[extreme_torque]

Originally Posted by aargee

Boss, they're making a big time impact in real life, meaning, they exist in real life more than virtually online.

Online presence and off it, is related. If they dont have eye balls online, the offline presence does not matter for a company which is going to sponsors all these rides.

Xbhp was an average forum to begin with and has been on a constant decline ever since. I was member but lost interest very quickly. It was mostly just a bunch of wannabe bikers fighting and shouting over each other. I have never been fond of the founder as well.

Originally Posted by fhdowntheline

I think the social media based influencers are a big reason why the community based platforms are dwindling. One would like to think of the social media (YT/FB) as communities, but really they are a sect or a cult , once critical mass is achieved. A truly secular, democratic ,unbiased approach is all but gone. Either you are a fanboy/girl or a troll. It is also reflective of the sad fact that people don't want to think, research, discuss and debate anymore.

The power of a community forum is the ability for people to freely express their opinion, no matter how much vitiated it becomes at times. And of course, the presence of moderators is vitally important to stop platforms such as ours from becoming another personality cult.

This is so right and this is where Tbhp gets it right. I have more posts here than all the other forums combined, all of them.

[landcruiser123]

Times change, Things change. Old means of doing things die; The new means take over. The old method is used only for ceremonial purposes. Example: Like a rich man riding a horse.

Forums are were made for the age of the slow internet connection when loading high-resolution images sucked precious bandwidth. With the advent of modern smartphones and high-speed internet, social media like YouTube and Instagram have become ubiquitous. The world works on a “quick rewards” mechanism.

[am1m]

Originally Posted by Hayek

Even though I am monolingual in English and strongly prefer reading to watching videos, I have to agree with Mr Narayan - we have to find a way to survive in the video world.

Originally Posted by landcruiser123

With the advent of modern smartphones and high-speed internet, social media like YouTube and Instagram have become ubiquitous. The world works on a “quick rewards” mechanism.

Absolutely. I write documentation for a living full-time, have been doing so for the past 20 years and one thing is blatantly obvious- most users don't/don't want to read large blocks of text anymore. Several tech companies are in denial about that and continue to churn out volumes of documentation in traditional formats (including, alas, the one I've been working at for the past 10 years ) but there are undeniable signs that our audience has changed and wants to see exactly what they want up front and that's all. Very, very few users want to go deep into the whole material.

Outside of work, most of the 20-somethings I get to interact with consume video like water, perfectly comfortable on their phones all day. One of them even told me he gets his world news from Instagram! (I'm still trying to figure out that one, news hashtags I guess.)

However there are several intermediate stages, several things that can be done between the extremes of long text articles and video. Highlighting posts, an interface where the most useful (most thanked?) posts only show up when a toggle button is switched so that users without the time can brows through those quick, better keyword metadata for particular posts that capture the highlights of a thread and show up in a focused search. The tech can solve a lot of these already.

About moderating a video, I guess it'll work pretty much the same way as moderating posts and content creators will align with the same rules. But certainly the entire look and feel of a video-centric forum is going to have to be different from a text-post-centric one and simply embedding images/videos in a UI that was designed primarily for text will not have the same native usability and slick appeal.

BUT one thing remains inviolate, content is king. Whatever the format and that might mean video, shorter clips, animation whatever, contributions by informed creators/written from personal experience will always trump those created/posted just for the sake of posting or generating volume/aggregated from random sources. That hasn't changed forever and won't either.

[IP_Man]

Fifteen years back there use to many active Indian photography forums now it has reduced just to one http://www.jjmehta.com/forum/. This forum also barely surviving only because of some dedicated members regularly posting stuff but the main interest of other members are in buy/sell section and not in photography.

[ph03n!x]

Another forum that I frequent is XDA Developers. They have some rich content if you are serious about modding your phone - and I've contributed a bit too to the Android scene way-back-when.

But then, recent phones have become more mod-unfriendly, and with XDA getting into bed with Huawei - who do not allow unlocking their bootloaders (irony!), and a recent revamp of their forum along with getting rid of their app store meant they are becoming something that I'm neither familiar with nor comfortable with.

I still carry a modded-to-hilt secondary phone, but don't see a need or desire to actively participate there.

