To Don >>>> Just A Suggestion !!!

[Johnno]

To Don
Been away for a while but since being on here over the last few weeks have found that this site has become very quite.

In the time when I was a regular here the top 4 forums where General surf discussion, Bodyboarders only!, Shortboarders only! and Tangents & non-surf talk in that order of posts per day. Having just had a look at Bodyboarders only! very few seem to be there these days.

Just going over some of the separate forums and topics I would suggest that maybe you need to downsize a little as overall it has become a little cluttered with too may forums and not to many ppl posting these days.

Some of the last posts in forums are over a year old !!!!!

Maybe move the most inactive to just one forum heading and maybe keeping just 5 forums being the the 4 mentioned above and mals until the number of post per day pick up.

Also what happened to being able to do a poll as this thread needs one...........

Well just a suggestion ........... what do you all think

[Trev]

Agree johnno.
A half dozen at most.
I suggested some years back we rationalise but it was suggested I pull my head in (not nastilly I might add - and not by Don). My suggestion was as a result of discussion about the amount of bandwidth needed for the forum).

I think what's happened here is that Don has other interests and the forums pretty much run themselves. There's very little moderation going on. Which might be a good thing or a bad thing.
We lost a bunch way back (I've been here since 2004) and they set up their own forum called Ozisurfing Forums - Lard Lad who still checks in occasionally, Tiger, Gaz (Gibber), Wanderer (Wands) and several others. I joined them for a while but there's only about 20 or so on there and I only visit every few weeks now.

I don't make a habit of frequenting internet forums, just this and a car one mostly. But I enjoy Realsurf (mostly). I've made some good friends on here and shared surfs with them - Fong, Tiger, Digger, Mark P, and marcus_h in particular as well as righbrainpositive until he went overseas teaching. And Ledge, but I knew him before he came on here.

I suspect that the proliferation of topics makes it hard for some of those which are further down the list and have merit, esp. Weather, Health and Board Design.

I would also suggest a new approach to Moderating. Have a core of 2 or 3 who oversee them all but find someone with a particular interest to moderate special interest ones. EG ric_vidal could moderate the Board Design one. Otway the Health one and so on. Spread the load and give "ownership" to more posters.

[mustkillmulloway]

dino could moderate ...flame school for morons



the upgrade killed the site...i'm sorry...how can u talk about surfboards if u can't post a decent pic them

[Skipper]

Look, despite the tendancy these days for old schoolers to drop out sighting boredom and such, RealSurf is precious for the sustained sense of community and self moderation. Dino's and Shearer's aside who chip in with stupid worthless quips and baits there's still an ongoing sense of convivial exchange and banter about all things surfwise and beyond. More than you'd get on other Surf forums or interest specific sights. As though rev heads or goths could discuss politics, religion, sex, death, add, music or climate change in the same open, objective/subjective way.
Not sure what needs changing Johnno. But since you've been round long time, valued contributor 'n all, be good to hear what Don thinks.
But, .......Then again.........

[Skipper]

Sure, you are right. But despite my short lived existence on here I was witness to some fine banter for a coupla years before I felt I could jump in and yeah, it's gone down hill from then. Happy to wear the Johnny come lately hat I can understand why you'd feel pissed off with lack of responses.

[Johnno]

there's still an ongoing sense of convivial exchange and banter about all things surfwise and beyond.

.... you have no idea about how entertaining this this place "used to be".

Nail.......... Hammer Yeah agree with you salty once a upon a time ppl that work in a office would spend about 5 hrs on here and do about 3 hrs work

Then we had the afterwork group sessions that at times would go late into the night with most having a bit tooo much to drinks and having to try and back track the next day .................. ah the good/bad old days

[Johnno]

Welcome back Johnno and good suggestion imo. even though i think you hated me

Thanks guard ..........

As for hating anyone ...... .... just drop in's....

[Davros]

Since NC left there isnt a lot of talk about surfing.

[Johnno]

Since NC left there isnt a lot of talk about surfing.

I'm here now .............

[brendo]

hey nige, where is the post on samoa? never seen it. if you want info, pm me...oh wait...i never logon

tell ya what, i will this week. if ya still interested in goin, i can fill u in. im looking at trip 4 there in 2 months

[brownhornet]

I believe one of the biggest issues in the forums is that one a fair few occasions new posters get shot down or a thread hijacked shortly after it begins. Not the most open and friendly forum space. Interestingly I enjoy a forum for a quick bit of entertainment. Dissatisfied with RS I have often searched the likes of SN and ASL and to my surprise same people flaming others down and posting the exact same comment. Feels like an old boys club of some guys who know each other and not really open to others. I feel as though the RS forum is used in a way for those guys just keeping in touch with each other and laying crap on their mates and others.

With that said there are some that post meaningful comments. I can see why the drop out has taken place as not really a lot of forum topics that survive the 3rd post flamings by the old boys. Now I don't really care either way but would be nice to have some forums that ran in an open way where you can expect a decent reply rather than a sledging.

The real shame is that in a sense this is Don's business and it is diminished by such a culture. Time to find a new home as well. Interested to see where this topic goes with the flamers...

