new posts become a rare site,
so much - that a spam got replies

even the elections don't stir any debate

Dead and buried.

why

dying sadly :S as long as peeps chatting I'll be on and i recently did a new post myself, but people aren't on anymore, it's sad

ALLO

Theres a new post here.

Coincidently i spent an hour or so looking back at old posts on this forum a short while ago, i was surprised to see only ten pages i think it was, but even over that short span, you can see how the amount of posts has dwindled to virtually nothing. This place is really strange, i can almost feel the erie silence before i hit the log in button, you had some very interesting members and it was once a lively interesting forum from what i have seen, what happened here?

I took the decision back in September to effetively give up on the place - I didnt post it on the board I only placed it in the moderator chat section as I was trying to avoid contributing further to the problem. For me the very act of us having threads like this is evidence of the extent of the problem. That problem being that the only active members we had where the controversial ones, the trouble makers whose opinions and/or egos where too big for their own good. I remember when you could come on here and spend hours online - when it could properly be billed as a "community" - and on the whole witty banter and simple human interaction where the order of the day. In short we became more renowned as a point of conflict instead of a point of discussion and interaction.

All of the mods on this site I believe moderate this forum with as much fairness and impartiality as possible and we certainly gave the arseholes enough slack before we hung them with their own ropes!

Ironically this is probably the one thread that will get the most posts out of all the available sections on here - which begs the question why are people only interested in pointing out the problems, if you all genuinely want to see this place back as it was tell us what you want not what is wrong with the place.

We tried to get competitions going and be as interactive as we could but to be honest the response was poor. It's been said time and time again, this is your forum - use it!

So it appears that you believe there are only two options, 1. You have controversial troublemakers, or 2. A dead forum. surely there has to be some middle ground.



One thing I noticed when I looked back on the forum pages, and also on other forums, is that it is the controversial subjects that got the most replies, (immigration) being the most popular if I remember correctly. It would appear from that, the majority of people wanted controversial subjects, which is just like the news papers, bad news is popular, it sells more papers than good news, the majority of people want to read and discuss the bad/controversial stories.



So it appears that the majority of members wanted the controversial subjects, and the mods drove that majority away and killed the forum, can you not find some middle ground?

How dare you Charles, how dare you insinuate that the death of this forum is the fault of the moderators. You know nothing of the efforts that the moderating team put in to make this a better place and we tried for years to achieve your much mentioned middle ground.

You cant force people to post by any means but we tried our best to coerce as best we could. If the demand for covering controversy cannot be met without supposed grown adults tearing strips off of each other and resorting to petty name calling and squabbling then I doubt the credentials of anybody planning to enter into "debate" about the controversial stories of today who cannot do so in an adult manner. You can present me with half a dozen names of active arseholes on here whom people may think made the place a hotbed of discussion, but I can give you two dozen more names of those who left the forum as a result of the aforementioned arseholes (sorry debators). Sadly the two dozen whom I mentioned actually bothered to stick their heads up out of the news section and used the board as a place of interaction and discussion.

If you think tolerating abusive, lurid, inflammatory, inciteful and personal posts promotes an active forum then I realise that I made a terrible mistake bothering to look in here again.

The title of this thread made me laugh. Is it dying? Errm its dead. Get used to it. I thought we had the last of this kind of thread. Its getting boring.


The reason this forum is dead is because of the administrator. The person who owns this forum. The last time i asked, he does not pay for advertising for this place. That is your reason. It does appear on google, but not enough or prominent enough to bring crowds in. Other active forums are active because they appear high on google under whatever category they have decided to put themselves in. Every forum has members that come and go, just like this one. But forums that advertise have regular new members to replace them. Theres your reason.

I'm sick and tired of the moderators being accused of being the problem. We did as much as we could, as AB pointed out but we were hit with a wall due to the lack of members. We cannot force people to come. God knows i tried to get the old ones back but people move on, most of them due to harrassment they got from some idiots. And most of those idiots were the controversial ones that have been mentioned.

The people who like to criticise us also forget that this forum is much more than the debate section. Once upon a time, the general chat section was busier than the debating one. Ten's of us would stay up late talking every night and you cant say that about the debating section (apart from the saddo's).

