D,
I use to also feel that the move from the old site to the new site has caused several of our members that wanted to make the move, struggle with it. I was certainly one of them. Several I’m assuming like Gabriel, Nick, Patrick, and Gary (Gazza), took one look and just plain didn’t like what they saw and left. In any event the site became LIVE in June 2020, so we’ve been at it more then a year. Those that wanted to make the move did, and many struggled with the new site as it’s IMHO way to overly complicated for a plastic modeling site. I’m still struggling with certain aspects of it, but I’m here, and I do participate with threads, posts, and GBs.
But the fact is that AutoModeler has decreased in active membership for the car forum which is our main site. And yes we’ve had some new members sign on, but we’re still smaller now then before.
As far as a new GB goes, there are only 7 sign ups. Way less then then the previous GB, and not even close to what we achieved on the old site. Having a GB run for 6 months makes little sense. The average member who does complete his build rarely continues to be active in the GB, and others stall or never start.
Every month your GB summary urged members to get building and post. Unfortunately, for the most part it never happened.
As I’ve posted previously, we need to maximize what we have to currently work with, not hope or forecast new members joining in meaningful numbers any time soon. I’ve said in the past, and I firmly still believe it that we have way to many forums for so few members. By condensing them into one auto/truck/bike forum we get a larger number of posts and threads, as well as exposing those of us who rarely if ever visit any other forum with subject matter they don’t build. Even if you never opt to build a truck or bike (if you’re a car guy), you’re exposed those builds, and can appreciate them just on the modeling skills, etc.
What’s more, it will increase our GB member counts. I can’t see any reason why there’s not one truck (we had one two GBs ago) from the Truck guys is entered. At least we have Michael’s Bike build, and a proper race car by Richard both in 1/12 scale.
If we have all sorts of car interests in one forum, then including bikes and trucks sure does make a lot of sense to me. We’re not Armorama or Aeroscale. We don’t have the membership for all these forums. We need to consolidate so we can grow and become more active.
As I said in my previous post, i just don’t have the enthusiasm to participate in another GB that’s heading down the same road as the last one did. And where it ended wasn’t exactly the big city.
BTW, I went digging in my profile and there’s a Badge icon, which I clicked on and I have 19 various Admin related badges, but none for any GB. Maybe a dedicated Badge for each GB completed with dates might be another feature to think about.
While the badge I received under my Avatar disappeared after a few weeks, it as well as the others still remain in my profile.
joel
