Forum Changes

[sidcharles]

9 hours ago, bobthehobbyguy said:

. . . .

As far as having a pay for the site fee I would suggest having a survey for any changes to assume not alienating forum members. I'm sure there is a segment that may not to pay for a variety of reasons. If the free option is too severely crippled there will be a loss of membership.

I am also curious on who is going to administer collecting the fees. Second is a new member going to be able to sign up immediately. If so that is going to take more resources to administer.

the tariffs are encroaching on our lives. once in place, they are seldom lifted. we take enlightenment from wherever we find it.

[Ace-Garageguy]

5 hours ago, Bugatti Fan said:

Some may lose access to sections that will become described as 'Premium' according to Xingu in a previous post.

So, does this mean that we will the forum access will become two tier ?

Nice I guess for the affords who have more disposable income who will be able to access those designated premium sections. So what will those sections be that will actually warrant premium status I have to ask?    And, what will be the proposed charge to use them? Also, how much extra benefit would there be in having them? At the moment there is no suggested manifesto about what shape they would take so users are unable for now to read any informed decision suggestions.

There may be many folk on limited incomes that might not be able to afford it depending on the proposed charges, and it would be disappointing if the site as a result were then to be perceived as an  'us and them' user experience.

The people who run the forum seem to be reasonably fair, so...

I'd expect the "free" part of the forum to remain as inclusive as it is now, for just the reasons you state.

I'd expect any additional "tier" benefits or content to be material or features NOT currently available on the all-free forum.

So free users would lose nothing, and paying users would just get a little extra.

This is what I'd expect, anyway, but it's not my decision...  

EDIT: And as far as "fair" goes, the way I see it, a pay-to-play tier is not to punish free users, but rather to allow those users who HATE advertising (like me) to directly support the forum while running an ad-blocker, which otherwise would deny the forum revenue for that user's exposure to ads on the forum.

Edited 19 hours ago by Ace-Garageguy

[Ace-Garageguy]

It bears mentioning at this point is that the whole reason the PhotoBucket debacle happened is that so many "free" users were running ad-blocking software that the site was losing money.

No business can offer a "free" service indefinitely while continually losing money on it. 

The well runs dry eventually if "free" users violate the implied agreement to see advertising to offset the expense incurred by providing the service.

In return for using PhotoBucket for "free", advertising was shown during the upload process, and said advertising generated income for the service.

PAYING users did NOT have to sit through the advertising, and as I run ad-blockers, it seemed to me to be the right thing to do to PAY for the service.

And because I'd been a pay-to-play user from the beginning, I did NOT lose access to my photos when the site revised its business model (which is not to say I agree with the way that site handled the transition).

But back to the point: simply put, using an ad-blocker while accessing a "free" site that makes its income from users seeing advertising is cheating, no more, no less.

All the proposed paying tier here is intended to do (as I understand it) is to allow users who hate ads (and have a conscience) to avoid them without cheating the system.

Edited 18 hours ago by Ace-Garageguy

[Dave Ambrose]

Thank you all for your input. There's a lot of interesting ideas. 

Regarding search, the forum software supports an improved search engine, but there are technical issues inhibiting its use at the moment. I'm trying to address those. 

We are due for a major version upgrade, and that will bring new features, and probably a few frustrations as well. 

 

[Xingu]

One of the big things we are discussing is offering a paid tier to go ad free, except for ad space we may sell to model companies (if we get that far). The free tier would have ads and probably require that ad blockers be disabled.

We have discussed limiting the number of photos (per post, not per day) based on tier.

We have also discussed changes to the Marketplace and who has access to it.

All discussion, nothing concrete yet.

[FoMoCo66]

I really like the idea of seeing model related ads instead of the other, let's just say, interesting ads.

[iamsuperdan]

7 hours ago, Bugatti Fan said:

Some may lose access to sections that will become described as 'Premium' according to Xingu in a previous post.

So, does this mean that we will the forum access will become two tier ?

 

Right now, the easy answer is...kind of...maybe.

We don't want to limit peoples' access to the forums. The WIP and Under Glass sections are the main reasons we're all here (well, most of us anyway) so we're not planning to take away access. 

As for the Community sections, limiting access to Off Topic areas has been discussed.

But nothing concrete is in place.

The of the main goals of introducing a paid tier is to provide an ad-free experience to those who want it. I'm not getting into the weeds with all of the adviertising nonsense we have to deal with, but that's an important piece. 

We're asking for input because we want to see what is most important to people. And to determine whethr we can add features that make a paid tier worth the cost to members. If it was strictly for the convenience of going ad-free, we're not doing it. What content can we add that makes paying a yearly fee worth it?

 

That's what we're trying to figure out here. And that's where suggestions are helpful.

 

 

Of course, we really can't win. We've already been accused of pandering to the masses and that we're money grubbing greedy overlords that don't actually care about anyone but ourselves and the lining of our own pockets.

