RUNNING 2 LISTS

PAULARGETYPE
PAULARGETYPE Senior Contributor
 I KNOW WE HAVE 2 DIFFERENT FORUMS IT HAS TO BE A LOT OF WORK JUST TO KEEP ONE UP AND RUNNING I WOULD LIKE TO SEE US CUTTING BACK TO JUST HAVING 1 THE HET CLUB FORUM AND DROPPING THIS ONE WE COULD KEEP IT AS A RESOURCE FOR THINGS WE HAVE TALKED ABOUT BUT HAVE IT NOT TAKE ANY NEW INFO NO NEW DISCUSSIONS THIS IS JUST ME TALKING AND I KNOW I'M GOING TO GET SOME HEAT OVER THIS BUT IT'S JUST WHAT I'M THINKING 

Comments

  • Jon B
    Jon B Administrator
    Well, this is a good topic of discussion because I am sure many are asking this question.

    It's true that we were took this (the Open Forum) when it was offered to us by Classiccar, because otherwise it (and 20,000 former Hudson discussions) would have vaporized.  And we really didn't know what to do with it.

     However, one consideration is this: we now have a sort of "general", "open" discussion room in which anyone (Club member or just someone who stumbled in off the Internet) are free to discuss Hudsons. If for example, someone buys a house with an attic full of Hudson parts, and wonders if they're too valuable to pitch out, he has a place to come and ask that question.  It's kind of a "free for all" discussion room. It's really helpful for "hooking" potential Hudson enthusiasts (and potential HET members) because it's like an open door into a room where a bunch of nice folks are having a friendly conversation.  Someone who was Googling Hudsons could run into one of our thousands of "discussions", and when he clicked on that link he would be brought to our Open Forum.  In fact, I believe that many of our new members here, did NOT discover us in the HET Club or on the HET Club Website; they found us through other means. 

    The OTHER forum is really designed for Club members, although outsiders can join that forum for free as "limited members".  But it's not so "stranger-friendly" as this Open Forum because -- unless you actually know about it and sign up -- you cannot "see" it.  So unlike the Open Forum, no one can stumble into the "regular form".  I don't believe any of the discussions are "picked up" by Google, so someone Googling Hudsons would never know the HET Forum is out there.

    So, if we shut this (Open Forum) down to further discussions (and kept it only as an archive of old discussions) we would immediately begin limiting the number of forum members.  Many of the Open Forum members (who are not already HET Forum members) would probably register over at that forum.  But others would not.  And new Hudson enthusiasts would not discover the "regular" forum as easily as they had this one.  They'd first have to find out about the forum through the Club or by wandering into the Club website and registering there.

    I dunno -- how about it, all you newer members of the Open Forum.  How did you find out about us?  If the "Open Forum" hadn't existed as a "going concern", do you think you'd have found your way to the forum on the HET website?



  • PaulButler
    PaulButler Administrator
    edited April 2015
    I don't think you'll take heat over your comment Paul as it is a very valid point.

    I might get shot down for my next comment but I'll make it anyway!

    To be honest it's not a huge amount of work involved in keeping the two forums up and running; the software takes a lot of the heat out of that. There are a number of people who are registered as Admin/Moderator and we share the day to day stuff between us on an ad-hoc basis with Rick Clark being the main go-to man on this Forum.

    Originally the "old forum" would have opened in its own right on its own page. A while back Aaron took a decision to plug it into the new web site because it showed people that there is actually a fully functioning club out there.

    That was , in my opinion, the right decision because , by and large, it seems to have worked. People drop on this forum and then see there is actually a club out there that caters for Hudsons.

    When I post I tend to post on both forums because there is a different audience as Jon says between the two. 

    There is indeed a section that looks at both (I'm one) but I can guarantee that there are people who log onto www.hetclub.org who have never visited here.

    What I will do (and I think the statistics are available) is to work out what the visit ratios are and publish them for people to look at.

    My vote would be to keep the forums as they are and allow this one to continue accepting posts. Should the work involved in keeping that running ever start to be a chore then I'm sure we'd look at it however at the moment it isn't     
  • Glowplug
    Glowplug Expert Adviser
    edited April 2015
    There would be the same result as when Hudson Chat ended. A significant amount of the group evaporated. The point of any of these forums is to share information in near real time. A historic record is captured and that is exploited ( data mined) at a later date by those who were not part of the original discussion. Do as is the concensus of the controlling entity. The need to be a member of the HET club is sufficient reason to not participate and learn. This point is not lost on those of us who on a daily basis try to cajol folks to join. I would rather have them learn here than have them forever lost as potential members. As has been used forever, build the interest and let the desire become the reason to join.
  • lostmind
    lostmind Expert Adviser

    If someone prefers the HET forum, they can choose to ignore this one.

    Should Facebook be eliminated also? Many go there instead of HET forum.

    It doesn't take me more then 10 minutes a day to stay current here.

    On the other hand , if you eliminate the HET forum , those users will come here?

  • StillOutThere
    StillOutThere Expert Adviser
    I'm not a club member.  This and Facebook are my participation.  I am not a "club guy" and won't be.
  • PaulButler
    PaulButler Administrator

    I use the Facebook page very rarely, not a member on Facebook and no real wish to be there either.

    People will use what they want to use and as long as we can support that choice then I'm all for it but note I do say "support". There was a major exercise a while back to upgrade this forum which would most likely (and hopefully) not have been noticed by most people. It needed to be done because the code to run it had some security flaws in it.

    There may well come a day when we can't upgrade the software and that'll be the day that a choice will be need to be made. Hopefully that day is still a long way away in the future and won't ever actually come.

    And if , like @stillouthere, you don't want to be a member of the club then that's great. The whole idea is that folks can come and share their views , ask their questions and just look to see what others are doing be it on here , the other forum or Facebook.

This discussion has been closed.