What adds to this move is that Discord has become quite popular with the Devs and users there, considering the easier interaction, real-time help, etc. So I'm in a couple of discord channels related to my device - that's more or less replaced XDA for me.

Originally Posted by GTO

Gearheads went dead a couple of months ago:
Attachment 2136563

Originally Posted by condor

I think one of the reasons for Gearheads going down was some sections being open to members only. This limits viewership. They would have had their reasons to implement that, but what if they had good content behind the closed doors ?

Gearheads got hacked - I got this email in Aug '20 (and got into a frenzy of password-changing for sites I might have used similar passwords):

[rpm]

Apart from the reasons fellow BHPians have already listed, I would like to add a slightly different perspective to what has already been mentioned.

Willingness of members to think through what is written, ponder over it, and come to a conclusion whether they agree or disagree, explaining their own reasoning for the same, while also being civil. It makes the conversation more engaging, especially if you feel like you are atleast being heard; your words being given some thought to. Disagreements are acceptable on this forum, they don't turn into a troll fest or name calling, thanks to the moderation.

With YouTube comments section and the like, you could be banging your head against a brick wall trying to talk to the audience, if you are not in unison with what the narrator of the video is preaching— just like this

Majority of the audience takes the narrator's word as gospel, and debating against the motion, even if you take the time to explain every bit with reason and sources, like you would on a team-bhp post, may simply be met with: choice words which I can't use on the forum; unwillingness to think it through; outright refusal/denial to even read through your post, let alone acknowledge if something unreasonable or debatable has been said by them or their celebrity YouTuber; or all of the above and many more. Majority is already out with their pitchforks, looking to stab anyone who so much as wanders within 1 km of their mammoth egos with a 10 feet barge pole. All this ultimately contributes to an unfulfilling and frustrating discussion— something that will cost you your sanity if indulged on a regular basis.

This is where team-bhp comes in for the folks who want to preserve their sanity, as well as discuss and learn from like-minded individuals. The majority here isn't out with their pitchforks, and you almost always get to have a healthy conversation. The posts here take more effort, sure, but your effort isn't going to be tossed into the garbage bin. That very effort is what contributes to the quality we have come to associate with team-bhp, and what pushes some of us to finally take the plunge and apply for a membership after lurking around for years on end.

As long as we have this conducive environment, quality reviews, travelogues, DIYs, scoops and much more, team-bhp will continue to exist.

[ashlil]

Originally Posted by GTO

P.S. Our forum activity levels have gone up by 25 - 30% in the last 2 years. We're growing, but we're an outlier among online communities. Team-BHP has hundreds of teenage members signing up too, clearly proving that youngsters serious about sharing & learning are attracted to forums.

The reason we are an outlier is that there is still sanity in this forum. And the credit goes to you, my friend, and rest of the moderators. Mind boggling achievement by you guys!

[vredesbyrd]

Team BHP is the only Indian form I follow because most other forums I find the content quality to be of appalling and extremely poor, especially any tech forum, quora and reddit India. The car section in reddit is full of petty fools who talk down on you just because other fools upvoted their garbage answer/poll.
I remember some poor chap on quora asking if the X3 was better than the Q5. This strange and ill-informed dumb creature put an answer and it was upvoted like crazy. The answer was "Audi Q5 because itz osssum!". Why was she so upvoted for an answer that does not even tell anything and is just a waste of pixels?

Slightly OT but here are some non-Indian forums I follow because of the general quality of content:

XDA Developers (https://www.xda-developers.com/):



Mostly good content with a lot of FAQs, tips, modifications and misc. Keeps on going as the mobile telephony world gets updated every few seconds

SevenString Forum (https://www.sevenstring.org/)



Bored of regular 6-string guitars and want to go LOOOOOW and HEAVY? Want 7, 8 or even 9 strings? Well, you've come to the right place. Lots of guides on maintenance, purchase advice and modifications. This forum helped me decide between my Ibanez GRG7221 and Jackson JS22-7 Dinky. It reminds me of Team BHP.
Arguments can get quite heated and verbal (in comparison to TBHP) but the quality and helpfulness of members remains paramount

The Starport (https://the-starport.net/)