 

But I digress....

 

[iamsuperdan]

5 minutes ago, FoMoCo66 said:

I really like the idea of seeing model related ads instead of the other, let's just say, interesting ads.

We want to see that too. It's really difficult when google is involved. Google tailors the ads to each user's internet history. So when we keep searching for models, or possibly drag racing, or transkits, or hooker headers; well...you can see what words google might pickup on.

But we have ideas.

 

[EngineerBob]

Just my two cents: As someone who is only "into" modeling from time to time (I haven't worked on any of my WIP models for almost a year), I appreciate the Forum just as it is. I typically only look at the "New Activity" posts to see if any topics or models are being discussed that catch my interest. I personally don't think the current amount of ads are too intrusive and wouldn't be interested in a pay option. Administrators, keep up the good work!

[iamsuperdan]

16 minutes ago, EngineerBob said:

Just my two cents: As someone who is only "into" modeling from time to time (I haven't worked on any of my WIP models for almost a year), I appreciate the Forum just as it is. I typically only look at the "New Activity" posts to see if any topics or models are being discussed that catch my interest. I personally don't think the current amount of ads are too intrusive and wouldn't be interested in a pay option. Administrators, keep up the good work!

It's strange because some members, like yourself, have no issues with the size and quantities of the ads they see. Other members have provided examples of ads that cover content or multiple ads that get in the way of viewing posts. 

Part of it is due to Dave's work in trying to keep on top of the changes Google keeps making. Just when he sets the preferences and things looks good, boom. Changes behind the scenes and it all starts over again.

 

 

[Falcon Ranchero]

19 hours ago, Ace-Garageguy said:

It already exists. Go to your own page, click "see my activity" in the upper right, and then select "topics" on the LH side of the screen.

Every thread you ever started will be magically displayed by the last date anything was posted on it.

I'm closing on 40,000 posts, and it's not hard to find a thread I started years ago.

Well that's great I had no idea; i've been doing it the hard way for over a year now.

[JollySipper]

I hope there will be an amount of time between the announcing of the paid subscription tiers and implementing them....... Some of us might would like to pay thru check or money order. Will that be an option? 

Edited 15 hours ago by JollySipper

[sidcharles]

raw-their thahn trying to quote everything that's been said, if it would make sense without hurting feelings, perhaps some of the space takers could be put in the higher priced columns.

the "off topics" section in its entirety. i don't need to know what was for supper or if your cat enjoyed the leftovers.

photos for sure should be limited in some manner. there are threads which i open, go out and make tea, and return before they are ready to view.*

and quoting those photos should also be limited. i try to trim responses to the relevant point, and have yet to have anyone mention the trimmed verbiage gave my response more or less relevance.

not sure if any of this would affect the bottom line of efficiency in operation.

i spend money on AdBlock Plus & YouTube plus Norton to keep ads off my screen. also search with DuckDuckGo almost exclusively. so my advertising contamination is at a minimum.

 

*admittedly i have the slowest internet speed Verizon offers. i am locked into a set monthly invoice for phone/ internet as long as i maintain this address, since i have been a 'loyal customer' for 26 years.

Edited 15 hours ago by sidcharles

[Ace-Garageguy]

3 hours ago, Xingu said:

One of the big things we are discussing is offering a paid tier to go ad free, except for ad space we may sell to model companies (if we get that far). The free tier would have ads and probably require that ad blockers be disabled.

We have discussed limiting the number of photos (per post, not per day) based on tier.

We have also discussed changes to the Marketplace and who has access to it.

All discussion, nothing concrete yet.

If I were paying for access, I certainly would have NO OBJECTION to seeing ads for models or related products, including other genres and some products not specifically aimed at scale-modelers, but very very useful to a variety of hobbyists including us...like Cricut and Sherline, for instance.

Limiting the number of photos per post makes sense too. Seeing two dozen fuzzy phone pix of every miniscule piece of work from every imaginable angle is a huge waste of resources and takes forever to load for some people, depending on their ISPs, internet speeds, and other factors.

Educating users as to quoting etiquette might be nice to try, as endlessly repeated photos are another unnecessary resource hog taking forever to load sometimes too. But good luck with that one. I understand some forum software has a "click to expand" photo option that can improve page loading times, but I'm not an IT guy, so I'll leave it at that.

Edited 14 hours ago by Ace-Garageguy
punctiliousness

[Falcon Ranchero]

If the pay thing happens, it's not going to make the site acknowledge I'm using a free ad block to get around paying to have no ads, right? I've been on other sites that won't even let you go on unless your ad blocker is turned off. And then I get all ads on the site. As long as the forum still lets free ad blockers stop ads without having to pay premium, then that's fine. I just don't want to pay to be on here is all.  

