We have a thread on the main forum that people post to to ask for details, they are then very quickly sighed up for the forum, and brought into the right Car club in game. One look at that open thread shows how it works, if folk miss that put flashing lights around it LOL
Maybe we could make a better job of making that clear, I will have a think and see if we could make the join up process clearer. But we are constantly signing up new members so it must be working fairly well, okay maybe one in six stay and become active but that is the nature of things as I'm sure all groups know. Remember we also recruit in game and on other web sites so a large amount of people looking for us already know where to look and what to do.
I don't think we miss too many people that come here looking for the Forza club. We do maybe lose PC Racers but that will change very soon :-)
Like I have said before I don't feel segregated, I feel very much a member of 2O2Play, I do feel outside the in crowed, the American contingent that meet up for LAN parties and can talk face to face but no amount of posying out here can solve that. But I do care, this is why I want to bring PC Racing here I am a member of a PC Racing club but it's not here...Someone said..."we should go back to being a Halo clan only" There is a problem right there, the site has moved on and maybe some don't know how a very different game changes the "Clan" model. I am open to any idea on how we can contribute to the site...but opening the forum won't make a blind bit of difference to our group or the sites members, other than meaning we will feel less able to comment on things we may not want seen outside our group, and as you know I think, I am not talking about pictures of naked ladies.
The very fact I am here, monitoring this and other threads means I am not in places I would rather be, I am profoundly dyslexic and every long post takes me 100 times longer to type than it takes you to read, so it takes a lot to get me off the Forza or GBR forums I say that only so it is known I am out here because I care what happens, and am willing to take whatever time it takes to fix what I can.
We have a thread on the main forum that people post to to ask for details, they are then very quickly sighed up for the forum, and brought into the right Car club in game. One look at that open thread shows how it works, if folk miss that put flashing lights around it LOL
Maybe we could make a better job of making that clear, I will have a think and see if we could make the join up process clearer. But we are constantly signing up new members so it must be working fairly well, okay maybe one in six stay and become active but that is the nature of things as I'm sure all groups know. Remember we also recruit in game and on other web sites so a large amount of people looking for us already know where to look and what to do.
I don't think we miss too many people that come here looking for the Forza club. We do maybe lose PC Racers but that will change very soon :-)
Like I have said before I don't feel segregated, I feel very much a member of 2O2Play, I do feel outside the in crowed, the American contingent that meet up for LAN parties and can talk face to face but no amount of posying out here can solve that. But I do care, this is why I want to bring PC Racing here I am a member of a PC Racing club but it's not here...Someone said..."we should go back to being a Halo clan only" There is a problem right there, the site has moved on and maybe some don't know how a very different game changes the "Clan" model. I am open to any idea on how we can contribute to the site...but opening the forum won't make a blind bit of difference to our group or the sites members, other than meaning we will feel less able to comment on things we may not want seen outside our group, and as you know I think, I am not talking about pictures of naked ladies.
The very fact I am here, monitoring this and other threads means I am not in places I would rather be, I am profoundly dyslexic and every long post takes me 100 times longer to type than it takes you to read, so it takes a lot to get me off the Forza or GBR forums I say that only so it is known I am out here because I care what happens, and am willing to take whatever time it takes to fix what I can.
Edit...Oh, and what Church said :-)
That's not exactly what I'm talking about though. While I think your method is fine for picking up people looking specifically to join your group, I'm not talking about the people that already know you guys exist. What about potential members that just want to quickly browse a conversation, lurk, or make a small post. I get that you can recruit fast and directly serve the players that come to 2o2p looking to race, however the perception of activity is really what we're discussing about here. Any site owner will tell you lack of content is what kills a site's community and if they outward facing side of 2o2p looks dead, it won't be able to sustain for very long.
To use 2o2p as a history lesson, it was fairly easy to find a clan back in the Halo days because everyone was talking publicly about Halo. If a new person came to the site they immediately found a discussion and would post to that thread, maybe PM about the clan, and join up for some halo. That can't happen in this current state.
Let me ask an even deep question to the older members here, would you have been able to find your clan without the conversations in the public forum?
Let me ask an even deep question to the older members here, would you have been able to find your clan without the conversations in the public forum?
When I joined, I would have and did. I used the clan forum area to help me decided. Between the clan descriptions and the post activity listed there, I decided which clan might be right for me.
In the current version, I would not be able to do that. I know you don't want to show post counts for individuals or clans, but that helped me in the previous versions.
Also do we really need as many forums on the main page as we have now?
I think some times its too much for a new member to take in, they get confused then board then leave.
Remove all the dead areas or condense them down.
And bring NSFW back :)
Why not ask that question of me? the answer would be yes, I was recruted from Fanatec.com, we have another new member just joined in the time I have taken posting here, recruted from the Forza forum...Like I said we have had people posting to our thread on the open forum as well, if there is one group that does not have problems recruting it's 2O4F...But it seems to me that is not the issue, that fact we don't have recrutment problems does not adress the other issues. BUT and it's a big but (still my favorite joke) I think 2O2Race will adress that issue at least from a Race game point of view. Church and I have seen that as an open forum from the very start of our talks, we will have 2O4F members posting there and as the title of the group is not platform specific race fans from all platforms will take a look and find what they are looking for...I hope.
The big problem is that clans don't want play other clans anymore. They rather gang up and beat on Timmy. Or rank up in wwhatever game they are playin. It has nnothing to do with more games than Halo. There just isn't any sort of clan interaction.
The big problem is that clans don't want play other clans anymore. They rather gang up and beat on Timmy. Or rank up in wwhatever game they are playin. It has nnothing to do with more games than Halo. There just isn't any sort of clan interaction.
