What's new
Pinball info

Register a free account today to become a member! Once signed in, you'll be able to participate on this site by adding your own topics and posts, as well as connect with other members through your own private inbox!

Owners Clubs Forum

Create new forum Owners Clubs?

  • Total voters
    10
Nedreud

Nedreud

Registered
Joined
Feb 12, 2013
Messages
3,092
Location
Aldershot, UK
Pinside is Pinside and PinballInfo is PinballInfo, and I like that they're different and wouldn't want them to become like each totally. But one feature I do like over there is a forum called "All Clubs... (Members Only)".

Topics created in this forum are for a specific machine (or sometimes multiple machines were several incarnations exist, such as Star Trek). The idea being that to be in a club you simply own that machine - it's just a get together area for owners to say "Hi! I've got XXX too, I've had it X years and it's the best pin ever!" and then posts a few pics and discuss common problems.

I'm a member of both "Paragon Club... the Valley of Demons" and "Vector Owners Club & Restorations".

So, would anyone else like to see this added to PinballInfo under Forums > Pinball > Owners Clubs?
 
So all that needs to be is a threat within a new section called Owners Club? That sounds quite easy to manage but there must be a crazy amount of threads for each machine. I can also see it opening abuse for machines not liked by others, do you have to say you own the machine somewhere to be allowed access?
 
Hmm... There would be FAR too many for each machine - however we could do a Forum for each Generation (eg Bally/Williams 90's) and then a thread for each machine??
 
I don't think we have enough regular posters here to worry about a dedicated forum for owners clubs to be honest. Why not just start a thread in the general forum? That is how it started on Pinside. They only made a new forum for them as it became really popular and more and more 'clubs' started appearing.
 
Threads/Discussions/Topics (call them what you will) would be created to form a club for each machine or collection of machines. Threads wouldn't be created in advance, just whenever some one decides they want to start a "club". The only thing @Paul would need to do is created a new "Owners Club" forum under Forums > Pinball. I realise that IPDB currently has 5,753 different pins listed but a club is only going to be started by someone who a) actually owns that machine and b) knows, or thinks, there's a reasonable user-base of other owners (or fans) to join in. Ad Jonker would be a bit lonely in the Matrix Owners Club, for example!

I thought it'd just be nice to have them in a separate area for visibility. Of course, topics could be added to the General forum with a title like "Owners Club: Twighlight Zone" but I think it'd be interesting to give them their own area. It's a new "feature" that doesn't require any new add-ons, plugins or maintenance, and if it doesn't take off then close the forum and fold the topics into General.
 
Its overkill to have a forum for every machine but you could split them by the following:

Data East/SEGA/Stern
Bally/Midway/Williams
Gottlieb
Other
 
Fintan Stack said:
I don't think we have enough regular posters here to worry about a dedicated forum for owners clubs to be honest. Why not just start a thread in the general forum? That is how it started on Pinside. They only made a new forum for them as it became really popular and more and more 'clubs' started appearing.
Click to expand...

I'd just do it like this tbh.
 
There are two things I really hate about pinside. The first is people constantly trying to talk up the value of their machines. The second is the "club" idea. Couldn't really say why I hate it but I never look into any of those threads. I think it's a throwback to when people start getting too snobby about music etc and divide everything up into micro sections. I like a good thread about pinball etc not a specific analysis about a leg bolt of Funhouse. To me it just fragments things too much, if you want to discuss a particular machine then what's wrong with just leaving it in the general area? It's not like the site has thousands of posters a day.
 
johnwhitfield said:
There are two things I really hate about pinside. The first is people constantly trying to talk up the value of their machines. The second is the "club" idea. Couldn't really say why I hate it but I never look into any of those threads. I think it's a throwback to when people start getting too snobby about music etc and divide everything up into micro sections. I like a good thread about pinball etc not a specific analysis about a leg bolt of Funhouse. To me it just fragments things too much, if you want to discuss a particular machine then what's wrong with just leaving it in the general area? It's not like the site has thousands of posters a day.
Click to expand...


I like the 'club' threads over there. I dont ssee anything snobby ..just makes it easy to go to one thread and just see a load of chat about a specific game ...Baywatch for example , or Popeye ....all the popular titles in fact :D
 
Ooh I love good Friday afternoon debate! My simple suggestions seem to have a habit of doing this, not just here, at work too. I think I'm what you'd call an agitator :p

I don't see any value to having forums just divided by manufacturer as it's not specific enough and doesn't tell you what the general subject is about. Threads in Pinball > Shop Logs are folks documenting their restorations whilst those looking for help should post in Pinball > Technical Questions & Help.

But why would I start a topic in Pinball > Bally/Midway/Williams? What is the purpose or "theme" of this forum? Topics inside could easily be categorised into any of the existing top-level Pinball > XXX forums. And whilst a topic called "Savers of Popeye Saves the Earth" could easily be put into Pinball > General Pinball Discussion not only would it be "lost" in the largest forum on the site (nearly 1,500 topics) but it doesn't immediately let you know that there is actually a rampant fan club of what many consider to be the worst pinball machine ever made ;)

Having an Owners Clubs forum would allow @GrizZ to commune with all the other schoolboys drooling over the skimpy bikinis on Baywatch whilst @johnwitfield can easily avoid those rubbing themselves up against the legs of a Funhouse :)
 
Last edited:
So, this is the way i see it....

If we were a massive forum the size of pinside, with a post every minute then i could understand it. However with the size we are, adding too many categories can water everything else right down. Also, creating too many categories makes things confusing... if you had an issue on say a white water, a request for assistance could feasibly be posted in a specific machine forum, general, or technical questions.... and all could be equally valid... and will then make things awkward to both find and moderate.

Simplicity is the key.

So to explain things a little more simply with regards to the structure...

The whole place is the forum
The sub directories in the forum are the categories
The individual topics in the categories are threads
And the individual posts in the threads are posts :D

IMO it's a good idea, however we could do with being bigger to benefit from it...
 
I agree with @Paul .

I think the club threads are fine but just think you should just start them in the general forum. Happy days all round.
 
Yep, I'm cool with that! That's why I put it up as a suggestion with a vote. If 50 people had jumped on and voted "Yes" then we'd all concede it's a feature that we all need right now!

Of the subject of the forum as a whole, where/how can I make a contribution? I use PinballInfo way more than any other pinball site and happy to donate towards the running costs. @Paul - it's been mentioned in the past, is this feature currently disabled?
 
It is... it was waiting for an upgrade, which is now released - ive just been too lazy to update it...

I'll look and see what i can do over the weekend :)

Many thanks :)
 
Paul said:
The whole place is the forum
The sub directories in the forum are the categories
The individual topics in the categories are threads
And the individual posts in the threads are posts :D
Click to expand...
what about the words in the posts, what are they?
 
Most people just flush their dark matter away, others share it freely on the internet. ;)
 
Nice to see the usual level of intellect has been maintained on the thread. All we now is for @cooldan to post some of his infamous animated gifs ;)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom