Lambeauleap.net and forum topics

[BuckyTuba]

I posted a topic in the off-topic board about college football starting up, and it was locked up nearly immediately. I have purposely not registered for the site for a couple reasons: 1) I am not a Packers fan whatsoever and 2) I don't need another message board to post on. It was merely a general post about the excitement leading up to the new season.

 

Usually I don't get upset about my posts being locked, but I've been quietly against the whole lambeauleap.net being a place to talk about football specifically. I really enjoy the dynamic that the off-topic board offers, and I don't feel like I need to go to another board to share opinions on college football (which is a completely different realm than pro football).

[M Skjellyfetti]

As another non-Packer fan, I also feel that the all football to Lambeauleap rule hurts football conversation. In the past, it was nice to have college football discussions with other Brewer fans in the off-topic forum. However, now I have to become a Packer fan (or pretend to be one and sign up for a Packer forum) to talk about the Badgers and Big Ten and NCAA football? I'm sure there's a legitimate reason for this, but it does kind of suck for the 7 non-Packer fans in Wisconsin.

[burniebrewer]

I'm sure there's a legitimate reason for this, but it does kind of suck for the 7 non-Packer fans in Wisconsin.

 

 

I'm registered over there and I'm not a Packer fan either. It's not all Packer talk in the NFL forum, but you can avoid that completely by going straight to the college forum.

[patrickgpe]

i am registered over there and hardly go over there but guys this is a baseball forum. I am sure there is somewhere you can talk all the college football you want and not be on a packers forum. Most of the big football fans that post here are over there, so there isn't much of a difference.

[M Skjellyfetti]

Fair enough....I'll have to check it out.

[Team Canada]

There are several members here who are openly fans of other teams (e.g. Redbird Ray). Signing up for a board doesn't mean your a fanatic for whoever that team is. I don't think anyone's going to think less of you for joining as a non packer fan. http://forum.brewerfan.net/images/smilies/smile.gif

 

 

Also, some folks could probably benefit by learning to utilize a tabbed browser effectively (if you're on IE6 or less, God help you). Who cares what the site actually is if you have it open all the time? It's no extra work, once you go through the excruciating 3-minute signup process.

[Jimbo]

However, now I have to become a Packer fan (or pretend to be one and sign up for a Packer forum) to talk about the Badgers and Big Ten and NCAA football?

ESPN has message boards for each of the major conferences. Football and basketball are discussed there.

 

[BuckyTuba]

ESPN Message boards..... don't make me join the immature ones over there.

 

It's not that I don't like the Packers, I just despise pro football as a whole. I feel it lacks personality and wholeness.

 

There's enough talk of other sports in the off-topic forum that barely gets touched by other people. How many Milwaukee Bucks or College Basketball threads get posted on a weekly basis during the regular season? We can have posts about "hot female athletes" but not college football.

[molitor fan]

I agree completely with BuckyTuba. Also, talking college football is not going to take away from the pull of lambeauleap, as college talk is just an ancillary aspect of that sight. College sports should be open to posts in the off-topic forum.

[COOOOP]

I am going to have to go one step further then Buckytuba. There is not much 'pull' to Lambeauleap.net at all. Take a look at some of the locked football related topics in the off-topic forum. They almost invariably have 100+ views, and are locked rather quickly. At the lightly trafficked LL.net, it may take a week to get 100 views on even an interesting topic. The thing that pulls people to Brewerfan.net is the discussion and it's vibrancy. You may not agree with a lot of the viewpoints bandied about here, but at least you have people to discuss with. Lambeauleap doesn't have that. So instead of discussing college football in the off-topic, I don't discuss college football at all.

[sbrylski]

EDIT: Nevermind, I like it how it is.

[PeaveyFury]

COOP, locked threads still collect views, FYI. So they might be locked, but it's not like they got 100 views PRIOR to being locked.

[temke]

i am with bucky tuba on this one...if it matters at all.

 

i understand the management wanting to get traffic on their pet project, but this is silly.

[brewers255]

I agree with bucky 100% mods are way to picky in what topics they lock.

[PeaveyFury]

I'm not sure how being picky comes into it..... it's a black and white question of where football talk goes/should be allowed.

[COOOOP]

So during a Packer game (the first packer game of the year!), Lambeau Leap forum has a grand total of 4 people on it. If we can discuss Subway, The Iraq, maps, and what you are currently listening to mp3 wise, I think college football wouldn't take too much traffic away from Lambeau Leap anyway. http://forum.brewerfan.net/images/smilies/wink.gif

[PeaveyFury]

The LL IGT for today's game currently has 578 views, Coop.