If this was the kind of forum where everyone expected to be harrassed and shouted at every time they voice an opinion (those kinds of forums do exist) then that would have been fine but that was not the case and thats why the controversial members were banned. We are not gonna apologise for doing so. And even if they were still here, the only section that might have been active is the debate section. But look around. There's loads more that would still be a ghost town.

I pretty much gave up when AB did. There's nothing left to moderate. Oh and the word MODERATE is key there. Our job is to keep the place tidy and free of spam. The rest (ie competitions, emails to members, posting suggestions, help and feedback topics) was all off our own back because we LOVED this place. We took it on but its not our job. And i'm tired of people assuming it is / was.

May I first say that, if I have offended you then I apologise for that, it was not my intention to do so, I sincerely hope you will accept that. As you accurately say, I have absolutely no idea at all what has gone on here in the past, hence I was reflecting the situation as I believed you described it in your post. I hope that explains my reason for forming the opinion that I did at the time with the little amount of information I had at that time



I am afraid I can’t give you any names at all, because as I have said previously, I don’t know any of the members here really.



I did not say that and neither did I imply that, to be honest I cant see anything i wrote that would give you that impression and I have re read my post a couple more times since I posted it.



Could I ask if any of the two dozen members who left, have since returned to the forum?



That is of course a real pity, I am pretty sure that no one would want that, it would be self defeating.

Another interesting point is that if we take the BNP thread as an example of inflammatory subject matter, it brought many strong feelings from many different members and I think that would surprise no one. What is a surprise though, to my self at least, is that the BNP thread drew an incredible 4,415 views. Does that not suggest that a heck of a lot of people found that thread fascinating to read? Would that not indicate that perhaps the majority of active members were enjoying that thread regardless of how inflammatory the subject matter was.

Of course I ask that question not knowing how many active members there were at that time and not having read every post in that thread. From that point, an interesting question that might arise regarding your statement “its your forum tell us what you want ” what would happen if the majority said they wanted to discuss inflammatory subject matter?

This thread is most certainly an emotive subject, I sincerely hope my post does not offend anyone, if it does please say so and i will try to modify my approach in future.

Do you really think that this is not better than no discussion at all? Personally I find this very interesting, I feel a drive to find out what has turned this lively, if not overly lively forum in to what is now, I have to say, that I have always loved puzzles and conundrums.



Isn't that a little defeatist?

Is the forum member that started this thread not offended by what you said here? In the short time I have been here, I have gained a high respect for his/her intelligence, along with the moderators here, it would seem to me that he is one of the assets of the forum. I would imagine that a moderator’s job, is rather like a Policeman’s, in that if they do their job to perfection, there is no more reason for their existence any more. It’s a strange fact of life that criminality creates many many jobs, we all hate criminals, but If there were no criminals, all Policemen would be unemployed, so too would Judges, Magistrates, prison warders, probation officers, many solicitors, and many social workers etc etc, is this the case here perhaps?

I think controversial subjects are essential to any debating section on any forum. As has been correctly pointed out here by Charles the figures speak for themselves. The fact is that we have never done anything to discourage contoversial threads, we have only ever acted to quash offensive subject matter that has no relevance to the topic being discussed or was just plain and simple personal insults of one or a group of members. So in answer to your question Charles if all members asked for controversial/inflammatory subjects then they could by all means have them provided the topics/stories where discussed in an adult, respectful and inoffensive manner. As for AI21 you are correct he is very intelligent and the responses in this thread are not given to undermine his question. The fact is AI21 asked a question and the answer is one he probably already knew but perhaps wanted to breathe some life into here in the form of debate in however small a quantity.

The fact is that even with subject matter that people want (or appear to want) the forum has died. That's not a defeatist point of view, it's the truth. Just like Scorpio says the forum receives no advertising from the owner and therefore whereas initially when members left we had more than enough of a base to cover the loss as the numbers have dwindled further we have had nobody to replace them. Thats what has gone wrong here.

I was not asking you direct Charles to provide me with names it was a general point for the board, the fact is that Scorpio and to lesser extent myself have tried without success to encourage these past members to return but to no avail.

The focus of the matter shouldnt be entirely on the "controversy" in the debating section, what this place also lacks (as a result of the problem highlighted) is a sense of community and belonging. Don't get me wrong none of us want a hugs round the camp fire forum but as Scorpio says the was some sense of community and a good level of interaction - thats why I came here in the first place long before I ever became a moderator.

