Forum Menbership- 3.5m registered only 56k members survived?..... Why?

[CryptopreneurBrainboss]

Meta serves as the forum's information/notice board, where you can get forum-related updates/complaints without having to comment; most of the time, reading is better than writing. I find it strange that someone would stay a week without visiting the Meta board to see if there is an update or the latest development. I understand that just a few users read the reputation board these days because it has turned to "Is he a cheater?", "as I suspect"? Kind of like a board.

I don't find it strange, it's not like the forum has information to pass on to her members every day. The information are always one in a blue moon like the dt update that comes monthly and the rest update I see on the meta board aren't that important but just members updating their threads on whatever information they're gathering so the meta board isn't a board to be visited very frequently. Even theymos is more active on the politics and society board than Meta. Guess we going a little bit off topic now so we should be getting back on topic but just wanted you to know the meta board is not as important as you think that you should expect everyone to visit. Important information can always be pinned as news or displayed on the ad slots that display on the first post of every thread.

I probably contributed to the defunct accountr totals. I have at least six alts that I no longer use.

You're making a point here, unused alts are also contributing to the low turn out of inactive members, while yours was done in good faith, we have those that created multiple ads to cheat the bounty system and most of them are no longer active due to them been caught and banned or red trusted while others are inactive because bounties aren't as lucrative for now due to the bear market which goes back to my first point that the current market conditions is contributing to the low activities.

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[aoluain]

I'm curious about the forum's membership reduction and what can be to blame. A community with 3.5 million registered users has 2.7 million banned/nuked accounts, 700k accounts are dormant, and just 56k individuals have been active for the past three months. I did some analysis and there is a somewhat high chance that the forum will disappear before 2030 if the information on https://bpip.org/ is accurate. Since the forum is losing traffic each month, which is awful from a financial standpoint, I'm wondering what might be the issue.



unfriendly environment for Newbies/users ?

DT members oppression ? ( so much red than green these days)

The merit system (high demands for quality) ?

The moderation/rules ( using the ban button more often) ?

Low Bitcoin adoption ?

Lets Talk...

DT members, merit system, moderation rules and bitcoin adoption has nothing to do with bitcointalk's popularity. This forum has the best rules, moderators, educated and professional users, etc but the problem is that forum has no clear goal, if any, and probably the owner has no motivation to do something with it, he just hosts it and that's all.
This forum doesn't meet the average standard that people expect. It has an old and outdated user interface, features, doesn't have a mobile application, epochtalk is abandoned. I think it's pretty clear why this forum loses people and it makes me really sad because I recently discovered this amazing forum with amazing history and amazing community and I don't wat to see it vanish.

The fact that the forum is not smartphone friendly is a big deterrent, I'm here 6 years
and I really only access the forum on my smartphone and have got used to Zooming,
I know 2 people who have accounts here who couldnt be bothered visiting because
its too difficult to navigate on a mobile. So gea its a very good point made above.

On the points made by the OP are also valid as are many others, social media is also
a big factor including messaging apps which are really convenient.

Also I think after the madness of the ICO era a lot of people left after either getting
badly burned or lost interest... so yea lots and lots of reasons for the big drop off
in membership/active members.

[jokers10]

The fact that the forum is not smartphone friendly is a big deterrent, I'm here 6 years
and I really only access the forum on my smartphone and have got used to Zooming,
I know 2 people who have accounts here who couldnt be bothered visiting because
its too difficult to navigate on a mobile. So gea its a very good point made above.
...

It is a very important issue. Looking at some other websites stats I can say that mobile users proportion has grown significantly last years. It is over 50% and some regular sites show up to three quarters of mobile users. If a site is mobile friendly they obviously stay longer. So making an adaptive design is very actual nowadays. And as for so popular forum I guess a special mobile app can be popular as well.

[JollyGood]

Here is another excellent opinion, I agree that the forum being lack of mobile friendly would play a part in membership retention too. We do not have to use statistics available at our disposal to understand the value attached to those scenarios. In the general sense, if a customer/client finds it difficult to use a mobile phone to browse then they might give up as they might not have access to another device (such as a PC) to browse from.

The fact that the forum is not smartphone friendly is a big deterrent, I'm here 6 years
and I really only access the forum on my smartphone and have got used to Zooming,
I know 2 people who have accounts here who couldnt be bothered visiting because
its too difficult to navigate on a mobile. So gea its a very good point made above.
...