[Principessa21]

Is the locking of threads and push for Lambeauleap.net about money?

 

I think it's beyond lame and annoying that if I want to talk about the football I have to go register and post on another forum, even though the people I want to socialize with are already posting here. We're all Brewer fans first, if I was a Packer fan or Badger fan first I would have already found a message board. If I want to talk about football I now want to find another forum (not Lambeauleap) just to "stick it to the man."

 

What else could it be about other than "we want more hits at our other site?" I know making brewerfan.net more marketable is an issue (since some threads are locked because it would land the site in filters) but don't you think the locking of football threads combined with the amount of yada, yada, yada threads are a turnoff to potential members?

[Katuluu]

Brian doesn't make any money on Brewerfan or Lambeauleap.

[TooLiveBrew]

then why do it? I'm confused, too. Especially about the college football discussion(s). Is it a bandwidth issue, or just a stubborn refusal? Don't get me wrong, I enjoy LLF, but I honestly can't think of a reason why (especially college) football chat is "locked down", as it were. Just an honest question here, and one to which there really hasn't been a clear answer, imho.

[Katuluu]

Their are two reasons:

 

1) At some point once Lambeauleap becomes established football topics would be locked here anyways as it has been deemed redundant. By locking them from the beginning it makes the transition far more seamless over the long run. It may seem extraneous at this point, but in the long run we hope it will be clearly established that football topics go there and baseball topics go here.

 

2) Locking them from the beginning also has the added benefit of giving Lambeauleap a bit of a jumpstart. It took Brewerfan almost 3 years before their was any noticeable increase in posters on the message boards, and we think this will give Lambeauleap an extra hand at becoming established.

[TooLiveBrew]

so once LLF is 'established', will the arbitrary locking cease?

[Principessa21]

Their are two reasons:

 

1) At some point once Lambeauleap becomes established football topics would be locked here anyways as it has been deemed redundant. By locking them from the beginning it makes the transition far more seamless over the long run. It may seem extraneous at this point, but in the long run we hope it will be clearly established that football topics go there and baseball topics go here.

 

2) Locking them from the beginning also has the added benefit of giving Lambeauleap a bit of a jumpstart. It took Brewerfan almost 3 years before their was any noticeable increase in posters on the message boards, and we think this will give Lambeauleap an extra hand at becoming established.

This is what bothers me. You can't force a message board to take off. It's like how there was a big marketing push to make "Snakes on a Plane" a cult favorite. It just happens. I don't understand why there is a need to have another message board, when a subforum will suffice. We are Brewer fans first. This is suppose to be a community, right? Why the need to monopolize and control? The locking of threads and forcing members to another site is kind of embarassing.

/end rant

 

ETA: I want to clarify my embarassing comment. I just don't like how a site that I love will have a perception of authoritianism.

[COOOOP]

"The LL IGT for today's game currently has 578 views, Coop."

Almost up to 900 now! Considering that some of the Brewers igt's are 4k+ views, I take it with a grain of salt. There also was a great deal of discussion over what people were going to watch today in the off-topic section; even with a great deal of people watching the Packer game, the Brewer igt thread managed to "scrape up" about 4x the number of views. My feeling is that those who have a football focus are already on a football website (and I doubt it is LL.) while the rest with a baseball focus are told to leave their community to post on a site with little traffic, or to post on some flame-tastic espn board. If I had a football focus I would post in a football forum; I have a baseball focus however, so college football is my off-topic along with threads on movies and what's bugging you! I am one of those rule followers, don't-park-in-handicap-spaces type people, so instead of breaking the rules and posting a college football related thread in OT, I don't post football related stuff at all.

[PeaveyFury]

A couple of points:

 

1. While directing football talk elsewhere doesn't affect the non-existent revenue of Brewerfan, it does effect how much Brian has to PAY to run it.

 

2. The goal is to eventually have an integrated forum, where no additional registration will be necessary. Since EZ board was on the way out and the Yuku migration was due at some point in 2007, it was decided not to put LL forums on ezboard, and to look elsewhere. At that point, beta versions of Yuku were rough and very poor, so phpbb was chosen. Casey tells us that something is in development to migrate non-ezboard communities to Yuku, so that may be something we explore when that becomes available, and create an integrated forum system. This has not been discussed and we don't have some sort of contingency plan, so I might be offering a possibility that Brian hasn't even considered yet.

 

So as of now, football discussion is being directed to Lambeauleap, and that won't change in the near future.

 

Put it this way, what would you expect us to do if someone started a Jeff Suppan thread in the off-topic forum at Lambeauleap?