What makes a forum die?

[Candice]

Jun 29, 2009 7:46:35 GMT -8 stardust said:

My forum is dying....and it only has 16 members...how do you make a forum better?

Hi,

That's not what this board is for. This board is for discussing what makes a site die. If you want your site to be better, try posting in the get opinions about your board board on here. If you want to continue posting in this board, please read over the rules.

Thanks.

[Grimm Valentine]

In my opinion, the thing that makes a forum die quickest is the lack of the admin's interaction. If an admin doesn't interact with his members, the members begin to feel that the admin isn't that capable. If it's a role-play forum, the admin should try and be in a lot of the role-plays, showing the members that they have a funside. Another thing that kills forums fairly quick is lack of advertising. When you first make a proboard, you have so much excitement and energy that you affiliate and advertise with everyone that you see. However, as the days go on, the staff begin advertising and affiliating less and less. If you don't get out there and advertise your forum, nobody will know about it and less people will join.

[LLlover]

I think the first thing that really hinders a site is the idea. Like it's been mentioned before the less there is of something the less people that will pay attention to it for the most part. It's sad, but true in most cases. The second thing that will do a forum in is member activity. A lot of times members get really excited when they first join and then their excitement fades and your left with an inactive member. As many of you probably know, with as many forums as there are there's always another forum for them to get excited about and join while leaving yours behind.

Personally I've seen a forum die recently because the main admin, the one that owned the board, just didn't really come back. They said they were taking some time off, stopped by a couple of times but never posted again. Sadly, at the time they left enough of the threads depended on them. So only naturally, since the forum didn't have that many active members before they left the forum just became inactive. Overall I think it comes down to the idea that the main admin's excitement about the game ran dry, which is just human really.

[Sarie]

As it's been stated before, I think a lack of member activity (both from members and admins) and a lack of a good plot that involves at least a majority of the members. Lack of advertising is also a quick way to kill a site. An admin might do a lot of advertising in the beginning but then stop once they have so many members. But without growth, it's hard for a site to grow and members might be tempted to leave the site (sorry if that doesn't make any sense).

[Akito]

Maybe the admin goes inactive, then the forum dies? No, without the admin there are still moderators, so admin doesn't really need to be a must for it to be active. At least, that is my opinion. But in some boards, the admins are a must.

Second, I visited this board before. There is A LOT of admins and there aren't any moderators and members. I was "kind" enough to join back then. Later, I found out the reason why is it dead. Because the admins are not willing to post something. You want others to post, but you did not post yourself, funny, huh? And this user created two other boards, that holds two members. She and her boyfriend.

Third, lack of advertisement. Some admins don't even bother. Well, I do understand some forgets and some are too busy. Some think that advertisement are useless.

Fourth, the staff's attitude. I find this quite effective. For example, Sarah joined this board that looked nice. She did her best on her application. And who knew, after she posted it, the admin didn't even bother to say welcome or even HI and goes unfriendly at her, bombard her with so many errors such as typos. See? Like when you did a long profile with your heart, you got kapushed. Even typos count. Bad Admin, I'd say.

...That's just my experience? xD

[LouZer]

There are many things that make a forum die. First of all, lack of advertising. If you do not promote your forum, you won't get as many members. Second, lack of a good design. I see forums with awful colors and strange layout set-ups. A good-looking forum will help when you want members. Third, if the idea of your forum has been used over and over, it most likely be as popular as you want. In order to keep that forum from dying, you need to offer something that every single other forum does not.

[lostangel09]

Basically what makes the forum die is lack of community (admins and members) alike. If members signed up then leave without activating their account or posting; when new members come they would want to join but won't because they don't see a community (as in lack of post) and I guess in a way communication. This also goes for the admins to, if thy don't post as they should be or just quickly leave that members does and never come back the forum would eventually die because of lack of community.

Therefore to risk the death/deletion of a forum, admins have to at least interact with there members, post more then they should be (probably make 4-5 threads or reply) a day and keep updating your forum so members would become interesting and would like to come back.

[hellyearockstar]

Yes, definitely the admins and their advertising will make a forum die. You need to be there, talking to your members and trying to get new ones. If you aren't, how are you supposed to get and keep your members? And the members themselves need to stay commited to a site. What it really falls down to is the activity and whatever gets the activity.