It is a very important issue. Looking at some other websites stats I can say that mobile users proportion has grown significantly last years. It is over 50% and some regular sites show up to three quarters of mobile users. If a site is mobile friendly they obviously stay longer. So making an adaptive design is very actual nowadays. And as for so popular forum I guess a special mobile app can be popular as well.

[Sandra_hakeem]

Hell no Igeb botz... I'm not totally against what you said but I'm not also fully accepting to it.
I Feel anyone that survived in here hasn't done that by chance neither is it a coincidence - the forum doesn't change, people do.. and AFAIK, you weren't there around 2013, where growing in the forum was seen as a tough renaissance; though it actually looked simple cus they weren't affect by any factor, but could you atleast remember that LAUDA and VOD won't take any shit to their bellies, assuming they had to? Talk more of the rest of them? C'monnnn,... Even Life itself wasn't meant for everyone - that the reasons some kiddies give up - cus whatever is meant to be, will always be. I believe the forum needs a few dangling sets of masterpiece information providers, with an already imbibed knowledge... Cheer up, we're in the new era.

Sandra 🧑‍🦰

[Igebotz]

Hell no Igeb botz... I'm not totally against what you said but I'm not also fully accepting to it.
I Feel anyone that survived in here hasn't done that by chance neither is it a coincidence - the forum doesn't change, people do.. and AFAIK, you weren't there around 2013, where growing in the forum was seen as a tough renaissance; though it actually looked simple cus they weren't affect by any factor, but could you atleast remember that LAUDA and VOD won't take any shit to their bellies, assuming they had to? Talk more of the rest of them? C'monnnn,... Even Life itself wasn't meant for everyone - that the reasons some kiddies give up - cus whatever is meant to be, will always be. I believe the forum needs a few dangling sets of masterpiece information providers, with an already imbibed knowledge... Cheer up, we're in the new era.

Sandra 🧑‍🦰

Which of the point did you agreed or disagreed to? i gave out some options... I'm lost here

To begin with, talking about 2013 is like talking about the 1930 first world cup because I'm 100% certain that neither of us watched or knew any players back then, neither of us were here in 2013, so I wouldn't want to talk about what I don't know, and we don't have many 2013 active members now.

I recall one instance where Vod had to red tagged MoparMinning due to an argument between the two on the Bitcointalk Discord; he seriously screwed up the DT. He quit the forum to focus on his pokoGO project.

[dragonvslinux]

The voted other, like most users it seems. To me it seems obvious that internet forums, in general, and declining in popularity. Partly due to the rise in social media platforms replacing them.

People generally prefer the "hive mind" structure of social media like that of Twitter (for better or for worse), as it priorities information distribution based on it's popularity, rather than in chronological order such as forums. For example a thread with 10+ pages, it's unlikely users would read all pages to find the most relevant comment (for example the most merited). Whereas with social media the most relevant comment is broadcasted the furthest due to likes/retweets, and therefore is placed at the top of discussions, with the least relevant comments at the bottom. Similar to how Reddit sensibly works and remains popular today.

I've noticed this trend generally over the past decade or so. When internet adoption initially spread, it was with the likes of MSN, chatrooms (IRC) and internet forums. Now these aspects of the internet have become the "old guard". The likes of WhatsApp/Signal has completely replaced MSN, chatrooms have become nearly obsolete, and forums are simply and outdated structure for mass communication.

It makes me wonder what this forum would be like if the most merited comments were at the top of discussion topics, followed by indented quoted replies. Generally this isn't possible in most traditional internet forums, but with merit acting as a sort of "like" function, it actually would be. I think it would lead to much more interesting conversation at least, even if many would struggle with the dramatic change.

[The Sceptical Chymist]

I believe the forum needs a few dangling sets of masterpiece information providers, with an already imbibed knowledge... Cheer up, we're in the new era.

I don't know if we're in any sort of new era or that we need new 'information providers' but you mentioned Vod and Lauda, both of whom were here and very active when I registered and remained so for years afterward.  They both had a lot of controversy surrounding them pretty much at any given time, and it made for some damn interesting threads.  I'm not suggesting that bitcointalk needs to have a bunch of drama to spice things up, but what I've noticed is that a lot of the fiery personalities have disappeared, either because they died or simply abandoned the forum.