I think this is one of the very important points about how online gaming has evolved since Halo 2. Most people predominately played customs with their clan/friends. In recent years with the introduction of XP and unlocks it's nearly impossible to get a custom game going other than an established clan night; if you can even get one going then! Online gaming and social media has evolved significantly since 2005. There are many more factors involved in the current state of 2Old2Play than just Clans.
Hmmm.......clan challenges. That was fun. Like when we kicked OMM's ass at Forza. Made Big0ne cry. Ah the good ole days. In all seriousness we need to have clan challenges, the winning clan can boot F1r3 from the site. :)
We recently opened up the 2O4F world chamionships to the whole site, this took the combined recourses of both 2O4F and tORN TV the online racers network. Once we have 2O2Race open we would be happy to see about other such projects if there is interest.
I enjoy being in a clan and having a "private" forum.I also spend more than half my time in the public forums.I think that is the draw to the site for me. I would probably still visit the site if it was public only but not nearly as much.
I don't think that closed clan forums are the root cause of the problem. Any new member that starts browsing the gen-pop forums will see what's probably the most common theme in any random thread you open: "this game sucks, and this why the developers of this game have ruined it". Which isn't to say that Tank is overly critical or negative about gaming, it's that from a certain point of view, he's correct. I blame games.
I'd say that VotH (a WoW clan) is pretty much dead, but then so is the WoW forum. So is almost every forum in the RPG section. And it's not because we have nothing to contribute, I think it's because there's only so many times a gamer can complain about the ending of Mass Effect 3, constant nerfs to multiplayer in Mass Effect 3, how SWTOR is going free to play and the game is dying, and so on.
It's just depressing.
Would anyone want to hang around after reading that?
But it's not like those points aren't valid, because they are. It's like we're reliving the pre-Nintendo 1980's.
But 2old2play isn't just about gaming. It's a community. There isn't a week that goes that I don't wonder how Jolly and his family are doing. Or wonder what shit Taxi is getting up to. Or if Smoke is still reading Ayn Rand (for some God-awful reason....read something better: like Twilight or 50 Shades of Grey. Seriously, at least get to the bottom of the barrel )
People posting in clans isn't the issue. It doesn't help and certain contributes to the problem, but it's not the root cause. And even the quality of games isn't the issue: do any of you remember playing games like Rygar? Original NES games, for all the nostagla, are crap compared to what we complain about today. I'd say, to a degree, it's an environment thing. Things out there are pretty crappy, alot of us don't have the energy to contribute anything meaningful, and it's easier to be a bit negative about things we're passionate about because we realise that it could be some much better. (Yeah, I'm looking at you, Diablo 3)
But all that said, it doesn't really help the issue does it? So what would I suggest? Treating this like any other problem.
What's the issue? Community active is down, trending lower and future attraction and retention of members is looking bleak. It's like we're RIM.
So a problem statement is in order: How can 2old2play increase awareness and attract new members while increasing the participation of existing members and increasing site revenues to enable continued development of new functions.
At this stage, I'd usually start throwing some numbers at the wall regarding performance indicators and what we want to measure, but for the sake of discussion we can ignore that.
I'd first suggest treating it like any other marketing issue. 2old2play is a brand, with quite a bit of history and a loyal userbase, but it needs to grow. Outside factors have changed since the heady days of Halo2. In order to adapt and grow, we must first identify what we want to be before we can go implementing anything. The surest way to fail is to start without any idea of where you want to go.
Without going into a full-blown case analysis (though I'm willing to), I do have a few suggestions.
1) Marketing: If we want the site to grow, there needs to be a concerted effort to spread the brand. I believe that this is something that's already been started or attempted, and I have a gut feeling that getting new eyeballs to the site isn't the biggest concern, - it's keeping them here once they've tried.
2) Content: Content on 2o2p is largely "volunteer" driven by the community. The question becomes, how do you entice already busy / stressed / grumpy community members to post more, without feeling like it's a chore or something else in their lives that they're being required / pressured / expected to do? I have a feeling, that as some have alluded to in the thread already, that if you attempted to force change, they'd simply go away. And I don't mean to another site, I mean they'd stop gaming related posting anywhere. It's hard to start again somplace new, and for the really tight clans they'd likely chat on someplace like Facebook - but not necessarily about gaming, just general interests.
Obviously, there isn't the cashflow to pay people to be site champions or community leaders to create content. That goes against the principal of the business model, which is people connecting and generating their own content. But we're (potentially) a sizeable group, and there are advertisers that would love to have a targetted audience available at a low cost. A place like 2old2play is a prime breeding ground for social media based, non-traditional advertsing.
Take the Gunnar Optics threads and front-page news item: They have a product some of our members would be interested in. But we're old and curmudgeonly. We don't like reading reviews about how great a product and our eyes squint suspisiously when a new member tries telling us how great the product is. Did I mention we're old? And curmudgeonly? But we'd probably love to read about a site member receiving something from the site as recognition for their work. You know, something provided by 2o2p that was given to it for free but the advertiser. Why? Because that kind of targetted advertising to a specific demographic is pretty much the future of advertising as companies jump ship from Facebook as an advertising model. And it's cheaper for them, and helps us build community goodwill. It's similar to that symbiotic relationship you mentioned earlier, only we're all sucking on each other. Yeah, I could have worded that differently, but I didn't want to. Live with the visual.
In the short term, however, I love the Kickstarter compaign idea for the Lan, and think it's a great way to build cashflow for starting up some sort of community recognition program. In large companies, it's usally something like a $hine program, where you can gift points to coworkers for excellent work. That's a longer term idea, but I digress.
2old2play is a business (I tend to think of everything as a business these days - any sort of community is a business, really) and it's alright to think of it as such. The issue of attracting and retaining new members and increasing activity among existing members is best solved by applying business-related tools, such as treating the issue like a case analysis.
