There have recently been two threads on Mobius which I haven't paid any attention to - one on Ken Foree (sorry, Ken) and the other on the Newsweek/Harvey Weinstein article. Boredom at work finally prompted me to check, and I was surprised to find that both discussions had taken detours into areas that I was very interested in.

Charting the twists and turns of discussion threads was a snap back in the days before Mobius went dark with the "tree" format. This format made it easy to chart the various paths that threads take, while also being aesthetically pleasing. Now, it seems that whenever I check the individual boards, it seems like the same dozen threads have been perched there for weeks on end.

This is an entirely non-scientific observation, but is seems that board activity has quieted significantly since the format switch. Being ignorant of how big a job it would be to switch software makes it much easier to complain, but are any other Mobians getting misty for the old days?

Since the format switch I've gotten used to the new software but I think my preference (although slight) was for the old format as well.

I'm sure the moderators could correct me if I'm wrong, but hasn't the board been "locked" to new members for pretty much the last year or so? A general lack of access for new people would surely lead to a slowing down of activity over time.

I'm happy to have it here in any form, but my preference is definitely for the old format, too, for exactly the reasons you cite, Andrew. I vaguely recall a poll of board members soon after we migrated here that found the preference not strong enough one way or another for the moderators to go through the hassle of switching back. "Or did I dream it?" (LIFE OF BRIAN)

And, yeah, it seems a lot quieter than in the old days. That would be news to me about the "lock" against new members. Why would that be?

Still one of the best places on the Internet to go if you're serious about the flickers.

I actually like this format a lot better. On the old board, it was a pain to view an entire thread, whereas this one just shows you all the posts at once with no hassle. Perhaps people should be better about starting new threads when a topic changes gears.

I'm sure I'll be corrected if I'm wrong, but I believe it was because this free hosting was supposed to be just a temporary landing spot.
Just prior to the planned move to another location, membership was locked down to make the move easier. The move fell through, and membership then wasn't re-opened for whatever reason.

That's what I gathered, at least, and if I'm wrong, I'm sure someone will eventually be around to correct me...

The Uwe Boll thread on the Horror/Sci-fi board quickly got overtaken and turned into a debate about Tony Curtis and in which 1950s movie he said (or didn't say), "Yonduh lies da castle of my fadduh," an amusing detour but certainly not one worth bothering to start a new thread for. People who would have been able to contribute to that part of the discussion but were intent on ignoring any thread with Uwe Boll as the subject would never know about it.

As for new members, I could have sworn I spotted at least one former Mobian from the old days who returned within the last week or so as a new member with a Feb. '06 sign-on date.

Yes, if you click on the Members button near the top of the page, you can see that new memberships mostly halted after May '05. However, oddly enough, a handful of members joined the board on Feb. 26, 2006.

I rather wish the floodgates were opened so that more people could join and we'd have more threads going.

New members can still join. Instructions for joining can be found under the thread User Registration Instructions, Real names, please, first and last. I prefer the layout of the old board being a creature of habit. This newer board has many new great features, "My Assistant", "View New Posts", etc. I also now get emailed whenever someone responds to a post. Perhaps a return to the old layout with all the bells and whistles of this new one would be ideal. The site still attracts quite a bit of lurkers. There seems to be a good number of people that for whatever reason read the site quite often that never post. It isn't unusual for me to get emails from people that are lurkers that I've never heard of. As far as quality of members and posts I dare say there isn't another one film related on the Internet anywhere as good as Mobius.

The message board software we used before our move here is no longer being developed or supported and I'm not aware of any good alternatives that function in the same way. Regardless, a majority of polled readers preferred non-threaded board software in the style we're running now. I prefer a threaded board myself but majority rules.

Automatic registration was closed for exactly the reasons Blake copied in his response. For every five people registering with their real name we were receiving 50 pseudonyms, like "Net Weasel." When "Net Weasel" wasn't approved because he didn't register under our real name policy, he'd come back and register again the next day as "Net Weasel" thinking it was a glitch or something. (We can't personally contact everyone to explain the registration policy.) When the registration wasn't approved again, he'd get upset and then the angry e-mails would start coming. Multiple that by 50 and that's what we were dealing with every day. Also there wasn't a way to validate that prospective users reviewed and agreed to our posting policy. It was a bad, frustrating process that wasn't working, so we had to go to manual registration.

We still set up accounts -- registration directions are pinned at the top of every message board. It surprises me how few people read those directions and instead write and ask why registration is closed or spread uninformed (and incorrect) assumptions that we're not accepting new registrations. We can't handhold people who miss or don't read the pinned instructions.

We weren't approving memberships for a while in anticipation of moving to a new web host, but we've begun approving them again because I don't have a timetable on when we'll be making a move. Basically it's a financial issue at this point -- Mobius no longer has a sufficient revenue flow to pay for hosting and a board software license and hasn't for quite a while. The money from these Google ads (which I hate) goes directly to the owner(s) of the free site we're at right now.

Mobius is what we make it. The core people who were at the old site have posting privileges here, so if it's not as busy as you'd like, well then why aren't you starting threads or participating in discussions? We've also been purging inactive memberships and members who only post once every month or so. Our goal here really isn't to be a DVDTalk/HTF or some other high traffic behemoth -- they fill that niche just fine. I much prefer a lean, less noisy forum and not handing out accounts to just anybody blowing through. Quality over quantity.

BTW, if a majority feel the forum would be a better place with completely open registration, one option is to scuttle our real name policy and allow anyone to register at will. If that's the direction most would like to go, we'll consider it.

Well now that I've got these tales from Blake and Todd, my vote if we took one would be for keeping the registration policy the way it is now. When I occasionally wade into other discussion boards, film-related and otherwise, I'm amazed by how many of them devolve into orgies of personal attacks, off-topic rantings and ramblings and even arguments about people posting bogus messages using other people's "handles" ("Net Weasel" or "Cyber Wallaby" or "E-Bonobo" or whatever). There's no sense of individual accountability or community obligation.

At least this way any new person who signs up is probably at least minimally intelligent and has demonstrated serious interest by going through the process.

And if new memberships just recently started getting approved again, maybe we'll begin to see a gradual increase in active members.

My 2 cents.

Ditto!

The "real name policy" is one of the main things that makes this forum unique. It makes for a more intimate and respectful community.