Out of interest Charles, you are still relatively new to BestUk, what brought you here in the first place and what drives you to return?

I expected a comment like that but please understand that we have had these threads for so long. They used to interest me too, i admit but I think as AB pointed out, people would rather talk about how crap this place has got, instead of creating other posts and topics.



Absolutely but do you realise how sad i think it is for myself to have said that? I had an unhealthy obsession with this place for a long while where i spent far far too much time on it, trying to contribute and make the place better. But i am only being honest i'm afraid. I can only try my best. Perhaps i should hand my permissions over to you and see how you get on without any advertising.



Yes quite possibly and i apologise for that but its not like i enjoy this place being the way it is now. I hope you appreciate how frustrating it is / was for us moderators to have done what we could but hitting a wall due to the lack of advertisng.



No not really. As i said before, the moderators job (at least on this forum) was to remove spam and move threads in the wrong place, to the right place. As long as there are any members, be it old, or new, theres usually something to be done. Although in BUKFs case, its so dead that theres nothing that needs doing most of the time. Are you implying we werent good at what we did? I'm sorry but i have to point out, and i think you have done so too, that this forum began five years before you joined and the most activity here happened before you were here.

But also, there was so much more that we took on, as i mentioned, that is needed on active forums. Such as running competitions, managing the forum software, and banning and suspending trouble makers. Without those things you'd have an out of date, and chaotic forum.


I have no idea what you are saying here. But it does sound like you are comparing members of forums to criminals which is strange. Unless you are implying thats how we treat them here. If thats not what you are implying, then i apologise but it seems again that you are saying we shouldnt have banned the members that we did. I'm not going to go over that again. But you did say this to AB:



... so i will repeat something else that either myself or AB said.

The very fact that we had lots of harrassment complaints, people leaving citing the trouble makers as the reason and lots of members not going into those topics at all, (i would estimate that at one time at least, those posting in the debate section were in the minority) suggests that the majority did most definitely not want that.



Alot of people did return for a while after i sent out numberous bulk emails to members. But by this time, the place had got slow so they didnt stay for long.

Pardon me for getting defensive here, but please indulge me. When this forum was created, it was not for a community to exist but simply links to Biggles own search engine. The place was in a complete state, totally disorgainised and had lots of unnecessary sections with little in them. When i became a moderator, biggles let me reorganise it alot to how it is today, making it alot more user friendly and having alot more interesting sections such as Mudpacks, Technical and Art. I then made lots of help topics which you can find in the suggestions section in order to help all members. After that all mods posted regular forum updates, rules, greetings etc not to mention adverts for special nights where we'd try to get as many members posting at one time as possible. You can see the Masquerade night as an example. As you also noticed, we had regular competitions and other member activities such as member interviews and blogs. I'm sure you'll agree that all this things are what is generally needed for a good forum to exist.

I believe that the only thing we are lacking is money. I'm sure you will say that you can have popular forums without advertising but i'm pretty sure as i said before that the forums that advertise are the most active as they are the ones with constant streams of new members.


Also, its funny how the moderators always get the blame but the forum owner never does. He is the one who started this place. He is the one who paid for the software and he is the one with he ultimate say so on what happens. Doesnt anyone think that he has some kind of responsibility in keeping this place alive? I know he isnt interested so thats not really the point i'm making, but I wonder why he is never mentioned.

Is BUKF dying?

I think this question has been a long time coming, and the answer from my point of view is no, it’s not dying. I admit I haven’t posted in a while, but it’s not because I have fallen out of love with you guys its simply because nothing interesting is happening in our world at the moment, the news has got unbelievably predictable.

I think this forum has evolved, topics have been discussed to death, and now we’re all sitting about wondering what to talk about next. Added to that there are no more angry people left to argue with.
This is not the only forum which seems to have fallen by the wayside there are many out there who have no one posting. This forum has helped me immensely over the last few years, develop my debating skills, I feel that I have gained a lot from the topics I have posted or have written replies to, to say the least its been a real education and to that, I say thank you to everyone I have had the chance to talk with, whether they be still with us or no longer with us.

