Too much trouble to post a pic and do other things. It is way outdated and would probably have more participation if it were updated.
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Too much trouble to post a pic and do other things. It is way outdated and would probably have more participation if it were updated.
So true the forum software is very outdated, it's a PITA to upload pictures to another host, copy the url, come back to the page your working on to insert the link. Then when one of the free hosts suddenly insisted on paid membership, those who held their ground soon found their images blocked with broken links to the forums those images had been posted on.
Admin recently spent time tweaking some of the forums self serving features, but modernizing user features was overlooked.
It is what it is and it certainly doesn't seem like anybody is doing anything to encourage more people to post.
My understanding is that a forum needs a lot more bandwidth in order to host graphics. Bandwidth costs money. Also too ...the threads that had a lot of pictures seemed awfully slow to load in the past.
Personally ... i'm well enough satisfied with it the way it is. It doesn't seem to be a big income producer for whoever owns the site. I wouldn't expect them to put a lot of their own money into it ... if they aren't getting much money out of it.
The other thing too ... times have changed. Everything has scaled up. There aren't all that many small time scrappers around anymore. We're a dying breed. Kinda like the old time shoe maker that could stitch new soles onto your shoes & boots when you wore a hole through them. Every city and town had at least one back in the 60's.
So, you're saying it's a matter of money ? How much do you think it costs to have more bandwidth ?Quote:
Originally Posted by hills
I honestly don't know.Quote:
Originally Posted by Kemper
One thing i have noticed over the years is that the forum goes off-line every so often. Might be down for a week or two until the hosting bill has been paid. For me ... that's okay. I understand about running an operation on a shoestring. As old uncle base oil used to say : Ayuh ... good enough !
Every forum has it's life. I would imagine that there will eventually come a day when the site goes off-line and doesn't come back. (I've seen it happen before.) That would be a shame because there's still a lot of good stuff in the archives ... even if the forum isn't as active as it once was.
You can add photo attachments to your post, it is pretty simple to upload them. I will work on making a tutorial post for those that are not aware of how to do it.
Valid file extensions: bmp doc gif jpe jpeg jpg pdf png psd txt zip
I know you can do it . It's a matter of whether or not you want more participation by having a forum that people are more likely to use.Quote:
Originally Posted by Scrap-Metal-Forum
I definitely do want to encourage more participation and build a forum that’s active, helpful, and easy for members to use. I am in the process of updating things around here so if you have specific updates or changes in mind that you think would make the forum more appealing or user-friendly, I’d love to hear them.
A lot of that is on us ... the people participating. Scrappers aren't always the easiest people in the world to get along with. We can be kinda grouchy sometimes ... especially old farts like me.Quote:
Originally Posted by Kemper
Your site stats are deceiving you, yea it will inform you how many hits the site gets daily and which country those hits are originating from. What the stats won't tell ya is how many of those hits actually logged onto the site.Quote:
Originally Posted by Scrap-Metal-Forum
I suggested to you years ago the need to make the site members only, guests don't pay the bills nor do they contribute to the site.
Similar to your Scrap Room members only format. Every post I've ever made too SMF , under the various alias's used were on the public side.
Time to lock in membership, open up the scrap room. Not that i believe anything important resides behind closed doors.
The more members you have will certainly add income from your associate links.
In the past week no more than six active members participating, while the guest count was in the hundreds.
There are threads on the forum with thousands of views, the question is how many of those were logged in versus guests. With incomplete data how are you able to make rational plans for future development. Be like pissing into the wind.
Watch the page views go up when there's a **** storm going on. Most will be guests checking in for a daily laugh. Then someone go and spoil the ruckus by bringing in Admin.Quote:
Originally Posted by hills
Its a proven fact bad advertising gets better word of mouth versus paid. People have very short attention spans, end up doing business with the guy who garnered the most attention.
Another observation, you know when your good at what your doing when your customers are introducing you to their daughters.
I know ... people like their drama. Others crave the limelight. It really doesn't build community though. People eventually grow weary of all the angst & chaos and lose interest in visiting this place.Quote:
Originally Posted by alloy2
I have to put up with enough Bull**** on my regular day job. Sometimes i have to be a real hardass and tell people exactly where the bear sits. I would rather not be that way on my off-time. Best to keep it professional and focus on talking about the scrapping work we do.
It's a good day when i learn a better way of doing things.
Quote:
Originally Posted by hills
Off topic and drama are what drive any successful forum. You could eliminate any other sub-forum and not really hurt participation as much as you would if you eliminated off-topic.
But nobody wants to babysit and do what it takes to keep people interested .
It's been my experience that you are apt to have people's undivided attention when you're talking about making money. Better ways to scrap = money in the pocket. ;)Quote:
Originally Posted by Kemper
Doesn't seem to be much interest.Quote:
Originally Posted by hills
Both sides came to the bargaining table, nothing was accomplished.Quote:
Originally Posted by Kemper
I don't think there is really much that anyone could do. There are some things that may help but there are too many other options in social media. I don't think they are as good but they are more popular. A lot of the forums that had a fair amount of traffic were primarily off-topic . A lot of them took their off-topic underground to members only while they still had a fair amount of posters.Quote:
Originally Posted by alloy2
Disregard - double post
It looks like you are trying to make a buck and there is nothing wrong with that. But, I noticed this posted by you recently-Quote:
Originally Posted by Scrap-Metal-Forum
Launch Special: Get Your Scrap Job Tracker Spreadsheet Now!
To celebrate the launch of this powerful tool, we're offering a limited-time discount. For the first 20 customers, get 30% off your purchase!
- Regular Price: $24.95
- Launch Price: $17.56 (Save $7!)
This offer won’t last long! Act now and start streamlining your scrap business today.
and I wonder if you even need or want more posts by members.
Cyberspace is a rather strange realm. Things are seldom exactly as they seem. Some of the AI forum bots are remarkably human like. We've had any number of advertising bots posting here over the last few years. When things are quiet ... they even chat amongst themselves.Quote:
Originally Posted by Kemper
To quote another poster : Is it real or is it Memorex ?
You might also ask yourself that same question in some of the other social media sites that you visit.
The AI Lady"s look awesome, it's when they start asking for money for airfare I begin to be suspicious.Quote:
Originally Posted by hills
If you figure out what you are talking about, let me know. :)Quote:
Originally Posted by hills
You've been here for awhile but you haven't been active. You might have missed it. I issued a computer command in one of my posts that will cause an AI to shut down & reset.Quote:
Originally Posted by Kemper
The results were interesting.
If you're an old guy who isn't too tech savvy .... you would have overlooked it. It's something that would have been outside your range of experience so it wouldn't have made any sense.
As i was saying before ... cyberspace is a strange place. Don't assume that it's like the mundane realm of your day to day life.
I was reading an interesting article in the New York Times back in February. Most of us here are getting on in years. We all will eventually have our end. The article was talking about the digital footprint that we will leave behind and how AI's may pick up and carry on in our stead for generations after we pass on social media. It's not just the stuff of sci-fi movies anymore. It's the real deal ... the technology is just that far advanced nowadays.
The online version of that NYT article is behind a paywall now but this article will give most of the gist of how it works.
https://www.psypost.org/digital-afte...oes-that-mean/
It takes two or more to make an entertaining bite fight. Grab some popcorn and come join in the fun ! ;)Quote:
Originally Posted by alloy2
I don't think there's been more than five forum members who were consistent of earning monthly payday's in the thousand dollar range, I'm only able to name one of those forum members who is still active on the scrap metal forum.
Our catalytic buyer has not been present for the last year or more, our e-waste buyer pops in occasionally to post price updates.
The forum was almost dead, mike1's compressor thread brought some life back, in my mind the information incomplete, what was the total number of units were any aluminum would, in pounds what was the copper content, how much oil was recovered, what was the cost of consumables, abrasives blades, sawzall blades.
Other than knowing mike1's thread captured your interest enough that you had processed a few unit's yourself beyond that knowledge we're none the wiser.
freonjoe as I remember had posted some great information on processing AC units for the copper, did mike1 source that information - no he did not search the forum archives.
Curb shopping for a few dollars a day is of little interest to most people.
link to freonjoe's thread, compressors.
https://www.scrapmetalforum.com/dism...sors-pics.html
With Admins recent attempt to breath new life into the forum, I do not expect that he will pay the domain registration fee, and that will be lights out for the forum. Any effort on the members part will go down in smoke.
You can only squeeze so much juice from a lemon, on the upside you can plant the seed found within and start a new tree in fresh soil.
There’s no issues with keeping the domain active, that’s all handled. I’m trying to wake the forum back up and get more people participating so it can stay a good resource for both current and future scrappers. I’m working on making it more useful and valuable for everyone who wants to learn, share info, and make money in the scrap business.Quote:
Originally Posted by alloy2
I had registrations paused for a while when spam was getting bad, but they’re back open now and we’ve got new users signing up. Just trying to move things in the right direction and build it back up.
You should have considered signing up with cloudflare to keep spam out.Quote:
Originally Posted by Scrap-Metal-Forum
By pausing the domain many of your members though the forum had finally gone dark forever and may never return, it;s not like we were all send an email to inform us - issues had been resolved.
Something you won't see from the admin side, when a member logs onto the forum and hits New Post's. i there are none the user is presented with a pop pop up saying you have to wait 20 second's before doing another search.
At my age 20 seconds is an eternity. Is there anyway to change the message on that annoying pop up, to say you might search the archives. That current wait time is ridiculous.
https://i.postimg.cc/W10YsrV8/Screen...8-10-23-55.png
Quote:
Originally Posted by alloy2
Freonjoes thread is my all time favorite thread on here.
i agree with the curb shopping... BORING