Comments on: WJ is gonna party like it’s …

By: Chrystie

Chrystie — Fri, 10 Nov 2006 23:10:22 +0000

We just need to see if we’re close to, at, or beyond that 1-10% range. I’ll look into it…

By: blg

blg — Wed, 08 Nov 2006 23:03:46 +0000

1200 posts/month really isn’t too lame, is it? The number sounded high, so I just checked on the forum reports for the month of October: total new messages = 1,411.

It does seem as though something’s working, at least for our community.

By: walt crawford

walt crawford — Wed, 08 Nov 2006 22:47:22 +0000

1,200 posts and 4,000 unique IPs a month are great.

Fact is, you don’t usually go to a real forum unless you’re actively interested in the topic: They make lousy passive entertainment. As a result, those really are good numbers.
By comparison, 4,000 unique IP visits to a blog might only represent midrange activity, because blogs can be passive entertainment–but 1,200 posts: That’s a hard figure to argue with. It says that things are working.

By: calebtr

calebtr — Wed, 08 Nov 2006 18:25:38 +0000

Leading an online community is hard, whether you use a forum or an e-mail list or an irc channel or Second Life, or what. Libraries do well to learn this skill!

Also, there’s no reason to scrap your message boards if people are actively using them.

By: Chrystie

Chrystie — Wed, 08 Nov 2006 16:29:34 +0000

Don’t get me wrong, our forums /are/ lively, with an average of 1,200 posts and about 4,000 visitors (unique IPs) dropping in to read along every month. So, I am happy with the level of conversation and participation there. It seems to be right alongside the benchmarks, if not a tad higher, but I’m probably venturing into my sense of things (and not the actual data) when I say that so I’ll back off a bit.