KatBookTrailers

On one site I wanted full control over the reports and didn't want anyone else touching them. It's because I had a protocol that I wanted to follow and it's hard to train people to think like I do, especially when staff come and go so quickly most of the time. Delegating a lot of other duties is actually a good habit to get into! It shows staff that you value them when you allow them to do the things that you hold dear or hold as important.

I think burnout is inevitable for the hard working staff member. They're there because they love it and want to see the place succeed. I really encourage long LOAs when possible, but no more than 30 days. It feels good to take a break and get refreshed and then have the energy to get back into the swing of things.

Since they're my babies, I don't like criticism! I want praise :) I guess if someone started off by saying what they like about my forum before they dig into it, then I'll have my listening ears on. Otherwise, don't shoot me down just for the sake of shooting me down.

I have never been on a forum where the chatbox has been successful. There was one site where two members only wanted to be in the chatbox and not post on the forum itself. They complained when the chatbox was finally removed, but they were the only ones. No one else noticed it gone.

Glitzy stuff that's all over the place. If it sparkles, shakes, moves or draws my attention, it annoys me. If you have good content, you don't need to resort to adding those things. Sometimes those things can be hard to read if they're text and if they're moving, they get in my way of clicking on things I want to click on.

There was one year I did Bingo games with my members. It was fun at the beginning and we had some activity from it, but then after a few rounds, it died down. I tried other events, but those members wanted good conversation, not fun and games. We had a chat box, that didn't go anywhere. We even online games to play, but one player dominated all the high scores and whined when others wanted a reset. SO we just got rid of those all together. Problem solved.

It's easy to call it quits instead of changing a forum, but sometimes all you need is time to wait for things to improve. I almost asked a site owner to close the doors on one site, but then it miraculously picked up again. Of course, some of those were trolls, but wow, they really brought the activity we needed. There is one forum I'm no longer a part of, but if they would ease up on their rules, I'd probably return. Being too strict and making a police state for a forum leaves a bitter taste in a lot of member's mouths and they just walk away, never to return. This was a Christian forum, of course.

For me it started when I decided to sign up to become a beta tester for an online dial up community that was run by a local newspaper. I had a baby in the house and yearned for some conversations that went beyond baba, momma and daddy. From there I went into the world of Christian forums, some of them long gone now, but I have friends from those old ones. What I like about the various Christian forums is that we tend to keep in contact and some of us even sent Christmas cards by snail mail for years. So to answer the question, it was for adult contact and then for like-minded friends.

(groan) I guess it's true that the more we read, the more words we'll use. I think teachers expected that to come from good literature and not AI LOL I'm sure you'll come up with better words to substitute very soon. I wonder what the new word for 2025 is going to be that becomes all the rage?

You really think that elevate is less used normally? Maybe we see different sites on the internet, but for the past 2 years it's been overkill to the point that I'll leave site after seeing it! It's become a huge pet peeve for me to see "elevate" because I know that people...and companies...like to hop on the word bandwagon. One year it was "populate" at the place where I worked. What I've done if I use AI to write, is to go through and flag the words that are overused by other marketing/advertising/etc... and I'll get my thesaurus out and choose synonyms that might appeal to more audiences, those audiences who might also be sick of overused terms.

I've never been successful with social media, but then again I haven't dedicated as much time as I probably should have. I think to really get a site popular through social media that a lot of energy needs to go into getting followers and then giving them reason to keep following, or even sharing posts/information. That can be a full time job in itself!

I'm an Admin at a niche forum and what has helped us is mainly to just keep plugging along. If we focus on keeping the forum up and running with interesting threads, then people tend to find their way over there, or their friends invite them. We don't do anything through social media because the owner kept promising he'd do it, and then never did anything. Word of mouth can be the best advertising for niche sites. Just be ready for when the newbies show up so they see fresh content.

