Thread: New Ownership - Please Read

Hey Everyone,

Im Blade and I have recently just purchased WebTalkForums from Grim. In this thread Im going to give a brief intro about myself and talk about some of the things I have planned for WTF.

My real name is Aaron and Ive been a webmaster for 4 years and internet marketing for 2 years. I have a lot of experience in the field of forum ownership / administration and run many successful forums in the past. I previously administrated an Internet Marketing forum with 60,000 members. Just in case there are some New Zealanders floating about, I would just like to say that I live in New Zealand.

My main ambition for WTF is to see it grow and to expand it to the best of my ability. I have some ideas in mind and would like to point some out now and see what your opinions are.

• New Theme
• Private Internet Marketing Section - With premium tools, methods and scripts
• Introduce more marketing related forums

These are some things that I have in my head at the moment. However I would like to hear your opinions first. So please reply in this thread with your opinions. Or shoot me a private message if you have any suggestions. Im more then happy to take on your ideas.

I would also like to recruit some new staff members who are willing to work alongside me. More about this will be posted in the coming days. But I will be looking for 3 or so people;

• A Software Developer
• A Web Designer
• A Web Developer

These would be people who are experts in their respective fields and would like to contribute their skills to help me see the forum to grow exponentially.

Well thats about it from me for now, I would just like to say hello to everyone and that I look forward to owning WTF and getting to know many of you.

Best of luck blade

Thanks,

Just to let people know ( I will send an email out about this ). That in the coming days, I will be upgrading the forum to vb4. Changing the forum theme. Removing some plugins and adding some new ones.

Ultimately I am going to be making the forum a lot more professional and aim to get some more quality being bought in. Im going to aim to get rid of the trend of people signing up just for links in their sigs. Rules may become tighter, but its in order for the community to grow.

I think it's best the way it is. Colleen did a great job.

Welcome and good luck. Looking forward to a new theme

Welcome and all the best to you. I hope we are going to have good times here.

I'm new here, but it looks like I came at a good time. Good luck on the board.

Best of luck to you..

I've got to say I'd stopped coming here because of all the spam on the forum. I moderate 3 forums myself so I know it can be a hassle but things here had gotten way out of hand.. hope to see WTF get back to the quality site it used to be, used to be one of my favorite forums.

In any case, like the new theme!

---------- Post added at 12:53 am ---------- Previous post was at 12:51 am ----------

BTW- wanted to add I think VIP or private sections are generally a bad idea. They tend to be divisive by their very nature and usually don't add much to the mix in my experience..

Welcome, Owner !

Have fun and good luck, Blade.

Welcome aboard Blade. I like Dave (dgridley) stopped coming by due to all the spam. I'm glad to see WTF went to someone who's going to take care of it.

Originally Posted by Big Dan

Welcome aboard Blade. I like Dave (dgridley) stopped coming by due to all the spam. I'm glad to see WTF went to someone who's going to take care of it.

Thanks Dan,

Now that the major upgrades are done. Apart from fixing a few things here and there. My main priority is going to be enforcing a new set of rules that will keep the forum spam free and encourage quality posts from members.

good luck for developing but dont go just as domain forums that would make profit to you.open forums are only the best way to build a large forum

Welcome. I think like most people I stopped being active here a while ago, but I saw the sale thread over at DP and it got me intrigued.

Best of luck with the forum

Im interested to see the new direction!

Originally Posted by LeenkzMike

Im interested to see the new direction!

You and me both! It'll be interesting...this forum has been going downhill for a while now, nice to see it in good hands

Hi Blade, it's great to see the forum will be taking a new direction, here's to hoping you can get it back to where it once was and beyond, congrats!

Good luck to you, Blade!

I would like to see recent blog posts come back. All of the competing webmaster forums have that. Don't even know why it's not here any more. Auto-merge double-post was a great plug-in, too. That disappeared a while back. I like it because it helps to keep threads clean.

Originally Posted by dgridley

BTW- wanted to add I think VIP or private sections are generally a bad idea. They tend to be divisive by their very nature and usually don't add much to the mix in my experience..

