Contingency planning for the future of F&C

[Woodsy]

Morning all,

As no doubt some of you have seen by now, there appears to be a non negligible chance that the forum may close in the coming months. Regardless of any eventual outcome, I want to extend my personal thanks to Marcel, Brian and Matt for setting up this forum, and, with the help of all the mods and people behind the scenes (especially @The Big Yin ), maintaining the forum as a friendly and welcoming place to share the enjoyment of photography. It's really the only forum I frequent, and I personally would be devastated if it no longer existed. I've personally met quite a few of the members of F&C and made some really good friends, so I truly believe it's a community worth saving.

Now, before I get way ahead of myself, Marcel has made clear that it's not yet a certainty that the forum will close, and that options for handing the forum over in the first instance are being discussed. Clearly if this is successful, then this thread is moot and we can all go back to worrying about light leaks, slow shutters, the price of film, and the state of our retinas after Brian has fired off his flashgun from 50 miles away. If however the worst comes to the worst, I would be very keen to hive mind some possible solutions for keeping A) the community of people in contact, interacting and sharing like we do here, and B) the F&C section combined historical knowledge intact. Clearly, the first is the most important point in the short term, and (again, assuming the worst just for now...) hence I would love it if we all came together and threw some ideas around for keeping the community alive in the first instance.

@nikki_s and I thought about setting up a small 'F&C' website with a forum on it to essentially replicate what we have here - a forum dedicated to film and conventional, and not limited to any particular format. It looks like setting this up would not cost a lot for a small scale website, but I personally have no knowledge of how to set this up or maintain it, nor would I know how to (potentially) add the database of this subforum to an existing forum in an archival format. Perhaps someone here knows a bit more about this?

So on the assumption that there are enough people here who want to keep our awesome little community alive, lets get some ideas thrown around for point A above in the first instance, and potentially worry about B a little later, as this can at least be stored if the admins are happy for us to have a copy for this purpose.

I shall update this post with a list of unique options, and then perhaps we can poll it later.

Edits:

List of options:

• Facebook group, private or otherwise. - Seems to be widely discounted due to structure and people not using the platform.
• Create our own website and forum - Potential final fallback option if no other solution can be found, likely problematic due to financial and time expenditure required.
• Flickr group - Private? There appears to be two F&C groups, so if this does make the cut, perhaps settle on just one of them?
• Join an existing forum en mass if either existing infrastructure is compatible, or owners are happy to create a subforum for us.
• Reddit - Mixed opinions on suitability as a 'forum'
• Discord - Initial opinion seem negative, will update with more data

 

[4wd]

Facebook groups can work well, you still need someone with time to run it.
It's easier by far than a proper forum like this especially when you only have a modest number of users.

 

[Harlequin565]

It looks like setting this up would not cost a lot for a small scale website, but I personally have no knowledge of how to set this up or maintain it, nor would I know how to (potentially) add the database of this subforum to an existing forum in an archival format. Perhaps someone here knows a bit more about this?

I ran a forum (phpBB) for an online community and I was glad to see the back of it.

The cost is really not important - like you say it's not expensive to set up. It's the admin.

1. Security updates and patching when a new version is released. This can be a nightmare and can easily suck a day. It's one of those things I didn't touch for 6-8 months so every time I went back to it I had to relearn everything. That's why it took so much of my time. Obviously if you have an admin that works in the field that would be far less of an issue. It's great for the first 6 months while everything is new and shiny and you're learning, but after that it became a chore for me.
2. Backups. Making a backup in case of catastrophic failure was similar to the above. Also the cost of storage.
3. User admin (accidental). This is only a small overhead, but there will be users who need help with various aspects of being a member.
4. User admin (PITA). Dealing with the idiots who won't go away or the nasty pasties is something I found soul destroying. Those people who just love a good argument or being pedantic. As a user, I can put them on ignore and go about my happy business, but as an admin I had to deal with them.
5. User admin (Spambots). Again, these were only an irritation for me, but irritation gets on your nerves after a couple of years.

Having a good admin team to help divide the work would be key, but you do need someone at the "top of the tree" who takes responsibility for the patching and updates. But even picking the admin team requires a bit of nouse because being "tough but fair" is a very difficult balance to maintain. I wasn't very good at it And when I was picking the admin team, I picked wrong on one occasion which caused a lot of headaches.