Ideas are great and all, but proceeding without a goal in mind and knowing what you're selling (even if the price is free, you're selling the site as a destination for people to engage as a community), most ideas will be doomed to fail if implemented. I think it was Walladog that suggested a survey, and I agree, this issue requires a bit of market research before deciding on an option or idea presented. And I'd be happy to help in any way I can with that (it's really the only way I can help at the moment - I don't post anything usually, because I have nothing worthwhile to post. I'm a consumer of content these days, not a creator)
The public forums should be considered the lifeblood of not only the site as a whole, but the clans that are housed here. People need to understand everyone benefits from healthy and popular public forums.
People should WANT to participate in the public forums. The public forums should be the most active element of the site under most environments. That’s clearly not the case here, so the question we should be asking is what happened that made people avoid the public forums and how do we fix it?
================================================
Here would be changes I would implement….
I’d severely prune the number of public forums – the current structure spreads things out way too thin. I’d think about going down to as little as 2 forums: a) Site & Gaming News/Discussion, and b) Non-Gaming Discussion.
I’d encourage the exchange of information in the non-gaming area instead of creating the same barriers that have been implemented in the past. As people’s interest in gaming is ebbing across our demographic, it’s not the clans that are cannibalizing traffic, people are spending their time on somebody else’s site where they are discussing popular events, etc.
As an end user, I’d trade most of the other functionality of the site for better forum software. I appreciate what you’re trying to do, but all the other stuff is really handicapping the forums. I’m sorry if this steps on any toes and I will admit it sounds petty, but the experience is terrible when we all spend time on better systems on other sites and know how things should work and feel.
Let me ask an even deep question to the older members here, would you have been able to find your clan without the conversations in the public forum?
When I joined, I would have and did. I used the clan forum area to help me decided. Between the clan descriptions and the post activity listed there, I decided which clan might be right for me.
In the current version, I would not be able to do that. I know you don't want to show post counts for individuals or clans, but that helped me in the previous versions.
Same here! I posted once in the New In Town thread and then scrolled through the list and applied to 2 clans. I didn't know anyone here, and found the site through a bungie writeup. Little known fact: I applied to Profanity first but I guess Drost never read his email notification, so after 2 days with no repsonse I went with another clan lol! :)
"(currently at 30 dollars per month with 4 people supporting)"
I hope I am still one of the 4 because my one credit card still gets charged every month, its been happening for years. If you arent getting it please let me know so I can cancel whatever is happening.
Cotter gave me the head's up that Knight was stirring shit up over here and, being a fan of his work, I just had to see for myself.
I've haven't combed through every post in this thread with a fine-tooth comb..it's quite lengthy. If this opinion has already been offered please chalk it up as support for the original idea.
I like the clan structure we have right now. I have the 2old4forza set as a browser favorite because that's where most of my interest lies and the majority of my game time is spent playing Forza. I would resent having to wade through the vegetable posts about games that I have never played to get to the meat. My expectation of this website, and all others, is to get to what I want to get to now. This site integrates many types of gaming over many different platforms which shapes the clans. Clan membership has a correlation with who choose to be friends with on the game side of 2o2p. Most of the guys on my friends list are in the 2old4forza clan. We don't intentionally exclude members from other clans, but the friends list is used to jump into a game with a friend, not to check out what what other 2o2p folks are doing. There are plenty of folks on the forums, and on the site in general, that I interact with who are not in the clan or on my friends list...I like Doodi but Doodi don't Forza. Once I got into a clan my friends list filled up very quickly and as a result I have to be selective about throwing out friend requests...I'm sure that sounds famaliar to most folks reading this.
Several of the people on the site have multiple clan memberships...if you like more than one kind of game you can join more than one clan. Activity in the forum side will generally correlate with game activity. I played the shit out of Midnight Club LA but I would not expect a lot of activity if I started a clan dedicated to that game. Many clans absorb games of a like genre..2old4forza has Dirt 3 and Need for Speed threads. I don't see any games, gamers, or genres being excluded.
That being said 2old4forza is the biggest (fact) and best (opinion) clan at 2old2play and the naysayers will be crushed under the tires of my 62 Lincoln. I would expect every member of every other clan to claim that their clan is the best and to argue with me about it. That is repping your clan and taking ownership in your part of the 2old2play community. The fact that this thread has grown to its current length show me how deeply everyone who participated in this conversation feels about this community. Makes me proud to be a part of it...just like it is.
Cotter gave me the head's up that Knight was stirring shit up over here and, being a fan of his work, I just had to see for myself.
I've haven't combed through every post in this thread with a fine-tooth comb..it's quite lengthy. If this opinion has already been offered please chalk it up as support for the original idea.
I like the clan structure we have right now. I have the 2old4forza set as a browser favorite because that's where most of my interest lies and the majority of my game time is spent playing Forza. I would resent having to wade through the vegetable posts about games that I have never played to get to the meat. My expectation of this website, and all others, is to get to what I want to get to now. This site integrates many types of gaming over many different platforms which shapes the clans. Clan membership has a correlation with who choose to be friends with on the game side of 2o2p. Most of the guys on my friends list are in the 2old4forza clan. We don't intentionally exclude members from other clans, but the friends list is used to jump into a game with a friend, not to check out what what other 2o2p folks are doing. There are plenty of folks on the forums, and on the site in general, that I interact with who are not in the clan or on my friends list...I like Doodi but Doodi don't Forza. Once I got into a clan my friends list filled up very quickly and as a result I have to be selective about throwing out friend requests...I'm sure that sounds famaliar to most folks reading this.
