Farewll Friends.


LOL ~

Having spent a little time over on the new Discord platform, I have my doubts about it being a viable format for the Seasons, and so I think it is wise to at least research and consider alternatives specifically for the SOTU sub-forum. That said, Andy told me he plans to run SOTU#425 on both forums and I'll be following it on Discord and doing my best to give it every chance to convince me otherwise ~
 
I've got a fairly simple solution for keeping the Seasons in place in the current format.

Reddit.com is a massive Internet forum with sub-forums on every topic under the sun. It'd be quite simple to create a seasons-specific sub.

What we wouldn't get is v-bulletin features such as embedding YouTube videos or smilies but other than that things would work much as they do here.

I'd have to look into whether there's a PM functionality but there is the added bonus in that we'd be able to set up our own seasons-specific mods I think, who would obviously be chosen based on the consensus of the community.

I can do a bit more digging if people are interested.

I sent Reddit a message and they created a subreddit for us (with me as moderator but I am more than willing to share that responsibility with others)
They created the subreddit /seasonsoftheukulele
and here is the link https://www.reddit.com/r/seasonsoftheukelele/
 
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LOL ~

Having spent a little time over on the new Discord platform, I have my doubts about it being a viable format for the Seasons, and so I think it is wise to at least research and consider alternatives specifically for the SOTU sub-forum. That said, Andy told me he plans to run SOTU#425 on both forums and I'll be following it on Discord and doing my best to give it every chance to convince me otherwise ~

Reddit created a subreddit for us; I would think that is more suitable than discord as a forum for what we do.
 
I'm going to be direct about this, the day I joined UU, I paid for a VIP membership, and have done so for the last 7 years. I agree with other posts I've seen that the people who will not pay a nominal fee are the cause of the UU forum problems.


This is Michael Kohan in Los Angeles, Beverly Grove near the Beverly Center
9 tenor cutaway ukes, 6 acoustic bass ukes, 12 solid body bass ukes, 14 mini electric bass guitars (Total: 41)

• Donate to The Ukulele Kids Club, they provide ukuleles to children in hospital music therapy programs. www.theukc.org
• Member The CC Strummers: YouTube: www.youtube.com/user/CCStrummers/video, Facebook: www.facebook.com/TheCCStrummers
 
to be completely honest, the part of UU forums that I will miss the most is the lively marketplace forum. I am certain that reddit is the place for us and will work out fine for our needs and for our separate platforms that we use.
 
I'm going to be direct about this, the day I joined UU, I paid for a VIP membership, and have done so for the last 7 years. I agree with other posts I've seen that the people who will not pay a nominal fee are the cause of the UU forum problems.

Very debatable!

Other forums don't require such a high 'fee' - as has been mentioned many times, it is considered too high.

We know you have money, & it is like water off a ducks back to you, but for others, it is a lot of money.

A voluntary payment scheme would have been a better option, I believe, like several of my other forums.
 
I've just paid the VIP subscription for twelve months. It cost me GB£38.42 - that's less than .75p a week. I don't consider that too much to pay.

YMMV

John Colter
 
From memory, they were asking for $75 when I last looked, maybe they reduced it, or I remembered it wrong... :confused:

Either way, it is always better to have a voluntary donation button, in my opinion. :)

The forum can be a lot of work, so I don't blame Rayan for thinking about shutting it down.

Hopefully something will work out, but in the mean time, I've joined the Reddit forum to keep in touch with my uke friends.
https://www.reddit.com/r/seasonsoftheukelele/new/
 
If you want another moderator, I can give you some time, I've modded on a couple of forums before, & am still a mod on a computer forum.

I am adding you as I write this Croaky Keith - I will send your reddit name an invitation.
THANK YOU
 
If there's going to be a new forum, one possibility is having different levels of membership. Maybe 3 levels? Possibly don't make it blatantly obvious, which level you are, just a subtle indicator somewhere.

One time donations are great, but there's less incentive for recurrence from year to year, so there should be more incentive to sign up for a membership.


I'm sure there are some people are donating smaller amounts if they feel the VIP cost is too much (or if they want to donate extra). Just because you don't have a VIP next to your name, doesn't mean you didn't contribute.

Everyone has different financial situations, and maybe less than $1 a week sounds cheap, but a one time layout of $45, means a big hit to the groceries until the next cheque comes in for some folks.
 