As 4wd suggested, you could do something like Facebook, but I (purposefully) don't have a Facebook account. I know Negative Positives has a pretty strong facebook group which might be worth a nose round to see how they do it, but I wonder how many anti-facebook folks here would be lost in the transition.

I'm hoping for a rescue.

 

[srichards]

Flickr has groups on it with ability to make threads. It's nowhere near as good as a proper forum though. I'm sure there was a fusty and crusty group on there. If there isn't it might be sensible to create one as a meeting point in case these forums do go.

Knew it existed. There is a fusty and crusty flickr group already! https://www.flickr.com/groups/2762533@N23/

@RaglanSurf foolishly volunteered to be admin.


Facebook is ghastly as a forum equivalent. Even short chats between friends end up a god awful untidy mess.

 

[TheBigYin]

Facebook is ghastly as a forum equivalent. Even short chats between friends end up a god awful untidy mess.

amen

 

[FishyFish]

Facebook is practically useless if you want any form of searchable / easy to navigate content. Plus it makes photos look a bit rubbish.

I was thinking about this a little last night when Marcel's message appeared. My first thoughts are that the simplest solution would be to just move en masse to somewhere like the Photrio forums (or another suitable online community). Some people may already be members of such places. The advantages are a ready-made and already administered place to set root, plus a bunch of other knowledgable and friendly folks to speak to as well. The downside is that the existing data we have here would most likely be lost.

I'm sure I echo everyone else in my hope that we cay here though.

 

[simon ess]

Flickr has groups on it with ability to make threads. It's nowhere near as good as a proper forum though. I'm sure there was a fusty and crusty group on there. If there isn't it might be sensible to create one as a meeting point in case these forums do go.

Knew it existed. There is a fusty and crusty flickr group already! https://www.flickr.com/groups/2762533@N23/

@RaglanSurf foolishly volunteered to be admin.


Facebook is ghastly as a forum equivalent. Even short chats between friends end up a god awful untidy mess.

I think this is a good idea as an interim solution. Membership can be invite only and discussions can be restricted to viewing by members only so we could arrange meet ups. In other words, there are quite a few options.

I don't do FB or Twitter. Never will.

 

[ancient_mariner]

Regarding existing data being lost, the forum does get snapshotted and archived at regular intervals by the wayback machine. It doesn't always present pages well and can be slow, but the data is there.

 

[TheBigYin]

Right folks - here's as much as I can share with you...

You've read the announcement presumably. I can confirm there have been discussions going on behind the scenes for a while now. Obviously, this is a bloody massive forum, and there's not loads of legacy data and members, but quite a bit of legacy infrastructure in terms of ownership etc. to consider and negotiate through any potential transfers...

All I can say is to re-iterate that at the moment, discussions are still in process.

I will however confirm one thing, and that is that sadly, I'm unable to commit to the financial and administrative demands that taking on (part/shared) ownership of the future organisation would require - I have however, pledged that I'll make myself available in my current role should the new owner wish that to happen. Sadly the reason i can't throw my hat in is purely financial - at the moment, and with my current employment, my salary is insufficient to cover the day-to-day running of my home, never mind funding a new business venture and guaranteeing the not inconsiderable cost of maintaining the server resources for a forum of this size - i'm actually at the point of deciding which of the camera collection has to go first, if I can't get out of this job and into something that pays at least the "living wage"... Of course, I consider myself to be in a good position compared to some, as at least I've kept my job during the pandemic.

Believe me when I say, it's my most fervent hope that something can be resolved, and that the forum and community can continue, in whatever form it may end up taking, because this place is a second family to me - it's been a massive part of the last 12 years of my life, and a link to far happier times. The prospect of its loss is devastating to me, made worse by my inability to step forward and take it on in a direct manner.

Please don't ask/PM me for any information "behind the scenes" or so forth - it wouldn't be fair to the people negotiating the future process - all I can say is, it's still being worked on, and everyone you know from "the mod team" are equally supportive of keeping things going...

I may not contribute much in this thread, for fear of giving away private information i've been party to about the historic operation, or future proposals - I hope you'll understand that this isn't to deny YOU information, it's to allow the prospective new owners their right to privacy in their financial and administrative commitments.

