[Debate] Why do you want to be an admin?

[kittyxartist]

The only reason I actually became an admin, is because I wasn't able to find active communities -other than dA groups, etc.- about my recent favourite movie, and nobody seemed in the way to make one themselves to me to just join and be a member.
Although long time ago, I wouldn't even wish to be a mod because I rather enjoyed simply being a member of a forum, but if I'd have the possibility to be a mod in a forum I see in troubles, I'd take it without hesitate.

But it has turned on to be a lot of fun Thankfully, the place doesn't have meanies so I don't have to use my "admin powers" in bad ways and whatnot.

I really like to discuss things and read what people have to say, so I'm proud to be an admin of a forum!

[Shirayuki Berii]

Well I became an admin because the many shows out there (anime wise) weren't even located on an RPG network. Meaning the ones I wanted to RP didn't exist, or were already long dead from people just leaving. Now as an admin, I still have my fair share of other rpgs' but this time I wanted to do things my own way. I'm not really rushed for post anymore, but as an admin I now know that most members may leave, or even just seem very lost without you around. Its fun being an admiin, I enjoy making things go my way a bit, and even if my first RPG went sour I didn't give up and made a new one. Currently its going well, and I've ended up meeting some pretty cool people and people that I might try speaking to again. Thanks to being an admin, I have learned is harder to make a site than join one.

[Taylor]

I'm, uh, a bit controlling.

It's not always in a bad way. But I like things to be run a certain way. I can join other forums, but the thing is... if the board starts dying, or something is implemented in a horrible way, I'm powerless to stop it.

I was a member of a really active forum which I loved, and went to every day. I never once considered the idea of becoming a staff member on it. And then the admin disappeared. She just moved on without a word to any of us. It stayed open for a little while, and some of the senior members like myself took over the role of plots and accepting characters, but ultimately, without someone that had admin powers, it died.

After that, I've always preferred my own forum. At least then, if it's dying and I want to do something about it, I can.

[pascaline]

I became an admin because I was sick of the way anime RPGs were being run nowadays, and how often people site-hopped, how anime/manga-inspired original fantasy RPGs on proboards were pretty much suffering. I was also sick of how often forums closed. So, I got an idea in my head and decided to make my own RPG that was centered around character development and story telling and earning things via RPing. And I also like the feeling of security, of being able to RP freely without worrying that the site will close because now it's in my power to decide how the RP will last.

[FLASHiNGLiGHTS !]

I started my own forum because I wanted to control how it was made - like most people. I wanted it to be different from other forums similar to it. It was, and that's what got me the members, but I ended up closing the site because all of the pressure was going onto me, as an admin. It takes a lot of work to be a solo admin and I applaud those who do.

I am now an admin on a very large RP forum. When they asked me if I wanted to be one, I didn't decline because I knew that I could help the forum if I became one. The admin had been doing stuff by herself (our other admin was busy at the time) for a while now and when I came on I helped lighten her load. Now all 3 of us (head admin, other admin, and me) are on and the load is considerably lighter than my load on my own site.

[Ace Trainer Dom]

I have tried being the admin of a board because to be honest I want to know what it's like to actually build a forum from nothing to something. There's a sense of accomplishment that comes with it. When I first joined proboards I created a Pokemon forum. That forum is now long dead, but at it's peak it had about 10 daily members and around 20 members each day log in. Posts got above 5,000 and I considered it a success. Now ever since then I've been trying to at the very least duplicate that success, most recently in my forum gaming board, but to be truthful I haven't had too many original ideas in a long time. Now I've been spending my time trying to help revive an advertising forum that seems to have died down. It seems such a shame that a board that has been around for 5+ years and has 2,000+ members and 30,000+ posts could die out so easily within a few months. Now it seems that everyone has either left or moved on, and while you miss the members there who used to give the board character, it's even worse when they aren't replaced by new people who stick around either.

I tried to become an admin to see what it was like. I can say for sure that it's not always fun, but it is certainly worth it if you are successful.

[Junia]

I've always wanted to run my own forum. I have never had the guts to actually sit down and plan everything out. It is a seriously daunting task.

These days you have to have a fancy lay out. Plain and boring - for RP sites at least - don't really do that well. To come up with a color scheme and match everything together is hard work.

The site that I'm currently apart of is pretty freaking awesome. I came across it when it was a few days old. It was slow to get off the ground, but watching it burst into life is - in my opinion - what makes being an admin, or atleast an assistant manager worth while. It's nice to see something that you are fond of is taking off and growing into something successful.

Isn't that what everyone wants...success?

It's what I want.

[fbmacagba]

Being an admin means taking some responsibility. One must be willing to learn and accept that no one is perfect . I saw some admins in other forums that thinks they are always right and the users have must always agree to them even if there is a room for compromise. More so, you should always have an answer to all questions and you should know how to treat everyones ideas or suggestions. Most important is an admin should be fair in implementing penalties.

[[ saga ]]

I opened my own site once, it was active for a while; a year, then. . it died. :3
I liked having it for a few reasons; basically, I liked the feeling when members came and posted. It made me feel uhh successful, even though looking back, not many posts were made. o-o. Also, it was a place for me to experiment with codings and designs; something which is kinda impossible to do on forums where you're a member.

But now, I like helping out other forums to be successful more and have never considered opening another site of my own. Being a staff member on other forums feels more worthwhile and I really enjoy helping the people with their site and posting lots. c:

[kgunblue2]

Why i became an Admin?

