Attention, RPGsiters...

Its been roughly three weeks since the real "reboot" of this site, so I thought it was time to give you all a summary of how we're doing.  And I'm putting it here, in the "roleplaying games" section ,because it is the most viewed.

First, the good news:

Three weeks ago, this site had 1342 threads; 19025 posts, and 826 members.

Today, this site has 1675 threads, 26 483 posts, and 876 members.

That means that we've gained 333 new threads, 7458 posts, and 50 new members!

That's an average of 15 new threads a day, by the way, which isn't bad at all.

But now the bad: in the last few days I've been noticing a slowdown on the site. It might be a temporary glitch, but I think we're still too early on to rest on our laurels and feel assured that our momentum will proceed indefinitely.

For one thing, anytime I see threads from 4 days ago still on the first page of the Roleplaying forum with no new posts, that troubles me. I'd like to get on that page, and see that every single thread is marked as "last updated" either "today" or "yesterday".  I hope that everyone here makes a point of coming by and participating; participating in the existing threads, but also throwing new threads out there for discussion!

Second, its important that we make sure to keep up the advertising. I'm very gratified that some of you have put RPGsite banners or links in your sigs on other boards or your own sites/blogs/etc; that's excellent. I ask that others who enjoy this site and haven't done so think about doing the same!
And besides that, try to provide links to threads here on other boards, let people know we are around, and the alternative that we provide.

I think we're on the right track, and I sincerely hope that in another three weeks I'll be able to say that we've augmented the momentum; but remember, this depends on you!

RPGPundit

I'd suggest regularly submitting news items to EN World. There seemed to be an increase in traffic after the first time. Perhaps do a round-up of new reviews and articles posted and send it to the EN World newshounds.

This sounds like a really great idea... is there someone here who is liking this site enough to be willing to take on this responsibility?

Perhaps yourself, Colonel?

RPGPundit

Go see if you can advertise this site on the andy hackard games forums, they've banned a lot of good, intelligent, contributing users like SeanR451, doktor teufel and others who would fit right in here.

Quote from: RPGPunditThis sounds like a really great idea... is there someone here who is liking this site enough to be willing to take on this responsibility?

Perhaps yourself, Colonel?

RPGPundit

I'd consider it. However, it occurred to me there could be a snag - I wasn't thinking about EN World being mostly focused on d20 and d20-based OGL products. The RPG Site has a wider focus, so it may be tough to come up with enough d20 material here to get it posted on the EN World newspage on a regular basis.

I think ENworld has grown somewhat in its scope. I certainly don't think that these days they'd have a problem with notices being put up when people make reviews of non-D20 games here, or collaborative works that can apply to D20 or to non-D20 games.

RPGPundit

Quote from: ColonelHardissonI'd consider it. However, it occurred to me there could be a snag - I wasn't thinking about EN World being mostly focused on d20 and d20-based OGL products. The RPG Site has a wider focus, so it may be tough to come up with enough d20 material here to get it posted on the EN World newspage on a regular basis.

They seem to be ok with posting notices I send over for new reviews. they ussually leave out the non-d20 ones though.

Quote from: McrowThey seem to be ok with posting notices I send over for new reviews. they ussually leave out the non-d20 ones though.

You might try submitting them to gamingreport as well.

Good idea!

We need new and more posters. Maybe we should ask if it's okay to advertise and cross post to Enworld, SJG and other large forae which are not general gaming.

Something else worth mentioning is that theRPGsite's still located on Nutkinland's old server but it really needs to find a new host. One of NKL's admins, Varaj, has been hosting it free of charge until RPGPundit and jrients could find a new home and we'd really like to see that happen.

Nobody's getting kicked out, but us still hosting theRPGsite was always meant to be a temporary solution -- even if you gave a friend the old car in your garage, you'd expect him to eventually start parking it someplace else.

Anyway, I figure this will be a learning experience for the new admins, so us old admins (that's me, Varaj, and maybe Pooka) will do everything we can to help. I'm also hoping you guys will also do what you can when the time comes.

There are two things I'd call good news. The first is that theRPGsite is still reasonably small: in September it used about 8.5Gb of bandwidth and is about 210MB of disk space. The second is that once you've moved, people like JimBobOz won't have to worry about us Nutkinlanders suddenly fucking everyone over -- theRPGsite will truly be independent.

So what does finding the place a new home actually involve?

Can such a home be found commercially or would someone need to buy a server or find someone with a server who is willing to host it?

Quote from: Mr. AnalyticalSo what does finding the place a new home actually involve?

It's really not as hard as it sounds. Do a full backup of the database, copy the files down, and then restore to a new host.

QuoteCan such a home be found commercially or would someone need to buy a server or find someone with a server who is willing to host it?

Buying a server would be overkill for a site this small. Right now theRPGsite doesn't use that much bandwidth, so it should be fairly cheap to find a new host. Me, I've already recommended Dreamhost to Pundit and jrients.

(The coupon code "GOONHOST" saves you $50 off any package.)

Oh nice one... it really isn't that much.

First off, I want to thank Gruff for his help in this.

Second, looking at the site he proposes, the "level two" package would probably be the best choice for us, it gives a more than comfortable level of support for practically unlimited growth (and this place does continue to grow, and the plan is that it will continue to grow onward).

We're still working out who will actually buy the hosting (probably Jrients, since he might have it easier from where he is), and the cost after the coupon code for it would $190 for a year.  We'll probably be setting up a paypal account and asking people for donations; because you know, unlike RPG.net, we're not secretly a business that makes money off this place.  So when we ask for donations, its because we actually need it.

Plus I figure it won't be that hard to get a few of you to shell out a few bucks, the costs we're talking about aren't really out of this world, fortunately.

RPGPundit