 

[sirch]

@Harlequin565 has summed up the joys of running a forum very well, as is so often the case the software, servers, etc is the straight forward bit, the wet-ware is the trouble. Small forums IME don't get enough new content so they wither and die and I think that means it would need in the hundreds of regular contributors.

I too was thinking Flickr would be a convenient solution and I did even make a very half hearted attempt to kick something off for the more contemplative TP members earlier this year - https://www.flickr.com/groups/14722736@N25/ but it hasn't (yet) reached critical mass.

 

[sirch]

Right folks - here's as much as I can share with you...

You've read the announcement presumably. I can confirm there have been discussions going on behind the scenes for a while now. Obviously, this is a bloody massive forum, and there's not loads of legacy data and members, but quite a bit of legacy infrastructure in terms of ownership etc. to consider and negotiate through any potential transfers...

All I can say is to re-iterate that at the moment, discussions are still in process.

I will however confirm one thing, and that is that sadly, I'm unable to commit to the financial and administrative demands that taking on (part/shared) ownership of the future organisation would require - I have however, pledged that I'll make myself available in my current role should the new owner wish that to happen. Sadly the reason i can't throw my hat in is purely financial - at the moment, and with my current employment, my salary is insufficient to cover the day-to-day running of my home, never mind funding a new business venture and guaranteeing the not inconsiderable cost of maintaining the server resources for a forum of this size - i'm actually at the point of deciding which of the camera collection has to go first, if I can't get out of this job and into something that pays at least the "living wage"... Of course, I consider myself to be in a good position compared to some, as at least I've kept my job during the pandemic.

Believe me when I say, it's my most fervent hope that something can be resolved, and that the forum and community can continue, in whatever form it may end up taking, because this place is a second family to me - it's been a massive part of the last 12 years of my life, and a link to far happier times. The prospect of its loss is devastating to me, made worse by my inability to step forward and take it on in a direct manner.

Please don't ask/PM me for any information "behind the scenes" or so forth - it wouldn't be fair to the people negotiating the future process - all I can say is, it's still being worked on, and everyone you know from "the mod team" are equally supportive of keeping things going...

I may not contribute much in this thread, for fear of giving away private information i've been party to about the historic operation, or future proposals - I hope you'll understand that this isn't to deny YOU information, it's to allow the prospective new owners their right to privacy in their financial and administrative commitments.

Thanks for the info Mark, I suppose a concern I have is that there are some of us who do have the wherewithal to make an active contribution in terms of both skills and finances but don't know how to make that known.

 

[ancient_mariner]

@Harlequin565 has summed up the joys of running a forum very well, as is so often the case the software, servers, etc is the straight forward bit, the wet-ware is the trouble. Small forums IME don't get enough new content so they wither and die and I think that means it would need in the hundreds of regular contributors.

I too was thinking Flickr would be a convenient solution and I did even make a very half hearted attempt to kick something off for the more contemplative TP members earlier this year - https://www.flickr.com/groups/14722736@N25/ but it hasn't (yet) reached critical mass.

It feels like I'm the only one posting to that group right now.

 

[srichards]

Vertical scope quite often buy out successful forums. They took over the SpeakEV forum. It's largely carried on just the same but they're a bit useless at dealing with connectivity and forum speed issues. They had to be told quite a lot about performance problems that were at their end as they just kept on blaming people's browsers. Fortunately now they seem to have sorted them out and realised that a lot of the users are quite techy so do actually know when it's the server being the problem.

I know the forum was always meant to be free but I'm happy to chip in financially as I value the forum and all the work Marcel has done. It can't survive on jaffa cakes alone

 

[TheBigYin]

as is so often the case the software, servers, etc is the straight forward bit, the wet-ware is the trouble. Small forums IME don't get enough new content so they wither and die and I think that means it would need in the hundreds of regular contributors.

Large forums bring their own problems - partly in terms of lots of idiotic wet-ware to keep on top of, but also, providing server storage, backup resources and bandwidth. Running this place is very much a non-trivial sum and relys heavily on our wonderful advertisers. Let's put it this way - there's a reason that the forum is owned by a Ltd Company, and not just run through the personal finances of the owners... that's not giving anything away that's not a matter or public record BTW... https://www.talkphotography.co.uk/help/privacy/

 

[sirch]

It feels like I'm the only one posting to that group right now.

