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Curt
climber
Gold Canyon, AZ
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Apr 24, 2019 - 11:20am PT
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You make a good case to shut down the SuperTopo Forum. Certainly, the economic case is undeniable.
Chris has been trying to figure out how to keep it going.
Perhaps he shouldn't.
Yes, perhaps. The point has been made that Chris owes forum users nothing, and while that's most certainly true, an internet forum is conversely worth nothing without its contributing members. It's one thing to ban pornography, libel, and other sorts of unacceptable content--and something different altogether to demand that users not talk about things (like politics) that may be of interest to them.
Curt
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zBrown
Ice climber
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Apr 24, 2019 - 11:57am PT
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How about one of the really "old-timers" (Chris and RJ are pre-occupied) give us all a little history lesson about the birth of the ST?
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Spider Savage
Mountain climber
The shaggy fringe of Los Angeles
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Apr 25, 2019 - 09:39am PT
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RJ Spurier & CMac
I very much appreciate this site and this Forum. I know, being a businessman, how much this costs.
Thus to contribute I have done the following:
1. Buy as many Supertopo books as I could ever need.
2. When I buy things on line I do my shopping until the search AI's know what I'm looking for. Then I go to Supertopo Forum and wait for ads to appear (not long) then I click through and buy on those ads.
3. I use Outdoor Gear Lab for my buying decisions and have spent thousands this same way via Outdoor Gear Lab.
I really appreciate what has been done for the community. I know you write checks every month to support this.
Sloughing off a mass of content that is causing legal liability as well as gobbling up costly server space is quite sensible. I do miss some of the great reference material and entertainment it provided.
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i'm gumby dammit
Sport climber
da ow
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Apr 25, 2019 - 11:02am PT
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What exactly are the expenses you're talking about?
There is basically zero out of pocket expense for adding a php forum to a website. There is maintenance required which does require time and unless things have changed since I did it, dealing with spam, patches and updates can be time consuming and frustrating but that's about it.
OTOH I never had to pay for a lawyer.
At the same time the CTR on adsense on forums is remarkably low so the revenue probably pays for very little.
Right now it seems the biggest expense the forum is facing is paying someone to remove valuable content.
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i'm gumby dammit
Sport climber
da ow
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Apr 25, 2019 - 11:03am PT
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Sloughing off a mass of content this is causing legal liability as well as gobbling up costly server space is quite sensible. I do miss some of the great reference material and entertainment it provided. Costly server space is NOT a thing.
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JLP
Social climber
The internet
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Apr 25, 2019 - 01:55pm PT
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Doesn't seem logical to separate this forum as an expense different from advertising for Supertopo books, especially seeing as it's the same website.
I get wanting to climb instead of dik around with maintaining the forum - but casting this whole thing as a generous gift given at a loss seems a bit much given what he's taken away from the same community to add content to his books and fund his lifestyle for quite a few years.
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Hoser
climber
Vancouver,Rome
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Apr 25, 2019 - 09:42pm PT
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With the photos as they are the place is useless really. If you have seen this go down on other sites then I think you are pretty aware that this is just the beginning.
Life goes on in the end.
If after all these years they couldnt make a business case for this site then yea thats pretty sad in general and I cant imagine they could all of a sudden figure it out now.
Glad I ALWAYS used the img tags, my photos are safe and sound.
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Spider Savage
Mountain climber
The shaggy fringe of Los Angeles
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Apr 26, 2019 - 09:19am PT
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Costly server space is NOT a thing.
Actually it is. It's like rent on self-storage.
Not expensive compared to food, rent, and cable TV but adds up over the year and you ask yourself, "for what?"
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i'm gumby dammit
Sport climber
da ow
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Apr 26, 2019 - 10:41am PT
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Not expensive compared to food, rent, and cable TV but adds up over the year and you ask yourself, "for what?" To help sell books and gear in addition to the ads. To get email addresses. To have a zillion extra search terms that can rank on Google and bring in traffic. To have the site rank higher on alexa.
Tp provide a home for these
http://www.supertopo.com/inc/view_tripreports.php?dcid=PzE4Pzw1Ow,,
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