Discussion Killers?

[HostColor]

Hi everyone,

I have been a HD member for ages and I'm not happy to see that the quality of discussions is not going in the right direction. There are bunch of new members who either has zero knowledge or the web hosting industry, bump the threads or just open threads themselves on topics which could do mental damages to anyone who wants to participate to a meaningful discussion.

Is it that people are getting less intelligent despite all the knowledge out there, is it that more and more shameless plugs come to HD... or I'm just getting older?

 

[bigredseo]

It's probably a little of everything

There's definitely been a shift over the past couple of years, in all forums, not just HD, where the new people have read that posting on forums help with their online presense. As such, they just post for the sake of posting.

I've certainly seen it in the graphic design forums too.

I'm a member of several Google specific forums and support centers, and the number of people that post the exact same post as the person 2 days previous, is pretty insane. We spend more time flagging and moderating posts than we do actually helping resolve issues

 

[Artashes]

As Conor said, there has been a shift. However, it's been much longer than just the last couple of years. I feel it's been in decline for the past 10 years.

Judging by web hosting as a subject, if 10 years ago there were approximately 25 English-based hosting forums (of all sizes), today I wouldn't name more than 3 that survived the barrage of members that colonized community with spam and fluff content. You know exactly the kind ⏤ those that pretend to be legitimate members that post with sole intent to push some company that pays them for link-building or SEO activity.

But what I consider to be an even bigger factor is the cost of web hosting. 15-20 years ago web hosting was a meaningful expense, with basic shared plans costing $20-30/month. It was so new that many people were afraid to make a costly mistake of signing up with the wrong company. It was so new that there were plenty of questions of how to perform certain actions, install applications, promote the site, etc. Over 20 years, hosting has become super cheap, software has become simple to use and information wildly available. As consequence, fewer people have the need for any assistance or opinion of others.

As for HD, overall we've done exceptionally well protecting the community from spammers, shills and low-quality members, by either banning them or making their activity senseless (prohibiting their signatures, issuing infractions for low quality posts). To this day I go through every new post, check for plagiarism, verify every new account manually (far from every registration gets accepted). I am also game to hear any idea you may have that might help generate newer relevant and engaging discussions instead of replies to old threads.

And thank you for starting this threads. It's always great to hear what other members think.

 

[easyhostmedia]

The big issue is in some countries where people are getting paid to join and post in forums.

 

[easyhostmedia]

But what I consider to be an even bigger factor is the cost of web hosting. 15-20 years ago web hosting was a meaningful expense, with basic shared plans costing $20-30/month.

It is heading back that way if cPanel have anything to do with it going off their new price structure