Survival UK Forums

The traffic light system.
I made a remark in a thread recently with regard to" Introduce yourself " and a lack of new members ...i have thought for quite some time now of encouraging a reversal of the present trend of NEWBIES so here go,s

LIGHT IS RED
this means newbies only can respond to a thread...the reputation rating would take care and trigger this say o to 3 no one above can participate in the discussion they get all the time to themselves no other members above the 3 could enter in....except the mods .

LIGHT IS AMBER

this means the rep rating increases from o to 10 say ...all members from 0 to 10 can now interact in the threads up to that.


LIGHT IS GREEN

All members may participate in a full discussion of any thread.


SO why SS ?
this might be a way forward for fair play for people who need the most help, and a way to make members stop and think before they respond ...and in a better frame of mind , this also gives the newbies confidence to post without the instant threat of ridicule or some degrading put down or being raped on the spot of any confidence they mustered up to start with.

Now i have no doubts there are plenty of holes in the above but inaction is even worse ...please indulge yourselves kicking the shit out of me and the concept...this may result in more work for SD but i expect he is all charged up waiting to full fill my every whim .

Sorry SS, I don't like this idea. Members with high reps might have something vital to contribute to a thread.

me too , sorry mate.

I have to say that I do not see the need for this at all.
Too complicated.
Keep things simple and if whatever isn't broken why try to fix it?
Perhaps dealing with the planners is rubbing off?!!

Nice thought, S, and I can see where you are going, but the need is to encourage new members generally. Maybe setting limits as to which thread they could contribute to would reduce the input rather than increase it. What we need to do is produce enough posts of interest to newbies to encourage their participation, and some kindly input from the veterans could go a long way to help this.

Better question;

I look at the bottom of the screen and find that 22 guests are viewing and two members are on line.

Of the two members only one of us has made a post in the past month.

What is keeping those 22 guests from registering, and what is keeping registered members from participating?

Lack of interest?

Lack of knowledge?

Lack of content?

Fear of being connected to this group?

How many view the main site and never get as far as the forum, which has always been considered a side dish, and a great irritation, to the main site to begin with?

Now there is some bloody good input Thanks MB....while i am thanking.....can everyone now stop sending me Diazepan and Prozac ....i have enough ...great for barter.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M8KdtJOCzOU

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I'm sure you are feeling much better now.

Sure am MB much much better now !

I have been thinking about this worry over participation, joining and such and decided to do some checking.

I belong to several forums of outdoor nature or prepper leanings. They are big forums and have been on the internet for 8-10 years and would seem quite successful by normal standards.

Some of them have as many as 15,000 members. 500,000 posts in thousands of threads.

Looking at the statistics just this morning I see that they are averaging about 100 people on line at any time and about 10% of those are members.

Here we are averaging 25-30 at any given time and the same 10% being members.

This forum is averaging a better % of the population viewing and participating than the very successful American forums.

This forum is really doing OK and you just do not realize it!

Here there are fewer posts because there are fewer people available to post. Once a topic has had all 10-12 active members post they are out of things to say and the thread sits untended for months. (On a US forum that number would be 30-50 active members making it look like there is more interest in the topic.)

The really strange thing I see is that the US forums are commercial. They have adds in the sidebar and on the headings. A post on a specific subject will be followed by adds for products related to that topic.

The owners of the forum get paid for each of these adds and promote the products and supporters of the forums.

There are many outdoor topics (fire starting, outdoor shelters, navigation, best backpacks) one can google search and the first hits will direct one to the forums rather than to an Amazon, You tube or Ebay site due to repetitive use of content on the forum.

The forums are heavily moderated just to keep the visitors looking and bring them back directly to the site the next time they have a question, because each time someone hits on one of the sidebar adds the forum gets financial support. Many people register on the forums just to ask one single question and never return. Others join, send specific members PM notes and read daily, but never post on the open forum.

But every time they click the forum owner makes money.

Holding oneself above the nastiness of commercialism and avoiding that dirty word called profit sometimes holds one (and a forum) back, redefines "success", and changes the attitude toward the forum's usefulness and value.