[Ace-Garageguy]

20 minutes ago, Falcon Ranchero said:

If the pay thing happens, it's not going to make the site acknowledge I'm using a free ad block to get around paying to have no ads, right? I've been on other sites that won't even let you go on unless your ad blocker is turned off. And then I get all ads on the site. As long as the forum still lets free ad blockers stop ads without having to pay premium, then that's fine. I just don't want to pay to be on here is all.  

So let me get this straight...you don't want to see the ads that generate income for the site when you look at it, but you don't want to have to pay to be ad-free either?

OK...

[FoMoCo66]

23 minutes ago, Falcon Ranchero said:

If the pay thing happens, it's not going to make the site acknowledge I'm using a free ad block to get around paying to have no ads, right? I've been on other sites that won't even let you go on unless your ad blocker is turned off. And then I get all ads on the site. As long as the forum still lets free ad blockers stop ads without having to pay premium, then that's fine. I just don't want to pay to be on here is all.  

Yeah, I dont think that works...

[sidcharles]

51 minutes ago, Ace-Garageguy said:

So let me get this straight...you don't want to see the ads that generate income for the site when you look at it, but you don't want to have to pay to be ad-free either?

OK...

you know when the car dealer says "how much do you want your monthly payments to be?"

the correct answer is:

 

Zero.

[Xingu]

We have discussed forcing ad blockers to be turned off. There are options in most ad blockers to allow them to be disabled on sites you list. Free would be a slight inconvenience, but still free. 

[bytownshaker]

I think the categories are fine maybe a little tweaking her and there.

I'd limit the number of pictures per post as I don't really need to see a picture of every paint, paint brush, glue etc  used during the build.

I try to view posts from all types of builders elite or newbie as you can learn from everyone.

The ads don't really bother me I just scroll past.

I do miss seeing what country people are from.

I want to thank the admins as they do a fantastic job.

 

[bbowser]

1 hour ago, bytownshaker said:

I think the categories are fine maybe a little tweaking her and there.

I'd limit the number of pictures per post as I don't really need to see a picture of every paint, paint brush, glue etc  used during the build.

I try to view posts from all types of builders elite or newbie as you can learn from everyone.

The ads don't really bother me I just scroll past.

I do miss seeing what country people are from.

I want to thank the admins as they do a fantastic job.

 

I agree.  I like the idea of a forum for motorcycles but after looking through the "All the Rest" I don't really see enough posts to warrant a separate forum.  I also am in favor of limiting the number of pics per post.  I don't mind the ads, I'm used to ignoring them on every other site I visit.

And kudos to the admins!

[peteski]

Few members seem to enjoy posting "walk-around" photos of their model taken 360 degrees around it, a photo taken what seems like 10 degrees increments.  Is that really necessary?  Granted, there are very few members who do this, but I don't find it informative.  Limiting number of photos per post seems  like an excellent idea . . . but OTOH, some build threads have posts with lots in-progress photos which I find informative.   I guess the person posting large photo essay could just split it into multiple posts, so I'm not sure that such a limit would be useful or helpful.

What I think would be more useful is limit the resolution (file size) if the photos uploaded to the forum.  Some modelers upload huge size photos. It isn't really needed for viewing, even on large size monitors, and totally wasted on tiny smart phone screens on which many view the forum.  Having file size limit (or auto-resize on upload) would drastically slow  down the storage space gobbling on the forums server.  I originally offered this suggestion but I was told that the MCM editors sometimes use those photos in the printed magazine.  I thought that was not a very good reason for those high-res photos  in the forum posts (since the editor could just request the original size photos from the author of the post).

I also recall a fairly recent plea from the admins to limit the uploaded photo sizes due to the forum's storage space quickly filling up,  but then nothing else was mentioned about it.  The problem is that nowadays most digital cameras (DSLR and other cameras, and all the portable devices)  have huge image sensors (12 Megapixels and much higher) and most modelers don't bother to resize (resample) them into lower res images.  That's why auto-resizing during upload  would be very beneficial.  I resize the photos I upload to around 1200 pixels (or less) across.  That results in most of my uploaded photo size of 300kB or less. Since I messed around with computers for decades I learned to be thrifty with computer storage. My first computer had 1kB of RAM and 360kB floppy drive for storage! 

[Ace-Garageguy]

4 minutes ago, peteski said:

...My first computer had 1kB of RAM and 360kB floppy drive for storage!  

My first computer was a single flip-flop.  

[Roger U]

I also think the categories are fine now. Adding more will probably result in more confusion and complaining.

I just ignore the ads and scroll past them. 

I'd also agree to limiting the number of photos, there are way too many in some posts.

[peteski]

1 minute ago, Ace-Garageguy said:

My first computer was a single flip-flop.  

You mean like  the beach footwear mentioned in Jimmy Buffett's song? 

I know you're funnin', but single flip-flop cannot be a computer.