Even Quickseller and OgNasty fit into that category, but I don't see either one of them posting in sections like Meta or Reputation as was the case a few years ago.  That said, I don't think any of what I just mentioned has anything to do with the ratio of active to registered members being as low as it is (I think I've already said my piece on that in a prior post).

[Shamm]

I'm curious about the forum's membership reduction and what can be to blame. A community with 3.5 million registered users has 2.7 million banned/nuked accounts, 700k accounts are dormant, and just 56k individuals have been active for the past three months. I did some analysis and there is a somewhat high chance that the forum will disappear before 2030 if the information on https://bpip.org/ is accurate. Since the forum is losing traffic each month, which is awful from a financial standpoint, I'm wondering what might be the issue.



unfriendly environment for Newbies/users ?

DT members oppression ? ( so much red than green these days)

The merit system (high demands for quality) ?

The moderation/rules ( using the ban button more often) ?

Low Bitcoin adoption ?

Lets Talk...

There are many reason why Users her in our forum being not active or banned, first is that lack of knowledge and didn't know the forum rules and regulations which is there are many users here in forum searching topics and paste it here and claim that is their work also known as plagiarism and we all know that is prohibited if those user obey the rules and regulations then they will not getting a permanent banned.
And second thing is, as I observe many accounts been abandoned after creating, and I there are many newbies account out here being abandoned and we don't know what's the reason behind this. Maybe a friend of them told or let say share them in the forum but they are not interested.

[bayu7adi]

During the ICO hype, this forum was bustling with activity, and many newcomers flocked to it. However, some of them came with the sole purpose of seeking bounties and engaging in spamming. The merit system has the ability to filter out users who lack creativity and contribute nothing to others. This can be seen as a firm step to eradicate spammers. Hence, the merit system is indeed crucial.

The decreasing number of users can be attributed, in my opinion, to the outdated UI/UX of the forum. We're aware that the current appearance is not significantly different from that of six years ago (I joined the forum in 2017). Perhaps this is one of the reasons why users don't feel treated as special by this forum.

Moreover, it's natural for everyone on the forum to want to check it during leisure time using their smartphones. However, this has yet to be realized. Accessing the forum through the mobile browser is highly unfriendly, which diminishes the enthusiasm for accessing the forum via smartphones. Popular social media platforms like TikTok, Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube become the second choice.

It saddens me to witness the gradual disappearance of many individuals from the Bitcointalk forum.

[Lida93]

 It's not easy being a newbie, particularly when you don't have a prior knowledge about bitcoin before joining the forum. it demands a lot of courage and determination to be able to withstand certain ugly reactions and replies in the forum. And for a newbie that understands what he's here for then no amount of intimidation that should deter their determination and steps to continually being active in the forum. Dealing with those reprimand replies and the supposed harsh environment from some older members is just another way to prove them wrong and showing them you're worth being a forum member by virtue of your exposition and contributions to discussion.

 And all of these are locked in patience which some newbies lack when faced with certain forum challenges like growth, and perhaps shy away abandoning their account never to return.

The finest of all gold's are refined in the hottest furnace. If it is pampered in the fire it wouldn't receive the beauty, admiration and attraction it gets from people that come across it. So relating it to the forum I think I wouldn't caption it as a harsh environment but rather describe it as a way of retaining quality personality to membership but in my opinion I think some older members are just going the extreme in their firmness to maintaining best standard in the community.

[JollyGood]

Like you I would also like to understand what Sandra_hakeem was trying to articulate because it is unclear. As for Vod, why did you attribute a Pokémon GO! link to him? I must seriously be missing something of significance here therefore apologise in advance.

I am glad this thread has been used to discuss a wide array of views and opinions and I look forward to reading more.

Hell no Igeb botz... I'm not totally against what you said but I'm not also fully accepting to it.
I Feel anyone that survived in here hasn't done that by chance neither is it a coincidence - the forum doesn't change, people do.. and AFAIK, you weren't there around 2013, where growing in the forum was seen as a tough renaissance; though it actually looked simple cus they weren't affect by any factor, but could you atleast remember that LAUDA and VOD won't take any shit to their bellies, assuming they had to? Talk more of the rest of them? C'monnnn,... Even Life itself wasn't meant for everyone - that the reasons some kiddies give up - cus whatever is meant to be, will always be. I believe the forum needs a few dangling sets of masterpiece information providers, with an already imbibed knowledge... Cheer up, we're in the new era.

