Best posts made by Rob

Wouldn’t say vBulleting is a relic. The new version really sucks though. The local forum uses vB 5.1 “connect”. Really should be called vB 5.1 BETA. Facebook did a number on forums.

Will this help get it back? Dunno. Many of the bike forums I’m on pretty much died. Cycleforums, eSportbike, Chicagolandsportbike and Madisonsportbikes pretty much dead other than a few. Wisconsinsportbikes is gone. Some I just got tired of dealing with morons (Insane Speed, Cycleworld, R1-forum). Cycleforums was unfortunately the victim of Vertical Scope panic. Now its just a couple members left and spammers constantly signing up.

FB wont last forever. Remember they said MySpace will last forever and where is it now? Forums do have their advantages over sites like FB. Easier to search for posts, you can read at your leisure, far easier to post photos and what not.

Our local newspaper implemented a new policy for using real names in the comment sections (along with having to pay to comment). Didn’t stop the nasty comments. Same with the local TV station websites. They started requiring facebook logins for the comments. Didn’t change a thing. Some people really just don’t care if you know who they are.

A different approach to moderation I don’t think would had mattered. Facebook did sign the “death warrant” on a bunch of forums, although Verticalscope did flatline a bunch after they bought them. Will forums come back? Possibly, but it would need facebook to go the way of myspace. And with the number of people I know deactivating their facebook accounts and how much facebook is ticking people off, I wouldn’t be surprised if facebook disappears in 5 yrs. Even then it doesn’t mean the resurrection of forums.