Members mistersully Posted June 2, 2013 Members Share Posted June 2, 2013 koiwoi wrote: I certainly won't miss the "bully brigade" that gang up on anyone that threatens their popularity. i honestly have no idea who that is Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members noisebloom Posted June 3, 2013 Members Share Posted June 3, 2013 I've kept out of this until now, but I'll weigh in, however unsteadily.I am/was a regular of both EG and GJ, from the time I joined HC in 2006. Most of you probably aren't aware of me, because I fly under the radar and I don't ruffle people's feathers. I try hard to make my posts informative and mostly serious, although in GJ I've been able to let loose sometimes.I have tried to stay engaged in the forums since the January meltdown, but it's been hard, partly because of the awkward (although stable, admittedly) new forum software, and mostly because that awkwardness has resulted in a major exodus of many of the knowledgeable people we had in those forums.The fact is that it's been almost five months since the old HC disappeared, and this new HC still feels like it's in beta, and we're the beta testers. It's hard not to feel frustrated by the slow progress. A lot of people have simply given up and are finding other solutions. Some of those alternatives, like Guitar Amp Board, are thriving in the face of HC's continuing struggles.And to make a bit of a confession, I have hardly played my guitars at all since January. My attention has been diverted by other things -- my growing family and my writing projects, primarily -- and the problems with HC were a catalyst for that. For years, HC was a daily, often hourly obsession. I spent countless work hours in front of HC, when I should have been, well, working. This place inspired me to pick up guitars again (after many years away from them), and it continued to feed that addiction to gear and my "sound" and playing and having fun. The meltdown forced me to reevaluate my priorities. I relegated my guitar obsession to where it probably should be: a nice hobby I can spend a few hours a week at, maybe, but no more than that. So you can count me as one of the intangibles. I'm now spending less time here, because the end of the previous HC and the rebirth of a new HC have taken away that addictive quality I thrived on. And I'm afraid that may never return. I'm still here trying to see the glass as half full, but there seems to be less and less left in the glass.I wanted to address the PG-13 issue and the "opt in" issue, but that may have to wait. In a nutshell, I think both are restrictive and not constructive. The goal should be to rebuild this community we used to have, not to stifle participation. Both of those changes do nothing to rebuild HC, IMO. They segregate rather than integrate, and I'm not convinced that's the stuff of a thriving community. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Dougy Posted June 3, 2013 Members Share Posted June 3, 2013 Well, this thread is turning into a nice ****-slinging match. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members DaveAronow Posted June 4, 2013 Author Members Share Posted June 4, 2013 Nicholai, I appreciate your opinion and yes, you are absolutely invited to say what you like or don't like about the forum, past or present. I only wanted to let you know that some of your gripes have recently been addressed and without having to explain it all to you myself, I just wanted to let you know where to find the info for yourself so you can draw your own conclusions.But aside from that, I am not seeing any of the problems you are now specifically talking about with ads and such. I mean zero. I wonder if anyone else is having similar trouble but I don't even have a clue what you are talking about as I have seen nothing like that. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members realtree71 Posted June 4, 2013 Members Share Posted June 4, 2013 Well most pg-13 movies suck but this one thread, thanks Dave, has me interested enough to stop in and check the progress. I remember back then getting in late from a gig and firing up the laptop just to see what all I missed........ Even many of the troll posts were fun to read.. Dave, thanks again Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Elias Graves Posted June 4, 2013 Members Share Posted June 4, 2013 @Dougy (using the built in high tech automated quote feature) Well, this thread is turning into a nice ****-slinging match. ------------------------------ Maybe there's a little life left in the old forum after all? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Elias Graves Posted June 4, 2013 Members Share Posted June 4, 2013 Now fuk off. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members knotty Posted June 4, 2013 Members Share Posted June 4, 2013 Ha ha Nicolai has some advertising malware, and blames Dendy for it! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members noisebloom Posted June 4, 2013 Members Share Posted June 4, 2013 knotty wrote:Ha ha Nicolai has some advertising malware, and blames Dendy for it! That's pretty much what I thought, too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members virtuzoso Posted June 5, 2013 Members Share Posted June 5, 2013 12345678901234567890123456789012345678901234567 47 characters wide. That is the width of the text entry for quick reply. I am on a wide screen monitor. About 50% ( didnt measure exactly) of the width of my screen when reading an actual topic is blank gray space. I dont find the adds that intrusive, I understand they generate revenue. But how much revenue is generated from the lack of traffic now that the website is a clusterfrak of inefficiency and just plain poor design. I am not a web designer, but it looks like someone strode down to the local community college and hired a first year student to do the web programming. It might as well be a geocities or angelfire site, its that cumbersome. I visit several forums regularly, most of which use different formats, and holy hell, this is by far now the worst I have seen. It's 2013, not 1995. There have been more user friendly formats included on an AOL disc! I've been coming here for over 10 years, tho I didnt register for a long time @ first. I've gotten tons of great info, but almost all of it was from users on the forum. I dont care about cursing or not. My mother isnt a moderator here and I am a big boy with big boy pants. I dont need a sitter and people that do should probably NOT be here in the first place. you want more kids on the website? Go play Call of Duty for half an hour and see how many times you get called a n*g**er f*g*ot and listen various boasts about what happened to your mother last night and consider if you really want to cater to unsupervised 13 year olds. I dont know how the new directions really helped anything other than actual site performance, traffic had to die by , I dunno, probably 70%. So if the point was to help with site stability, I guess that's one way to do it. Otherwise, it seems pretty poorly executed, and that sfrom the perspective of a casual layman user. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members CrackerD Posted June 7, 2013 Members Share Posted June 7, 2013 I leave here for a couple years, and look what you guys allowed to happen while I was gone! Where is JJ Pistols? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members GilmourD Posted June 8, 2013 Members Share Posted June 8, 2013 CrackerD wrote: I leave here for a couple years, and look what you guys allowed to happen while I was gone! Where is JJ Pistols? I wish I knew where JJ was. Does anybody know his real name? We could find him on Facebook. Speaking of Facebook, I started an HCEG group on there, just in case HC suddenly were to disappear or something. There's a bunch of us carrying on conversations there. You're more than welcome to join. http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m9fv5tt56K1qajic1o1_500.jpg Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members nicholai Posted June 11, 2013 Members Share Posted June 11, 2013 Please explain to me how I have advertising malware on my iPhone? I don't have any of my home computer either this is the only one that has a box pop up with the coupon for guitar center every **** page. Jesus guys drink the Kool-Aid Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members nicholai Posted June 11, 2013 Members Share Posted June 11, 2013 The Facebook group is pretty cool I can vouch for Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members nicholai Posted June 11, 2013 Members Share Posted June 11, 2013 Sorry for the triple post it's hard to edit from my iPhone another complaint. I appreciate all the years I had fun here. They are irreplaceable. I wish you guys the best rebuilding but I'm not really sure what to say It might happen in time but forms are quickly moving to Facebook it's kind of weird I don't know what is next. No one else has a guitar center ad come up every single page on this forum now? I don't have any pop-up ads anywhere else. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members ugameus Posted June 11, 2013 Members Share Posted June 11, 2013 I have no ads whatsoever on my android phone. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members noisebloom Posted June 11, 2013 Members Share Posted June 11, 2013 nicholai wrote:Please explain to me how I have advertising malware on my iPhone? I don't have any of my home computer either this is the only one that has a box pop up with the coupon for guitar center every **** page. Jesus guys drink the Kool-Aid Two guys (including myself) thought you might have advertising malware on your computer (iPhone, sorry!) and you're shooting the messenger?If that's the way you want it, figure it out for yourself and stop honking about it. Dendy already said HC wasn't the culprit, and no one else is bitching about it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members axegrinder Posted June 11, 2013 Members Share Posted June 11, 2013 No popups here on my iPhone. I joined the Facebook group. It's not a replacement, but it feels way more like a community. People behave more like you would expect in real life than cyber behavior. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members DaveAronow Posted June 11, 2013 Author Members Share Posted June 11, 2013 You don't "find" someone like JJ. JJ finds you when he's good and ready. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members nicholai Posted June 11, 2013 Members Share Posted June 11, 2013 This place isn't the culprit why are the ads only for companies owned by them? I don't get that anywhere else. Sorry I use a real browser on my phone instead of the crap that comes bundled with it. Same thing at my home computer so no one else gets ads? I'll Take pictures of them later but I really don't post here anymore anyways Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members nicholai Posted June 11, 2013 Members Share Posted June 11, 2013 Sorry no one else is annoyed. But the tons of users left for some reason...... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members knotty Posted June 11, 2013 Members Share Posted June 11, 2013 Are you still here? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members GilmourD Posted June 12, 2013 Members Share Posted June 12, 2013 nicholai wrote:This place isn't the culprit why are the ads only for companies owned by them? I don't get that anywhere else. Sorry I use a real browser on my phone instead of the crap that comes bundled with it. Same thing at my home computer so no one else gets ads? I'll Take pictures of them later but I really don't post here anymore anyways There's an ad on the top and an ad on the bottom. That's really fairly unobtrusive as far as web advertising goes. Half the time I forget the bottom ad is there because I just don't scroll down that far. In fact, it's not on all pages, either. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members audionet Posted June 15, 2013 Members Share Posted June 15, 2013 nicholai wrote:Please explain to me how I have advertising malware on my iPhone? I don't have any of my home computer either this is the only one that has a box pop up with the coupon for guitar center every **** page. Jesus guys drink the Kool-Aid On your iPhone go into Settings>Privacy>Location Services> Scroll down to...System Services and turn OFF Location-Based iAds Then go into General>About>Scroll down to...Advertising and turn OFF Limit Ad Tracking This will solve your issue. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members steve42 Posted June 21, 2013 Members Share Posted June 21, 2013 I haven't checked in on HC in quite some time. Not because I was upset with the regime change, and not because of the language used by HC's spicier members. I was gone because life happens whether you plan it or not and I just haven't had the time and finances to work on the projects that inspired my visits most of the time. What does suck for me is that this seems to be a growing trend on the internet. Craig Anderton made the statement that the "Golden Age of Forums" is starting to fade. Well, if it is, it's at least partially due to the corporate takeover of the forums. This is not the first popular forum that I frequent that has been bought out by corporate interests. I was once an active member of a forum focused on another hobby. I am member #317 on that forum. Once it hit about 40,000 members, the owner couldn't handle the time and expense of keeping it up, so he sold it to a company that owns hundreds of forums. The new owners swore their allegiance to the community and promised they would do nothing to harm it. They failed to keep their word, but today the forum has over 100,000 members and the ad revenue is doubtless making the owners happy. The members suffer because there is so much traffic that you can't keep up with threads unless you subscribe to them individually. Most of the olde guarde has moved on, and the "managers" are quick to quash any dissention in the ranks.I'll say this for HC... at least the new owners told us things were going to change. The argument here is that the owners claim the change will make the forum better for all parties, and the regulars see the changes as a slap in the face and a dismissal of what made the forum great in the first place.I'm not a prolific poster. I come in to ask questions (answering few because I'm not qualified), and to check and see what GuitarNoobie has built this month. If he moves on, half my motivation to visit is gone as well. I don't care for the profanity, but I take it with a grain of salt because the guys who have the talent and ability to answer my questions seem to also use the language. So be it. If the babysitter runs off the cool kids, there won't be much talent and skill left to give value to the forum.The "Community Managers" cite quasi-frustration at how some of the changes were implemented against their advice/better judgement. That's a clear indication of the owners' version of the Golden Rule: he who has the gold makes the rules. I'm glad you guys popped in to give your side, and perhaps it ingratiates you to the members somewhat, but you are also affirming that the decisions are being made independent of the lifeblood of the forum. When that happens, the forum dies. If leadership refuses to listen to the wishes of the community, perhaps they'll replace the population, but they'll never rebuild the community.I leave you with this: 13 year olds don't buy guitars, or drums, or keyboards. Yes, they bug their moms and dads to buy them, but the adults in this previously adult-centric forum are the ones who go home from work several times a month with a paycheck. Run them off and GC/MF loses money. Will the rumored inclusion in schools' whitelists make up for that revenue? You be the judge.Steve Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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