Just a thought

You will never stop that happening, the only way to combat it, is to make this forum better than the rivals, and that cannot be done overnight.

I would say the first thing that has to be done is for an idea's thread, then Bob can look at it, and make up his mind if he wants to instigate any of the suggestions, he has to like it.

Then I suppose he has to look at his present Admin team, and see who is active and who isn't, get shot of those that aren't, and replace them with people he thinks will do a better job.

 

You can't escape the fact that most people will go to forums in same niche we're the activity is best. It's really that simple, and brings back the point about TAZ having the staff numbers in place that gives the forum that appearance daily with their posts made (making up for lack of member posts as times). Doesn't matter if most posts are fluff topics, people read past that and comment on topics they spot interested in, or on other replies made. But it's the fact there's new posts made on a regular bases (from staff) that helps keep members coming to check what's new maybe worth replying too.

Know if I owned this forum with the amount of content listed on it, that's what I'd be doing to try and compete against TAZ. Running a staff recruitment drive for a while, try and get plenty staff on-board, then later replace ones who never post out with more active staff. But built on forum activity that way - and it will start to bring more members when seeing more regular discussion posted.

Your in a good position with this forum, people do come here from XF and vB - same as they visit TAZ on their regular forum rounds. You have no ads displayed, the theme used is a good one. It's just the fact people see nothing new, so leave and uses places like TAZ instead. Where they do show ads to members, and this forum has an advantage on not doing that.

 

Also think XenAdmins could have done well. but the fact Lisa has decided to revolve the forum around "just XenForo" is killer blow. People are sick to death of seeing these bias admin forums aimed at supporting XenForo too much, otherwise that new admin forum could have boomed with AA and AX now gone. But it never will because it's an XF fan site.

 

Ooohhh a xenforo fan site


Only joking, I think I might be a platform whore, I will try anything once unless the reviews are truly terrible, I like xenforo and believe it is the most user friendly that I have used so far but I know it's not perfect and will not defend it as the be all and end all of forum platforms, it's just the best solution for me at this time.

I agree any activity is better than none and it would be great if this place picked up a bit activity wise.

 

Out of interest, what kind of things does TAZ expect from staff. Does he dictate they must be activate posters to boost the forum

 

I don't dislike the software, but do dislike sites that show bias towards it and while allowing discussion to bash all other forum products freely with little moderation... will defend anything said against XenForo like a bulldog with a bone to gnaw on, locking topics. That's what I dislike, not the software.

 

OK, didn't expect you'd say. Was just curious really if he depends posts from staff on forums.

 

I know what you mean and it can be a bit cringy at times, look at it the other way they are passionate about the platform and there are plenty of xenforo haters out there as well to help keep the cosmic balance.

 

Is it that if the posters see an Admin site using a particular software, they expect it to be biased toward that platform, TAZ to me when I joined it always seemed to be biased toward VB, then the courtcase and VB5 happened, and all of a sudden it seemed to go very pro XF, to the point where every VB thread was degenerated to a hate fest, and anyone who supported VB whether it be 3,4 or 5 was was made to look foolish & stupid.

 

And you know... I don't get that mentality at all. If they prefer XenForo, fine, but letting it stop you post on a forum because it uses vBulletin is plain silly. I know who you mean that's joined TAZ since moving to XenForo and are quickly becoming the most vocal members their now. Beforehand they stopped at XenAdmin but have ventured onto TAZ now it runs XF, but before they wouldn't be caught dead posting their.

Always good for laugh seeing it happen though, don't get that mentality at all, and it's not like most of them have never used vB3 before that TAZ was running. Most of them are ex-vB3 users.

 

I'm only visiting TAZ and posting there because of @Lizard King 's IPS4 comments because he's a great IPS4 informations source

That's the same phenomen like brogan and admin extra as he left xenforo.com...
It's very active for 1-5 weeks and once all the informations are public (or people realize that they'll never get the informations, they'll leave the page again )

I never liked TAZ because there's TOO much chitchat for me...
Once it starts here too, i'll leave this community too.

 

The guy does get worked up very easy though, he's a bit touchy, also gets himself involved in arguments dead easy. Say one wrong word to him and he tends to leave your forum for 12 months. Read him get into a few arguments already on TAZ over IPB, wondered how long before he goes off on one, has a rant and leaves.

 

This for me is a great idea, and one that needs investigating, I am sure there is an audience out there for a forum like that, and I for one would be interested in helping it get off the ground.

 

But even if you moved away from being as software centric, in what forums listed cover. Wouldn't they still look at the forum software being used for the board and you're still kind of left with the same problem, people avoid it because you use vB or IPB, instead of XF.

 

There are ways to make a forum look a lot less like others in the same genre, branding free, and complete custom style are only two ways.

 

But you can still generally tell what forum software is used, I've seen very few forums with a custom style, even a heavy modified one that still doesn't give away the forum software used pretty easy on first glance.