Attention Mark / Forum Issues Thread - Continued

Post by **Site Owner** » Sun Aug 26, 2007 11:06 pm

Moved to here for continued discussion. See locked post under same title in "Fiat Spider Related" for initial topic.

mbouse · Post by **mbouse** » Mon Aug 27, 2007 1:29 pm

i'll not pretend to know much about what it takes in effort, time, or financial resources to keep a site like this open for my use.

i will offer that i wish it to remain open for my use, allow my friends to use it, and offer new legit users to be added to our society.

what do i need to do to make that happen? there is truly no such thing as a free lunch.

i currently belong to four Spider/fiat/italian car forums. each has its own distinctive flavor and style. I have unique friends at each site. i do not want to lose any.

racydave · Post by **racydave** » Mon Aug 27, 2007 7:16 pm

Whats the diff? How is it that the other folks seem able to deal with these issues???

So Cal Mark · Post by **So Cal Mark** » Mon Aug 27, 2007 11:34 pm

I think the biggest stumbling block is the time requirement

sawmkw · Post by **sawmkw** » Tue Aug 28, 2007 11:52 am

As far as how other sites deal with this issue, Evan alluded to the solution in his post. The key component in preventing auto bots has to do with investing in the asset, or purchasing the appropriate infrastructure components to authenticate and validate users. Outside of making that investment, registration becomes a manual effort.

Unfortunately in today's digital world there is a cost associated with the maintenance of on-line assets and the more valuable the asset (in this case the registered DNS names) the more expense is required to keep it secure. The balance is time verses money. As the value of the name increases (by virture of presence, i.e. hits) more investment is required and that investment is going to be taking the form of time or opening the wallet.

The real rub here is that as a forum, this site generates no income so the value of the name is paradoxically ambigious. There is no real world (consumerism) way to determine it's value except maybe to Fabbrica Italiana Automobili Torino.

Bottom line is that owning and managing a forum is an effort driven by the love of the subject matter and not business...

mbouse · Post by **mbouse** » Tue Aug 28, 2007 12:21 pm

which to me, makes sense in the way i understand what is happening here at FS dot com.

I don't know half of what i think i do about the internet, or computers. but i could never see a great value for the owner of a forum unless it benefited his real business; or if the cost to maintain it could benefit that business.

based on what i think i know, evan has spent untold hours protecting this site, and our home computers from invasion. he has done so as his schedule permits, and without being monetarily compensated. if mark or anyone else were to assume the operational responsibilities, it would be at zero pocket change for them, just for the love of Fiat Chat.

Am i correct? i am leading up to a suggestion if i understand the basics.

sawmkw · Post by **sawmkw** » Tue Aug 28, 2007 1:02 pm

mbouse wrote:evan has spent untold hours protecting this site, and our home computers from invasion. he has done so as his schedule permits, and without being monetarily compensated. if mark or anyone else were to assume the operational responsibilities, it would be at zero pocket change for them, just for the love of Fiat Chat.

You are correct Mike. It's going to take (1) time that Evan states that he does not have or (2) financial investment which makes little sense given the return i.e. zero. As he has correctly stated, without investing in the site, the headaches will just get passed to Mark or whomever assumes the registration responsibilities. As a site moderator, Mark is still spending a significant amount of time overseeing this thing.

My guess is that Evan used to have the ability to write the expense off but has lost that so it really does now come out-of-pocket. As the value increases, so does the maintenance and upkeep.

Mark, Maybe you and Evan should organize a conference call with Jeff and John. It might be that there is common knowledge that can be shared. It would also bury that proverbial hatchet and capitalize on the synergy that is there...

mbouse · Post by **mbouse** » Tue Aug 28, 2007 1:34 pm

certainly merging two forums to one is a potential option. Too bad the ill feelings exist, even if they are only one sided. healthy debate and banter are one thing; mean spirited posts are another.

is merging the best option for all involved? i'd suggest that both forums would not be the same after a merge, or the merged forum would lose more than it would gain. But, i guess that would be MYcost in all this.

how many of us really see the advertising on the home page of this forum? hard core users merely click right past it when the screen refreshes; i could not tell you what is being sold here, can you...without looking? is this an option to bring in sufficent cash flow to make the effort worth while? what potential revenue is attainable that is not currently being captured? sellers of advertising space don't guaruntee product purchases, they only report volume of visits to a particular site.