I have to agree. One of the things I always liked about WTF is that it never really had that sort of thing. I'm not sure what the criteria is for becoming a premium member, but if I recall the one section that's private has always been based on post count (participation) and not just because someone paid, like on some forums.

Originally Posted by LeenkzMike

Im interested to see the new direction!

Same here!

Originally Posted by vectro

Good luck to you, Blade!

I would like to see recent blog posts come back. All of the competing webmaster forums have that. Don't even know why it's not here any more. Auto-merge double-post was a great plug-in, too. That disappeared a while back. I like it because it helps to keep threads clean.



I have to agree. One of the things I always liked about WTF is that it never really had that sort of thing. I'm not sure what the criteria is for becoming a premium member, but if I recall the one section that's private has always been based on post count (participation) and not just because someone paid, like on some forums.



Same here!

Thanks for the welcome,

The blog system that was being run was made for vb3.6. Its not compatible with vb4.0. There are a few reasons why I don't want the blog system in the forum.
- Used for link dropping
- More spam to deal with.
-Doesn't really contribute SEO wise or content wise ( content posted is usually quite poor ).
- Generally under utilized by members
- Puts more strain on the server.

Also the doublepost prevention ( doublepost merger ) plugin is back.

In regards to the premium section. The content in there is content that would not currently being discussed on WTF and therefore it would not be taking any content out. The methods and information in there at the moment is worth several hundreds and I would be charging a small monthly fee to access that section. Its not information that I could give out for free.

At the end of the day, in order for WTF to be able to progress, the site needs to be making a steady income stream. I'm not trying to be greedy here, but in order for me to be able to expand WTF it costs money. Advertising, new features, contests and the like all cost money. I paid quite the number for WTF and that money does need to be recuperated. Expenses are about to increase quite a bit soon and in order to provide a better experience for WTF members, I need more then the little amount that the Adsense ads provides.

I will make sure that the premium section doesn't create a rift at all at in the long run its just going to mean a better forum.

Originally Posted by Blade

Thanks for the welcome,

The blog system that was being run was made for vb3.6. Its not compatible with vb4.0. There are a few reasons why I don't want the blog system in the forum.
- Used for link dropping
- More spam to deal with.
-Doesn't really contribute SEO wise or content wise ( content posted is usually quite poor ).
- Generally under utilized by members
- Puts more strain on the server.

Also the doublepost prevention ( doublepost merger ) plugin is back.

In regards to the premium section. The content in there is content that would not currently being discussed on WTF and therefore it would not be taking any content out. The methods and information in there at the moment is worth several hundreds and I would be charging a small monthly fee to access that section. Its not information that I could give out for free.

At the end of the day, in order for WTF to be able to progress, the site needs to be making a steady income stream. I'm not trying to be greedy here, but in order for me to be able to expand WTF it costs money. Advertising, new features, contests and the like all cost money. I paid quite the number for WTF and that money does need to be recuperated. Expenses are about to increase quite a bit soon and in order to provide a better experience for WTF members, I need more then the little amount that the Adsense ads provides.

I will make sure that the premium section doesn't create a rift at all at in the long run its just going to mean a better forum.

I don't think they mean the blog system that was here.
Just the "recent blog" RSS feed that you could attach to your account.

Originally Posted by tsdesigns

I don't think they mean the blog system that was here.
Just the "recent blog" RSS feed that you could attach to your account.

Ah ok, sorry about the misunderstanding. Its quite late here, so will look into getting it re setup in the forums first thing tomorrow.

Hey Blade.
Nice to see the forum taking a different direction.
I haven't been here in ages, myself.

I like what you've done with the place so far.

Originally Posted by Big Dan

Welcome aboard Blade. I like Dave (dgridley) stopped coming by due to all the spam. I'm glad to see WTF went to someone who's going to take care of it.

he wasn't the only one

Good to see the site in new hands, looking forward to the future of WTF
Welcome to your forums Blade!

after weeks of not logging, i see some difference on the forum and new owner. congrats!