[pridmore]

the net is full of wankrs and this site is no different, so if ya get written off, best to ignore them or retaliate with valid points and discussion but if ya cant or dont wanna bother, then the forums might not be for you, in saying that, I agree that the flamers scare off genuine decent posters but not much you can do about it realy unless you wanna moderate the shite out of it, but there are many decent people on here, just gotta work out who is and who is a tool...I get bagged often for advertising my boards but they can go and get farkked for all I care, I'd be posting pics even if I didnt sell my boards, when I win lotto, I'll still be here making boards and posting pics coz I just love suring and makin boards, and those who have met me know that...just post what ya want and hopefully you can dismiss the wankers comments as most of the time they are just trying to get you to bite, I have leant that over the past 5 years or so.....we do need more members to liven things up with quailty discussions.....

www.moresurfboards.com this is the advertising shit that pisses some off haha......

[Trev]

I believe one of the biggest issues in the forums is that one a fair few occasions new posters get shot down or a thread hijacked shortly after it begins. Not the most open and friendly forum space. Interestingly I enjoy a forum for a quick bit of entertainment. Dissatisfied with RS I have often searched the likes of SN and ASL and to my surprise same people flaming others down and posting the exact same comment. Feels like an old boys club of some guys who know each other and not really open to others. I feel as though the RS forum is used in a way for those guys just keeping in touch with each other and laying crap on their mates and others.

With that said there are some that post meaningful comments. I can see why the drop out has taken place as not really a lot of forum topics that survive the 3rd post flamings by the old boys. Now I don't really care either way but would be nice to have some forums that ran in an open way where you can expect a decent reply rather than a sledging.

The real shame is that in a sense this is Don's business and it is diminished by such a culture. Time to find a new home as well. Interested to see where this topic goes with the flamers...

Brownhornet, I was driving back from the surf this morning and came to the same conclusions as you in your first paragraph. You'll see I've been around for a while - and barring something unforseen, I'll stick around. I hope you and others will too. Mark Pridmore is right, you have to learn to ignore the few who put everyone down (I fail at that sometimes when they go overboard).
Mark is right to worry about over moderation, however I'm a member of a car forum and the mods are active in keeping things on topic. They'll allow a little off topic aside or two but then simply split the thread like marcus did with the flood topic. Maybe the "flamers" are a bit like graffiti artists. When they don't readily see their handiwork they move on.
It's why I suggested a little more active moderation in a post further up this page.
On the car forum I moderate one topic about something I know - tyres- and the "ownership" (maybe not the right choice of word, but a sense of ownership is what it is) of that topic gives you more care in what's happening there.

There's no doubt the flamers are worse than the trolls they supposedly are so much afraid of. I'd rather let a newbie have his head for a while. He'll soon move on if he's not genuine. But I shudder to think how many potential new members we've scared off.
Maybe Coops or marcus could make Don aware of this thread. Some behind the scenes discussions via pm might help steer the forum into a better direction.
And Salty, did you get any decent replies to your Samoa query on any other sites? Whenever I look at others I find them particularly dull and uninteresting - much more so than here.
Don't forget Iggy and Salty (Itchy and Scratchy) are sometime surfing buddies so I suspect he's just supporting his mate

[admin]

Hi all

Interesting thread. FWIW, a few general thoughts.

Consolidation of categories
I think this is a good idea and once I get the current magazine out of the way, I shall have a go at smooshing some of the old posts into a single category. What would be extremely helpful would be some indication of how many categories we should have. Any discussion/thoughts on that front will be useful to me when I get to the task.

Quality of posts/threads
A year or two ago I spent some time researching forum administrator experiences (can't think of a less clumsy way to describe my part in all this) with a view to understanding what worked and what didn't. You won't be surprised to hear that the biggest issue was/is flaming - particularly in forums with a high male population.

Nobody that I've come across has discovered the magic solution to the issue, but everyone agrees that once flame wars break out, most users turn off and the forums go down hill.

The basic problem is that the medium of forums has a strong culture of anonymity. And when people can be anonymous, they are much more likely to not worry about civility and to be more impulsive/aggressive.

Of all the remedies I came across for improving forum culture, the two that stuck out for me were strategies to limit anonymity-fueled aggression and more comprehensive moderation.

Some sites have a real names only policy and they swear by it. I like that idea too, but also have reservations about privacy and the potential decrease in informality. Other sites use karma point or reputation systems of one sort or another. This appeals to me too because reputation is an extension of our present post-number ranking system.

On the moderator front, most of you will know, income from advertising on the forums -at best- covers the bandwidth bill. And lately it hasn't even done that. So, adding a paid moderator is out of the question and we are therefore totally reliant upon the generous efforts of our mods. The forums would've disappeared a long time ago without their selfless efforts. A huge, huge thanks to every one of them.

So where to from here?

I will keep an eye on this thread for starters!

From now on I will be making full names a requirement at registration time. I WILL NOT retrospectively impose this requirement on the pre-2011 forum members. New forum members will be able to post under their preferred handle, but their real name will be registered on the system.

I will look into a reputation system (I'd like something like digg or ebay).

I will consolidate the forum categories based on the responses I see in this thread.

ps: any thoughts about improving the income situation would be gratefully received.

Cheers and hope you all get lots of waves!

Don

[Larry]

ok don, you have to know - larry is not my real name

[Trev]

Great to hear from you Don.
Hope we can get some good out of this.
I'll put together a few more suggestions for the gang to pull apart (constructively ).

Trev (my real name )
ps. Maybe you could make the provision of full names retrospective as an option for anyone who wanted to record it.

[Trev]

ok don, you have to know - larry is not my real name

Good to see you still checking in occasionally Larry.

[Larry]

can't help meself trev, this is where the whole mess started - and howareya johnno? - I heard that you went mad and the coppers shot you ..