SD Forum early closure / new facebook page

[moonshado]

For those of you who use to be followers of the Steve Dean forum. A short while back Steve announced he was shutting the forum down at the end of the year. Due to a misunderstanding with the hosting company it has already been closed down. For those who did not have chance to see the notification the Forum is continuing as a closed group on facebook. If you wish to apply to join the facebook group the link is ;-
https://www.facebook.com/groups/191318267941035/

[stone-cold-lead]

Why a closed community?

[grant]

I hate facebook.

[Silent Invader]

I hate facebook.

Ditto 

[Dags]

Why a closed community?

Makes it much harder for spammers and keeps the rubbish you post off other peeps' feeds.

[Mad Doc Morris]

Surprised and sad to see SD closed. Hopefully the painters who shared their work there will find any other outlet than a Facebook group. Closed communities and invisibility to the general public feels like a step back (mailing lists and Yahoo spring to mind), regardless if you do use social networks or not.

[Nord]

What's the big deal? A forum is as closed as facebook, you have to actively find it and sign in. In some ways facebook is better, it gives you notifications, you can set privacy as you like, it's available on mobile devices, etc. It's also free, which might be a contributing factor to the old forum owner. 

[Malebolgia]

A forum is as closed as facebook, you have to actively find it and sign in.

That's not true. With a forum guests can browse topics and see almost everything, they just can't reply, send PM's, etc. With a closed Facebook group you can't even view stuff if you don't have Facebook. As one of the people who does not use Facebook on principal reasons, groups like those are immediately a 'no go area' for me. Would it have been a forum, I could have browsed the images and see the discussions (and Admins also have the options of creating closed groups on forums for (certain) members only).

[Silent Invader]

I'm sad to see it go, though I was a browser rather than a contributor. But I have to say, whatever the reasons for closing it, I don't see a lot of fun in the running of a forum (hats off etc to the owner and mods here!!!).

[Mr. Peabody]

I love the flexibility and community of a forum. You can tell it's built and maintained by those involved.

I have a hard time imagining the connections and opportunities to learn that this community offers translating easily to FB. But then I have a limited imagination. 

Hope the SD community thrives in their new home.

[Captain Blood]

Steve is a member here on LAF too, under the cunningly disguised name 'Deano'.

He didn't want the continuing cost and hassle of running a standalone forum. Hence the move to a Fb group for ex SD forum members who wanted to continue their club feel. I don't think there's any intent for it to be exclusive in any way. I'm sure anyone can join the group if they're interested in the subject matter.

I think the openness or otherwise of forums depends very much on the choices and settings made by forum owners. LAF, like many other forums (fora?) is very open. Guests can see almost everything. But only members can post. But there are certainly other places out there which seem to limit guests from quite a lot of content.

[tomrommel1]

Yes everybody who wants to take part on the Steve Dean FB page can do so . The only reason for a closed group is to get rid of content which doesn't have to be on there ( adverts etc). So feel free to ask ! Till today everybody who asked was invited in!

[Connectamabob]

What's the big deal? A forum is as closed as facebook, you have to actively find it and sign in. In some ways facebook is better, it gives you notifications, you can set privacy as you like, it's available on mobile devices, etc. It's also free, which might be a contributing factor to the old forum owner.  

The only one of those things that isn't also standard for forums is being free for the host. In fact it's kind of baffling that anyone wouldn't have noticed how all those features are normal everywhere on the modern web, not just Facebook.

In my experience, forums offer better privacy/security options than Facebook, which is crufted with all kinds of extra features and scripted stuff you aren't allowed the option of turning off or opting out of, and can't block/disable locally without it completely breaking the site. There is a certain high level of ambient BS you have no choice but to accept if you want to use Facebook in any capacity.

Forums also use a layout specifically designed for this kind of community interaction. Facebook is designed primarily for "latest news" type content, and kinda sucks at presenting the kind of social interaction forums are designed around. The capability is there and used, but it's over complicated and unintuitive if one is new to Facebook. In contrast, a forum is very direct and immediately understandable even to someone who's never even seen one before.

And as Malbolgia points out, when you sign up for a forum, you're targeting your interaction to a specific entity. Signing up with Facebook group requires you to sign up with Facebook as an overarching thing, and in so doing opens the floodgates to all kinds of completely unrelated crap you may not want to be bothered with, or may find actively objectionable.

[digid]

I do not do Facebook either. And I don't understand how any company can think that using Facebook as an only outlet is good for their company. 90% of the people I know in gaming will not use Facebook.

Just my opinion, good luck with trying this out this way. I hope it works for you.

[Captain Blood]

It's not a company. It's just a guy who ran a forum for fellow painting enthusiasts for many years, recently decided he didn't want the cost and hassle any more, and in response to requests from a few of the members there, opened up a Fb group instead. So that those people could continue to discourse and share their painting with their friends from the former forum. That's it. His choice. Their choice. Let's not make a great big drama out of it