April 2011 is my join date, I'm fresh meat and I carry a good argument!!! "lertsy" looks like a pretty good member too, signed up around the same time as me but like me he has his times of "mega activity" and then times of "supreme quietness". It's hard to be active on a forum where you leave 10 replies and wait 12 hours to get replies through (I'm guessing anon had a busy day the few times this happened - LOL). Takes a good few people talking to lure more people into talking. Very off putting for somebody considered "fresh meat" to say the least. Nevertheless, the discussion might be dying down but this is still the #1 bit-torrent cheating site - it's where I found new updated versions of ratiomaster and subsequently found all the other juicy software produced independently by sb-i coders such as mRatio. I believe this forum has a lot of lurkers too (people who read here and come here to download cheating apps/app updates but don't actually register and take part)
Btw, this is a natural cycle.. I've been on forums in the past that had their glory days and never got them back. Other sites I have been on have had a very loyal fanbase, the loyal fanbase breaks apart due to real life, then the forum enters a quiet period where there really isn't much being said by anybody and then the cycle begins again with a bunch of newcomers who create a new fanbase and adopt the site as their new home. You always get that one member who was there to see it all though and stayed the entire time with a tear in their eye, telling stories of how the forums were "back in their day". Please note this could be a 30 year old but judging by his typing style you'd think he was 87.
Anyways, back to seriousness I also think the .de domain name might be off-putting for some. This is the only ".de" website I visit. Not being from germany, I am not used to typing in .DE into my url bar and to do so semi-regularly now is still kind of strange for me. Perhaps having a .com would help the site target an english speaking audience, although I see sb-innovation.com has been highjacked already by some random french jackass: http://sb-innovation.com/
What you need to consider is how this site is partially segregated. I never set foot in the German parts of the board because everything is written in German and I cannot understand/type German. Likewise I bet there are german members on this board who post solely in the German sections and do not post in the English section because they do not know/are not fluent in English to carry off some form of advanced discussion.
Last edited by GymTanAndLaundry; 21.06.11 at 03:52.
I don't think you understood what I said.
This forum has been .de since its inception. (Well, actually it hasn't, but on the most relevant plane it has) I think switching to a different domain would be more trouble than it's worth.
As you said, this isn't the only SBI either. There's the Small Business Innovation, Small Bone Innovation, and a Russian site with a similar name.
"I just remembered something that happened a long time ago."
No no no, don't switch the domain.. keep the domain but add an alternate one that is less "exotic" if it's available. I'm not sure if it's a major problem, but it's something I've noted and thought could be a valuable suggestion.
You can make everything 100 "non-spam posts" meaning instead of automatic promotion to an accepted usergroup that is allowed to use PMs and do trades, the user must be manually approved by either a member of staff, or volunteer trusted "committee" members who take the time to skim through all of a users posts for signs of spam. You could also have an automated system in place that says "100 posts in less than 5 days = spammer, do not promote" or something along these lines... although as far as I'm aware VBulletin does not have that functionality.
Suggestion: Regular (monthly) giveaways to users with good rep/high posts could be a very nice enticement for new users, looking to join the forum and build buffer/access new torrent sites.
Last edited by GymTanAndLaundry; 21.06.11 at 04:02.
Domains aren't free, either. I'm not in charge of this kind of decisions, though.
It was like that long ago, shortly after registrations reopened. To trade or send PMs, you had to be a Member. We changed from that to the current, more open system because almost no one was trading and no PMs were a significant drawback for some, staff often being asked to act as proxies to relay messages between non-Member and more privileged users.You can make everything 100 "non-spam posts" meaning instead of automatic promotion to an accepted usergroup that is allowed to use PMs and do trades, the user must be manually approved by either a member of staff
"I just remembered something that happened a long time ago."
You could enable PMs to all, but make the trading section the only part of the site where trading wont earn you a swift ban, and have that section 100 posts to access. That way if people want to trade individually they can do that over PM and you can't stop it, but they won't be able to advertise everything they've got to the mass market. Add semi-regular (and not random) giveaways to the trade section so it's more of an "invites board" than a "trading board" and you have yourself a potential winner... of course the benefits of the area would need to be grossly over advertised both on sb-i and on other websites to get attention.
You also face the risk that too much new blood = a potential tracker staff slips through the net, you invite them and they ban you, not before sharing your Ip with a bunch of other trackers getting you a torrent-wide ban.
Last edited by GymTanAndLaundry; 21.06.11 at 04:24.
That may work at increasing useful activity, at least a bit, but it'd be stretching the word "invites" a bit too much, and I don't like how it's done on other forums.
The whole trading thing is just a mere plus to this forum's main topic, actually (which doesn't mean it can't get some changes, of course).
I know that on What.cd they prefer a more subtle approach. Trading SB-I accounts on #disabled and whatnot.You also face the risk that too much new blood = a potential tracker staff slips through the net, you invite them and they ban you, not before sharing your Ip with a bunch of other trackers getting you a torrent-wide ban.
"I just remembered something that happened a long time ago."
I don't think the problem is confined to SBI. There seems to be a general lack of activity on most BT sites these days.
With the decline in private BT, the proliferation of ratio-free sites, and the ease of accessing cheap seedboxes, there's also much less demand for the need to cheat these days.
When my friends ask what I do on "SBI Innovation", I tell them it's a technology forum or sorts. I kind of don't want them to know I administrate (at least nominally) the best cheating forum around. But that isn't the only thing discussed here!
Cheating and minimal apps, what do you mean by that?
"I just remembered something that happened a long time ago."
I mean minimal applications as in lightweight and useful ..something like rtorrent,irsii and other I can't remember right now including a nice audio player for windows that was even more lightweight than foobar and a hex editor.
Last edited by SBfreak; 21.06.11 at 21:57.
foobar2000? soprano? They're both lighter than light.
This place has a ton of tiny apps. It's nice to see some people can still code very efficiently and package awesomeness in KB-sized executables.
A subforum in the Software section could be manageable if that's what you want...
"I just remembered something that happened a long time ago."
Even lighter than those two. That's not what I want,it was just a suggestion my dear anon.
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