The thing about GetDPI ....

[Paul Spinnler]

Olaf - I think that's sometimes forgotten; the fact it just runs means you guys are working in the background.

Thanks for that.

 

[ThdeDude]

I kind of disagree that nothing is happening in the medium format world.

You are absolutely right but the last few years felt like watching a glacier move.

 

[Paul Spinnler]

You are absolutely right but the last few years felt like watching a glacier move.

This year its gonna be different. IQ5 will shake things up. It will move around a lot of backs and drive camera sales and lens sales - I am sure.

 

[Abstraction]

Any forum that revolves around tech is bound to hit a dead end sooner or later, as the tech reaches the point of "good enough". Forums that revolve around image making, that aren't limited to technique, have a much longer life span.

 

[olafphoto]

Any forum that revolves around tech is bound to hit a dead end sooner or later, as the tech reaches the point of "good enough". Forums that revolve around image making, that aren't limited to technique, have a much longer life span.

I want to agree with you. Image-making is something I personally prefer to discuss. However, the reality is much different. As someone who run multiple forums, each time I started a thread about image-making, creativity etc... response was slow - not much interest in general. On the other hand, almost any thread about gear usually results in massive response. This forum is a great example. About one year ago we started a few sections about image-making. Unfortunately, not many members commented or got involved. At the same time, posts about gear or gear-related are met with huge responses. That's one of the reasons we scrapped those sections related to image-making. Simply, the members were not that interested in that. I am not complaining. This is simply the reality. Do you think we should try again introducing some sections about image-making? I am wondering about this idea.

 

[Paul Spinnler]

This is interesting. Perhaps everyone feels they can find their own way of image making, but the techniques and tech side are something where one is glad to read from experiences of others? Because sometimes its not easy to gather information on technical aspects of high end MF digital and before purchasing items people read up ...

 

[abruzzi]

just a few small comments from someone that has minimal participation:

• When I first signed up, I never received the confirmation email that is needed to enable the account. I was able to get fixed because I had been messaging a Photrio user who was also a user here. He intervened and go someone to enable my account. More than once I've seen users of other forums posting that they never received that email. If signup doesn't work on the first try, most people will move on.
• The various branded camera forums on this site are mostly ghost towns with the only threads being photo threads (which I skip.) Fuji and to a lesser extent Sony do seem to have discussions, but the rest are just photo threads. At this point I don't really read aany of them. At most I might poke in on the least used of the bunch (Pentax) but all I ever see is photo threads.
• The MF forums and the FS forum are by far the most frequently used forums here.
• I've used web forums for a very long time and even run a few myself. I've always thought that too many subforums make a forum look dead. A good example is electro-music.com. If you visit you'll see that it has been broken up into 169 subfora (I just counted), which makes the site look fully dead even if they have good engagement.
• getdpi is nowhere near as bad, but honestly I'd probably merge all the full frame/36x24 or smaller camera branded forums (since most people who join the site are here because the medium format.) I'd merge LF with the Analog cameras focum. I'd split the medium format forum into "digital backs and the cameras that they work with" and a separate "MF cameras with fixed sensors" forums. I'd also look at some of the other fora to see if it is worthwhile to merge some of them.

The other general comment worth pointing out--my MF digital back is 15 years old, but it seems many of the people here have a $50k camera and back. My income and budget could never touch one of those. So for me most of the dicussion is outside my budget, but when it comes to sign-ups, I think the pool of potential users is pretty small. There aren't many people out there that could afford a phase one XT, let alone adding a digital back to it.

Given that this is primarily a MF site, price most likely filters out a lot of potential members, and a lack of engagement in the smaller-than-MF forums probably turns away people shooter smaller sensor cameras. Not really much you can do about that though unless you can get enough non-MF users to participate.

 

[ThdeDude]

This year its gonna be different. IQ5 ... - I am sure.

Also long overdue, an iPhone with a quad camera setup.

 

[ThdeDude]

... dead end sooner or later, as the tech reaches the point of "good enough". ...

It's a bit of a PhaseOne fan club here, there is no thing as "good enough".

On the more serious side, the current IQ4 definitely could be improved as to usability & fluidity of operation, and also some new features would be nice.

 

[Abstraction]

I want to agree with you. Image-making is something I personally prefer to discuss. However, the reality is much different. As someone who run multiple forums, each time I started a thread about image-making, creativity etc... response was slow - not much interest in general. On the other hand, almost any thread about gear usually results in massive response. This forum is a great example. About one year ago we started a few sections about image-making. Unfortunately, not many members commented or got involved. At the same time, posts about gear or gear-related are met with huge responses. That's one of the reasons we scrapped those sections related to image-making. Simply, the members were not that interested in that. I am not complaining. This is simply the reality. Do you think we should try again introducing some sections about image-making? I am wondering about this idea.