A forum dedicated to a near and dear game, Freelancer https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freelancer_(video_game)
To start with, I am 27 years old and I have 18 years of this game under my belt. I know every nook and corner of each system. I know the weaknesses of each ship and weapon. I am flying death with yellow photon cannons.
Showoff aside, this forum is dying. Only people from the Discovery mod (an independent project but I am no fan because moderators can freely police, loot and destroy player ships and stations. You can't even scratch them because of their infinite regeneration shields), Crossfire and Nomad Legacy are active. Crossfire has it's own forum (SWAT-OP) but it's the same. Games have been made mass-market and nobody seems to make anything even an kilometer close to Freelancer. Quality of AAA games is at historically low.

I cannot even begin to express my immeasurable disappointment with game companies these days. I joined The Starport back in 2006, when there was an internet limit of 2.5GB/day on BSNL. All these years and never a dull moment here. That said, at least Nomad Legacy and Underspace have my hopes up. I think I went of the handle a bit for this one

My request. If you find yourself with a few days of free time and nothing to do, please give Freelancer a test drive.

[swunkjyn]

@GTO, I started using Tech related forums like TechTree, XtremeSystems, TechpowerUP and couple of others too. Initially there was great influx and we would see some amazing stories, DIY, Overclocking etc. but soon that faded away. From my personal experience, I have stopped visiting multiple forums as I think it involves too much work. So now, I am mostly referring to only a couple of forums, be it Tech related News, Automobiles and other topics.
Could this be one of the factor too that I as a user signed up for a lot of Forums and later as the time progressed decided to stick with just a few or may be one in particular.

[Behemoth]

Really True and a sad reality. It seems that other Short gratifying platforms like TikTok, Instagram and even Youtube shorts are taking the eyeballs or attention span of people away and diverting them away from real content based discussion boards.
There is real value in these platforms as people with genuine experience and knowledge share their views and the views are almost immortalized (until the forum exists or the moderators delete the data) and remain visible perpetually. That is why real content is extremely important - genuine user generated content - text and images are crucial for the success of this platform.
Some of the others initially started well and managed to create decent sized member communities but could not sustain the momentum and hence got lost forever. I had been following gearheads and TAI forums also initially, but there were hardly any upgrades to the Ui and user generated content was too less. This is where Team BHP has really taken the lead and it does deserve it. Some happy stats about TBHP which I am sharing from worthofweb.com





You guys at TBHP are definitely doing some really good stuff and the community is also very engaged and literally addicted. Keep up the good work!

One surprise is TBHP Alexa rank suddenly shot up from around 9500 rank to around 4200 rank in Dec 2020.. whatever magic you guys did, we need more of that!

[Maky]

I noticed this a few years ago when a favourite online gaming forum of mine began to become more and more inactive, and today is a shell of its former self.

We at the time attributed the rise of Discord to the demise of gaming forums, ours and others, I feel that is very true today; although I am not sure about the reasoning behind the automotive related forums you mentioned.

Is it the next gen youth and their general lack of attention span that makes them not want to read? Or something else entirely?

[amalji]

Originally Posted by GTO

good forums are indispensable in this world of biased media outlets & unmoderated social networks.

This rang a bell inside me. I personally took a full cycle. I used to depend on the known media outlets and over a period of time I started realising their biases. Then I came across forums like team-bhp which was a refreshing experience ( I will call it one of the best in the world ). And then I got addicted to the social media which I thought was a revolution of sorts since there is no filtering of opinions. But, over a period of time, I realised that a non reviewed content ( whether biased or unbiased ) is more dangerous than the biased content that comes out of a known media outlet with some editorial review in place. I exited facebook, all whatsapp groups and the kind of peace it gives me is priceless. I'm no longer exposed to junk.