Sorry, I haven't been that active on Flickr of late, I'll get my finger out

 

[ancient_mariner]

Sorry, I haven't been that active on Flickr of late, I'll get my finger out

Hey, don't worry Chris - if it wasn't working for YOU then it wasn't working. No use in holding on to things unless there's a good reason. OTOH if you want to try to make it fly then I'm glad to work with you.

 

[rick448]

I'd be happy to try and use the Flickr group more if that is the way to go. I'm afraid I won't be doing anything on FB as I hate the place.

 

[nandbytes]

Sadly the reason i can't throw my hat in is purely financial

I gather there's two sets of resources that's required to run a forum like this - financial and time.
We have to appreciate not everyone can afford one or both. I certainly would struggle with time and may be even a bit financially. But if you can afford the time surely there are people (where that's 1 or 10) that'd be willing to support it financially.
Does it have to be the same person?

 

[Peter B]

I too was thinking Flickr would be a convenient solution and I did even make a very half hearted attempt to kick something off for the more contemplative TP members earlier this year - https://www.flickr.com/groups/14722736@N25/ but it hasn't (yet) reached critical mass.

I must have missed this when it kicked off, but I'll drop by later on.

 

[TheBigYin]

I gather there's two sets of resources that's required to run a forum like this - financial and time.
We have to appreciate not everyone can afford one or both. I certainly would struggle with time and may be even a bit financially. But if you can afford the time surely there are people (where that's 1 or 10) that'd be willing to support it financially.
Does it have to be the same person?

As I thought I'd mentioned (these posts of mine are getting edited, read, re edited, re-read and re-re-edited before sending, so I don't give up private info) - I've said I'm available to the future owner(s) in my current capacity if they want/need me to do so - I'm still committed, but without someone providing the financial underwriting side of it, its academic.

 

[ancient_mariner]

I gather there's two sets of resources that's required to run a forum like this - financial and time.
We have to appreciate not everyone can afford one or both. I certainly would struggle with time and may be even a bit financially. But if you can afford the time surely there are people (where that's 1 or 10) that'd be willing to support it financially.
Does it have to be the same person?

Seems there's quite a few would be interested in a subscription model (many forums have financial supporting members) but it would need someone to set up & run that side of things as a business within the limited company of TP.

 

[Asha]

Like others in here, I will be at a loss if TP disappears but well appreciate that personal circumstances, particularly health, have to be given priority over the forum.

As for finding an alternative.
In theory it is of course a good idea and something that we all ( or at least many of us) wish for.

Options are difficult.

Building a replacement f&c community is, as mentioned above no easy task and I for one would have no idea where to begin.
It is however, imo, realistically the only way that we could keep this little ´family’ group of frusty crusties together outside of TP

Social media groups such as FB are from personal experience, a waste of time.
I follow FB purely for a local village group as it is practical at times, however that group , not unlike all the photography / LF groups that I have tried to follow underneath the FB umbrella, host far too many egoistic and highly opinionated members who simply jump on the postings of anyone else to criticize ,ridicule and generally debate every word...... it is tiresome and irritating, thus I take snippets of info , post the odd word or two after assessing for a week how to choose my words to avoid being brought down in flames, and pretty much use the groups for nothing more than a resource when all other options fail.

F&c has become much much more than a resource and as such has become unique as a sub forum.

Sadly without a central hub, even with best intentions, folk tend to drift apart and this is what I fear will happen with us.

‘It will be a real shame but in all honesty, if TP finds no way to hold itself together , then I don’t really know how we can maintain our little community.

We’re quite a resourceful bunch so maybe( hopefully) we can come up with a solution that will work.
My skills in such matters are pretty much zilch so I’m unlikely to be able to offer a lot of help, nonetheless i remain available should there be something that I can do

 

[ChrisR]

I too would be really, really sad to see TP go. Should the worst happen, I would definitely like to find a way to continue the spirit of friendship and mutual support that I've found here, particularly in F&C. That would not include making active use of FB, unfortunately.