Well the main reason I did was because I had found sites that were nice, the staff was ok. Things were fine for awhile, but I'm a writer by trade, i have been writing stories and have been working on a book for a long time.. 10 years to be exact.. But one thing I noticed was that most sites didnt give members the creative box they needed to excel in their writing skills. I made my site for those who wish to advance and become better writers by far, I know that many sites helped me along the way.. But not all of them helped as well..

I had an idea for a site and the site I was in was rather slow so I decided to start it with a little help from the admin on that site. She helped me out a bunch but i vanished for a couple of months (trip to europe) and i only popped in once in awhile without their knowledge. When i came back the site was in turmoil and I didnt want to search for hours to find yet another site that i had to integrate into. So i made my own with their help and things have been wonderful so far, I have a lot of free time and I use it to update things and make the site nicer when i can.

The biggest reason I became and admin was because I know how some admins are, and I also know how some places put a stop on your creative side. I want my site to be different, I want the players to RP in a world where every action they make has consequence and that's exactly what i plan to do. I want it to be continually challenging to those who have a lot of experience, but still easy for newer members to advance nicely and gain the knowledge they would need to continue their RPing lives. Plus it's a great way to mentor new people and teach them the ropes, i love showing people things and helping correct their errors in posts. I do make my own grammar mistakes but I'm not an English teacher so i dont really bother.

Kgun

[Fallen <3]

I want to be an admin because I want to be in charge.
I want to control what happens on a site, and make it my own. And hey, if it gets 100 members, I can look at it and say: "Hey, I did that."

[Makenna black (canons needed)]

I want to be an admin cause well i love to interact with people and be the one in charge of a site and in years later to know i was in charge of something for once. I love to help people out and i'm better at coding then i use to be. also ive had a dream of running a roleplaying site and now my wish has come true. one last thing is that i wanted to make something different then others have done

[EelKat]

Jul 29, 2006 5:35:21 GMT -8 ∞ ConqueringWolf ∞ said:

This is something similar to my thread on being an admin or a regular member. What I want to know is what has made you want to be the admin of your forum instead of just joining an already established forum and helping them to be successful? I still see new Harry Potter forums being opened daily along with LOTR and many others where there are already hundreds of forums that exist with the same topic. Do you feel you can create a better forum than the other people who already have one? If so then why do I see so many people in GOAYB coming in asking for rates with default or single color forums and no other customizations and saying they have the best looking forum ever and everyone needs to come check it out. What makes these people want to create a forum if they are not going to put the effort into it to customize it and provide content for their members. They want their members to do all the work for them while they just sit back and say they have made an awesome forum.

So really, what made you want to become the admin of your own forum and has it worked out for you?

Myself I have always had forums that were on topics that there were not many other boards about and those boards that were around I did not much like the design, activity, and overall feel of the forum myself so I created my own in efforts to have a large thriving community that would be of help to others. I take pride in being an admin and providing someone with a community they can be proud of and they want to return to to chat with others.

I have a couple of forums I created years ago - in 2005 & 2007 - and at the time, there were no other forums on the topics I had created.

One board (for fiction writers) went on to be very successful for a few years but tapered off in recent times as other similar forums have since been created.

One was just meant for me and a couple of friends so that we could have a place to chat online (Twitter and FaceBook had not yet been invented at the time).

The others were each forums for web sites (online businesses) I have built and so are generally very small and basically are more of a FAQs section for the web sites, so are used only very rarely, because they are not for general discussions, but rather are for providing info to clients and answering their questions.

When it comes to customization, I go all out hog wild with it. One of my forums actually took 4 months to write the script for it. I kind of tend to get all geeky about the script side of my forums.

As a general rule none of the forums I've made are for "mass market crowds" and very niched and never were intended to grow very big. I'm not into creating the "fan-forums", because like you said there are enough of them out there already and I am a member of quite few Harry Potters and fan-fiction ones so no need to create my own there. I try to search out forums I'm interested in and join them, rather than create new ones as I can usually find what I'm looking to be a part of, already out there.

I haven't created a new forum since 2007, but have joined several. I came back here to the support boards today, because I am expanding my business, completely over hauling the web site (in other words creating a totally new web site) and have just set up a new forum for it, so needed to get some codes to edit it with. I'm going into this new forum with a different goal than I've done in the past however, because as I said the other forums I made were designed to only answer client questions, and I want to create a forum that is fully interactive, not just to my clients, but to any one interested in my topic in general including other professionals in my field; the topic being psychics and gypsy magic - real natural born gypsy, not the new-age pagan stuff - I'm a Scottish Traveler, The Royal Highland Clan. Again however this is still a very niche topic so my forum I am building right now, actually is the VERY FIRST proboard forum for this topic and very likely to remain the only one there is as it is ethnic/culture based for a very small ethnic group.

[RF44]

I can see your point when it comes to RPG's and HP fan forums and what not. Personally, there aren't a lot of NASCAR fan forums as it is, let alone Proboards. I want to try to establish an active community that can discuss and debate it. I know going in that I won't establish a large community but I am okay with that. I'm in it for the quality, not the quantity.

~RF

[Karcolith]

I became an admin because I was the third member of a board which was created from another board which died. The second guy was a bit temperamental and overreacted to certain things, however he still did a good job, though I like to think I do an outstanding job. I try to post new, relevant content regarding the forum and we also use Skype should issues arise on the site, by no small chance, our activity on the forum dropped a bit since we use Skype to discuss an ideas we have.

However we do have a lot of forum based tom foolery that gets rather well used, and an RP which often makes for great reading but may frighten new members out of the idea of becoming involved.