Sandra 🧑‍🦰

Which of the point did you agreed or disagreed to? i gave out some options... I'm lost here

To begin with, talking about 2013 is like talking about the 1930 first world cup because I'm 100% certain that neither of us watched or knew any players back then, neither of us were here in 2013, so I wouldn't want to talk about what I don't know, and we don't have many 2013 active members now.

I recall one instance where Vod had to red tagged MoparMinning due to an argument between the two on the Bitcointalk Discord; he seriously screwed up the DT. He quit the forum to focus on his pokoGO project.

[Igebotz]

I believe the forum needs a few dangling sets of masterpiece information providers, with an already imbibed knowledge... Cheer up, we're in the new era.

I don't know if we're in any sort of new era or that we need new 'information providers' but you mentioned Vod and Lauda, both of whom were here and very active when I registered and remained so for years afterward.  They both had a lot of controversy surrounding them pretty much at any given time, and it made for some damn interesting threads.  I'm not suggesting that bitcointalk needs to have a bunch of drama to spice things up, but what I've noticed is that a lot of the fiery personalities have disappeared, either because they died or simply abandoned the forum.

Even Quickseller and OgNasty fit into that category, but I don't see either one of them posting in sections like Meta or Reputation as was the case a few years ago.  That said, I don't think any of what I just mentioned has anything to do with the ratio of active to registered members being as low as it is (I think I've already said my piece on that in a prior post).

OgNasty posting habit on the reputation board went from 693 post to 2 posts since VOD left the forum, he only started posting few months ago. The Vod vs. Og battle was epic; Vod put everything at it, including creating a website and other shits. Was there an actual lawsuit or was it just an internet spat? lol

Like you I would also like to understand what Sandra_hakeem was trying to articulate because it is unclear. As for Vod, why did you attribute a Pokémon GO! link to him? I must seriously be missing something of significance here therefore apologise in advance.

I am glad this thread has been used to discuss a wide array of views and opinions and I look forward to reading more.

The 50 years old man went on another adventure of life with his PokoGo project - my PI says it belongs to Vod. You are welcome  

[Rruchi man]

unfriendly environment for Newbies/users ?

The forum is conducive for newbies who read the rules, understand why they are here which is to learn and try to settle in. The "Beginners & Help" board is flooded with many newbie post, and the responses to some of the newbie questions that they ask are usually more friendly and patient replies than blunt criticism.

The merit system (high demands for quality)

Quality is required, and a newbie needs to understand what quality is. Old members who also begin to find it difficult to meet up to the mental demands of being a quality posters may also abandon their accounts.

Some other reasons could be;
- loss of interest in learning and sharing knowledge that can lead to plagiarism, spamming and shit posting or just quitting the forum. Newbies who are not interested in learning and sharing knowledge will find it difficult to continue when they discover that quality is required.

- Reduced time and a bulky schedule; someone who has daily activities that eats up all their time may decide to keep their account here dormant.

[Bushdark]

The fact that the forum is not smartphone friendly is a big deterrent, I'm here 6 years
and I really only access the forum on my smartphone and have got used to Zooming,
I know 2 people who have accounts here who couldnt be bothered visiting because
its too difficult to navigate on a mobile. So gea its a very good point made above.
...

It is a very important issue. Looking at some other websites stats I can say that mobile users proportion has grown significantly last years. It is over 50% and some regular sites show up to three quarters of mobile users. If a site is mobile friendly they obviously stay longer. So making an adaptive design is very actual nowadays. And as for so popular forum I guess a special mobile app can be popular as well.

I have seen some persons complaining that the website design and interface is not so appealing to them because they expect to see something new with different interface already. This should not be the issue since the forum is friendly enough with some strict rules attached to make it safe for everyone here. The analysis that op drop could be accurate because there are many reasons why people can decide to stop visiting a platform that could be based on there personal thought.
 Some persons only come here to make enquiry going there separate ways why some would keep visiting because of the benefs they are getting here.

[JollyGood]

These are another excellent set of reasons to be added to potential reason there are retention issues within the forum. The truth of the matter is that we will most probably never know or understand in full why the forum failed to retain huge numbers of new members but when reading through the possibilities being posted, it is clear a combination of reasons and/or events play their part.

