What's it like managing a Forum?

[gadget]

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I'm thinking of adding a forum to a popular site but have always put it off due to my perceived expectation that it'd be a pain to manage. Does anyone have any experience of adding a forum to a site?

[loquax]

I'm thinking of adding a forum to a popular site but have always put it off due to my perceived expectation that it'd be a pain to manage. Does anyone have any experience of adding a forum to a site?

It's the best of worlds, it's the worst of worlds.... on the plus side it can be brilliant, however it can also be incredibly hard work and at times stressful.

It can absorb a lot of your time too (spam, user arguments, upgrades, admin/modding, dealing with problem users)... and can be tough to monetise.

If you have any doubts I'd say don't do it... it can be great but it can also be tiring.

Jason

[jezaff]

My forum runs fairly smoothly. It only has about 5000 members and a handful of posters a day. A couple of volunteer mods (I love those guys) are a massive help at looking out for spam.

I worked hard to promote a friendly atmosphere from the start and enforced some strict (but normal) rules. This scared off a number of "freedom of speech" antagonists early on who left with a typical "you're killing your forum by enforcing the rules" speech but to be honest I haven't missed those guys ! So now everyone is so used to friendly and accepting chat that even the flameyest posts are met with counselling!

I have no plans to grow the forum any further as I would feel uncomfortable not being able to keep an eye on things. Potentially the publisher is liable for libel comments etc although I understand if you can show you enforce rules and act upon complaints then the liability will fall to the poster. Something to be aware of though.

The forum generates a fair amount of income for me, people often start threads asking what's the best accessory etc and I pop in a few affiliate links. I'd like to automatically stuff my amazon tag into links (for example) and will get round to coding that one day! For now the forum auto generates links around any stores that are mentioned, eg when someone posts "I bought this great DVD drive from Dixons".