Hi Blade
I hope you will bring some new blood into the forum as I have been a member but not really felt the new to post anything useful in the forum

Originally Posted by georgerogers

Hi Blade
I hope you will bring some new blood into the forum as I have been a member but not really felt the new to post anything useful in the forum

Same here, I hope and have faith that Blade will get the forum going again.

Site looks legit. Haven't been on here for years. I'm glad all the great and old members are still active as ever

Did you ever consider making a mobile version of the site.
Or perhaps a marketplace to better organize sales within the community.
Love the single player games. That was the only reason why I came to this site. Well that and Colleen

Originally Posted by Colleen

Same here, I hope and have faith that Blade will get the forum going again.

Thanks Colleen, just fixing some smtp issues and then I will be sending out an email to all the members.

Originally Posted by JakZ

Site looks legit. Haven't been on here for years. I'm glad all the great and old members are still active as ever

Did you ever consider making a mobile version of the site.
Or perhaps a marketplace to better organize sales within the community.
Love the single player games. That was the only reason why I came to this site. Well that and Colleen

A mobile version will be coming soon, thanks for reminding me. It was on my to do list, just slipped out of my mind for a sec.

I might give the marketplace a makeover soon, however I have some other big ideas at the moment that I am looking at implementing

Congratulations to the new forum Blade. It looks good. I stopped visiting too because it looked as thought the forum was dead. Hopefully, it will become a great place for webmasters to hang out once again

Good luck with the forum.

Happy to see where it's going.
~Roland

Congrats, Blade!

I have not been here for ages! The last time I lurked around, most if not all of the old timers I knew were inactive. But I see you've resurrected a few of those members in this thread alone.

I'm looking forward to see the forum flourish under your management! Good luck!

Thanks everyone.

To those who came here after my recent email, Im sorry but you may get another one in your inbox. Vbulletin froze after 8000 of the 48000 emails, so Im going to be finding a better solution and then sending it out again.

Good to see interest sprouting here again. I peeked in every now and then but, as everyone else has said, it seemed lifeless... good to see someone has cattle prodded it. Best of luck! I'll definitely check back in.

Welcome and congrats! good luck and thanks to the previous ownership for everything they did for WTF. Hope to come back and see how everyone is doing.

Just received your new email! Congrats on the takeover and the upgrade to vb4.

Looking forward to the new changes and direction!

Watch 'em all come out of the woodwork! LOL

Just wanted to let you know that you're email did some good! Apparently I registered for this site back in 2007 for something.. Anyways I've been trying to find a new forum lately and got your email and figured I'd check it out haha. Hope to see a lot of new things coming, good luck with it all.

Welcome Blade and Thank You,

Thanks for introducing yourself to the WebTalkForums Community of Webmasters and forum members. I must say that through your introduction alone, your professionalism and passion for what you do is commendable. I just finished reading the new forum rules and agree with every point, I found lots of amicable threads and posts and received some great replies to my own threads and posts, but the spam being thrown in everywhere was getting out of hand. I am very glad to see that WebTalkForums is engaging in developing a rapport with its members and users. I have loved using WebTalkForums to both learn and exchange in banter with other webmasters online. I have been gone from the forum for 7 months due to personal reasons and upon my return I see that lots has changed and the forum is now under new management. I am also glad to see that I am now an Elite Member as well. WebTalkForums is and continues to remain the only online forum in which I can proudly say that I choose to be a member of. So with that said, I welcome the new direction and focus WebTalkForums is headed in and I thank you for both providing and ensuring that a quality webmaster forum exists for webmasters worldwide!

Much Thanks,

BiologyWebmaster

Originally Posted by ThailandForum

Blade, just out of interest, you posted this thread on 15th Feb, your join date was 12th Feb, I'm assuming you had a previous user name?

Hey ThailandForum,

The reason for the difference in posting time was that I was waiting for GRIM to transfer the site to me and was going under that process. I didn't post this thread until the site was fully under my control. I didn't have a previous name.

Blade

From your "Come on back" email:

We have started to fix what went wrong with WTF, encouraging more intelligent discussions and cutting down on that unwanted annoying spam. Now we just need you to come back and join us.

Responding to reported posts will help you clean the place up.