This type of flagging really needs to be made available to Facebook. My older friends and relatives haven't really caught on that a lot of the things they're sharing were made by AI, and the things they've shared have mostly been concepts that tug at their heartstrings. I've tried to tell them that their images are AI, but they still aren't very careful. Maybe I need to do a little training class for them to help them detect those things?

A lot of my liberal friends were posting on Facebook to try to get more of their friends over to Bluesky. I already had an account there for business, but didn't feel like letting them know about it, but that's because I'm a conservative. It sort of felt like when my conservative friends were leaving Facebook for MeWe...it didn't quite pan out. At the beginning it was all fun but then people dropped off and now it's practically dead there. Will Bluesky have the same ending?

The problem with AI is that it's usually very obvious that's what has been used to do the writing or the designing. For writing, there are words that show up often like "elevate", for instance. I think AI needs to expand its dictionary usage? As for AI graphics, there is just something about them that doesn't feel right. It doesn't feel genuine in a way? I guess I am at a loss to explain it, but maybe it's that real artists can detect it and perhaps someday the look of the graphics will be less easy to spot.

Oops, I expected a different type of "questionable" since I'm a woman, but okay. My answer to both would be YES, I have. I try to not engage with people who do that or I am very cold and straight forward in my response. If they're spammy, they are kicked off the site.

YES! The perms were awful for me to get a hang of when I opened my very first forum with PhpBB. I had to ask the guy who "built" the forum for me for help all the time and thankfully he was patient with me. I liked the look of the forum and it felt really homey compared to the professional business look of XenForo.

I go by what the forum's protocol is, and that often changes through the years depending on the members and if they complain about staff actions. I personally like to start off with informal PMs because no one likes to get a Warning of any kind. Let the new members know what's expected of them at the site and give links to the rules and other threads that could help them assimilate into the forum. For the past 15 or so years as a mod/admin, I've been told my style is kind and fair. I can have a fight with someone, but still stick to the rules and not go beyond them, just because we don't get along. I'm very to the point when it comes to the rules though, if it says you shouldn't do ____, then don't do it.

That's interesting that you've had a different experience than I have. On one of the forums where I'm Admin, most of the beginning registrants are still active today. I think it's because the place was built especially for us and is like a second home. Not all of the first 10 are still around though, but that's because some of them were only there to "build" the forum.

Controversial topics can definitely bring engagement, but it can also cause unnecessary strife with members leaving if allowed to go too far. Once these topics hit the board, the mods have to remain on guard and be active in preventing excessive flaming, tangents that don't benefit the topic or the site and also not be afraid to be assertive in dishing out staff actions. On one of the forums where I'm an Admin, these types of topics can also lure new people to sign up so they can contribute. But those aren't always the people I want at that place, but it does bring activity.

Hi, I'm Kat. I'm a graphic designer with over 30 years experience, and I graduated from the American Academy of Art in Chicago in the late 80s. I've been involved in online communities for almost as long, starting with dial up, then using UsetNet and other types of groups, and then moving on to web-based forums once the WWW took off big time. I'm always interested in how to make forums succeed and keep members happy. Hoping to find some answers here.

I hate it when the client chooses the ugliest design of the bunch. Lately I don't even offer more than one sample for them to choose from, I give them the best (in my opinion) and we work from there. It helps me also in that I'm not wasting my time, but it means that I'm protecting my reputation as a professional who does high quality work.

I rely on repeat clients! I used to run a portrait business decades ago and having repeat customers gave me a lot of work when I had down time. It was good to know that they enjoyed my artwork and that they trusted me to draw/paint their family and pets. As a book trailer freelancer, I intend to build up a good database of repeat customers of authors who can trust that I do the job in the way they not only expected, but above their expectations.

Hi, I'm Kat! I am a freelance graphic artist whose main focus is designing videos for authors seeking to use book trailers to help promote their books. I also love to create banner graphics for ads or signatures. I have over 30 years of experience as an artist and am a graduate of the American Academy of Art in Chicago (it closed its doors this past summer unfortunately).

Does your host ever let you know if your site has gotten DDoSd or do they pretend it never happened?