Very debatable! Other forums don't require such a high 'fee' - as has been mentioned many times, it is considered too high. We know you have money, & it is like water off a ducks back to you, but for others, it is a lot of money. A voluntary payment scheme would have been a better option, I believe, like several of my other forums.

No, I don't have money, I live on Social Security, and it's certainly not like water off a ducks back, but I pay for what's important to me. I'm 70, never been married, no kids, and qualify for financial assistance with my health insurance so I don't have any co-pays, which would be high because I have a variety of health issues caused by radiation treatments for cancer years ago. I pay for VIP here and on the Talk Bass forum, the two things that occupy my life when I retired 7 years ago.
 
I have used internet fora and social media for years, and only in the last few years experienced internet fora that were funded by user donations/memberships. Perhaps the fora I have used are some that are more attractive to advertizers, so they can generate more money on advertizing.

Because of the Seasons this forum is one I frequent regularly enough that I would get the membership if that would save the forum, but most fora I use I would never pay a membership for. Regardless of how small the amount, I am pretty strict about any regular expense and dont want my credit card info too many places online.

Last year I tried making hard cider for the first time and made a profile on a homebrewing forum to ask a few questions, and they keep trying to sell me stuff and ask for donations. I am not going to sign up for payed memberships for a forum that I log into one month a year, if I even post there again next year.

Same with this forum. If I was not participating in the Seasons, the time I spend in the others sub foras is often time I could spend better actually playing my uke. If I had to pay I would take that as a help to put myself together and quit.

So here is not a paywall, but now just shaming of people who dont donate. And when does that kick in? When you make your profile? What makes an online forum vibrant is the flow of users who join to ask a question and end up hanging around. If they all after a month recieved a passive aggressive PM asking if they were cheapskates that would like to be despised by other users or pay up, most would just quit.

I wonder how Reddit managed without donations, they probably sell our info or something.
 
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Long rant gone wrong.

Most people are ready to pay for the hobbies they prioritize.

Most things going on in online fora are what we call "overspringshandlinger" in Denmark, or "acts of skipping [what you ought to be doing]". That is not something most people prioritize, and hence people are hesitant pay for online fora.

Some fora manage, like social media, to be funded by adds. I dont know what makes the difference, but I believe that that also makes a more relaxed atmosphere in the forum, and makes for more new users.

Edit: I just went and made a donation corresponding to a one year subscription. I dont have PayPal, and it looks like you would need one to manage returning payments or cancel subscriptions.
 
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I wonder how Reddit managed without donations, they probably sell our info or something.

I'm positive they're selling our information. I just signed up for Reddit, and after giving it just my e-mail address as info, it immediately knew enough about what I'd done on other web sites to recommend a half dozen sub-reddits to me.


I gave money to UU for a couple of years, but I've had bad experiences with PayPal, so I won't use them anymore. At the time, that was the only way UU was set up to receive money. Maybe they're taking advantage of more options now.
 
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Most people are ready to pay for the hobbies they prioritize.

That is very true, my main hobby gets a lot of my time helping others where I can, it is the way we do it in the land of FOSS.
(FOSS = Free Open Source Software)
(I'm a moderator on one forum too.)

My computers take up quite a bit of my time these days, since my fitness disappeared & I can no longer manage to do all the cycling I used to do.

Then there are my various harmonicas, flutes, & my whistles.........the uke is just another hobby for me nowadays, to be picked up & played when I feel like it.

Each of my interests have their own forums, some two or three, & keeping up with them takes quite some time - it's just as well I'm retired. :D

Stay safe, folks.
 
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I was a vip for 3 or 4 years? Ironically those were the years I hardly visited! The Seasons got me back on the forum. I get that there needs to be financial support for things to run. It is up to the owners to decide what is free and what needs to be paid for. And if stuff is offered for free, no shame in making use of it.

Also, there are ways to contribute outside of money. Answering questions, asking questions, creating and sharing content all add to the value of the community, and give the owners of the site more opportunity to sell lessons and merchandise. Again, they get to decide if it works for them, and when it needs to be changed. We get to decide if we want to stay and pay, or leave. No harm, no foul.

UU doesn’t owe us anything, unless we have paid for it. And we don’t owe UU anything.

The main obligations I feel are to support the site as I can, and to honor the relationships I have found on the seasons. But I have put those on myself.

Thanks to all for starting the Reddit! I haven’t gotten too far on discord yet.

:)
 
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