Quality is required, and a newbie needs to understand what quality is. Old members who also begin to find it difficult to meet up to the mental demands of being a quality posters may also abandon their accounts.

Some other reasons could be;
- loss of interest in learning and sharing knowledge that can lead to plagiarism, spamming and shit posting or just quitting the forum. Newbies who are not interested in learning and sharing knowledge will find it difficult to continue when they discover that quality is required.

- Reduced time and a bulky schedule; someone who has daily activities that eats up all their time may decide to keep their account here dormant.

[jokers10]

It is a very important issue. Looking at some other websites stats I can say that mobile users proportion has grown significantly last years. It is over 50% and some regular sites show up to three quarters of mobile users. If a site is mobile friendly they obviously stay longer. So making an adaptive design is very actual nowadays. And as for so popular forum I guess a special mobile app can be popular as well.

I have seen some persons complaining that the website design and interface is not so appealing to them because they expect to see something new with different interface already. This should not be the issue since the forum is friendly enough with some strict rules attached to make it safe for everyone here. The analysis that op drop could be accurate because there are many reasons why people can decide to stop visiting a platform that could be based on there personal thought.
 Some persons only come here to make enquiry going there separate ways why some would keep visiting because of the benefs they are getting here.

If you don't like visitors you place a "go away" rug in front of your house entrance. If you don't want mobile users to come you say that there is a lot of benefits so no need in adaptive design or in mobile version. Well, you'll get much less visitors, search engines will lower the results of your site in the search results. And after all you can say that only true supporters stay to get their benefits.

But we are talking not how to justify the lack of mobile friendliness, but about why can it be so that number of users is going down. And statistically it is very important to have a mobile version or adaptive design nowadays if you are not against visitors.

[Aanuoluwatofunmi]

It's not easy being a newbie, particularly when you don't have a prior knowledge about bitcoin before joining the forum. it demands a lot of courage and determination to be able to withstand certain ugly reactions and replies in the forum. And for a newbie that understands what he's here for then no amount of intimidation that should deter their determination and steps to continually being active in the forum. Dealing with those reprimand replies and the supposed harsh environment from some older members is just another way to prove them wrong and showing them you're worth being a forum member by virtue of your exposition and contributions to discussion.

Little or non did people know that when one is being corrected, it shouldn't be taken as an attack, but an avenue for us to adjust a d learn more, just as the scenario between a mother and her child, she corrects him even when the child feels bad but everything was together for his good, it's good to take all these challenges as a preparatory ground for learning as you target where you're going to, sometimes it may be like a distraction as well because some have left the forum because of the occasion of them being attacked by another user while discussing.

The finest of all gold's are refined in the hottest furnace. If it is pampered in the fire it wouldn't receive the beauty, admiration and attraction it gets from people that come across it.

You can as well check the history to how some of the well known members of this forum first started by clicking on the profile or even asking them to learn from their experience as some are always open to things like this, they were at a point in time newbies just like everyone here and have received lots of corrections and attacked that brought them to where they are today.

[bettercrypto]

If in the whole world the most popular book is the Bible, in Bitcoin or Cryptocurrency, Trading, Exchange the best source for this is Bitcointalk.org, Because if I compare it with YouTube, Articles, Facebook, when it comes In the matters that I have mentioned, this is the only platform that can be said to give detailed information.

      Now, the only thing that doesn't make it better are the spammers who came in to this platform, now if the community here decreases, I would prefer that only a few are active, but the posts on this platform are of quality, rather than having too many members that are polluted and reduced as for the quality of what is being discussed here, it doesn't matter that there are only a few members.

Because this forum is for those who really want to know the deep beauty of Bitcoin or cryptocurrency and so on.

[Etranger]

The forum is conducive for newbies who read the rules, understand why they are here which is to learn and try to settle in. The "Beginners & Help" board is flooded with many newbie post, and the responses to some of the newbie questions that they ask are usually more friendly and patient replies than blunt criticism.

I totally agree here. I still consider myself as a newbie in a lot of questions and topics which are raised here on Bitcontalk. And I can undoubtedly say that there are many ways to find help here, especially on some local boards. If one really eagers to become a part of the forum community and tries his best in consciously reading and understanding what is discussed, then he will definitely gets lots of useful information and advice for himself.