Page 1 of 2

PLEASE READ! Ridersite - the next stage.

Posted: Sun Dec 01, 2019 7:47 pm
by mangocrazy
As I'm sure everyone reading this will agree, numbers of the Ridersite 'faithful' have been dwindling year after year. What was once a bustling community now has the forum equivalent of tumbleweed blowing through it. There have been days when I've logged on and there have been no new posts whatsoever. Unfortunately those days seem to be happening more frequently as time goes by.

We've all agonised (individually and collectively) over how to turn this around, and I can assure you that behind the scenes the moderators have been having this conversation regularly. The problem is, there is no easy answer. All of us are primarily motorcyclists who are largely IT non-experts but who call this space a form of home where we can talk to like-minded individuals, but don't have the knowledge to fix and update the crumbling building we inhabit.

Andy (D-Rider) has on more than one occasion asked the question 'do we really want the forum to continue', to which the answer is yes. But to the question 'how do we ensure that RS can continue' there is a deafening silence.

So when the site owner (Jake) approached the mods a few weeks back with a proposal, we were interested (and naturally a little worried). Jake had received an enquiry from Ben Cope (who originally set up Visordown), as he wanted to get back into the forum-running business and Ridersite seemed like an excellent fit for his purposes; an established forum, but one that had languished in recent years.

Anyway - that's the scene set. Below is a brief note from Ben about his intentions and assurances he can give. Please read what Ben has to say and fire away with your questions and concerns. We (the mods) have already asked Ben a lot of questions and have been broadly satisfied with the replies we've had, but really it's down to what you as forum members think.

Here's Ben:

Hello! I'm going to try and keep this short and sweet:

I'd like to inject a bit of life back into RiderSite and see if we can rekindle the community. A long time ago now I started Visordown. Very recently the current owners deleted the entire forums, which was pretty shocking and spurred me into action. All that history, gone.

Massive thanks to Jake and the Admins for keeping the site going and putting in the hard yards.

I have discussed my plan at length with Jake and this is it in a nutshell:

- Update the forums to the latest version of phpBB
- Move it onto a faster server if possible
- Clear out the spammy users and posts and any inactive accounts
- Add in a few more forum features that should make it a better user experience
- Use my experience to bring in a few more characters into the forum, to help us grow the community
- I promise (and it's set out in my agreement with Jake) no banner ads, ever
- I'm happy to refund any donations towards server fees from the past 90 days that are sat in the kitty
- All I'm after is your backing and we'll make RiderSite the best it can be

If you have any questions, just shout.

Thank you, Ben

Posted: Mon Dec 02, 2019 6:19 pm
by fatboy
Well done all of you that toil behind the scenes!
I was dreading what I may have ended up reading.but that is good news indeed !
Card is behind the bar and please keep us informed of when we need to pay our new master !

:smt006

Posted: Mon Dec 02, 2019 8:27 pm
by Falcopops
seems like a reasonable offer, I'd be happy with that proposal.

Posted: Mon Dec 02, 2019 9:44 pm
by DavShill
This seems like a reasonable way forward. Thanks to all the existing admins for their work and support. I’d like to see the site continue.

Posted: Mon Dec 02, 2019 11:01 pm
by mangocrazy
My personal view is that without an injection of impetus, the forum would eventually collapse under its own weight, so I'm supportive of what Ben plans to do. There will be change (which can be challenging) and there will be some attendant disruption, but if you want to make an omelette you have to break some eggs...

At some point in the near future I believe Ben will be updating the forum software (which is horribly outdated and out of support) which will require some downtime - just to make people aware of this.

Posted: Tue Dec 03, 2019 11:03 am
by Falcopops
DavShill wrote:This seems like a reasonable way forward. Thanks to all the existing admins for their work and support. I’d like to see the site continue.
Aye, well said Dave, my thanks also to those that have donated their own time on our behalf.

Posted: Tue Dec 03, 2019 8:54 pm
by katie1
Sounds like a good idea. The site is great but could really do with some more people (obviously the current crop are still going to be the nicest crew :smt002 )

Posted: Wed Dec 04, 2019 8:24 pm
by BikerGran
Seems to me it's the ONLY way forward. I've stuck with RS through thick and thin, and now I can't even ride but I've hung on grimly as it's part of my biking history - the first forum I joined!

We may not like some of the changes, just because we're people and that's our natural response, but I hope Ben can achieve something with it - if anyone can he can. Good luck to him!

Posted: Wed Dec 04, 2019 8:59 pm
by Falcopops
BikerGran wrote:Seems to me it's the ONLY way forward. I've stuck with RS through thick and thin, and now I can't even ride but I've hung on grimly as it's part of my biking history - the first forum I joined!

We may not like some of the changes, just because we're people and that's our natural response, but I hope Ben can achieve something with it - if anyone can he can. Good luck to him!
True thing BG and well done on your longevity through thick and thin.

Re: PLEASE READ! Ridersite - the next stage.

Posted: Fri Dec 06, 2019 3:10 pm
by Ben
Hi all, thanks for your support.

As you may have noticed, things already look a bit different.

We have:

- Moved to ridersite.com from ridersite.ws
- Upgraded to the latest version of the forum software
- Installed a security certificate to make the site safer to browse and use
- Moved to a faster server
- Cleared out 100s of spammy accounts
- Merged a few old / unused forums

We're working on a few new features now, including the ability to upload attachments directly to the site, so you don't need to use anything like ImageShack, imgur, photobucket etc. so that images won't be lost in the future.

:smt023

Re: PLEASE READ! Ridersite - the next stage.

Posted: Fri Dec 06, 2019 7:23 pm
by BikerGran
Fast work Ben!

Re: PLEASE READ! Ridersite - the next stage.

Posted: Fri Dec 06, 2019 8:38 pm
by mangocrazy
Hi Ben,

You're clearly a fast worker... :smt003

Excellent stuff. Particularly pleased about on-site image hosting facilities. That will make things a lot better. Once it's done I'll go through all my technical posts and refresh the photos with on-site hosted ones.

Re: PLEASE READ! Ridersite - the next stage.

Posted: Mon Dec 09, 2019 2:37 pm
by Aladinsaneuk
And to think how Segway was received.....

Re: PLEASE READ! Ridersite - the next stage.

Posted: Wed Dec 11, 2019 2:43 pm
by RiceBurner
Looking forward to some good chats and fun. :)

When's the first pissup?

Re: PLEASE READ! Ridersite - the next stage.

Posted: Wed Dec 11, 2019 11:17 pm
by fastasfcuk
I must admit, I'm one of those dwindlers for various reasons. But the site was never out of my mind. When I popped my head up a few weeks ago I was sad to see the lack of activity. I would back anything that put new blood into the site.