I also wandered about setting up a "TFC" forum, but Ian summarises the issues very well. I think it should be a last resort, to b considered if the worst does happen, and we can't find an alternative, bearing in mind that whatever "we" found, some might not want to come along for the ride (eg me and FB).

This morning I've been exploring other forums. Several seem to be relatively under-used. I'm a member of a black and white (digital) forum (which does have a film component) but there only seem to be a few active members. A pleasant feature of TP is that it's relatively UK-focused, which is good for sales, market experience, meets etc.

I had a look at Film and Darkroom UK (FADU). @pentaxpete appears active there, in fact being 90% of the sellers on their marketplace!

Looking at Photrio at the moment. A bit more active and the bit I'm on does seem to be quite good on film stuff (maybe from the search I made). Will keep looking...

 

[nandbytes]

As I thought I'd mentioned (these posts of mine are getting edited, read, re edited, re-read and re-re-edited before sending, so I don't give up private info) - I've said I'm available to the future owner(s) in my current capacity if they want/need me to do so - I'm still committed, but without someone providing the financial underwriting side of it, its academic.

Seems there's quite a few would be interested in a subscription model (many forums have financial supporting members) but it would need someone to set up & run that side of things as a business within the limited company of TP.

Without having an idea of how much a forum like this costs to run it's hard to suggest anything one way or another. If it was like £100 I'd throw in my hat to keep it running if that's all was required.
If it's like £1000 then may be a few people could chip in or have a cheap subscription most people could afford.
If it's like £10k then we have a bigger problem.

 

[srichards]

Xenforo does have a subscription/paid member option. I'd hope it's all automatic so mods didn't have to do anything and the amount collected could be totalled up easily.

 

[ChrisR]

You could perhaps have levels, like free for just discussions, a subscription for value-added services like (eg) access to the marketplace, or photo hosting etc?

(I'm sure the mods have been debating these sorts of issues for years!)

 

[nandbytes]

You could perhaps have levels, like free for just discussions, a subscription for value-added services like (eg) access to the marketplace, or photo hosting etc?

(I'm sure the mods have been debating these sorts of issues for years!)

Depends on the cost. There's 60K members. Say 30K are willing to pay, if the cost is say £10k that's still like less than 50p per member!

Depending on how much it costs I am sure there's a solution that could be explored with the membership, whether that's donation, or someone owning it financially or subscription.

I think the bigger problem is the time and people willing to administer the forum. But looks like we have at least one staff member willing to help.

 

[TheBigYin]

But looks like we have at least one staff member willing to help.

I don't think any of the current staff have expressed a desire to leave - bear in mind, I'm probably one of the more recent joining members of staff... we're part of the fixtures and fittings here!

 

[nandbytes]

I don't think any of the current staff have expressed a desire to leave - bear in mind, I'm probably one of the more recent joining members of staff... we're part of the fixtures and fittings here!

That's even better, we have a number of dedicated staff willing to continue and contribute time wise which IMO is a harder problem to solve.

I seriously feel money problem can be solved more easily. Can you give us an indication of how much it costs to run the forum per year?
Don't want exact figures, just order of magnitude.... Eg: 3 figures, low 4 figures, mid 4 figures, high 4 figures or 5 figures?

If I'm crossing the line I'll back off.... No intention of breaking any rules or getting you in trouble.

 

[Harlequin565]

I used to play an MMO back in the olden days that recently had it's code "rediscovered". A bunch of people then set about re-creating the environment in a community funded kind of way.

It costs around $6k/month to run the game servers (of which $1k is forum servers and game auth servers - not broken down further). The community opens up a Paypal donation window at the end of the month, and closes when the donation goal has been met. They usually raise their $6k in a couple of hours. There are no benefits to donating - everyone gets the same free level of access. It literally relies on the goodwill of its own community to keep itself going.

Their financial needs are transparent (here if you're interested) and as you can imagine, some are happy about the way it's done, and some aren't, but it's a well thought out model for running a community. They had larger up front costs because they had to set up a company to manage it, with legal and security hoops to jump through too, but they did it.

It still needs a team of people to actually admin and manage it (much bigger because it's far more than just a forum) but they have a huge willing pool of people to draw from.

