Post by TimeTravelAstronaut on Feb 11, 2017 22:43:58 GMT
I got the notification last night that pledges reached $5/mo, which marks my first goal successfully completed. Originally this goal was a much higher pledge threshold ($20/mo), but Raab convinced me I probably shouldn't go balls deep on a forum that might not actually be used all that much. So I've created a proboards forum, which is free, and charges $6/mo to remove ads. We're currently in a trial period where the forum is ad-free for the next 2 weeks.
I also dwelled briefly on purchasing a domain name, but ultimately decided against it. While the address to reach the forum is a little janky and having a simpler domain redirect to it (www.tta-lp.com was the domain I was about to purchase) would have been nice, it didn't seem like good value for the you enduser. In the end, the additional costs were a little too confusing to bother with, and researching which domain registrar to go with ended in people just shitting on company A and claiming company B was the better choice for no real reason.
I can understand that a forum might not be able to compete with all the social media alternatives that are available out there in 2017, but I still wanted to give it a go to try and centralize discussion among the community. Just by the way Twitch and Youtube and Twitter etc work, a lot of conversations can be fleeting, and get buried. A forum (or a discord/slack style alternative or whatever we may end up settling on) should make it easier to talk with other people, or myself, without having to wade through old videos and finding the right comment thread or tweet. You can see things like all my LP requests, updates on my schedule, and see questions people are asking about my content.
The other main option available for this sort of discussion to take place would have been Reddit, but I'm not a fan of that place. By its nature people can just stroll in and mess up the content aggregation, or derail discussion; I've also read that the mod tools can be mediocre and the Reddit admins always have that one tier of privileges above your own as a community owner. I feel a forum gives the most features for both you the poster, and me as the owner, with minimal meddling from outside forces. I may just be old-fashioned though.
So ultimately, after reaching the first pledge goal, no actual purchases have been made yet: the forum is in an ad-free state until 2/24/2017. The first round of pledges shouldn't be charged to your CC/Paypal until the beginning of the month, so March 1st, at which point I'll evaluate if the forum is a good investment. If it's not, I think it might be better to move forward with just the ad-supported version of the forum, and put the $5/mo toward the next goal of purchasing a capture card.
I also dwelled briefly on purchasing a domain name, but ultimately decided against it. While the address to reach the forum is a little janky and having a simpler domain redirect to it (www.tta-lp.com was the domain I was about to purchase) would have been nice, it didn't seem like good value for the you enduser. In the end, the additional costs were a little too confusing to bother with, and researching which domain registrar to go with ended in people just shitting on company A and claiming company B was the better choice for no real reason.
I can understand that a forum might not be able to compete with all the social media alternatives that are available out there in 2017, but I still wanted to give it a go to try and centralize discussion among the community. Just by the way Twitch and Youtube and Twitter etc work, a lot of conversations can be fleeting, and get buried. A forum (or a discord/slack style alternative or whatever we may end up settling on) should make it easier to talk with other people, or myself, without having to wade through old videos and finding the right comment thread or tweet. You can see things like all my LP requests, updates on my schedule, and see questions people are asking about my content.
The other main option available for this sort of discussion to take place would have been Reddit, but I'm not a fan of that place. By its nature people can just stroll in and mess up the content aggregation, or derail discussion; I've also read that the mod tools can be mediocre and the Reddit admins always have that one tier of privileges above your own as a community owner. I feel a forum gives the most features for both you the poster, and me as the owner, with minimal meddling from outside forces. I may just be old-fashioned though.
So ultimately, after reaching the first pledge goal, no actual purchases have been made yet: the forum is in an ad-free state until 2/24/2017. The first round of pledges shouldn't be charged to your CC/Paypal until the beginning of the month, so March 1st, at which point I'll evaluate if the forum is a good investment. If it's not, I think it might be better to move forward with just the ad-supported version of the forum, and put the $5/mo toward the next goal of purchasing a capture card.