It's much easier to discuss gear, rather than image making. The image making forum will probably need some massaging until it gains momentum.

 

[Paul Spinnler]

shou

It's much easier to discuss gear, rather than image making. The image making forum will probably need some massaging until it gains momentum.

For real is there any critically high standard high brow image sharing forum out there with top notch moderation?

I don’t think so?!

 

[vieri]

Hello Peter,

"The forum lost an immense amount of its history when the site underwent some changes" - what are you talking about? We moved over the entire content from the older platform (I should say very, very old platform). It was a truly monumental task


Hello Vieri,

As someone who worked with me you would know that my team and I deeply care about everything we do. So your statement was misleading and ill-informed. Too bad you still don't see it. On another point. No, being on the forum all day discussing things is not the highest form of caring. The highest form of caring is making sure that the forum exists and it works on daily basis. The highest form of caring is waking up in the middle of the night and dealing with some technical issues.. I could keep going but you get the point - I hope. We can keep discussing the future of the forum forever and there are multiple threads dealing with it. At one point changes need to be made - something everyone agrees with (even thought some of us may disagree about direction). In sum, before you make this type of statements directed at me, please do me a courtesy and message or email me directly to check the facts. You have my contact info. Now, I am going back to work or in your own words, "just keeping things running."

Hey Olaf,

it is you that keep attacking, not me. Not what I expected from you, sadly. It seems that rather than reading the thread and trying to actually listen to the forum and to register what people feels about things, you decided to blindly attack me and only me, while my post was mostly summing up and reporting words from others, and while not just members but even people working with you seems to not be very happy about the way things go.

About caring, caring from the owner's part and caring from the membership part is obviously different. It is very true that you are keeping this forum going, and we are all thankful for that; it is also very true that without us, this would be an empty box. As someone who provides a service - as long as you are willing to provide it, of course - you are kind of expected to keep things running, that should be the basic minimum. I am sorry if you feel unappreciated for it, it seems to me that pretty much everyone is thankful here - I definitely am.

On the other hand, once a forum exists, it's people "being on the forum all day discussing things" (as you put it) that keeps a forum alive, and I am sorry you don't see it. The thing is, we as the membership don't actually have any obligations of showing up and participating if we don't feel like it, nor we have to offer suggestions on how to improve things if we don't feel like it, nor we have to contact you and ask for facts in order to express our opinions, and so on. Everything we do here when it comes to contribute our time, ideas and effort towards the future of GetDPI is, in fact, caring for our forum home.

Best regards,

Vieri

 

[vieri]

shou


For real is there any critically high standard high brow image sharing forum out there with top notch moderation?

I don’t think so?!

Hello Paul,

I don't think there is. And, I am afraid that would be a very, very hard forum to run...

Best regards,

Vieri

 

[John Leathwick]

just a few small comments from someone that has minimal participation:

• When I first signed up, I never received the confirmation email that is needed to enable the account. I was able to get fixed because I had been messaging a Photrio user who was also a user here. He intervened and go someone to enable my account. More than once I've seen users of other forums posting that they never received that email. If signup doesn't work on the first try, most people will move on.

I had exactly the same experience as you, trying several times to join GetDPI, but never receiving an email, even when I contacted the site directly and asked if they were aware of any issues with joining. Eventually I was able to join when another existing forum member intervened on my behalf. This suggests to me that we may be missing out on a significant number of new recruits, who try to join, but for some technical glitch, are unable to complete the process.

-John

 

[Knorp]

You are absolutely right but the last few years felt like watching a glacier move.

Jakobshavn Isbrae in Greenland is generally considered to be the fastest glacier in the world, with speeds of up to 40 meters per day.

 

[BillyBagel]

I had exactly the same experience as you, trying several times to join GetDPI, but never receiving an email, even when I contacted the site directly and asked if they were aware of any issues with joining. Eventually I was able to join when another existing forum member intervened on my behalf. This suggests to me that we may be missing out on a significant number of new recruits, who try to join, but for some technical glitch, are unable to complete the process.

-John

Similar issue here, but with both recovering password and creating new account. Email would never be sent. Ended up having to make a new account in the end using a different email service. No communication from forum when trying to fix the issue prior to creating a new account.

 

[olafphoto]

I had exactly the same experience as you, trying several times to join GetDPI, but never receiving an email, even when I contacted the site directly and asked if they were aware of any issues with joining. Eventually I was able to join when another existing forum member intervened on my behalf. This suggests to me that we may be missing out on a significant number of new recruits, who try to join, but for some technical glitch, are unable to complete the process.

-John

Thank you for sharing. Noted. We are struggling with this issue and we think we know how to solve it. Unfortunately, it will take some time.

 

[PeterA]

Hello Peter,

"The forum lost an immense amount of its history when the site underwent some changes" - what are you talking about? We moved over the entire content from the older platform (I should say very, very old platform). It was a truly monumental task




[/QUOTE

Hi Olaf,

I can show you many examples like this one below ...there are no images that go with the discussions - in the early days many people went to a lot of trouble to SHOW examples of the gear working in actual IMAGES the signal to noise ratio was much higher ...it is a shame that many threads have lost their associated images ...

Resolution Games

I got my mini Alpa body today ( 12TC) and thought I would show a couple of ( to me anyway) interesting things. I put my Schneider 35 Apo digitar on it and walked around my garden to make a few shot in evening light. I was shooting at F11 ISO 100 hand held between 1/15th and 1/30th. The body lens...

www.getdpi.com

at any rate make no mistake - the continuing existance of the forum is greatly respected and appreciated - my comments were aimed at those people who cause discomfort enough to see other people leaving - maybe they should reflect on the consequences of their behaviour and pointing out the absence of the original founders was an extension of the implicit lack of moderation on the forum (thankfully) rarely required but sometimes a good circuit breaker - and no offense meant to anyoine who is a moderator - the only one I know of is Drevil - who as a Ducatisti is obviously a nice bloke.

atb
Pete

 

[olafphoto]

Hello Pete,

We transferred the entire website (all data) to the new platform, which was monumental task. Since then a few least popular sections were removed to simplify the forum. Based on the comments it appears that some people want to simplify it further and focus on medium format (film and digital) and a few other aspects like printing. I agree with them. Having said that, we are approaching the subject very carefully because it would clearly upset some people. For this reason, we left the forum unchanged for the last few months to see how it functions and where members gather. I still believe that this forum should be very clearly defined. It cannot be a general photography forum. Places like this disappear. I appreciate your comment and observations.

 

[olafphoto]

just a few small comments from someone that has minimal participation:

• When I first signed up, I never received the confirmation email that is needed to enable the account. I was able to get fixed because I had been messaging a Photrio user who was also a user here. He intervened and go someone to enable my account. More than once I've seen users of other forums posting that they never received that email. If signup doesn't work on the first try, most people will move on.
• The various branded camera forums on this site are mostly ghost towns with the only threads being photo threads (which I skip.) Fuji and to a lesser extent Sony do seem to have discussions, but the rest are just photo threads. At this point I don't really read aany of them. At most I might poke in on the least used of the bunch (Pentax) but all I ever see is photo threads.
• The MF forums and the FS forum are by far the most frequently used forums here.
• I've used web forums for a very long time and even run a few myself. I've always thought that too many subforums make a forum look dead. A good example is electro-music.com. If you visit you'll see that it has been broken up into 169 subfora (I just counted), which makes the site look fully dead even if they have good engagement.
• getdpi is nowhere near as bad, but honestly I'd probably merge all the full frame/36x24 or smaller camera branded forums (since most people who join the site are here because the medium format.) I'd merge LF with the Analog cameras focum. I'd split the medium format forum into "digital backs and the cameras that they work with" and a separate "MF cameras with fixed sensors" forums. I'd also look at some of the other fora to see if it is worthwhile to merge some of them.

The other general comment worth pointing out--my MF digital back is 15 years old, but it seems many of the people here have a $50k camera and back. My income and budget could never touch one of those. So for me most of the dicussion is outside my budget, but when it comes to sign-ups, I think the pool of potential users is pretty small. There aren't many people out there that could afford a phase one XT, let alone adding a digital back to it.

Given that this is primarily a MF site, price most likely filters out a lot of potential members, and a lack of engagement in the smaller-than-MF forums probably turns away people shooter smaller sensor cameras. Not really much you can do about that though unless you can get enough non-MF users to participate.

Thank you for your valuable observations. As I mentioned before, the sign-up confirmation process has some issues and we are working to solve them.
I agree with some camera sections being "ghost towns" - therefore we are considering removing them entirely and focus on key areas, which you pointed out in the post. Your idea about splitting medium format forum is worth considering for sure. Thank you for your thoughtful post. Very helpful!