I believe another reason for people dropping out of existence is the social networking revolution, Facebook, Twitter and other sites have totally changed the way which we communicate. We can post quick messages like twitter, or post videos on Facebook, you can now play games on these Social networking sites. But I think one of the most attractive elements of these sites is that you as an individual can amass a personal fan club. Think of it as that scene from Life of Brian where Brian inadvertently ends up preaching rubbish to the local folk, and then ends up with thousands of followers. You can literally become your own cyberspace Messiah on these sites. My scifi design Facebook account has well over a thousand followers now, and is adding more each day, I’m hoping to have several thousand by the end of the year, and that means opportunity to sell stuff.

People do blame the moderators for lack of interest which I think is slightly unfair, it’s not their fault Joe Bloggs no longer comes on to rant and rave about the state of the world. I for one will continue to pop in and out to see what’s new.

I have to admit, I always wondered where the board administrator was because everyone seemed to be just mods, the admin is the one that should keep the place going.

I think the mods are being pinpointed because they have been the most involved

... not that I'm saying that good reason to

I packed this place in a few years ago because I got tired of the bitchiness, but it was busy. 2005-6 it was great fun.

I was at a loose end today and thought I'd see what was going on here.

It might not be dead, but it seems to be about to draw its last breath.

Shame really.

I'll have another look later tonight at a time when it used to be the busiest.

P.S.

Just looked at the bottom of the front page - 9 Guests and 1 member on line.

Well, it's now nearly eight at night.

2 members and 9 guests and no new posts since I last looked - about 2 hours ago.

I pronounce life extinct.

What a pity.

Well it's now 10.00.

Other than my posts above, the most recent post in this entire forum was at 10.51 this morning - which is 09.51 in real time. 3 posts in 12 hours, all from the same person.

That's that then.

Forgot to add... 6 Guests and 2 members - one being me, the other has been looking at the samepage since my previous post. Maybe they're dead too.

Shame on you teeo, you did not see me sat in the corner talking to my self, you should have gone to Spec savers i think.



And it appears that he succeeded in his endeavours, this thread has attracted a few contributions already, well done ai21.




Regarding how I came across this forum, I found it quite by accident, I was searching for UK forums using goggle with out much luck, so I was trying different search terms ie uk forums, good uk forums, popular uk forums, list of uk forums ect ect and I came across this web page here. http://www.osmium.org.uk/links/05Forums.htm

As you can see, right at the top of the page is Best UK Forums http://bestukforums.co.uk/. I don’t know what the connection is between this forum and the web page and I cant remember the exact search term brought up that web page, but that’s where I got the link. I had a look around the forum a few times before I joined. Primarily the reason I was interested was because of how quiet it appeared to be, but when I went looking further back I could see how busy and boisterous it was in the past and that is what sparked my interest. I would say that it was what killed the cat that kept my interest, simple Curiosity.

Wait..... what's this?? A faint pulse, a slight fogging of the mirror held close to the mouth.....?

It's just gone 11.00 - what was the busiest time in the 'good old days' and we have 11 guests and two members right now, with a daily total post tally of about 13.

No, it must have been an involuntary muscle spasm or maybe rigor mortis setting in.

(Sorry charlesr, didn't see you. You must have been bloody well hidden)


Down to 6 + 2 now.

Of course you could not see me, that's because i was in Ninja mode or was it because i had fallen to sleep on the chair and had slipped to the floor in the corner, one of the two anyway.

Good evening to you sir, its good to se you out this time of an evening, haven't you had your cocoa yet?

But does this not tell us that people here enjoy discussing the forum, this is certainly interesting to me, and perhaps to one or two others who have posted here.



That’s a very generous offer sir, but my workload is rather heavy at the moment. How’s that for a cop out?





I have to say that, I don’t understand how a compliment can be turned in to in insult, if some one had compared me with a policeman, I would have been greatly flattered. My comments regarding a Moderators job being like a policeman’s job, was simply to say that your job is a very important job, just as a policeman’s job is. You get little thanks for your efforts, as with our boys in blue. Moderators are right on the front line, as are our police. And as for doing your job so good that you have eliminated the need to moderate, I really don’t see how anyone could take that as an insult, its clearly a compliment.



So Moderators Keep the peace, just like a policeman? And get little or no credit for it, like our police?



Just like the police?



That’s not what I said and it is not what I meant.



That is not what I was implying and I accept your apology in the spirit it was offered.



