alright (Eirambler's suggestion aside, which may or mayn't be a factor).

I think though when the YBIG fanzine moved across (see here), the fanzine went towards putting money into the atmosphere at games. Even now I think they co-ordinate the singing section at home games, so that naturally gives them a base to build on that we don't have here. They also have a social media presence which foot doesn't have (twitter, etc) - I don't know if that helps any, but it has 36k followers so it can hardly hurt. And if it does, is it worth setting up a foot.ie twitter account to highlight new threads that are being discussed? And who'd run it if so? (I know Adam has said before he was happy to keep away from the likes of twitter because, well, just have a read of twitter...)

All we have is the general lack of the numptiness that's so often seen there!

(And this is probably something that should be split out into a different thread of course)

The forum does need a SM platform I think. I’m a fiend for it and like many it is now how they primarily source their LOI content and groups. I do think PS’ idea of a Foot.ie a Twitter account is a very good idea. Few people on here as admin’s maybe sharing links to threads or generating discussion on Twitter but then linking it back into the forum.

[CraftyToePoke]

I think any redesign has to consider YBIG looks like a child with crayons made it & its winning, and by comparison its rubbish, in content too. You can post one emoji there FFS.

SM footprint, maybe a Reddit presence. Something shareable onto the too numerous content overlapping FB pages. Awareness drive.

[Acornvilla]

Sharing stuff in to the facebook groups is a good shout. Facebook is kind of dead and a weird hell full of everyone's racist relatives, but groups themselves seem to be thriving. The LOI ones, do definitely seem to basically all parrot one another, and every discussion just turns in to lads calling the league ****e and arguing over which council paid for whose stadium. Not the most constructive stuff, but you would definitely get eyeballs.

[nigel-harps1954]

I wouldn't alter the design of the forum. For me, it's fairly clear and easily managed, which can't be said for many other forums.

A Twitter feed like Tets might help get fresh faces in, but I'd be wary of an influx of online trolls too. There's still a fairly healthy community here, and largely a respectful community, despite disagreements fairly regularly.

I don't think there's an awful lot wrong, and over 20 years of posting and still going strong is a testament to that.

A rejig of existing forums could be done, not entirely sure what way I'd arrange them but there are a few semi-dead forums on here.

Bring back post of the month too.

[Razors left peg]

Bring back post of the month too.

The post of the month was good craic.

I really think the biggest impediment to engagement on the forum is the football team itself. Especially in the last year with the depressive manager hunt and lack of games, theres been very little to talk about. If individual players are doing well at their clubs and the team itself is doing well people will naturally want to talk about more. Im posting less myself these days simply because the overall tone is so negative about everything it seems, but thats a result of the last year being so crap.

Ive said previously that I think discussions are shut down too quickly if they arent exactly on the topic of the thread. I dont see the point of that, if lads are talking let them talk unless it becomes abusive. Deleting posts because they are not in line with how a particular mod thinks is silly.

A social media presence would certainly help generate more traffic, but you also dont want it to go too far down the road of YBIG where there are so many posters who genuinely havent a clue about football.... theres a 12 page thread on there with lads arguing that the players not singing the anthem before the game affects how they play ffs!

If the forum got a new shiney coat of paint it wouldnt be a bad thing, but I wouldnt mess with the format too much. Even when I go in on my phone I have to switch to the desktop version rather than use the mobile one, because its what I know and like.

[Crosby87]

I still love this site. I've been on YBIG for 20 years but I would prefer the way Foot.ie was, over that site. (Oh, G'wan ?) Jeez fellas on YBIG it's not funny anymore if it ever was!!

I got kicked off years ago for saying MSNBC was left wing, (!), and I'm sure a lot of other things in fairness, and Dahmasta kindly let me back for Xmas years later. I'm grateful.

But it had changed drastically. I was shocked.
It's just become so egg shelly, like I don't even make a comment I'm serious about half the time now, without thinking about it five ways lest it be taken as jest.

But again, I'm happy to be back on and I am not trying to get kicked off again. The world is filled with a crazy amount of anxiety now people in the US at least are so freaking unhappy and not making it. I felt that for me, talking about the Irish national team is enjoyable and not serious. It seems like the tone set from the certain mods was like so serious and tsk tsk. Not personal just saying.

Last thing, sorry: For example I would love to pick peoples brains on here in an off topic thread about immigration. It can be a calm, interesting discussion for anyone wishing to join in. But in current form, I mean it would get taken down in two seconds. If it was measured and non offensive, even.

Why?

[sbgawa]

I think when stuff is taken off for being off topic mostly it's cos 1 or 2 are getting political or preachy, it's a hard one but take away the moderation and it's just twitter with people shouting.

An idea might be to get all the clubs to tweet a link to a new twitter account with comments like "chat about tonight's matches on foot.ie with a link to the game thread. Can't imagine it wouldn't get at the very least a load of lurkers who might join later. If it was planned properly (of course it would be) we could start the thread early

[SkStu]

It turns out all we needed was a Saipan thread.

[osarusan]

It turns out all we needed was a Saipan thread.

Could anything be more attractive to potential new forum members than "Click here to join the debate on foot.ie about the 2002 Saipan incident and whether a different camp location might have led to less friction" ?

[Crosby87]

Could anything be more attractive to potential new forum members than "Click here to join the debate on foot.ie about the 2002 Saipan incident and whether a different camp location might have led to less friction" ?

I thought it was the fried breakfast!

[pineapple stu]

An idea might be to get all the clubs to tweet a link to a new twitter account with comments like "chat about tonight's matches on foot.ie with a link to the game thread. Can't imagine it wouldn't get at the very least a load of lurkers who might join later. If it was planned properly (of course it would be) we could start the thread early

No harm in trying, though clubs tend to run a mile from forums (and places where officials, etc, can be criticised). More than one club has threatened this place down the years for example; they'd be unlikely to turn around and promote it.

[dahamsta]

On the topic of replatforming, there are several reasons but the most important are:

1. Security -- Foot.ie uses an old version of vBulletin, which is up to date, but it will only run on an old version of PHP and it's really only a matter of time before someone develops a hack for old vB that the vB team won't fix.
2. Mobile -- the mobile skin is rubbish and it's too awkward to bring it up to modern standards. Mobile is too important to leave out these days.
3. Usability -- the functionality is very outdated at this point, particularly compared to other platforms. You say you're happy with what you have, but you'd be happier with a more modern platform, believe me.
4. Design -- is last, I'm not bothered about it, but a modern platform will just look better anyway.

Vanilla isn't a given, it's just the first option that popped into my head. I'd actually be more likely to go with Discourse, in hindsight, but it's been a while since I reviewed so I'd need to do that again. I understand the animosity towards Vanilla but as someone else pointed out, that really is down to the complete balls Boards.ie made of their migration. They messed it up so bad that they had to remove more and more functionality over time, so it's a shadow of what Vanilla should look like now. But again, I'm more likely to go with Discourse anyway, if past experience is anything to go by.

I won't be going with vB, Invision, or phpBB.

[sbgawa]

No harm in trying, though clubs tend to run a mile from forums (and places where officials, etc, can be criticised). More than one club has threatened this place down the years for example; they'd be unlikely to turn around and promote it.

Not saying your wrong but
a) there are probably a few itk on this forum who could ask their clyub to promote.
b) compared to twitter etc the moderation on this site is surely better for the league

[elatedscum]

is the profanity filter really needed? or what's the thought process behind it...

[SkStu]

Its helps to stop people from acting the ****