Getting more people in the forum...

[overscan (PaulMM)]

If anyone has some ideas on how to make this site more widely known, please post them here.

We need more users, and we need more posts from the 95 members who have signed up already.

I am posting things that interest me. If you are interested in a particular subject, post it. There are some very knowledgeable people already on this forum, they might well be able to help!

Paul.

 

[Antonio]

I think it would be difficult to get a high number of users because of the highly specializated nature of our subject of study.
whatifmodelers.com, which has a similar subject to this forum, has about 500 users now. So I think secretprojects has could reach a similar number.

I think the quality and interest of posts is high and this could be the main reason to get new users. If we keep quality high, people will be interested.

The most significant figure for me is the activity of users. Most users had never posted a single message and the bulk of activity is carried by a group of 10-15 users.

Gentlemen, please don't be shy

 

[RP1]

Whatifmodellers has the advantage that the activity it centres upon - modelling - is "open to all". The posts here mainly concern research type topics. Consider the Secret Projects: series of books - they are read by far more people than it took to write them. I think this place has an important role to play as a nexus of information about the projects themselves. Perhaps... come here, get the drawings. Go to WifM, post the model. Go to ATS, argue with 14 year olds.

All IM-not so-HO, of course.

RP1

 

[overscan (PaulMM)]

Well, yes. My intention was to have a broader range of military aircraft discussions as well, but the "Secret Projects" aspect is the one attracting posts right now.

I also wish Thorvic, for example, would post some of his amazing scratchbuilt models of real projects.

 

[Antonio]

I agree with you Paul,

Thorvic's models fit perfectly here.

Also, at whatifmodelers there are also some fine artists drawing aircraft profiles, may be they would post fine drawings inspired in the pics shown here

 

[Sentinel Chicken]

I suspect that we all participate in other forums or even have our own webpages, perhaps a pitch for this forum would be including the URL for this site in your signature line or perhaps even being as bold as to pitch this forum in post.

I'll be happy to post some of my artwork here. I've got some P.1216s I've been working on......

 

[Antonio]

Dear Sentinel,

your profiles at whatifmodelers are superb, I have collected it all. The RAF Mirage IV series is my favourite. I wonder if here we could enjoy that luxury. If it could be possible to vote...I would like to see one of the US intercontinental WWII bomber designs I posted in USAAC markings.

Regards,

Antonio

 

[TinWing]

I suspect that we all participate in other forums or even have our own webpages, perhaps a pitch for this forum would be including the URL for this site in your signature line or perhaps even being as bold as to pitch this forum in post.

I'll be happy to post some of my artwork here. I've got some P.1216s I've been working on......

Your artwork is well know and appreciated.

I especially like what you did with the Mirage 4000 - although I disagreed with how you drew the canopy of the two seater. I always surmised that a two seat Mirage 4000 would have had a canopy like the F-15B/D/E or like the later Rafale B?

I like your ideas for promoting this site, but I really don't know if it's a good idea because of the hosting issue? I would ask Overscan before I made any public announcements on the more general interest aviation forums.

 

[overscan (PaulMM)]

I'm not sure what will happen with a large influx of visitors. With any shared hosting solution, your website is sharing processor time with an unknown number of other sites. With a web forum, there is a lot larger processor load than a static site due to the dynmaic nature of it.

However, I am paying nothing for this current hosting arrangement. Any dedicated server hosting solution is typically quite expensive. I can't see a way of the site generating enough money, unless I can find some static websites to host on the same server.

Does anyone here actually pay for hosting? Scott, Andreas?

Paul.

 

[Sentinel Chicken]

I suspect that we all participate in other forums or even have our own webpages, perhaps a pitch for this forum would be including the URL for this site in your signature line or perhaps even being as bold as to pitch this forum in post.

I'll be happy to post some of my artwork here. I've got some P.1216s I've been working on......

Your artwork is well know and appreciated.

I especially like what you did with the Mirage 4000 - although I disagreed with how you drew the canopy of the two seater. I always surmised that a two seat Mirage 4000 would have had a canopy like the F-15B/D/E or like the later Rafale B?

I like your ideas for promoting this site, but I really don't know if it's a good idea because of the hosting issue? I would ask Overscan before I made any public announcements on the more general interest aviation forums.

Mirage 4000? I did the Mirage IVK (the Spey design that would have been a BAC/Dassault joint venture). I think it was forum member PolluxDeltaSeven that did the Mirage 4000. You can tell my artwork from the stylized chicken logo in the lower right corner.......

 

[Andreas Parsch]

Does anyone here actually pay for hosting? Scott, Andreas?

Yes, I do (13 € / month). When I started Designation-Systems.Net six years ago, free hosting was not really an option (low reliability, mandatory banners, low bandwidth). Maybe I could find a suitable free hoster today, but I've come to like the good standards of my hoster ("1&1" in Germany) . Anyway, my requirements are very different from yours - I have only static pages (so no CPU overload), but ~10 GB/month traffic (and rising).

Andreas

 

[overscan (PaulMM)]

Hey Andreas.

My site actually topped 5 gig this month, which isn't bad for a small forum

 

[Dilbert]

Out of curiosity, is there an economic benefit to more traffic (I thought it drove up costs), or we mean that it just makes the site more interesting when it's more active?

There were a few posts where I wanted to write, "wow that was a great post!" (e.g. that one explaining the radar of the SA-1), but I wasn't sure if that would be enough content.

 

[overscan (PaulMM)]

Currently there is no economic benefit to additional users, but (unless we become very large) there is no economic penalty either. The hosting account is "unlimited" transfers.

If the site became very popular, it could perhaps generate advertising income, but that might mean losing the quality of postings.

Personally, I like to get feedback, even if its just "thats great, thanks". It means that someone read and appreciated the post, which is all the reward I'm after.