Originally Posted by GTO

There is simply no better way to share your own knowledge as an individual, and learn from that of others by engaging in a stimulating discussion. As a BHPian, you will have undoubtedly learnt a lot from this community, not just on cars, but even other stuff

+1. I think, what is affecting us today a lot is the easy availability of video content. 10 years back, if I used to search the web for queries, today people directly go to youtube and search because the video content takes less effort for you to digest. You can be doing something else and at the same time consume the content with just the background part of your brain. If you ask me whether it is comparable to the content available on a forum like team-bhp, the answer is "no way". But, people might not even know the difference that's here. Recently, one of my team members who is normally a well researched person in the work that he does was researching about cars and he has done a lot of research. When I asked him, did you read the official review on team-bhp, the answer was No. I was kind of surprised considering the kind of research oriented person that he is. I cannot blame him because even a google search these days takes you to those paid reviews on youtube! But, once I gave him the comprehensive review links on team-bhp, he changed his buying decision of the vehicle.

Maybe, the forums also need to figure out a way to come up in youtube and then link back to the forums for deeper discussions. Or maybe, figure out a different way. The reason why team-bhp survived this is because of the kind of hardwork done by every single member in this community to preserve the quality of content here. We all will have our biases but there is one thing that unites this community - and that's the quality of content. I just look for the facts rather than judgements in a review. And there is no better place to mine the facts out than team-bhp. And this applies not just to automobiles. It applies to anything and everything. I was pleasantly surprised to find out the treasure we have in team-bhp regarding home automation. Since google search don't give out these results by default, I always use the inurl for team-bhp.com explicitly in google search now.

[ebonho]

Originally Posted by aargee

Boss, they're making a big time impact in real life, meaning, they exist in real life more than virtually online.

I'm not supporting them, just taking a different perspective. xBhp has traveled/ridden through several countries, ridden every exotic motorcycles (and some cars), made several great Indian road trips, CONNECTED with all possible motorcycling groups in India, most folks in the community know Sundeep Gujjar by name & face and some may even have Sunil Gupta's personal number, they even run a extremely high quality monthly (printed) magazine with high quality contents aimed to higher shelf life, they've arranged track days for their members.

What I mean to say is, though their website may attract less attention, almost no valuable content, Their Model of Business is Different & they're growing stronger over the years.

Edit - And they're even hiring

You make very pertinent points about xbhp vs team bhp where motorcycles are concerned.

Simply put, xbhp was a motorcycle community, and team bhp is a car community. That's the basic DNA.

Even I, in spite of being a hardcore biker, came and joined Team BHP when I started reading up on the Safari as my next upgrade over my Baleno.

The fact that I then found a motorcycle sub-forum here and later a cycling one, was a happy coincidence. Not why I came here in the first place.

All/most of the very best non Bullet riders I've been privileged to ride and race with have been hardcore xbhp guys.

Even today, when wanting hardcore rider-based info on a particular model, I search through the xbhp archives (very cumbersome and non reader friendly, but info is info). Like when I was in the market for a bike for my son. Or when looking for some info about my KTM, some bug, etc. There is a huge difference in the number of active users and their primary focus and real world riding volume between xbhp who are primarily young bikers and team bhp who are predominantly 40+ weekend warriors. That's purely what the demographics are.

Which to my mind also explains the difference in traffic between the two forums.

The first lot of xbhp are now in their 30s. Making a mark for themselves in the careers and starting young families. They have little to no time anymore for forums.

The younger lot are no longer interested in forums. Instagram and Snapchat and twitter and Quora and Reddit and Whatsapp are ruling the roost. Forums and long posts are too long for their compressed attention spans.

That leaves the 40+ crowd well settled career wise with disposable income and time on Team BHP. The last forum generation.

Cheers, Doc

[splitinfinitive]

Content & context give the impetus, but Moderation is what keeps things alive. If any forum degenerates into low standard & low effort, meme-riddled, posts or flame wars, its days are numbered. I think the moderation here and the high-standards set for post quality and civil discourse are what make Team-BHP the place it is.

[i_nv]

Absolutely echo your views . I am also a big believer in the power of communities . This is my 12th year of engagement with TBHP and I absolutely enjoy the wide selection of knowledge sharing available here.

More power to us .

Another forum I had immensely benefited from was www.indiarealestateforum.com. During the mad rush of Real estate in early 2010 , this was the only forum where members benefited from knowledge sharing by real buyers . Sadly after www.housing.com bought it over , IREF met it's untimely death .

Wishing T Bhp another 100 years of BHP .

Regards

Originally Posted by GTO

I'm a big believer in the power of communities. .