zYnthetic wrote:I've been following this for a while before responding. I have available resources to provide a continuation of the site as it is now but also many reservations about doing so. Some reservations are exclusive to myself and others are more universal, both converge at the same point.
What does UnrealSP need?
The answer isn't a new host or renewal, these are only facilitators. They may be necessary but I'm not asking what we need to keep the site running. A million years ago a few BuF'rs splintered off and made what was at the time the best way to bring people together over an interest in Unreal. It is uncontestable how much easier it is to engage with others today, yet it has been a serious problem on UnrealSP for years. Running phpbb is one of my own biggest reservations for the security concerns it raises and the high administrative costs make managing a community nearly impossible without restricting it.
My opinion of what UnrealSP needs the most is participation. Specifically the ability to participate with as little cost (to admin) as possible. What that means in terms of where the site goes is anyone's guess but if we can't make it easier for more people to engage in the community, even if the site is take care of indefinitely it wont matter if the community shrinks to nothing.
I have no problem hosting static content or even purchasing the domain. I'd like to hear some suggestions of what we can do with the community portion of UnrealSP. Is the forum format really something we should be doing? With access to different community based services (reddit, amino, etc), is staying an island the best thing? What options are there that help UnrealSP as a community become more accessible and visible to the world at large?
zyn's stance is one I share, and why I have been personally less than excited about ideas of continuing to host UnrealSP "as-is", while of course I appreciate the option for it.
The entire idea behind the USP "reboot" was to allow people to chip in reviews and articles on their own, and have them only be approved by administration. This would play into zyn's ideas above. But that, of course, requires either continued development of the platform I've been working on, or someone to make their own from scratch. Both are undertakings of effort.
@zyn: I have, a long while ago, acquired mod rights to r/Unreal on reddit, if that is of any interest.