Several of the people on the site have multiple clan memberships...if you like more than one kind of game you can join more than one clan. Activity in the forum side will generally correlate with game activity. I played the shit out of Midnight Club LA but I would not expect a lot of activity if I started a clan dedicated to that game. Many clans absorb games of a like genre..2old4forza has Dirt 3 and Need for Speed threads. I don't see any games, gamers, or genres being excluded.
That being said 2old4forza is the biggest (fact) and best (opinion) clan at 2old2play and the naysayers will be crushed under the tires of my 62 Lincoln. I would expect every member of every other clan to claim that their clan is the best and to argue with me about it. That is repping your clan and taking ownership in your part of the 2old2play community. The fact that this thread has grown to its current length show me how deeply everyone who participated in this conversation feels about this community. Makes me proud to be a part of it...just like it is.
ps...2old4forza really is the best!
I disagree, racing games haven't been cool since I was slapping quarters up on the edge of the glass to play pole position and spy hunter, so therefore any clan based on them is obviously disconnected and doesn't bring anything to the site.
A lot of folks who can't drive have told me that. I'm sure you're just resentful about your grandchildren taking away your car keys so I won't take offense to your comments.
Let's start with the " credentials " - I joined 2o2p around 2006 / 2007 and then the OMM clan soon after.
I left OMM, I posted less on the forums as I made new gaming friends and began being more casual about my xbox time, until I sold my console three years ago.
Now, I play a few games, on my PC, maybe twice a week, probably less than an hour. I'm not really a gamer.
I come to 2o2p almost daily for the Unrelated thread, and a few other forums.
How to increase numbers ? I'd go with the point somebody made earlier - Marketing. Mom and Pop marketing.
That means recruiting the way I was recruited. That means, when you hear an older player over the mic. and they seem cool, tell them about 2o2p. Send 'em a message with the site url.
Don't become so insular online that you ignore potential candidates who might be looking for a 2o2p environment, regardless of being with your clan or not.
( On a side note: when a group of 2o2p'ers where ruling a GRAW lobby, I seem to remember that a chance comment from me about having no chance of beating a team was met with he suggestion to join their squad, and subsequently visit the site ).
I'm sure there are a lot more gaming / clan sites out there than six years ago. The choice has increased, sure, but by being good ambassadors for this community, maybe a trickle of site traffic might bring new blood. If they like what they see, in turn, they'll spread the word.
The same goes for forums. If you use the Barbie Magic Horsie Adventure forums, let users there know 2o2p exists. Timmie will start a flame war, but ignore it, it's just advertising.
How to make people stay / like what they see ?
I don't have the answer. Only by being different to anything else they can get elsewhere, but when 2o2p was a heaving mass ( ! ) of clan nights and main forum flame wars, Facebook and the other miriad internet time wasting options were still shitting their diapers.
2o2p has been usurped as the older gamers way to f#ck about on the internet.
Clans aren't the problem, ( in my opinion ). I think a big clan hub like 2o2p is relatively unique in its accepting / accomodating style.
More clan interactivity, ( already mentioned ), and more word of mouth - I believe the kids call it " viral " these days. I remember calling it " popular ".
Good luck keeping up with the internet. If you master that, you'll make millions !
Stryker927 - Member since 2006, top ten poster on v2 (everyone else was doing it) :D
I think this boils down to the definition of a clan. Clans are traditionally a team that you practice with and compete with in a given game or type of game (i.e. FPS or Racing). I think you can see the current issues are a root cause of 202p clans developing into mini-communities instead of just gaming teams. It turned into 100 little 2o2p inside 2o2p. Instead of your clan just being about your favorite game, it became about your favorite people and you started playing all games together. But just like the larger 2o2p, the little communities suffered from a lack of focus and then were separated again due to so many different interests.
I think you have to have a clear definition of clans vs communities. If you want the original 2o2p model to work, then you have to have real clans. The current communities aren't going to transition well into that model so something that blends both or has both will be needed.
I'll start by saying the number one reason I'm not posting in the main forums is that I stayed up past midnight last night reading this thread, then stayed up even longer writing this post, then hit submit only to get the blue screen of maintenance. :) Luckily, anytime I write more than a few sentences, I always put it in copy buffer for just such an emergency. So here's my post:
Add me to the list of names that haven't popped up in the main forum in years. I, too, used to write for the site and for the magazine too (remember that?).
Here's what drove me from the main forums a long time ago, pretty much in order:
- The Politics forum. Both the sheer number of douchebag posts and, oddly enough, the elimination of it.
- The insane amount of of threaded quotes I'd often find in off-topic. I would remind me too much of the idiots at work who have to "reply to all" on every e-mail they ever get. I'm sure this one one sounds really petty, but this REALLY was annoying to me.
- The - ahem - competitive nature of many of the threads and posts in the gaming forums. It's a site for over 25 gamers, not a site for extremely competitive over-25 gamers.
- The fact that my clan not only "gets" my jokes (yes you do, dammit), but that they can skillfully bash me back without escalating the situation.
I'm going to guess someone will say all of that has gone away and the fourms are much friendlier now or whatever, but to my mind, that area of the site died, and I just haven't had a reason to go back. I can also say that I'm one of those who has moved up the ladder at work over the years and I just don't have as much time to game and post both, so I choose gaming over posting.
I'm guessing I'm probably missing out on meeting some really cool people by staying in the clan forum, but for me, keeping up with a few threads from close friends in the clan forum is good enough. And as it is, I usually only look at even that forum after work.
Now, onto solutions. I hate to say it, but clan mixers and the like are not the solution. I can compare it to the efforts at my company to hold cross-team mixers to build collaboration. Major fail. Now, mixers would be FUN, just like they always have been, and I would probably participate in them, but they're not going to draw people out into the main forums. If it's a money thing, I'd pay a small fee to keep the clans going, but honestly, I'm not going to pay more per year for that than I pay for XBL service, and I usually buy my XBL service when Amazon or someone has a deal.
I'm not positive ANYTHING would draw me out, but I'm going to echo PDT's suggestion of severly curtailing the number of public forums. We did this on an internal site at my company and, lo and behold, we suddenly had 4 active forums instead of 24 dead ones. If/when people started clamoring for a separate forum (emphasis on PEOPLE - not one or two cranks who want their own playground back) then give it to them, but make sure there's a real demand. I also like the idea of clan mods being able to push a thread public when they feel it is something that the rest of the site would be interested in. If that's technically possible to accomplish, that would be truly stellar, and I'll tell you why. When this version first launched and anyone could post in any clan forum, I took a bunch of time to just stop in and say hi to a bunch of other clans and quickly found myself drawn into conversations in their threads. I was disappointed when the clans locked back down. So that would be a way to open the clans up selectively, and THAT would bring me back to at least the "Threads Gone Wild" forum. Other than that, it's all about recrutiing new blood. I remember when I'd hear what sunded like an adult voice in a game lobby and I'd talk about the site. These days, I'm in an XBL party most of the time and never hear the other team becaue the older I get the less I can tolerate the timmies. That's on me, but it's also on almost everyone I play with, because they almost all game in parties now.
This site, and through extension the people I've met through this site, have been a big part of my life for a long time now. I used to be a producer, but I've been a consumer for a long time now. If anyone thinks that me starting to write for the site again would make a change, I'd find some time to do that, but I don't think that would solve anything either. In the spirit of go big or go home, I'd try the consolidation of forums first. Only two might be too few, but if you could get it down to 5 or 6, I think each one would see more traffic and the topics would begin to cross-pollinate.
Now if only someone will call me some poorly-phrased, misspelled insult so I can relive the glory days of the politics forum.
Thanks Doodi
We have a thread on the main forum that people post to to ask for details, they are then very quickly sighed up for the forum, and brought into the right Car club in game. One look at that open thread shows how it works, if folk miss that put flashing lights around it LOL
Maybe we could make a better job of making that clear, I will have a think and see if we could make the join up process clearer. But we are constantly signing up new members so it must be working fairly well, okay maybe one in six stay and become active but that is the nature of things as I'm sure all groups know. Remember we also recruit in game and on other web sites so a large amount of people looking for us already know where to look and what to do.
I don't think we miss too many people that come here looking for the Forza club. We do maybe lose PC Racers but that will change very soon :-)
Like I have said before I don't feel segregated, I feel very much a member of 2O2Play, I do feel outside the in crowed, the American contingent that meet up for LAN parties and can talk face to face but no amount of posying out here can solve that. But I do care, this is why I want to bring PC Racing here I am a member of a PC Racing club but it's not here...Someone said..."we should go back to being a Halo clan only" There is a problem right there, the site has moved on and maybe some don't know how a very different game changes the "Clan" model. I am open to any idea on how we can contribute to the site...but opening the forum won't make a blind bit of difference to our group or the sites members, other than meaning we will feel less able to comment on things we may not want seen outside our group, and as you know I think, I am not talking about pictures of naked ladies.
The very fact I am here, monitoring this and other threads means I am not in places I would rather be, I am profoundly dyslexic and every long post takes me 100 times longer to type than it takes you to read, so it takes a lot to get me off the Forza or GBR forums I say that only so it is known I am out here because I care what happens, and am willing to take whatever time it takes to fix what I can.
Edit...Oh, and what Church said :-)
That's not exactly what I'm talking about though. While I think your method is fine for picking up people looking specifically to join your group, I'm not talking about the people that already know you guys exist. What about potential members that just want to quickly browse a conversation, lurk, or make a small post. I get that you can recruit fast and directly serve the players that come to 2o2p looking to race, however the perception of activity is really what we're discussing about here. Any site owner will tell you lack of content is what kills a site's community and if they outward facing side of 2o2p looks dead, it won't be able to sustain for very long.
To use 2o2p as a history lesson, it was fairly easy to find a clan back in the Halo days because everyone was talking publicly about Halo. If a new person came to the site they immediately found a discussion and would post to that thread, maybe PM about the clan, and join up for some halo. That can't happen in this current state.
Let me ask an even deep question to the older members here, would you have been able to find your clan without the conversations in the public forum?
When I joined, I would have and did. I used the clan forum area to help me decided. Between the clan descriptions and the post activity listed there, I decided which clan might be right for me.
In the current version, I would not be able to do that. I know you don't want to show post counts for individuals or clans, but that helped me in the previous versions.
Why not ask that question of me? the answer would be yes, I was recruted from Fanatec.com, we have another new member just joined in the time I have taken posting here, recruted from the Forza forum...Like I said we have had people posting to our thread on the open forum as well, if there is one group that does not have problems recruting it's 2O4F...But it seems to me that is not the issue, that fact we don't have recrutment problems does not adress the other issues. BUT and it's a big but (still my favorite joke) I think 2O2Race will adress that issue at least from a Race game point of view. Church and I have seen that as an open forum from the very start of our talks, we will have 2O4F members posting there and as the title of the group is not platform specific race fans from all platforms will take a look and find what they are looking for...I hope.
I think this is one of the very important points about how online gaming has evolved since Halo 2. Most people predominately played customs with their clan/friends. In recent years with the introduction of XP and unlocks it's nearly impossible to get a custom game going other than an established clan night; if you can even get one going then! Online gaming and social media has evolved significantly since 2005. There are many more factors involved in the current state of 2Old2Play than just Clans.
I'm not in a clan either. I really don't consider the public co-op game forum in my profile a clan
I use to be in a couple clans though, but they are no longer on the site
Hmmm.......clan challenges. That was fun. Like when we kicked OMM's ass at Forza. Made Big0ne cry. Ah the good ole days. In all seriousness we need to have clan challenges, the winning clan can boot F1r3 from the site. :)
We recently opened up the 2O4F world chamionships to the whole site, this took the combined recourses of both 2O4F and tORN TV the online racers network. Once we have 2O2Race open we would be happy to see about other such projects if there is interest.
I enjoy being in a clan and having a "private" forum.I also spend more than half my time in the public forums.I think that is the draw to the site for me. I would probably still visit the site if it was public only but not nearly as much.
My God, you people write alot.
I don't think that closed clan forums are the root cause of the problem. Any new member that starts browsing the gen-pop forums will see what's probably the most common theme in any random thread you open: "this game sucks, and this why the developers of this game have ruined it". Which isn't to say that Tank is overly critical or negative about gaming, it's that from a certain point of view, he's correct. I blame games.
I'd say that VotH (a WoW clan) is pretty much dead, but then so is the WoW forum. So is almost every forum in the RPG section. And it's not because we have nothing to contribute, I think it's because there's only so many times a gamer can complain about the ending of Mass Effect 3, constant nerfs to multiplayer in Mass Effect 3, how SWTOR is going free to play and the game is dying, and so on.
It's just depressing.
Would anyone want to hang around after reading that?
But it's not like those points aren't valid, because they are. It's like we're reliving the pre-Nintendo 1980's.
But 2old2play isn't just about gaming. It's a community. There isn't a week that goes that I don't wonder how Jolly and his family are doing. Or wonder what shit Taxi is getting up to. Or if Smoke is still reading Ayn Rand (for some God-awful reason....read something better: like Twilight or 50 Shades of Grey. Seriously, at least get to the bottom of the barrel
)
People posting in clans isn't the issue. It doesn't help and certain contributes to the problem, but it's not the root cause. And even the quality of games isn't the issue: do any of you remember playing games like Rygar? Original NES games, for all the nostagla, are crap compared to what we complain about today. I'd say, to a degree, it's an environment thing. Things out there are pretty crappy, alot of us don't have the energy to contribute anything meaningful, and it's easier to be a bit negative about things we're passionate about because we realise that it could be some much better. (Yeah, I'm looking at you, Diablo 3)
But all that said, it doesn't really help the issue does it? So what would I suggest? Treating this like any other problem.
What's the issue? Community active is down, trending lower and future attraction and retention of members is looking bleak. It's like we're RIM.
So a problem statement is in order: How can 2old2play increase awareness and attract new members while increasing the participation of existing members and increasing site revenues to enable continued development of new functions.
At this stage, I'd usually start throwing some numbers at the wall regarding performance indicators and what we want to measure, but for the sake of discussion we can ignore that.
I'd first suggest treating it like any other marketing issue. 2old2play is a brand, with quite a bit of history and a loyal userbase, but it needs to grow. Outside factors have changed since the heady days of Halo2. In order to adapt and grow, we must first identify what we want to be before we can go implementing anything. The surest way to fail is to start without any idea of where you want to go.
Without going into a full-blown case analysis (though I'm willing to), I do have a few suggestions.
1) Marketing: If we want the site to grow, there needs to be a concerted effort to spread the brand. I believe that this is something that's already been started or attempted, and I have a gut feeling that getting new eyeballs to the site isn't the biggest concern, - it's keeping them here once they've tried.
2) Content: Content on 2o2p is largely "volunteer" driven by the community. The question becomes, how do you entice already busy / stressed / grumpy community members to post more, without feeling like it's a chore or something else in their lives that they're being required / pressured / expected to do? I have a feeling, that as some have alluded to in the thread already, that if you attempted to force change, they'd simply go away. And I don't mean to another site, I mean they'd stop gaming related posting anywhere. It's hard to start again somplace new, and for the really tight clans they'd likely chat on someplace like Facebook - but not necessarily about gaming, just general interests.
Obviously, there isn't the cashflow to pay people to be site champions or community leaders to create content. That goes against the principal of the business model, which is people connecting and generating their own content. But we're (potentially) a sizeable group, and there are advertisers that would love to have a targetted audience available at a low cost. A place like 2old2play is a prime breeding ground for social media based, non-traditional advertsing.
Take the Gunnar Optics threads and front-page news item: They have a product some of our members would be interested in. But we're old and curmudgeonly. We don't like reading reviews about how great a product and our eyes squint suspisiously when a new member tries telling us how great the product is. Did I mention we're old? And curmudgeonly? But we'd probably love to read about a site member receiving something from the site as recognition for their work. You know, something provided by 2o2p that was given to it for free but the advertiser. Why? Because that kind of targetted advertising to a specific demographic is pretty much the future of advertising as companies jump ship from Facebook as an advertising model. And it's cheaper for them, and helps us build community goodwill. It's similar to that symbiotic relationship you mentioned earlier, only we're all sucking on each other. Yeah, I could have worded that differently, but I didn't want to. Live with the visual.
In the short term, however, I love the Kickstarter compaign idea for the Lan, and think it's a great way to build cashflow for starting up some sort of community recognition program. In large companies, it's usally something like a $hine program, where you can gift points to coworkers for excellent work. That's a longer term idea, but I digress.
2old2play is a business (I tend to think of everything as a business these days - any sort of community is a business, really) and it's alright to think of it as such. The issue of attracting and retaining new members and increasing activity among existing members is best solved by applying business-related tools, such as treating the issue like a case analysis.