[Prince of Saor]

When the admin goes inactive the forum dies. It doesn't matter how many good staff members there are to accept character applications and whatnot. When the site's creator loses interest in what he or she created, so do the members.

It happens every single time, throughout my role playing experience.

[Reisuke]

TWO THINGS: Staff and Members.

STAFF: Either lazy or abusive; both are equally bad as the other. Lazy staff simply don't work and could careless about something getting checked, unless it's there's. People aren't patient, believe it or not, so this will make somebody quit. I mean I, myself, hate when I have to wait 7 days for my application to get checked. Come on, tf? Abusive staff are usually biased and still careless. They want to seem superior so they degrade you. I'm going to lave your site if I'm degraded, nothing keeps me there so deuces.

MEMBERS: It's called a roleplay for a reason. It's like a story. Since when did you need somebody else to write a story? I don't get it. They sit and wait for somebody to rp with when in all honest they could be already started by bettering there skills roleplaying with themselves. Members also get inactive because of the excuses "There's nothing to do", "There's nobody to roleplay with", "I got bored". Shame on them.

Overall it's a two person thing. It takes two for one thing to go wrong.

[Keegan]

For one when people out-grow a idea! For example if somebody likes something like Pokemon and spends all there time on it till one day they think "Wait i'm to old" so they look for a new idea. Another way for a forum to loose people is if the people themselves get bored of there characters like for me for example. i once had a character and put time into him for about a week but constant and all of a sudden it had lost its flair so i gave up

[0truth]

Being an admin of several forums that died I can tell you first hand that the first thing that will kill a board are inactive Mods, and Admins. It's a sad truth. I had lost internet for a week, and had noway of sommunicating this to my staff or memebrs. Alot of things got mixed up, my co-admin, nothing against him, was inactive for like two weekes, and he started when I lost my internet cause he got in a car accident. When I got back the baord was on life support. So with that knowledge in mind it's up to you as an Admin to be as active as possible. Even a week of inability to post or relay info to your staff is a backbreaker when it comes to form, especially RP based threads.

[FOX LOVER ?! <3]

I totally agree with everything said. My first site didn't ger far because of my inexperience. It's got members now, but most of them are inactive. But, I have gained more expirence now. I have found that even announcing your leave to a site to go on vacation or out of town, the site dies because the admin is not there to post and clean up the site. And, as soon as I get back, I find that my site is spammed by members, they are breaking the rules horribly, and when I delete any rule breaking posts, graphics, threads, etc. they all get mad and leave the site.

I am the most active on all my sites seeing as I am on nearly all day of everyday. And, I think that what makes a forum die mostly would have to be members. Where staff is a part as well members just dont like it when anything of their's is deleted when they break the rules, so they leave. Many of them don't care about inactivity. I once joined a site with such misleading information it was amazing. According to the ad, the site was active. Well, I joined created a horse. 2 months later my horse still hadn't been accepted. No one had even been on but me. So, I went ahead and posted. 3 months later, I caught the admin on. She had written in size 10 letters, PLEASE WAIT FOR YOU HORSE TO BE ACCEPTED BEFORE POSTING! I simply wrote back, That thread has been there for three months because no one ever got on to accept my horse. Then she wrote back, I DONT GIVE A SH**! So I left her site.

Over-reactive admins do cause a site to die, as well as inconsiderate members who don't like it when their rule-breaking-posts are deleted. But, the main cause would have to be inactivity and overreaction from both sides. Staff and members.

[$%@Sophh@%$]

I think you have to pick something that there is not really much of. For example when i first discovered building forum site and stuff, I made both and Twilight site and a The Host site (both written by Stephenie Meyer) And there are millions of Twilight sites, so mine didn't really take off. But my The Host site took of almost immediately, even though i was very inexperienced and didn't know much about site making. And my The Host site is still going strong we now have about 300 members. So you need to pick something new and original, Maybe make up a world or something?

[My Kitty Twofer]

Hard to see skins, unactive admins and members, low member count, no oomf to the plot and storyline(if any), and a boring display up front.