Ah well...

[andyg]

It was fun while it lasted, but I won't be following this over to Facebook.

I have standards.

[tezza]

Sorry to hear that Andy. Funny thing was, up until about 3 years ago I thought the same thing. I finally succumbed to that voice in my head saying "Resistance is futile..."

I've just found Facebook so convenient , especially with the three other Facebook vintage computer groups I belong to. I found it so easy to be active, share images and articles...way more than on here. But yes, that's how they get you..it is surrendering to the corporate cloak with it's ads and tracking, and I can understand it's not for everyone.

Peace

[nzoomed]

Ill carry this forum on if no one else wants to.

There are many advantages with a php forum than a facebook group where you cant manage threads and requests for help.
php forums are far from outdated and there are many various ones i belong to.

Besides if we are a "vintage" computing group, who cares if this is out of date??? lol

[SeanKennedy]

Besides if we are a "vintage" computing group, who cares if this is out of date??? lol

[ZL2AOX]

[Roux]

This forum has been great, even tho not terribly active its still better than Facebook which gets so messy with and annoying with notifications etc. I also feel things get lost on an FB groups page and the random changing of order of content is so confusing. Its hard to use it as a resource like this forum where you have categories and can easily search for content. I think it is quite nice to have to log in to see if anything has changed or if there is a new message, it kind of keeps with the whole "Vintage" theme

Huge thanks to Terry for all his work and efforts with this forum and I wish everyone all the best for the migration. Sadly at this stage I will not be moving across to FB but will support anyone who wants to take this forum over or start a new one even if it means small donations from time to time to pay for hosting costs etc.

In the meantime you can find me on Amibay.com user name : Roux

Thanks All!!

[nzoomed]

This forum has been great, even tho not terribly active its still better than Facebook which gets so messy with and annoying with notifications etc. I also feel things get lost on an FB groups page and the random changing of order of content is so confusing. Its hard to use it as a resource like this forum where you have categories and can easily search for content. I think it is quite nice to have to log in to see if anything has changed or if there is a new message, it kind of keeps with the whole "Vintage" theme

Huge thanks to Terry for all his work and efforts with this forum and I wish everyone all the best for the migration. Sadly at this stage I will not be moving across to FB but will support anyone who wants to take this forum over or start a new one even if it means small donations from time to time to pay for hosting costs etc.

In the meantime you can find me on Amibay.com user name : Roux

Thanks All!!

competley agree

[acsi]

I'm sorry Guys but Although I have a Facebook account I have never got into it.

I have joined the Facebook group but probably won't be posting anything.

Sorry but I'm showing my age and just can't get my head around Facebook Maybe a few lessons from my kids will help

[Roux]

I'm sorry Guys but Although I have a Facebook account I have never got into it.

I have joined the Facebook group but probably won't be posting anything.

Sorry but I'm showing my age and just can't get my head around Facebook Maybe a few lessons from my kids will help

I don't know if it is age that is the issue, I am 33 my little brother is 20 and we are both not fans of "The Book" It used to be quite a good platform for communication with friends but now it just feels spammy and advert driven. Trying not to be too negative about it so excuse me while I go and play Rainbow Islands ((( ((( (((

[Audronic]

@Tezza

Hi Terry
How will moderation be achieved.

Thanks Ray (Over the Ditch).
Good luck anyway.

[tezza]

@Tezza

Hi Terry
How will moderation be achieved.

Thanks Ray (Over the Ditch).
Good luck anyway.

Hi Ray,

You mean on Facebook? As group administrator I can delete peoples posts and block their/cancel membership just as I can on these forums. For new members, they need to be approved by myself. I can check out their public profiles before I approve them and message for any follow up questions also.

[tezza]

Thanks for the thanks Roux.

There were a number of reasons I wanted to migrate the forums to a Facebook group. :

Membership management on these forums takes work. Almost every day I get membership applications and four out of 5 are from bots or, occasionally, spammers. I have to manually send applicants an email to check, and there can be a bit of toing and froing. In Facebook, I won’t get bothered by bots. I still have to authorise members, but at least they are not a bot. They can still be spammers and hackers but at least I can trawl through their profiles to see if they seem ok…and follow up with a message if needs be.

The forum is open source PHP. It is vulnerable to hacking unless you update frequently and even if you do it can still happened. The site’s got hacked once before and a few years ago it was vandalised by a rouge user. Rebuilding took a lot of work. With Facebook, people can trash the room but it’s unlikely they will bring down the house.

I have very little experience/knowledge of PHP so it’s not easy for me to tweak and fix things if they go wrong. Including if things go wrong when updating. This is not an issue with Facebook

Forums generally require people go look at them to see if anything’s been posted. Although members can switch on email alerts for every time a new post has been made in each forum, the default is off. If this isn’t set to on, people can register, make a few posts, then forget the forum is there as they get busy with other things. It’s the out-of-sight-out-of-mind thing. People with Facebook use it frequently and you’ll always be altered to postings.

It’s a visual world these days. The forums allow images as attachments which can be displayed but users have to manage image size, and the upload and display is far clumsier than Facebook. Uploading photos and videos is a breeze with the latter.

Sharing articles or other work you’ve found on the web is also a breeze in Facebook.

Facebook allows a simple response to your article, to show people have read it and appreciate the post (the like button). This can be derided as trivial and narcissist but it does show someone who’s bothered to post something, that the effort is appreciated. You can’t do this in the forums, apart from leaving a comment.

As I mention, I am a member of some other FB VC groups. You can get very active discussions going on. These have given me confidence that FB can be a good platform for social interactions regarding VCs. Already 85 people have signed up to the new group.

There is a downside. Lack of full control, advertisements at the side and no clear “groupings for topics. Just one long news Stream. I’m not too concerned about this, because the forums don’t get a lot of postings anyway. One stream should be able to handle it. You can search for things in a group.

Having an active forum on my domain, did bring quite a bit of traffic here. I now won’t get as much but I don’t make any money off traffic so that’s ok.

Perhaps most significantly, you need to be registered with FB to use the group. Some people won’t use FB. It’s their choice and I respect it. It’s propriety. It may fall out of use someday. It’s a closed garden and posts won’t be seen by everyone. However, there are always blogs for the important reference stuff though. This is one of the reasons I write up my repairs rather than just leaving the details in a discussion forum.

There is certainly nothing to stop someone starting their own forums to continue VC discussions in this format. The topic listings and colours would be fine (the colours and layout are a standard template anyway). The only thing I ask is that you don’t use the exact same name and the signature image. On the web the “New Zealand Vintage Computer Forums” are associated with classic-computers.org.nz., and myself, and besides I’ll be keeping this one up as an archive. Having duplicates run by different people would just confuse people.

I could certainly link any new subsequent forum from this archive (as I will to the Facebook site). I’d probably even join myself just to keep a check on what you guys are up to .

[tezza]

In case you didn't get the email...

These forums will be remain open. Please see the News section for details.

[andyg]

Yay! Thanks Terry!

[SeanKennedy]

It's a Festivus miracle!