Ideas are great and all, but proceeding without a goal in mind and knowing what you're selling (even if the price is free, you're selling the site as a destination for people to engage as a community), most ideas will be doomed to fail if implemented. I think it was Walladog that suggested a survey, and I agree, this issue requires a bit of market research before deciding on an option or idea presented. And I'd be happy to help in any way I can with that (it's really the only way I can help at the moment - I don't post anything usually, because I have nothing worthwhile to post. I'm a consumer of content these days, not a creator)
Here’s my two cents……
The public forums should be considered the lifeblood of not only the site as a whole, but the clans that are housed here. People need to understand everyone benefits from healthy and popular public forums.
People should WANT to participate in the public forums. The public forums should be the most active element of the site under most environments. That’s clearly not the case here, so the question we should be asking is what happened that made people avoid the public forums and how do we fix it?
================================================
Here would be changes I would implement….
I’d severely prune the number of public forums – the current structure spreads things out way too thin. I’d think about going down to as little as 2 forums: a) Site & Gaming News/Discussion, and b) Non-Gaming Discussion.
I’d encourage the exchange of information in the non-gaming area instead of creating the same barriers that have been implemented in the past. As people’s interest in gaming is ebbing across our demographic, it’s not the clans that are cannibalizing traffic, people are spending their time on somebody else’s site where they are discussing popular events, etc.
As an end user, I’d trade most of the other functionality of the site for better forum software. I appreciate what you’re trying to do, but all the other stuff is really handicapping the forums. I’m sorry if this steps on any toes and I will admit it sounds petty, but the experience is terrible when we all spend time on better systems on other sites and know how things should work and feel.
I have nothing constructive to say or give a flying fuck about any of this so here's a picture of Dethlok.
[IMG]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v506/elGrumpo/wqxyeo.jpg[/IMG]
Don't want to know why you have that picture........ *shudder*
Was wonder the same thing.... Either way..gif "114")
It's a 2o2p classic that most of the wieners looking at this probably have never seen.
Hey hey hey now....that was a valuable user that no longer posts here. See...just contributing to the problem...
No
Same here! I posted once in the New In Town thread and then scrolled through the list and applied to 2 clans. I didn't know anyone here, and found the site through a bungie writeup. Little known fact: I applied to Profanity first but I guess Drost never read his email notification, so after 2 days with no repsonse I went with another clan lol! :)
I hope I am still one of the 4 because my one credit card still gets charged every month, its been happening for years. If you arent getting it please let me know so I can cancel whatever is happening.
Cotter gave me the head's up that Knight was stirring shit up over here and, being a fan of his work, I just had to see for myself.
I've haven't combed through every post in this thread with a fine-tooth comb..it's quite lengthy. If this opinion has already been offered please chalk it up as support for the original idea.
I like the clan structure we have right now. I have the 2old4forza set as a browser favorite because that's where most of my interest lies and the majority of my game time is spent playing Forza. I would resent having to wade through the vegetable posts about games that I have never played to get to the meat. My expectation of this website, and all others, is to get to what I want to get to now. This site integrates many types of gaming over many different platforms which shapes the clans. Clan membership has a correlation with who choose to be friends with on the game side of 2o2p. Most of the guys on my friends list are in the 2old4forza clan. We don't intentionally exclude members from other clans, but the friends list is used to jump into a game with a friend, not to check out what what other 2o2p folks are doing. There are plenty of folks on the forums, and on the site in general, that I interact with who are not in the clan or on my friends list...I like Doodi but Doodi don't Forza. Once I got into a clan my friends list filled up very quickly and as a result I have to be selective about throwing out friend requests...I'm sure that sounds famaliar to most folks reading this.
Several of the people on the site have multiple clan memberships...if you like more than one kind of game you can join more than one clan. Activity in the forum side will generally correlate with game activity. I played the shit out of Midnight Club LA but I would not expect a lot of activity if I started a clan dedicated to that game. Many clans absorb games of a like genre..2old4forza has Dirt 3 and Need for Speed threads. I don't see any games, gamers, or genres being excluded.
That being said 2old4forza is the biggest (fact) and best (opinion) clan at 2old2play and the naysayers will be crushed under the tires of my 62 Lincoln. I would expect every member of every other clan to claim that their clan is the best and to argue with me about it. That is repping your clan and taking ownership in your part of the 2old2play community. The fact that this thread has grown to its current length show me how deeply everyone who participated in this conversation feels about this community. Makes me proud to be a part of it...just like it is.
ps...2old4forza really is the best!
I disagree, racing games haven't been cool since I was slapping quarters up on the edge of the glass to play pole position and spy hunter, so therefore any clan based on them is obviously disconnected and doesn't bring anything to the site.
Oh and 2old2pwn is the BCE..gif "55")
@selden007
A lot of folks who can't drive have told me that. I'm sure you're just resentful about your grandchildren taking away your car keys so I won't take offense to your comments..gif "18")
All kinds of names I haven't seen in years popping up in this thread.
Time to chip in.
Let's start with the " credentials " - I joined 2o2p around 2006 / 2007 and then the OMM clan soon after.
I left OMM, I posted less on the forums as I made new gaming friends and began being more casual about my xbox time, until I sold my console three years ago.
Now, I play a few games, on my PC, maybe twice a week, probably less than an hour. I'm not really a gamer.
I come to 2o2p almost daily for the Unrelated thread, and a few other forums.
How to increase numbers ? I'd go with the point somebody made earlier - Marketing. Mom and Pop marketing.
That means recruiting the way I was recruited. That means, when you hear an older player over the mic. and they seem cool, tell them about 2o2p. Send 'em a message with the site url.
Don't become so insular online that you ignore potential candidates who might be looking for a 2o2p environment, regardless of being with your clan or not.
( On a side note: when a group of 2o2p'ers where ruling a GRAW lobby, I seem to remember that a chance comment from me about having no chance of beating a team was met with he suggestion to join their squad, and subsequently visit the site ).
I'm sure there are a lot more gaming / clan sites out there than six years ago. The choice has increased, sure, but by being good ambassadors for this community, maybe a trickle of site traffic might bring new blood. If they like what they see, in turn, they'll spread the word.
The same goes for forums. If you use the Barbie Magic Horsie Adventure forums, let users there know 2o2p exists. Timmie will start a flame war, but ignore it, it's just advertising.
How to make people stay / like what they see ?
I don't have the answer. Only by being different to anything else they can get elsewhere, but when 2o2p was a heaving mass ( ! ) of clan nights and main forum flame wars, Facebook and the other miriad internet time wasting options were still shitting their diapers.
2o2p has been usurped as the older gamers way to f#ck about on the internet.
Clans aren't the problem, ( in my opinion ). I think a big clan hub like 2o2p is relatively unique in its accepting / accomodating style.
More clan interactivity, ( already mentioned ), and more word of mouth - I believe the kids call it " viral " these days. I remember calling it " popular ".
Good luck keeping up with the internet. If you master that, you'll make millions !
What is with these GINORMOUS smileys?
Stryker927 - Member since 2006, top ten poster on v2 (everyone else was doing it) :D
I think this boils down to the definition of a clan. Clans are traditionally a team that you practice with and compete with in a given game or type of game (i.e. FPS or Racing). I think you can see the current issues are a root cause of 202p clans developing into mini-communities instead of just gaming teams. It turned into 100 little 2o2p inside 2o2p. Instead of your clan just being about your favorite game, it became about your favorite people and you started playing all games together. But just like the larger 2o2p, the little communities suffered from a lack of focus and then were separated again due to so many different interests.
I think you have to have a clear definition of clans vs communities. If you want the original 2o2p model to work, then you have to have real clans. The current communities aren't going to transition well into that model so something that blends both or has both will be needed.
I'll start by saying the number one reason I'm not posting in the main forums is that I stayed up past midnight last night reading this thread, then stayed up even longer writing this post, then hit submit only to get the blue screen of maintenance. :) Luckily, anytime I write more than a few sentences, I always put it in copy buffer for just such an emergency. So here's my post:
Add me to the list of names that haven't popped up in the main forum in years. I, too, used to write for the site and for the magazine too (remember that?).
Here's what drove me from the main forums a long time ago, pretty much in order:
- The Politics forum. Both the sheer number of douchebag posts and, oddly enough, the elimination of it.
- The insane amount of of threaded quotes I'd often find in off-topic. I would remind me too much of the idiots at work who have to "reply to all" on every e-mail they ever get. I'm sure this one one sounds really petty, but this REALLY was annoying to me.
- The - ahem - competitive nature of many of the threads and posts in the gaming forums. It's a site for over 25 gamers, not a site for extremely competitive over-25 gamers.
- The fact that my clan not only "gets" my jokes (yes you do, dammit), but that they can skillfully bash me back without escalating the situation.
I'm going to guess someone will say all of that has gone away and the fourms are much friendlier now or whatever, but to my mind, that area of the site died, and I just haven't had a reason to go back. I can also say that I'm one of those who has moved up the ladder at work over the years and I just don't have as much time to game and post both, so I choose gaming over posting.
I'm guessing I'm probably missing out on meeting some really cool people by staying in the clan forum, but for me, keeping up with a few threads from close friends in the clan forum is good enough. And as it is, I usually only look at even that forum after work.
Now, onto solutions. I hate to say it, but clan mixers and the like are not the solution. I can compare it to the efforts at my company to hold cross-team mixers to build collaboration. Major fail. Now, mixers would be FUN, just like they always have been, and I would probably participate in them, but they're not going to draw people out into the main forums. If it's a money thing, I'd pay a small fee to keep the clans going, but honestly, I'm not going to pay more per year for that than I pay for XBL service, and I usually buy my XBL service when Amazon or someone has a deal.
I'm not positive ANYTHING would draw me out, but I'm going to echo PDT's suggestion of severly curtailing the number of public forums. We did this on an internal site at my company and, lo and behold, we suddenly had 4 active forums instead of 24 dead ones. If/when people started clamoring for a separate forum (emphasis on PEOPLE - not one or two cranks who want their own playground back) then give it to them, but make sure there's a real demand. I also like the idea of clan mods being able to push a thread public when they feel it is something that the rest of the site would be interested in. If that's technically possible to accomplish, that would be truly stellar, and I'll tell you why. When this version first launched and anyone could post in any clan forum, I took a bunch of time to just stop in and say hi to a bunch of other clans and quickly found myself drawn into conversations in their threads. I was disappointed when the clans locked back down. So that would be a way to open the clans up selectively, and THAT would bring me back to at least the "Threads Gone Wild" forum. Other than that, it's all about recrutiing new blood. I remember when I'd hear what sunded like an adult voice in a game lobby and I'd talk about the site. These days, I'm in an XBL party most of the time and never hear the other team becaue the older I get the less I can tolerate the timmies. That's on me, but it's also on almost everyone I play with, because they almost all game in parties now.
This site, and through extension the people I've met through this site, have been a big part of my life for a long time now. I used to be a producer, but I've been a consumer for a long time now. If anyone thinks that me starting to write for the site again would make a change, I'd find some time to do that, but I don't think that would solve anything either. In the spirit of go big or go home, I'd try the consolidation of forums first. Only two might be too few, but if you could get it down to 5 or 6, I think each one would see more traffic and the topics would begin to cross-pollinate.
Now if only someone will call me some poorly-phrased, misspelled insult so I can relive the glory days of the politics forum.