If Mark were to take over this site operationally, would there be anything wrong with placing his own advertisements within? After all, it would cost him time away from his REAL job to maintain the entire site. Does that thought really turn off the average user? Certainly not me. All that i would ask is that the blatant advertising be RELAVENT to me, and be in the areas that do not affect my ability to communicate with my friends.

So Cal Mark · Post by **So Cal Mark** » Tue Aug 28, 2007 3:44 pm

Evan has told me that the current ad situation brings him a small check each qtr. I think the advert level would have to increase to cover all of the expenses involved, especially if I or someone else was leasing the forum.
I'm not sure that merging forums is a good solution; from my experience these forums all have very distinctive personalities, and I believe more options are better than fewer.
If I do end up operating this site, I don't intend to make it my personal ad space. I'd prefer it to remain as it is, although at times it may seem like my personal site with the number of posts I have. I'm not sure if the various Fiat vendors around the country will participate in ads though, a couple of them are very active on other forums, and some others feel like they already have the Fiat community worshiping at their feet and don't advertise at all.
The other problem with pursuing potential advertisers is the time involved selling ad space. Evan has asked me to be creative; to come up with a proposal that works for all of us. I've contacted some forum members to get their thoughts, I'd welcome any comments here or via email.

mbouse · Post by **mbouse** » Tue Aug 28, 2007 4:31 pm

i do not perceive this site as your personal space, Mark. And, i have alway appreciated the knowledge and the freedom to disagree with you publicly. Perception is as individual as one's nose...everyone has a perception of reality.

We do not have that many GOOD suppliers available. with a modest amount of time investment, i could see that most of them would be willing to spend a few sheckles this way. is it possible that they could offset your out-of-pocket expenses on a monthly or annual basis?

then, do you (Mark) need an avenue of expenses to write off? Only your accountant can tell you for sure. It has to be worth the effort to continue to administer...plus lease the site.

do you have a computer geek nephew that needs some practical experience in web management?

anyway, i encourage you to pursue this.

sawmkw · Post by **sawmkw** » Tue Aug 28, 2007 6:14 pm

I was not suggesting that the sites merge.

I have not heard that Fiat Center has not experienced any of the spam issues that this forum has so my suggestion was to have the principle parties of both sites discuss what one site may be doing that the other may not be. It may be as simple as the hosting entity. An exchange of intellictual information on site managment was my suggestion, not looking into merging the sites.

So Cal Mark · Post by **So Cal Mark** » Tue Aug 28, 2007 6:20 pm

I'm not looking for the site do to anything other than pay for itself. If I take on an added expense, it just means I have to generate more income which would mean less time to be involved with the site. I do have some time available to admin, so I'm not too worried about that commitment.
If the site needs some upgrades to deal with security, etc, there may be some initial cost involved. I'd have to look into that. While I'm not a real techie, I do have some contacts that can help.

Post by **Site Owner** » Wed Aug 29, 2007 2:11 pm

All very good comments and dialog. One of the important things to keep in mind here is that there are 2 distinct properties of value involved:

1. The domain names are most valuable. This domain name drives huge amounts of targeted traffic.

2. The 10,000 + posts containing great advice on the car

While I own both items, I don't expect a return on #2. I take the joint contribution aspect of the content seriously and would want to make sure that it continues to be available to all. It's not my intent to "sell" or "lease" #2, but I will be very mindful of it's fate so to speak. As far as #1, the domain name and the traffic, I do consider that as an investment property that I most certainly do expect a return on in some form or fashion, either through outright sale or a "lease" agreement.

sawmkw makes a lot of good points. Let's just continue the dialog until we reach some sort of conclusion that makes all involved feel satisfied with the future direction of this 11 year old site. I'll check in often, and Mark has my number.

Cheers,
Evan

Attention Mark / Forum Issues Thread - Continued

Attention Mark / Forum Issues Thread - Continued

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