Bitcoin Forum

Honestly, I really hate SMF and vBulletin (they look like they're from the 90's), and I'm not a huge fan of phpBB, because of how easily hackers/spammers seem to get into it.

To solve this problem, I went ahead and created my own bitcoin forum, based on Xenforo.  Xenforo is a very modern and smooth up-and-comer in the forum development arena.  I already have a forum for an established gaming community that I run in Xenforo, and everyone loves it.  It really works quite well.

The goal of the forum is to provide a mature, stable, and clean (of spammers) environment for discussion of everything related to Bitcoins.  I am also considering options for paid membership, or paid moderation, to help keep spammers/scammers at bay, but that is entirely up for discussion.

So, check it out and register before someone else takes the screenname you want!

www.bitcoinforums.net

Ok, promotion time!

The first 10 people that make 20 LEGITIMATE posts (non-spammy), and then private message me with their bitcoin address on bitcoinforums.com get 0.2 BTC!  That's $0.28/post, easy money!

Wow, I would have thought that'd have gotten more interest.  Too many posts required?  Posting in the wrong section of these forums maybe?

Anyone have any ideas for ways to improve the forum as it sits?  Or have some promotional ideas?  I need a good way to kickstart this in the pants!

What were the main things you were hoping the new forum would provide?

Smoother/better UI than SMF.

Also, some folks were talking about wanting to have a "no noobs allowed" section on this forum, where it was paid membership only (i.e. pay 0.1BTC or something small, but something that noobs generally wouldn't have).  I would likely implement this if there was enough interest in it.

I hate these "web 2.0" interfaces that constantly blink at you when you move your mouse around.

Very good, I regesitered, cause in this forum you can not reply a specail thread.

It looks that I can in your forum.

I've always been a fan of google groups. Simple and reliable. You can also quickly read everything with an email program if you want, rather than moving around clicking on links. Is there one?

Having multiple communities will be good though as Bitcoin grows. Allows for different people to associate with people more like them and provides redundancy when some are down. I wish you luck!

Nice. I registered.

bitlotto, thanks for the good wishes!  I have no idea whether a google group for Bitcoins exists... might be a good thing to start up as well though - certainly, different people have different preferences.

I'd do it myself, but I have no cell phone and they only way to get a google account is to get an sms message. WTF! But if anyone creates a google group I'd join!

Haha, gotta love Google's account verification.  My wife was complaining about the same thing last night.  We have cell phones, but have text messaging turned off and use a free app to message people.  Unfortunately, for whatever reason, Google's verification texts don't come through to the free text service, so there's no way to actually verify the account.   ::)

Congrats to My_Time, he's the first to reach 20 posts and win one of the 0.20 BTC prizes!

I am new to this forum and I hardly have anything to complain about. I haven't noticed any problem with spam here?  I am interested in your community, however, and I'll check it out when I get a chance. :)

Agreed. This forum which is "outdated" in its design I actually prefer. It's clean, simple and usable. I personally hate Xenforo. It's trying to be too modern for a forum imo.

we already have a forum why do we need a new one? bitcoin is still somewhat small splitting the community apparent isnt going to help.

In my opinion, only offering a new forum software won't be enough to attract people. Its personality has to be very different from this forum. For example, quite a few people have been complaining about the high noise of this forum so you might get a good market share if you strongly discourage newbies across the whole board, or even go as far as only letting known faces in.

I wouldn't be interested in it, in that case. How did all the known faces arrive on the scene without ever being a newbie?

They were newbies once. They are not anymore and they don't want to be reading a forum infested with the same newbie questions that get repeated over and over.

A section full of only new ideas would be awesome. You can't get that if you let newbies in because they haven't been caught up on all the ideas. 'All' is an exaggeration, but you get the point.

Well as you can see I am a 'newbie' myself so I cannot comment on whether this forum is 'infested' as you say. If that really is a problem though I suggest re-organizing this forum into areas more friendly to beginners and those explicitly intended for the well seasoned. I don't think it would be a good idea to splinter a community on the basis of seniority. It would seem that a welcoming attitude toward new arrivals is an important part of the longevity of any community.

I would like to implement some features to help sort out the newbies from the people who don't want to see all the newbies questions.

Either a paid usergroup, or just having some subforums that are inaccessible until you have more than 500 or 1000 posts or something.  Maybe a combination of both.

3 more prizes paid out, 6 more to be claimed!

Joined the http://www.bitcoinforums.net (http://www.bitcoinforums.net) forum and reached 20 posts over there. Just got the 0.2BTC reward from SgtSpike so happy about that.

good to have competition in all things so good to have the option of another forum.
This forum still has the best content but is becoming more and more unusable with the massive spike of new members. The other forum doesn't have the critical mass yet but is just starting out.

Also good to have the redundancy of an alternative forum. This forum had some downtime today right around the time of the price crash. I'm sure there were a ton of people looking to talk about what was happening.

Also while I'm at it I'm going to promote this http://area51.stackexchange.com/proposals/30763/bitcoin-crypto-currency?referrer=AvOIuBHoZXfspDOgXlkhmg2 (http://area51.stackexchange.com/proposals/30763/bitcoin-crypto-currency?referrer=AvOIuBHoZXfspDOgXlkhmg2) - not a forum but a Q&A site.

Anyway,
thanks again SgtSpike and good luck. I'll continue to be active in both forums (at least while my mild obsession with bitcoin lasts)

I'm open to anything Alex, just let me know what it is you want to do, and how it needs to be done.  Preferably, post on the other forum so it's easier to see/access the information.

xenForo is pretty slick, and very developer-friendly.  They have a nice API for it.  It's not open source though.

Different people like different things I suppose.  I can't stand the looks of this forum, or any SMF/vB-based forum for that matter, and how aged they look.  I love the refreshing modernness of a xenForo-based forum.

But, you're welcome to not like it.  :)

Still have 6 more prizes to give out!  Get up to 20 posts and send me a PM with your bitcoin address at www.bitcoinforums.net, and I'll send you a free 0.20BTC!

I love the forum you made. It is:
(1) faster than this one
(2) allows my post to stand out from the noise
(3) and is easier to use (it doesn't feel like it was made 20 years ago).

- Jared

Signed up. Looks really good to me so far! Nice job!

In the name of decentralization, I demand you join this forum!

Ok, just kidding, but seriously, more posts would be appreciated to help the forum grow.