Readit a mess, Forums of old less used - Something New

[neXus]

Hey guys,
I remember being on here daily and the activity here was huge, but we all move on, busy and when you are on the web there is just a million places your on these days.
I also miss some of the community on here and while I look at readit it in terms of it's size, it's discussions, link with imgur etc.. It is a mess. More and more people say that and moderator scams and things have been frequent.
I personally have never been able to get into it, I find the whole site layout, design unreadable. It is hard to use, discussions can be long and confusing and I remember when making the theme here based on the original from Sam I tried to keep things clean and that was a few years ago now.

I keep thinking there could be something better, and something the people still here could form and create. I am not sure exactly what it is, but I am sure discussions can form that.

- Forums as they were do not work any more, but there are many aspects to them that are great.
- News sites like engadet Lie about their design updates to be better for the community, but in reality the layout is there to improve advert focus. Same as Clingfilm company here in Australia. They moved the cut blades to the flap lid of the box. They said it was consumer feedback. It was harder to use, you cut yourself more and it was DUMB. Obviously it was done to save money in producing them. They now have switched it back after just about everyone complained.
- You even have the sponsored news articles that are just rife, or the fake related articles which in fact lead to adverts
- Comments on news articles have some interesting discussions sometimes but the space for them, the layout and lack of actual features make it not a great place for that.

I think something from all this can be formed... A forum esk approach to discussions but combine the news / article discussions within it in a space where the topic has been written, and discussion can flow from it. Community leads write articles, community discusses them. Basically the OP's post is the article and the discussions flows from that.
You may think "well that is news and comments or readit" but you think about the approach, methadology adaptions and design and the core focus a key difference could be formed.
Revenue is important and a way to do that which is not in a way that pisses everyone off.

Giantbomb.com did this in terms of gaming, sick of the review score for advert money, the push to that and the way things went for the companies they worked for.. They formed a whole web engine running wiki based game information producing game content and review and previews of games you actually want.

I just feel there is something we could build and form better then readit and something if formed right could be the thing everyone turns too. Profiles take some of the things people use facebook for, more dynamic live discussions able to take place and so on.

What do you guys think?
What do you feel you like on the web and hate and what would you like to see?

[Eggtastico]

Id like to see it all shut down. I visit a handful of sites these days &I only post on a handful of forums.
obviously I use shopping sites, bbc, etc.

I don't trawl the internet anymore unless it's for something specific information wise I am looking for.

[Clock'd 0Ne]

The nature of the web is social more than anything now, the closest paradigm to a haven for us all would be something like Facebook with a forums-like format, so you have all the forums and topics but you have that immediacy of notifications, personal messaging, etc. I don't know if Tapatalk does any of that as I never used it as I'm not an 'app' person.

Forums as a format are dying for the most part because you have to wait around for replies and you don't know when they are there in the first place. There are still some big forums around but they are mostly image boards and the like or specific interest groups. If the tech powering them was bought up to date maybe things would be different.

[zpyder]

How about just migrating to a facebook group? Many of us are friends on facebook anyway I assume...

[Sam]

Id like to see it all shut down.

Here's the clever bit about the internet. You can f**k off anytime you like, and you don't need our permission!

[Eggtastico]

Id like to see it all shut down.

Here's the clever bit about the internet. You can f**k off anytime you like, and you don't need our permission!

but thats no good when everyone is still using it

[soopahfly]

Id like to see it all shut down. I visit a handful of sites these days &I only post on a handful of forums.
obviously I use shopping sites, bbc, etc.

I don't trawl the internet anymore unless it's for something specific information wise I am looking for.

Why don't you just pretend it's shut down and go away?

[knighty]

but... it wouldn't be the same without Egg being here saying his usual stuff...

[soopahfly]

Remember when he won the lottery?

[Rivkid]

Tricky one - Forums are definitely outdated now, but then again I spent enough time on Facebook not sure I need another FB page to visit!!


Besides if it's not turning a darkened room blue and amber its not Tekforums!

[matt5cott]

[M3ta7h3ad]

Herro! I kinda like the fact I can wander back after months away and the same faces I knew back in  2005 are still about today.

[Bacon]

Same faces yep

[Serious]

How about just migrating to a facebook group? Many of us are friends on facebook anyway I assume...

I have a facebook account. Hate the format, keep getting lost. Yep, facebook is too complicated for me to use easily. Need something with the ease of use of forums with the delivery of facebook.

Id like to see it all shut down.

Here's the clever bit about the internet. You can f**k off anytime you like, and you don't need our permission!

but thats no good when everyone is still using it

There is another option, and I will buy you a super economy sized headstone, if you are quick...

Just kidding

[XEntity]

By the way I don't agree that forums as a format are dying especially for tech support type situations , I think there are more social orientated forum softwares than the one we use, the software smartthings use is pretty sexy, although I don't think is available on tapatalk (might be disabled in there instance though I guess). Our main problem is that we no longer have the volume of content or visitors to make this a publicly viable forum! How ever if this is just to live its life out as a small social community of nerds on the net, then there is only us and the occasional spam bot to please and for that it's hardly worth moving to anything else, the format works for us..