We're kinda lucky here, because there are a bunch of experienced moderators all willing to stick around. If more are needed, at least level heads will be recruiting them.

The question is - where is the main problem? Is it finance or is it someone willing to take overall responsibility? The two don't need to be the same, but even if you're crowdsourcing your finance, you still need people willing to manage it all. Then there's the numbers. How many active users are there on TP? How much does TP cost to run? If you divide the latter by the former, is that something you'd expect people to pay bearing in mind not everyone will be able or want to pay.

 

[Cobra]

That's even better, we have a number of dedicated staff willing to continue and contribute time wise which IMO is a harder problem to solve.

I seriously feel money problem can be solved more easily. Can you give us an indication of how much it costs to run the forum per year?
Don't want exact figures, just order of magnitude.... Eg: 3 figures, low 4 figures, mid 4 figures, high 4 figures or 5 figures?

If I'm crossing the line I'll back off.... No intention of breaking any rules or getting you in trouble.

Marcel has posted everything that he is at liberty to do so at the moment, they maybe further announcement in the not to distant future.

 

[Woodsy]

Also, let's not get ahead of the intention of this discussion. When I mentioned the possibility of setting up a forum of our own (if the worst comes to the worst), I didn't have anything near the scale of this whole forum in mind. Perhaps if running the whole forum is what people have in mind, that discussion is better located outside the F&C section? Note that any interest in keeping the whole place running is not at all unappreciated!

 

[nandbytes]

Also, let's not get ahead of the intention of this discussion. When I mentioned the possibility of setting up a forum of our own (if the worst comes to the worst), I didn't have anything near the scale of this whole forum in mind. Perhaps if running the whole forum is what people have in mind, that discussion is better located outside the F&C section? Note that any interest in keeping the whole place running is not at all unappreciated!

Apologies things did go a bit off-topic but personally I'd interested in keeping the whole place running, F&C bit included
But you are right, that discussion is possibly for another thread.

 

[gramps]

Second Option
I announce that the discussions fell short and I will set a close date for the forums

The forums will close and all data deleted.
Please note I will give at least 3 months notice for this option.

 

[Woodsy]

quote...

We’re aware never too soon to at least start discussing options. My sincere hope is that this thread becomes completely moot, but if it doesn’t, it’s best to at least start the discussion now.

Apologies things did go a bit off-topic but personally I'd interested in keeping the whole place running, F&C bit included
But you are right, that discussion is possibly for another thread.

No need to apologise the sentiment is hugely appreciated, so please don’t take my post the wrong way!

Absolutely, I too would prefer it is the whole forum is kept going.

 

[StephenM]

Like Woodsy, one of the first thoughts to cross my mind was creating a website with a (small) forum. But I went this way a few years ago as well, when my then main forum was closed down. It was run by a photographic magazine who closed the forum in favour of Facebook. I didn't follow, as I don't do Facebook. Nor do I do Flickr...

I hope that TP will continue. The only other site that's UK based that I know of is the UK Large Format Forum, which covers my main photographic interest. F&C though offers a more varied diet, particularly with the photos I see from photographers NOT using large format at all.

 

[Mr Bump]

Personally I would be happy with a facebook F and C.
appreciate some folk say they wont do FB but i suspect most would and its all about the most.

FB is also a ready to go setup and could be up and running in 10 minutes with zero cost and just a few mods.

 

[excalibur2]

Is there going to be any good news this decade
If you have a invite to join a forum how would newbies post a question as we all like to encourage film use even though the newbie might disappear after posting.

 

[Retune]

Seems there's quite a few would be interested in a subscription model (many forums have financial supporting members) but it would need someone to set up & run that side of things as a business within the limited company of TP.

It would be one thing to offer voluntary subscriptions with some minor perks, but I think a compulsory subscription would kill a site like this. I've seen other forums die that way - they just become echo chambers for a subset of the Old Guard, stagnate, and fail to draw in new members with new ideas. I'm not personally interested in a Facebook group.

 

[Asha]

appreciate some folk say they wont do FB but i suspect most would and its all about the most.

be sure not to include LF or indeed film in this FB group idea then, as most folk now use digital and it’s all about the most.

To be fair @Woodsy has stated that this thread was , for him, based on the sub forum of f&c .
It is already , rapidly , being derailed