another forum gone

[AlexJ]

I don't think you can see that info on mobile.

"Newer isn't better". Depends on perspective. Web 3.0 might be worse than 1.0 and 2.0 in most ways. Doubtful, but whatever, because it's really great at obliterating their relevance.

I bet this place had thousands of active users 10 - 15 years ago, and there was a genuine need for over-segmenting topics into dozens of sub-forums, probably didn't take a year or more to organize a group buy, either. Anybody's guess as to what's happening today. Maybe people don't like cars anymore, or Bimmers, or restoring and modding classic vehicles, or the feeling of tearing ass down the road in beautiful cars, or hot chicks in miniskirts at car meets. What do you think? Newer isn't better, so hell if I know.

Integrate the new. Or be crotchety car guys that can't stop taking about how great everything used to be. Everyone loves those guys.

[varg]

Man, I can tell you're old. Maybe 50? maybe coming up on 60? What a waste of time and energy to fantasize about the golden era of the internet, and what a stupid ship is a discussion board to go down on. This format is dead. It's not coming back. Whether this format is better than another means nothing. I hear Betamax was better than VHS, and HD-DVD was better than Blu-Ray. And I'm sure there's folks out there obsessing over their Laser Disc collection because of what it could have, or should have, been, but who cares about those losers?

Don't confuse discussion boards for your constitutional rights. One is worth fighting for, and the other isn't. Not everything is high stakes, and you impress no one with your super spicy takes on modern society.

Get with the times or die. Or don't. Maybe it's better to watch your beloved community fail because you think things were better in 200X. Whatever floats your boat.

If you knew so much about using the internet, you'd have taken your genius ass to my profile to see my age. Instead you proved that you're just the type who belongs on reddit...

[MrBurgundy]

Man, I can tell you're old. Maybe 50? maybe coming up on 60? What a waste of time and energy to fantasize about the golden era of the internet, and what a stupid ship is a discussion board to go down on. This format is dead. It's not coming back. Whether this format is better than another means nothing. I hear Betamax was better than VHS, and HD-DVD was better than Blu-Ray. And I'm sure there's folks out there obsessing over their Laser Disc collection because of what it could have, or should have, been, but who cares about those losers?

Don't confuse discussion boards for your constitutional rights. One is worth fighting for, and the other isn't. Not everything is high stakes, and you impress no one with your super spicy takes on modern society.

Get with the times or die. Or don't. Maybe it's better to watch your beloved community fail because you think things were better in 200X. Whatever floats your boat.

Have you ever watched the move "Tropic Thunder?"

Maybe you're too young?

[MrBurgundy]

i don't have anything further to offer other than technical help if it's needed, but that made me laugh kinda hard.

just gonna leave this right here. i don't know who has what access, but this is one thing that could be tried, and it looks like it might be easy to install.

https://www.keycaptcha.com/vbulletin-captcha/

Dude a captcha... IDK what it has not been implemented yet..

[decay]

You say we have to "Get with the times or die", if getting with the times means cutting off your balls, would you do it?

i don't have anything further to offer other than technical help if it's needed, but that made me laugh kinda hard.

just gonna leave this right here. i don't know who has what access, but this is one thing that could be tried, and it looks like it might be easy to install.

https://www.keycaptcha.com/vbulletin-captcha/

[roguetoaster]

I'm not saying there isn't a place for bulletin boards. Obviously, there is. But, unless you think you're going to attract a bunch unicorn old folks who pine for the Internet of their youth, who obsess over vintage bimmers, and who haven't gotten used to the trappings of the modern Internet, you're going to have to get used to some significant changes, because those people DO NOT EXIST.

Search your feelings. You know it to be true.

I did, and we're still here because we think this format is superior, despite it's many flaws. It's more manual, more labor intensive, and yet produces a really useful result in the DIY or project space.

Now cut off my damn hand already.

[AlexJ]

I signed up here because it's a good website with good discussions and lots of invaluable information. The question is how do you keep this place alive? The answer is to embrace new technology, not double down on a failing one.

I'm not saying there isn't a place for bulletin boards. Obviously, there is. But, unless you think you're going to attract a bunch unicorn old folks who pine for the Internet of their youth, who obsess over vintage bimmers, and who haven't gotten used to the trappings of the modern Internet, you're going to have to get used to some significant changes, because those people DO NOT EXIST.

Search your feelings. You know it to be true.

[rturbo 930]

Man, I can tell you're old. Maybe 50? maybe coming up on 60? What a waste of time and energy to fantasize about the golden era of the internet, and what a stupid ship is a discussion board to go down on. This format is dead. It's not coming back. Whether this format is better than another means nothing. I hear Betamax was better than VHS, and HD-DVD was better than Blu-Ray. And I'm sure there's folks out there obsessing over their Laser Disc collection because of what it could have, or should have, been, but who cares about those losers?

Don't confuse discussion boards for your constitutional rights. One is worth fighting for, and the other isn't. Not everything is high stakes, and you impress no one with your super spicy takes on modern society.

Get with the times or die. Or don't. Maybe it's better to watch your beloved community fail because you think things were better in 200X. Whatever floats your boat.

Dude if you love reddit so much, just go back there. Did you sign up here last month just to tell us how much the site sucks and how much better reddit is? Also everything he said about modern society is correct. You say we have to "Get with the times or die", if getting with the times means cutting off your balls, would you do it? Do we go along with something just because it's popular in the current age? Or maybe we see it for what it is and decide we want no part of it? Just because something is newer doesn't mean it's better.

