Starting on New GC Projects Soon
 

In May or June I've been planning to begin working on a few GC projects again. This would probably be a good time to also see about that new forum software project that I have yet to get around to working on.

If anyone wants to take a look at the various new forum software that I'm considering for GC, links are below. The links are to their software community support forums.

Xenforo

Invision Community

I'm most interested in the above two options.

Others that I may also consider and will be looking more into are:

Discourse

NodeBB

Flarum

Whatever option we end up going with for GC, everything will be migrated over. We won't lose any threads, posts, accounts, etc. And whichever is used, GC would end up functioning and looking somewhat similar to what you see in their support forums which are linked above.

Please feel free to share your thoughts here regarding any of those forum software options. Or if there's a different community software system you know of and would like to suggest for use on GC, post those links as well and I will check them out.

Some of the forum software has licensing fees, all have web hosting expenses, and this will likely take a significant amount of work on my part with various testing, data migrations, server work, any necessary customizations, etc... if anyone would like to help chip in on the cost & help support these efforts, please do so on GreekChat's "Buy Me A Coffee" page at https://buymeacoffee.com/greekchat (Thanks a bunch, in advance, to anyone who chips in to help support GreekChat. Your support is greatly appreciated.)

So what’s the differences between the different softwares, John? Is one more pricey than the other? I’m huge on the old saying “You get what you pay for.” lol.

And I’ll be more than happy to buy more cups of coffee. :)

I read through them, but I’m still not understanding their differences.

Core forum functionality with all of them is basically the same as they all have forums, subforums, threads, posts, private messages, etc.

Some differences are related to how the systems are programmed, so that would not be readily apparent.

More obvious is related to site design, how the site's flow.

Xenforo & Invision are both paid software. The others are free, but some (maybe all of those) still have commercial backing. They give away free in order to promote their software and make money by offering hosting services. Basically hosting companies giving away software in order to gain clients. I prefer hosting myself, though, as it gives more flexibility and options.

Xenforo is unique in that one of the primary developers was also a primary developer of the software we've been using. That likely means Xenforo may be more familiar in how it's designed, how it functions. Also I would expect migrating from our current software to Xenforo to possibly go a little better. Although, it's also possible some other forum software does all of that better despite the Xenforo dev's previous connection to our current software.

Invision, last I checked, has a significnatly larger development team. Also quite a bit more costly compared to Xenforo.

I'll be looking into all of those forum systems much more after I start this project. Definitely want to make sure to use the one that will be best for GC.

I don’t mean to be a jerk, but does the traffic here even make such an endeavor worth the cost and hassle? This board has made me lifelong friends, given me countless hours of reading and smiles. However, over the last several years, it’s become judgmental, homophobic, transphobic, and low key hateful. The interaction is largely older than me (42). Does this board hold a space for the future that isn’t hate filled on the down low? I don’t know that I have a clear answer to that anymore, despite all the insight and life it’s supplied from the late 90s until recently. I don’t think anyone could ever say a negative word about you, John. However, I’m almost concerned to revive gc if it’s going to move forward with some of the moderators and most active voices, which have a tendency towards suppression and negativity over youth and hope if that makes sense.

Please don’t let this message read as I am not grateful, I’m just scared that the voices of reason, hope, optimism, and acceptance have been suppressed to the point of no return.

I suppose there's a number of ways to look at it. My largest "cost and hassle" is time that I put in. It's often not much time, but depends. Not counting time posting in the forums but rather time working on the back end of things that keep GC running. Just a very rough guess, maybe 20 to 50 hours in the past 6 months. But the 6 months prior to that was many hundreds of hours. Financially, it's not significant but funds being tight does make it more difficult.

Another way to consider if GC is "worth the cost" might be the question: What is the value of multiple lifelong friends for many people? Not sure exactly how many but probably a lot have made lifelong friends here. Also, the countless hours of reading and smiles that you described, I would guess there are thousands, maybe tens of thousands, from over the years who would have agreed. It kinda makes my work on GC seem worth it. But I do often think about if all the time and energy put into GC is worth it for me personally.

Sidenote: Before GC I had started a real-time chat network that got quite big. Early on I received an email from a guy who said he met his wife on my chat network. Said that he had my chat network to thank for him having his family, wife & kids. That was a big realization for me how impactful the Internet was going to become. I was already convinced how important the Internet would be in the future (this was back when people were still asking daily what the Internet/web/www was), but to hear from someone and having them thanking me so much because they met their wife in my chat and they now have kids seemed to take it to the next level. That probably impacted me quite a bit way back in the day... maybe that's partly why I do what I do, I don't know.

Not sure quite how to best & most accurately describe this. We've had so many times over many years going almost back to the beginning of GC where any number of members had similar views/complaints and even differing views/complaints.

Back in the day I did try to help sort out issues & disagreements between GCers. When the site was much busier these issues were overwhelming and very time consuming. All this took me away from projects that I probably should have better prioritized which would have benefited GC much more.

My general thoughts & conclusion regarding these issues are that people are different and some people are going to clash with each other. I think it's probably just human nature for people to disagree at times.

This is somewhat related to your first question. I really must try to revive GC, otherwise what's the point of any of it.

Your concerns are understandable.

I think it might be important to mention that my goals with GreekChat are not ideological but rather just to maximize use and enjoyment of the platform.

I believe there are technological solutions that will offer some improvements even directly related to some of the issues & concerns you mentioned. Maybe completely or just partially, not sure at this point. The upcoming new forum software will likely enable for some solutions that will be useful in improving your experience on GC. Will probably improve things for everyone.

All I can really say in summation regarding all this is that my overall goal is to improve things as best I can within some reasonable limit of time & expense.

I’m just curious to know that if this site is so negative, why’d you return?

Well, I’m not quite sure. I check in, glance around, and think about how I miss how it used to be a hub of recruiting stories, advice, and full of badge photos and info. I guess I keep checking on hopes of something like that. Nostalgia I guess?

I don’t really get where you’re coming from with the idea that the board is suddenly “negative now.” When I joined back in 2012, GC was already a wild place. Folks were beefin’, coming for each other over the dumbest things, and from what I heard, it was even worse before I got here with real life drama, people crossing serious lines, stuff that had no business leaving the screen.

So let’s not rewrite history like GC used to be some utopia. It’s always been a mix with some mess, magic for some, and a whole lot of personalities. That’s what I think made it what it was and lightweight still is.

And as far as asking why the board’s still open? That kind of misses the point. Just because your favorite version of it doesn’t exist anymore doesn’t mean it has no value to anyone else. Not everybody was here for recruitment stories. Some came for connection, advice, culture talk, even just laughs.

So if you’re still logging in, even occasionally, then clearly it means something. But if folks like you only come around to talk about how it used to be better without bringing anything new to the table, then you’re not helping it move forward. You’re just standing in the past.

And respectfully, the board doesn’t need to be shut down, it just needs more people willing to build instead of compare.

Do you think the more expensive one is better than the others? I mean, I’m not sure if that’s how it works with what you’re doing for us, but it just seems like the more expensive one would be better?

I guess this is more common than I thought. :)