Hey, uh...Not sure if I should really post this here, but I'm going to anyway since it's my thread.
I'm trying to get A TON more members for my message board...And am trying to get it really active. People are really shy in posting and I'm doing my best to make everyone happy, but...If anyone knows how to use phpBB for free boards, PLEASE let me know and...we'll talk? Otherwise...If you want to join, great. There are other positions I need filled as well.
It's for: Star Wars RPG Star Wars fan fiction Original fantasy RPG Original fantasy fiction
Beta reading, contests...a bunch of other stuff. Please check it out and join. I wasn't sure where else to post this, so if you have any suggestions...
It doesn't have 'very few members'. It has twelve, which isn't a lot but it's better than what I had. And the colors are the way they are because of the skin I chose. I tried getting it to change but it takes a while to do so (at least if it's still the galaxian theme).
As for the forums, I have to have that many because of how many things I'm offering. If it were for just Star Wars, that'd be one thing, but it's not.
I disagree. I didn't make all of those forums at once; the ideas came and I made the forums as they did. There are probably one or two I could get rid of but that's about it because the board is for more than one thing. If it were for mainly Star Wars stuff, then I'd agree. This isn't the first message board I've made, so I have some experience with it. Plus, I'm still getting used to phpbb.
I might agree with you if you only had one or two forums for each category of writing, but what I believe Daemon was trying to say, and what I am saying besides, is that there are way too many forums for each category. You have different forums for multiple planets, which not only stretches things out and makes them harder to access, but also gives a potential new member the impression that your board isn't very active, at first glance, if he happens upon the planet forums that may not be so popular.
Also, you have multiple forums like Beta Readers and Writers Block for example for multiple categories, and while its good to keep things as categorized as possible, when dealing with so many forums these are some things you might want to think about trimming down a bit.
Also, it might be easier for new users if you had only one rule forum, instead of multiple ones for each RP, so they have one solid source for the board information.
Of course, these are just my opinions on the matter. I'm not telling you to do anything, of course, or saying it won't work if you don't, these are just some things to take into mind.
Daemon is correct. You have 53 forums, 12 members, and 73 posts. Something is definitely wrong there. Five forums, twelve members, and seventy-three posts would be a more attractive ratio. You typically want fewer forums than members, and far more posts than both of the previous ones combined. Forums should be added based on need, not based on when the idea arises.
After years of seeing it on ezBoard, and to a lesser extent, independently, I can say with confidence that the mark of a newbie admin is too many forums. Delete about forty-five of your forums, and you'll be far better off. People come to a board for its unique topic, not because it offers discussion about everything. Any yahoo with an internet connection can offer discussion on any topic. The internet is not a 'build it and they will come' place, it's a, 'offer something no one else does, and they will come' place. That's what you need to do. You need to identify your unique bits exploit them.
Don't take this the wrong way; it's just that most of us have seen this kind of board advertised on TRF well over a hundred times, easy. For awhile we had a dedicated forum just for advertising, where we made fun of people who posted their I had this cool idea guyz lets make a forum right now and get peoplez to postes and then well have a big forum to be gods over come on post in our forum guys you have more members than you could ever use share a few with us plz thx by adverts.
As a side note, why is your username Myster_of_the_Force, anyway? You could have registerd Mystery D'crat, with no underscores and the quote, if you wanted. It can be changed, too, if you want.
I added those planets last night because originally, it was going to be storyline-based, with a pre-set storyline, but I added the general RPG section because no one seemed to be coming up with any storyline ideas. I'd post a few ideas and they'd be like "I like this but I don't like this" and that's it. I added the different planets because I thought it'd be a good way of making it less confusing if it was all in one forum, like if someone forgot to post what planet they were on. I also added them in hopes of getting people interested in the general RPG. The message board is still new, so even without that whole section, there are a lot of forums without any posts.
As I said, I'm still working on the different sections of the board. I plan on getting rid of two of the forums for beta reading and just having one big section for it. I also added the 'beta reading 101' etc last night, so those are stll new.
I don't have much experience in actually having a message board that stays active for a long time. While I have the experience in being a moderator and making the boards, I lack in being able to keep it active, so...I am still looking for moderators, and if you plan on joining, you could be one. I made the Council...Or something...Which is going to be for discussing different rules and stuff, but you could be in charge of coming up with suggestions for future features of the board and when they'll come and all that since you seem to know some things about it. If you don't want to, that's fine, but the offer still stands as of right now. -Shrug-
There aren't many boards, at least that I've seen, that focus on mainly fan fiction/original fantasy and RPG, so I'm hoping that it'll attract some attention just because of that. Usually you find Star Wars RPG boards with no sections for writing or whatever.
I believe (not 100% sure) I made it so that only mods can post there. If I didn't, I'll do so.
As I said, all I'm trying to do is make a message board that will actually -be active- and become a success. I'm open to suggestions, but if I get a little snappyish/protective of my board, thats just me. Just as writing and my stories are like my babies, stuff like this is the same way to me because I've put a lot of work into it.
I know I could have. I liked Mystery_of_the_Force because she's supposed to be myseterious (hence the name) and I just liked it better. I (intend to) only use this name for IC posts. I don't mind the underscores; I think that's because I'm used to having to have them in a screen name from Yahoo! Chat...At least you have to have them if you want to be considered a 'cool RPer' and not a newb like krazycat3958_ or something.
