Public forums?

[Endothermia]

Hey, everyone. I'm new here. Glad to see MM2x is still going strong.

Just a question: The forums seem to be blocked from view for non-registered users (correct me if I'm wrong), so why is that? Most other forums I've seen have threads that can be viewed by non-members, whereas I remember being prompted to log in when I tried to access the MM2x forums.

If anything, I think it's withholding a lot of interesting information from MM enthusiasts who just happen to be non-members here (I found out about the exciting MMClone project only now!).

[cody]

I was wondering the same thing. I have an idea:

1. Give guests read-only access to all the forums (except Area 51).
2. Give the non-staff members with over 100 posts read-only access to Area 51.

I mostly want 2, but 1 is the most important. I see no reason to block forum access from the guests, and I've been wanting access to the Area 51 forum for years. What would it take to get access to that without becoming a staff member?

[Franch88]

This is a choice of the website owner and is so since more than a decade, at least. What's assumed, is that who's interested in the topics of this now very old game series won't get any sort of problem to register the account, and then, eventually also participate by posting.

[quote="cody";p="111348"]I see no reason to block forum access from the guests, and I've been wanting access to the Area 51 forum for years. What would it take to get access to that without becoming a staff member?[/quote]
Why are you putting this senseless question? Is it your business? Why even wish to have access to that forum section (that's also pretty abandoned, as you can see from the low number of topics and posts in it, and from the latest post date)? Your sort of "curiosity" is absurd...
There's nothing really worth and interesting for you... In it, there are just few topics related with very old website/forum tests and questions related with the previous version of the website, just to be discussed between DjDecibel and the administrators active in past, like Ryan and Gafaddict...

[cody]

Because I don't see any reason to keep it from us, other than anti-hacking purposes. Plus, it's there to click on, and anyone who clicks on it is going to start wondering what's in there. Same goes with real-world cases. In cases where information is kept secret from someone, they're likely to start asking questions to try and find out what that info is. That's why people are interested in government stuff, UFOs, etc.; it's because they want to know what's going on behind the scenes, and it's being kept from them, and this could potentially upset some people.

Also, something else that bothers me is this:

Code: Select all

Archives -> Maximum Upload Size: 256 KB ace  gtar  gz  rar  tar  zip Images -> Maximum Upload Size: 256 KB gif  jpeg  jpg  png  tga  tif  

Why can't we upload txt files, 7-zip, or ar files? Also, the max upload size is a bit small, as MM2 screenshots could easily exceed that size if the resolution is set high enough. This would be better:

Code: Select all

Archives -> Maximum Upload Size: 512 KB 7z  ace  alz  ar  gtar  gz  rar  tar  zip Images -> Maximum Upload Size: 512 KB gif  ico  jpeg  jpg  png  tex tga  tif  

EDIT: Whoa! What's up with the large gap before the Code box? It's larger than the box itself.

[Seahawk]

@Cody: I also always want to view the Area 51. But I respect the thought that it's only for admins.

[Franch88]

Because I don't see any reason to keep it from us, other than anti-hacking purposes. Plus, it's there to click on, and anyone who clicks on it is going to start wondering what's in there.

And instead, I don't see any reason of why you have to do this useless polemic... Okay, I realize that it could have been kept hidden and visible only to moderators and administrators from the beginning, and I don't know why it hasn't never kept so... Probably, it was a choice of DjDecibel, that's it.
As I've written in the above post, it's just a forum section that the old website admins used to do tests and talk about this website and its forum, and it has used very little, actually. If you don't believe me and even begin to do stupid sort of conspiracy theories about it, well, it's just an your problem...

Same goes with real-world cases. In cases where information is kept secret from someone, they're likely to start asking questions to try and find out what that info is. That's why people are interested in government stuff, UFOs, etc.; it's because they want to know what's going on behind the scenes, and it's being kept from them, and this could potentially upset some people.

Oh my... Seriously? It's jus the damn section of an Internet forum! Your exaggerated examples can't match it... Some people (but it's only you, so far...) can be "upset" because of a choice done by this forum ages ago? That's all? Who cares!

Why can't we upload txt files, 7-zip, or ar files? Also, the max upload size is a bit small, as MM2 screenshots could easily exceed that size if the resolution is set high enough.

Another question now... Are .txt files archives or images? No. Also, what's the purpose of giving the possibility to upload and download plain text files on this website? The .ar file aren't supported archive files, it's just MM2 that uses this file format for renamed .zip archives, and it's fine to put them in known official archive file formats to allow their downloading. It's alright about give the .7z files support, also if this format is still little used in general than .zip and .rar ones.

Also, you've gone a bit too much off-topic... I'm sorry for the new member who posted the topic, but you've now ruined it, congrats... Topic locked.

[Endothermia]

This is a choice of the website owner and is so since more than a decade, at least. What's assumed, is that who's interested in the topics of this now very old game series won't get any sort of problem to register the account, and then, eventually also participate by posting.

I think that making the forums public will in general contribute to more users registering, because they might find some thread interesting and may feel like contributing to it. I know that it probably won't make any difference to MM2x, though, because the game is very old like you've noted (but I guess even a minimal increase in registrations would be nice).

Anyway, since I don't think there's anything to lose if the forums are public, I think it will be a nice change. What I want to know is: Is it logistically hard to do? If it's too tedious to make this change, I'm ready to live without it.

[Franch88]

I think that making the forums public will in general contribute to more users registering, because they might find some thread interesting and may feel like contributing to it. I know that it probably won't make any difference to MM2x, though, because the game is very old like you've noted (but I guess even a minimal increase in registrations would be nice).

In the past years, where the forum and the website were more active, there were much more new registered members, with peaks of 10 per day. But, most of them didn't even do any activity here, neither visiting the forum. With this, I wonder why they registered an account here to neither be used... So, I guess that for most of the people isn't a problem to register an account if that's forced. Then, as said, have an account suddenly opens opportunities to be active in the forum, replying in topics or discussing new ones.
Times change and the interest to this now old game series gets lower. More, I let you know that the activity of the most active members remained is now mainly moved to a Discord server chat called Midtown Club, and there, you're not only forced to register a new Discord account, you're also forced to join the server chat even if your purpose is just to lurk and browse around to read and see what they talk about in it.

Anyway, since I don't think there's anything to lose if the forums are public, I think it will be a nice change. What I want to know is: Is it logistically hard to do? If it's too tedious to make this change, I'm ready to live without it.

No, it ain't an issue of hard and tedious work. Anyway, if you're really speaking for yourself, you've now registered your account also to discuss of this thing in the forum. So, for you, the thing can well finish here. As said above, in the past, lot of people created new accounts without hesitations even not using them (the average was of 5-6 accounts per day; you can check by yourself from the members list). What else there's to complain about?