Hi everybody, my name's Brock and I'll be part of the team taking over the site

[Brock Beauchamp]

TBH, my fear is the opposite. They make a go of it here for a year or so and when it doesn't develop they shut it down due to cost.

You don't have to worry about this. We're in this for the long haul and fully expect to lose money the first couple of years, maybe turning a profit by year three or four.

 

And if things go disastrously wrong from there, it costs us virtually nothing to shut down the parts of the site with high overhead (front page news, videos, etc) and return to being a forum. There will be no need to ever shut down the site provided there are people here interested in discussing the Cubs.

 

This is the part where running multiple sites is beneficial. We have the server space, we have the tech being developed for other sites, piggy-backing an additional site that is chugging along isn't a problem.

[Derwood]

SPOILER: I’ve been a chat bot this entire time

[WrigleyField 22]

TBH, my fear is the opposite. They make a go of it here for a year or so and when it doesn't develop they shut it down due to cost.

You don't have to worry about this. We're in this for the long haul and fully expect to lose money the first couple of years, maybe turning a profit by year three or four.

 

And if things go disastrously wrong from there, it costs us virtually nothing to shut down the parts of the site with high overhead (front page news, videos, etc) and return to being a forum. There will be no need to ever shut down the site provided there are people here interested in discussing the Cubs.

What if 80% of my posts are in social/other sports sub forums

[Brock Beauchamp]

What if 80% of my posts are in social/other sports sub forums

You do you.

[David]

Let it be known that I am still firmly in team down with megathreads, especially with all of these sub-forums already there to organize topics (for the most part...true miscellaneous discussion stuff has its place)

[Sammy Sofa]

especially with all of these sub-forums already there

 

Uh, not for non-sports stuff. There's "Social" and "Rants."

[David]

also, uh, hey guys remember how dabum was a robot, beep bop boop... he really needed ram upgrade

 

 

 

(is this the right thread?)

[Irrelevant Dude]

Let it be known that I am still firmly in team down with megathreads, especially with all of these sub-forums already there to organize topics (for the most part...true miscellaneous discussion stuff has its place)

I vote we go the opposite direction. Everything goes in the Brian Roberts thread.

[WrigleyField 22]

Let it be known that I am still firmly in team down with megathreads, especially with all of these sub-forums already there to organize topics (for the most part...true miscellaneous discussion stuff has its place)

I think social/sports forum has a pretty good mix of mega v non mega threads honestly. Like every subset of idiots we talk about there has there own thread and we are consistently adding threads for new kind of idiots and occassionally spinning them off into tangential threads.

 

General Cubs Chit Chat on the Cubs Discussion sub forum is definitely a mockery of forums lol

 

Page 1 of Cubs Discussion still has a last post date of July 2022! Just start a new damn thread! Compare to Feb 2023 for social and Dec 2022 for other sports for latest post date on page 1

[David]

especially with all of these sub-forums already there

 

Uh, not for non-sports stuff. There's "Social" and "Rants."

 

fair. the off topic stuff was what i was mainly thinking of as the place for some megathreads. i guess it depends on how granular you would want to get with that stuff and how much the traffic does or doesn't warrant it.

[squally1313]

Certainly not expecting any of the actual data, but a little curious on the actual financials of a forum like this given the pretty low traffic. In the middle of a Mad Men rewatch and I keep thinking back to when the people they originally sold the company to decided to sell them (right before they make Lane fire them to start their own agency) and Don keeps talking about just buying the company back for themselves. I share Sofa's concern about the new guys coming in, trying a few things, and then just pulling the plug, and even though Brock says that isn't the case....everyone has someone to answer to. I'm not naive enough to think that like, the remaining 16 of us would band together and start paying out of pocket, but just financially curious on what all is involved.

 

Really, in a roundabout way, this is just me belatedly thanking Tim for keeping this thing up and running all these years. I'm sure it was a lot easier during the 2014-2017 stretch, before we all mostly decided we hated the Cubs and maybe baseball in general.

[WrigleyField 22]

Let's adopt this forum and let Mojo go nuts imo

https://brewerfanatic.com/forums/forum/42-head-2-head-debate-forum/

[Brock Beauchamp]

I think social/sports forum has a pretty good mix of mega v non mega threads honestly. Like every subset of idiots we talk about there has there own thread and we are consistently adding threads for new kind of idiots and occassionally spinning them off into tangential threads.

 

General Cubs Chit Chat on the Cubs Discussion sub forum is definitely a mockery of forums lol

 

Page 1 of Cubs Discussion still has a last post date of July 2022! Just start a new damn thread! Compare to Feb 2023 for social and Dec 2022 for other sports for latest post date on page 1

To be blunt about it, I don't care about off-topic/social stuff unless it goes against advertising policy (ie. gets us blocked from our advertiser, which requires some pretty awful stuff or nudity, which definitely isn't awful by my standards but they feel differently) or goes against what I talked about above (ie. basic human decency). And when I say "basic human decency", I *do not* mean dark humor, I mean racism and general awfulness that is all too prevalent in our society.

 

My opinion is that the first page of a forum should roll over every couple of weeks (again, specifically talking Cubs content here). Having more, focused threads increases engagement while encouraging new users to jump into the pool. Hell, just the news of the site purchase and this active thread has bumped traffic considerably in the past 24-ish hours. I encourage people to start considering what they're about to type and go ahead and create a new thread about it if it's a timely, specific point that will spin off its own conversation. To a significant portion of users, long-running mega-threads become wallpaper. More topics with specific titles encourage people to not only read more but post more, too. And a more visually active forum with lots of recent posts takes down one of the barriers people have to registering and making their first comment.

[Brock Beauchamp]

Let's adopt this forum and let Mojo go nuts imo

https://brewerfanatic.com/forums/forum/42-head-2-head-debate-forum/

This is actually a REALLY fun forum if done right. Unfortunately, I haven't had time to really manage it over at BF but Twins Daily has a more active version of it. It's a fun way to kill time during a long off-season.

[WrigleyField 22]

I think social/sports forum has a pretty good mix of mega v non mega threads honestly. Like every subset of idiots we talk about there has there own thread and we are consistently adding threads for new kind of idiots and occassionally spinning them off into tangential threads.

 

General Cubs Chit Chat on the Cubs Discussion sub forum is definitely a mockery of forums lol

 

Page 1 of Cubs Discussion still has a last post date of July 2022! Just start a new damn thread! Compare to Feb 2023 for social and Dec 2022 for other sports for latest post date on page 1

To be blunt about it, I don't care about off-topic/social stuff unless it goes against advertising policy (ie. gets us blocked from our advertiser, which requires some pretty awful stuff or nudity, which definitely isn't awful by my standards but they feel differently) or goes against what I talked about above (ie. basic human decency). And when I say "basic human decency", I *do not* mean dark humor, I mean racism and general awfulness that is all too prevalent in our society.

 

My opinion is that the first page of a forum should roll over every couple of weeks (again, specifically talking Cubs content here). Having more, focused threads increases engagement while encouraging new users to jump into the pool. Hell, just the news of the site purchase and this active thread has bumped traffic considerably in the past 24-ish hours. I encourage people to start considering what they're about to type and go ahead and create a new thread about it if it's a timely, specific point that will spin off its own conversation. To a significant portion of users, long-running mega-threads become wallpaper. More topics with specific titles encourage people to not only read more but post more, too. And a more visually active forum with lots of recent posts takes down one of the barriers people have to registering and making their first comment.

I tend to agree.

 

A lot of us I think use the active topic shortcut to view activity. That looks like it's rolling over from Sunday on page 1 right now. Not sure if 48ish hours is typical there.

 

So you might get some pushback there from users accustomed to logging and and seeing a couple days worth of active topics. But probably a majority of those are not even cubs/baseball related since the non baseball forums actually start new threads with regularity whereas all Cubs/baseball discussion gets swallowed into mega threads almost by default.

[Brock Beauchamp]

I share Sofa's concern about the new guys coming in, trying a few things, and then just pulling the plug, and even though Brock says that isn't the case....everyone has someone to answer to.

I mostly answer to me. I have business partners but they've come to accept that I'm a busy-body and stuff like this keeps me off in a corner being busy without much cost outlay for them. And the upside is there even if it takes awhile to reach it. They're happy to mostly leave me alone and let me go do my thing, as I've taken less interest in Twins Daily itself over the years as I become more and more of a general baseball fan. I still do a ton of work for Twins Daily but managing three sites with almost identical code bases allows me to roll something out at TD then spend the bulk of my time drilling down into the specifics of the other sites.

 

It's the old 80/20 rule. I've pretty much done all that 80/20 work at Twins Daily. We have a good advertising program. We absolutely dominate search results. We're listed in most of the important aggregators. There just isn't a lot left for me to do over there except run the community and I've done that for so long the community basically runs itself at this point.

 

And frankly, somewhat to my surprise (it shouldn't have been a surprise but it was), being immersed in other communities really helps me make *all* communities better. I made mistakes with Twins Daily. I made fewer mistakes with Brewer Fanatic. I hope to make even fewer mistakes here. And all those lessons improve all of the sites over time.

[Sammy Sofa]

especially with all of these sub-forums already there

 

Uh, not for non-sports stuff. There's "Social" and "Rants."

 

fair. the off topic stuff was what i was mainly thinking of as the place for some megathreads. i guess it depends on how granular you would want to get with that stuff and how much the traffic does or doesn't warrant it.

 

I'm kinda with you; I don't mind the megathreads, but would prefer more subforums. Like, one for politics, movies, music, food, etc.. Having a broader off topic forum still makes sense, and rants is fine.

 

I think a "serious topics" forum is a decent idea, too.

 

I know I'm biased, but I think the non-sports posters/topics have been doing a LOT of the legwork in keeping this place from being a ghost town.

[Brock Beauchamp]

I tend to agree.

 

A lot of us I think use the active topic shortcut to view activity. That looks like it's rolling over from Sunday on page 1 right now. Not sure if 48ish hours is typical there.

 

So you might get some pushback there from users accustomed to logging and and seeing a couple days worth of active topics. But probably a majority of those are not even cubs/baseball related since the non baseball forums actually start new threads with regularity whereas all Cubs/baseball discussion gets swallowed into mega threads almost by default.