The viewing figures do not seem to back that up though, although the stats do point to the fact, that far fewer people contributed, than just viewed. That would indicate to me that those who view the posts only, felt too intimidated to join in, or equally that they did not feel qualified to join as their knowledge of that subject was not sufficient, clearly the viewing figures were high, which i would have thought says that a lot of people were enjoying the thread, but what I cant understand is why those who left because of intimidation have not returned.

If I could just add, my comments were not meant to be derogatory in any way, I was simply trying to find out what had happened, I was curious, it’s the way I am. You could say, its non of my business, and that may be true, but if I am a member of a forum or a club of any kind, I like to know exactly what I am getting involved in, once again its just the way I am. I came here by accident, but I stayed despite being offended by one member, because of my curiosity and because of the kindness extended to me by aboutblank1967 and ai21. In the final analysis. I would say that my curiosity and inquisitiveness regarding this forum, has contributed to and extended this thread and quite possibly attracted other members to post in or view this thread, which I think tells me that this forum is not dead.

Strangely, I can not fully evaluate the success of this thread, because the posting and viewing figures are missing.



I would not dream of saying such a thing, because I have no idea how forums are run and I would not pretend otherwise.



Because, unlike the Moderator and equally the Police, he is not on the front line?

If my presence here is causing disharmony or friction between members or staff, please let me know and I will not return again.

Miss




Fair point, i just over analysed what you said. I'm not used to the police force being talked about in positive terms, especially on this forum so i took it in a negative way



I dont get you. Right now it says there have been 244 views on this thread.



Yes you're probably right, just as is Rach.



Cant see where that came from

I'm still here

then talk more!!

That really does surprise me, the police force as a whole has the most important job in the country and do it exceptionally well. I know that rogue elements have surfaced with in the force from time to time, but that happens in every organisation I’m afraid and having said that, the police have had far less rogues than other service’s as far as I have seen. If we had no police, who would catch the murderers, the rapists, the people who attack and rob our old age pensioner’s etc etc. I can only say, that have nothing but respect for our Police.



That’s rather strange, on the page I have been looking at, there are no stats showing either viewing figures or posting figures. I have just checked again right now and there are no stats showing, but only on this thread, on the other threads the stats are clearly their to be seen.

What about other members? Can they see any figures?

I couldnt agree more on the Police. Not everyone does though.

As for viewing the stats, i can see them both as a guest and using a "normal" member account

This is as a guest




----------------




And this is as a member

You should see the "rogue" element of the moderators - gosh we're bad, we make North Yorkshire Police look like pigtailed girls!

So,WTF are you going to do about BUKF imminent demise?

Why is it down to us??? We've always pulled it around before but why should we now? We're under no obligation to and i certainly have no time to go to all that effort again.

We've had at least 5 new members introduce themselves in the last few months. Those of you moaning on here - have any of you replied to their posts? People ask why new members dont stay. How ironic.

Do the North Yorkshire have a reputation for brutality? I have never heard anything along those lines.

Scorpio, my apologies to you dear lady, i didn't realise that you were actually a woman and believe it or not, i did not understand the emoticon either, its only upon reflection that it occurred to me. If you were to tell me that i was a somewhat dim at this point, i can assure you i would not challenge your opinion.

Did i offend you? If so, it was not intentional, although it certainly was a little thoughtless perhaps.

No, not at all, Charles. Did i shed any light on the topic views for you?

If you had actually been about enough you would have seen.




Couldn't agree more.

Jesus tells me to write on this forum.

Mohammad tells me to reply to this quote.

Richard Dawkins sends you both his regards.

Dead in the water!!!
Thought i would have another look under a new name
as I forgot my last member details.

Off now...won't be back again!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Missing you already

You say it like we're supposed to take it as an insult Shame you hadnt looked before you signed up then

Sounds just like me then. Joining a forum and then realizing after making my intro thread that the forum is dead...


Anyone fancy naming this forum GORDON?

Oh yeah really sorry Rob, thanks for the constructive criticism apologies the forum isnt a combination of Narnia and f*****g Disneyland for you!

Sorry about being so late in replying Miss Scorpio or Mrs Scorpio, but yes you did shed some light and thank you for that courtesy.



How is he doing these days orphadious? Jesus and i have become almost strangers these days.