[kdewebdev-site] kdewebdev could use a forum

[Eric Laffoon]

Hi Chris,
thanks for voicing your opinion...

On Sunday 22 May 2005 16:14, Chris van de Wouw wrote:
> Hi,
>
> On forehand, my apologies if this is already discussed and/or decided on.
>
> I think a major thing that kdewebdev, or even Quanta is missing, is a place
> for a community to evolve. Sure there are these mailing lists, but a forum
> on the website is much more accesible.

Yes it is, but forums on web sites have other factors. They require 
administration to a large degree. This includes the obvious answering 
questions as well as general focus and of course policing the forums to deal 
with disruptive or abusive types. The more popular a project is the more 
demanding this can be. We need administration for other things we want to do 
and we seem not to be getting a lot of people stepping forward already.
>
> I'm a huge fan of Quanta and have used it for years now, but since the
> start of kdewebdev.org I only visited the site twice. This was also the
> case with the old quanta site.

The old site was a joke and the new one is less than 10% finished so it's 
really not fair to evaluate it's functionality as a portal on that basis.
>
> Most users install Quanta or any kdewebdev app through their distrubution,
> giving them no reason for visiting the site. Some people might check the
> site to see something's going on, but most visitors will only come when
> they run in any kind of problem, or have some specific question in mind.

I'm cracking up now. ;-) You're about four years behind my realization of 
this. With KStuff, news, resources, tips, faqs, feature requests, the ability 
to see the development process and other things there would be more reason to 
visit the site. In fact there are about a dozen menu items built into Quanta 
that take you to the site, so we just need to complete that.
>
> For most people, only having a mailinglist available, is too much hassle. I
> think a forum would generate much more discussions and questions.
> Consequentially a more visible community will arise and therefor more
> frequent users will visit the site.

I agree that a forum site would be both appreciated and demanded and I intend 
to create this... ;-)
>
> This mail is inspired by the 'request for help' mail (Quanta mailing list)
> by Eric. Having more frequent users visiting the site, increases the chance
> of donations and sponsors. Off course I can't be sure, but I think most
> visitors of the site currently are people who are checking it out, not the
> people who are frequently using Quanta (or any kdewebdev app).
>
> my 2 cents,
>
> Chris van de Wouw

I have another domain which I acquired specifically for support reasons. With 
this I intend to do the following...
1) Offer consultant based support for commercial companies.
2) Set up a forum and offer support subscriptions to users. This will amount 
to probably around $2-$5 a month for a basic subscription and more for 
advanced support or corporate priority support. Users will be able to do 
things like take up admin tasks or work on resources for free subscriptions 
if they require a special consideration.
3) From this base pool we will launch professional articles on development 
with Quanta involving various tasks and technologies. This will mean that a 
subscription will not only provide forum access but a quality electronic 
magazine and advanced resources.

None of this will take away from the main site or program. The thing is, a 
small contribution from a 10%-20% segment of our users could create a massive 
development opportunity. Currently FLOSS conventions don't generally charge 
for attendance and as such we have a a hard time getting all our travel costs 
covered. Then there is the hardware upgrade issues, not to mention the huge 
amount of time I often end up investing on the project. Establishing a 
revenue stream based on a viable and reasonable subscription model returning 
real value to users would enable us to dramatically improve our efforts. I 
would like more XML tools and knowledge but I don't have time. I'd like to 
have advanced graphics and animation tools ready for plugin. I'd like to have 
a first class set of resources available to download.

For me it seems simple that since a forum will be so desirable it makes more 
sense to sweeten it even more and then give it the attention it needs than to 
have it become a further liability and drain on the few people actually 
making the project run. When I start work on it I would of course welcome 
help, but I have to do things with the kdewebdev.org site first as I think it 
would be bad form to go the other way.

So that's my take on it. ;-)
-- 
Eric Laffoon
Project Lead - kdewebdev module