The new software has a robust activity tool that many of you will surely want to explore. It has all sorts of settings and can be quite granular based on your own interests. And you can save these settings to be quickly-toggled options for future use.

 

https://brewerfanatic.com/discover/unread/

[Brock Beauchamp]

I'm kinda with you; I don't mind the megathreads, but would prefer more subforums. Like, one for politics, movies, music, food, etc.. Having a broader off topic forum still makes sense, and rants is fine.

 

I think a "serious topics" forum is a decent idea, too.

 

I know I'm biased, but I think the non-sports posters/topics have been doing a LOT of the legwork in keeping this place from being a ghost town.

We're gonna have to visit the number of forums and how they're arranged. It's pretty chaotic in its current form.

 

But we'll have a discussion about that. All the content will likely stay but we'll have to do some shuffling. I'm not in a position to really give advice HOW to do that so I'll be leaning on all of you to figure that out based on how you currently use specific forums, how often you use them, and how long they've been idle.

[David]

Really, in a roundabout way, this is just me belatedly thanking Tim for keeping this thing up and running all these years. I'm sure it was a lot easier during the 2014-2017 stretch, before we all mostly decided we hated the Cubs and maybe baseball in general.

 

on that last point, i think if/when the team is legit good again, that sort of activity will pick back up. what i feel towards the cubs of the last 3ish years or so is generally just apathy. if things look like they're going well, my interest picks up. when things are going to horsefeathers, as they have been for a while, i still follow day to day but don't have a ton of interest in discussing them.

 

there was a similar vibe in here around 2011/12 when theo came in and we realized they were going full tear-down. a lot of people said stuff like, "i'm not sure i'll ever be back where i was in 2008," which was definitely true for some. hell, things were so bleak in 2012-13 that even i found myself venturing into the daily minor league threads. but when things started to turn around, things seemed to pick back up here too in a big way.

 

i know 2023 is even further away from the golden era of these types of places, but i still imagine things will pick back up things if/when the team is legitimately looking good again.

[WrigleyField 22]

I tend to agree.

 

A lot of us I think use the active topic shortcut to view activity. That looks like it's rolling over from Sunday on page 1 right now. Not sure if 48ish hours is typical there.

 

So you might get some pushback there from users accustomed to logging and and seeing a couple days worth of active topics. But probably a majority of those are not even cubs/baseball related since the non baseball forums actually start new threads with regularity whereas all Cubs/baseball discussion gets swallowed into mega threads almost by default.

The new software has a robust activity tool that many of you will surely want to explore. It has all sorts of settings and can be quite granular based on your own interests. And you can save these settings to be quickly-toggled options for future use.

 

https://brewerfanatic.com/discover/unread/

Very excited to see it in action. As long as those tools exist, it should hopefully help with killing mega threads.

[Irrelevant Dude]

I don't mind the megathreads, but would prefer more subforums. Like, one for politics, movies, music, food, etc.. Having a broader off topic forum still makes sense, and rants is fine.

The problem with all the subforums it that you end up with a lot of inactive subforums. I would rather have broader forum categories with the activity consolidated.

[Rob]

I'm kinda with you; I don't mind the megathreads, but would prefer more subforums. Like, one for politics, movies, music, food, etc.. Having a broader off topic forum still makes sense, and rants is fine.

 

I think a "serious topics" forum is a decent idea, too.

 

I know I'm biased, but I think the non-sports posters/topics have been doing a LOT of the legwork in keeping this place from being a ghost town.

We're gonna have to visit the number of forums and how they're arranged. It's pretty chaotic in its current form.

 

But we'll have a discussion about that. All the content will likely stay but we'll have to do some shuffling. I'm not in a position to really give advice HOW to do that so I'll be leaning on all of you to figure that out based on how you currently use specific forums, how often you use them, and how long they've been idle.

 

Just some friendly advice, keeping Fred's name on the Game Threads Forum is sacrosanct. Reshuffling is fine otherwise.

[Brock Beauchamp]

Just some friendly advice, keeping Fred's name on the Game Threads Forum is sacrosanct. Reshuffling is fine otherwise.

Tim gave me the run down on that name and it's definitely staying for obvious reasons.

[Irrelevant Dude]

I tend to agree.

 

A lot of us I think use the active topic shortcut to view activity. That looks like it's rolling over from Sunday on page 1 right now. Not sure if 48ish hours is typical there.

 

So you might get some pushback there from users accustomed to logging and and seeing a couple days worth of active topics. But probably a majority of those are not even cubs/baseball related since the non baseball forums actually start new threads with regularity whereas all Cubs/baseball discussion gets swallowed into mega threads almost by default.

The new software has a robust activity tool that many of you will surely want to explore. It has all sorts of settings and can be quite granular based on your own interests. And you can save these settings to be quickly-toggled options for future use.

 

https://brewerfanatic.com/discover/unread/

I know I'm in the minority here, but I really like using Tapatalk to browse the forums on my mobile device(s). Any thoughts on whether you will be able to preserve Tapatalk support with whatever new forum software is going to be used?