[roguetoaster]

Man, I can tell you're old. Maybe 50? maybe coming up on 60? What a waste of time and energy to fantasize about the golden era of the internet, and what a stupid ship is a discussion board to go down on. This format is dead. It's not coming back. Whether this format is better than another means nothing. I hear Betamax was better than VHS, and HD-DVD was better than Blu-Ray. And I'm sure there's folks out there obsessing over their Laser Disc collection because of what it could have, or should have, been, but who cares about those losers?

Don't confuse discussion boards for your constitutional rights. One is worth fighting for, and the other isn't. Not everything is high stakes, and you impress no one with your super spicy takes on modern society.

Get with the times or die. Or don't. Maybe it's better to watch your beloved community fail because you think things were better in 200X. Whatever floats your boat.

This isn't a product or a commodity, it's an information repository. It can probably exist forever with a small user base, but changes are needed. For reference, r3v declined somewhat due to FB, then there was a decision to make the forum SFW, and then there was a desire to upgrade vB, but it was simply riddled with issues, some of which remain, for years. I suspect that poor timing has damaged this once vibrant forum, and not the inevitable march of people towards whatever the future might be.

Also, if it's so dead, why are you even here?

[AlexJ]

No, just no. Reddit is terrible, chronological and categorized information is the way of the sensible. The argument that just because there's a new way it's the better way is part of what is killing the internet and just turning it into electronic fast food, overly-commercialized mass produced slop for the masses. Where the internet was once the world wide web with nearly limitless information at your fingertips if you knew how to search, search engines more and more feed you algorithm-approved, advertiser or scam results first and what you want somewhere else. The best example is how google has seriously gone downhill as a search engine in the last 10 years alone, I'd call it more of an ad engine now. Centralization is terrible for the proliferation of information, tons of useful stuff has been lost to time as independent websites and forums have gone down, discarded in favor of megacorp instant-gratification swill like reddit and facebook.

IMO the internet peaked in the 200Xs, it has been downhill ever since. Web interface is awful now, endless scroll instead of pages, lack of chronological organization, massive companies with bloated HR and "trust and safety" divisions run everything, it's less fun and less informative. None of the bad stuff is gone; pop ups, obnoxious ads, scams, and the best stuff is more buried in the heaps of junk than ever.

Man, I can tell you're old. Maybe 50? maybe coming up on 60? What a waste of time and energy to fantasize about the golden era of the internet, and what a stupid ship is a discussion board to go down on. This format is dead. It's not coming back. Whether this format is better than another means nothing. I hear Betamax was better than VHS, and HD-DVD was better than Blu-Ray. And I'm sure there's folks out there obsessing over their Laser Disc collection because of what it could have, or should have, been, but who cares about those losers?

Don't confuse discussion boards for your constitutional rights. One is worth fighting for, and the other isn't. Not everything is high stakes, and you impress no one with your super spicy takes on modern society.

Get with the times or die. Or don't. Maybe it's better to watch your beloved community fail because you think things were better in 200X. Whatever floats your boat.

[DEV0 E30]

Simon have you emailed James? Since the people you tagged haven't logged in in awhile (Jason being most recent) I think reaching out via email may be necessary at this point.

And hey, this isn't to blame anyone, life happens. I just think you deserve some help. Pretty much everyone in this thread has offered to help in one way or another.


Last Activity for:

James: Last Activity: 11-10-2022, 12:35 PM

nando: Last Activity: 10-18-2022, 06:21 PM

Jason: Last Activity: 11-30-2022, 06:54 PM

I think you and nando are the only mods that have been active in the last year.
If spam controls / captcha can't be implemented at this point, then probably need more mods a few with ability to ban IPs and ranges.

[2mAn]

I’d love to see something rather than me playing wack-a-mole.

[decay]

can i throw a suggestion out, as an InfoSec engineer? put captcha into the sign-up process and we'll get rid of a lot of these bots.

[varg]

Also, vBulletin is dated. As far as BB systems go, it's a trusty workhorse. I've been on vBulletin boards for at least 20 years, which is part of the problem. Forums don't look like this anymore. They look like Reddit, which is maybe something worth considering. Where R3v has different forums, Reddit has searchable tags and flair. All content shown on a single feed. which can be filtered instantly by interest. There's no chance for a discussion board to go stale and stagnant because it's all one discussion board. It's a good system. Also, there's already a small E30 community there (www.reddit.com/r/e30), that I'd bet is filled mostly w/ young people (because old people don't use Reddit), and it would be very easy to merge with.

No, just no. Reddit is terrible, chronological and categorized information is the way of the sensible. The argument that just because there's a new way it's the better way is part of what is killing the internet and just turning it into electronic fast food, overly-commercialized mass produced slop for the masses. Where the internet was once the world wide web with nearly limitless information at your fingertips if you knew how to search, search engines more and more feed you algorithm-approved, advertiser or scam results first and what you want somewhere else. The best example is how google has seriously gone downhill as a search engine in the last 10 years alone, I'd call it more of an ad engine now. Centralization is terrible for the proliferation of information, tons of useful stuff has been lost to time as independent websites and forums have gone down, discarded in favor of megacorp instant-gratification swill like reddit and facebook.

IMO the internet peaked in the 200Xs, it has been downhill ever since. Web interface is awful now, endless scroll instead of pages, lack of chronological organization, massive companies with bloated HR and "trust and safety" divisions run everything, it's less fun and less informative. None of the bad stuff is gone; pop ups, obnoxious ads, scams, and the best stuff is more buried in the heaps of junk than ever.

[2mAn]