DBPacific
Contributor
Not since I got reamed out for suggesting not dragging fins on silt. I have seen others mention SB on there though
Expanding ScubaBoard to social media
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The Chairman
Chairman of the Board
In my mind, the biggest differences between Facebook and ScubaBoard, other than the size are threefold...
Google-fu. We have a lot of it
Are we perfect? Hell no! But the mods, admins, and I do try hard.
Google-fu. We have a lot of it
Makes it easy to find a discussion on split-fins, or Spare Air.
Allows instructors, manufacturers, dive ops, and the like to access our Google-fu.
Moderation. We believe in being friendly and respectful.Allows instructors, manufacturers, dive ops, and the like to access our Google-fu.
We just don't allow fights.
We don't allow character assassinations.
We don't allow dog-piling.
We don't allow stalking.
We moderate for tone and not accuracy.
We don't and won't sell your personal info.We don't allow character assassinations.
We don't allow dog-piling.
We don't allow stalking.
We moderate for tone and not accuracy.
Ever!
Are we perfect? Hell no! But the mods, admins, and I do try hard.
What is the problem you are trying to solve? If it's increasing ad revenue, then shifting views from this site to FB or Instagram is counterproductive. You can make money off YouTube and TikTok views, but that requires real commitments of time and money to create content.
So what you are looking for is to drive traffic here? Visibility comes from search results. Scubaboard is already the top site for web searches on scuba related questions and the more detailed the question, the more likely threads on this site end up as top search results. The best way to keep this going is not to screw up the things that make the forum attractive to those who already contribute to it.
What's left? If you want to get links to this site into the walled gardens of FB and Twitter apps, then you need content on those apps and some compelling reason for those who stumble across your content to then subscribe.
The obvious answer for content is to repost stuff from here with a link to the original. For FB and Twitter, you could do snippets of new thread first posts along with maybe snippets of replies that get multiple likes. Instagram is obvious, just feed it uploaded images.
The immediate problem will be hashtags, that's the primary discovery method on at least Twitter and Instagram. Getting an intern to plug them in for college credit is a possibility. For automated methods, I would use something to represent the subforum it was posted on. I'd also build a list of appropriate tags and then include one or two that match words in the snippet.
The danger of reusing content on other sites is that you might drive away some of the people who create that content. Your terms of use allow you to do it, but if you rub people's noses in your claim to their writing you shouldn't be surprised if people refuse to play along.
So what you are looking for is to drive traffic here? Visibility comes from search results. Scubaboard is already the top site for web searches on scuba related questions and the more detailed the question, the more likely threads on this site end up as top search results. The best way to keep this going is not to screw up the things that make the forum attractive to those who already contribute to it.
What's left? If you want to get links to this site into the walled gardens of FB and Twitter apps, then you need content on those apps and some compelling reason for those who stumble across your content to then subscribe.
The obvious answer for content is to repost stuff from here with a link to the original. For FB and Twitter, you could do snippets of new thread first posts along with maybe snippets of replies that get multiple likes. Instagram is obvious, just feed it uploaded images.
The immediate problem will be hashtags, that's the primary discovery method on at least Twitter and Instagram. Getting an intern to plug them in for college credit is a possibility. For automated methods, I would use something to represent the subforum it was posted on. I'd also build a list of appropriate tags and then include one or two that match words in the snippet.
The danger of reusing content on other sites is that you might drive away some of the people who create that content. Your terms of use allow you to do it, but if you rub people's noses in your claim to their writing you shouldn't be surprised if people refuse to play along.
The Chairman
Chairman of the Board
What's the vision?
I don't understand what you want a social media presence for. This isn't a dive op or dive shop that needs to connect with potential paying customers, driving traffic to FB would cost you money.
drrich2
Contributor
But what about the reverse? I suspect many people get into diving at the OW level relying mainly on their local dive shop and/or dive club for info. The LDS has likely got a Facebook presence. Yes, these divers may do Google searches for some questions, but they don't know who to trust, or really what's out there. The LDS or club Facebook page may send them to a business webpage with dive trip offerings, dive training courses and some free educational content.
Whether a Scuba Board Face Book presence would change much, I don't know. And how best to get the word out?
@The Chairman - when I think of scuba-related non-local entities other than vendors who seem to want to raise and keep 'brand awareness' of themselves out there, one organization pops into my mind ... Dive Heart. They seem to like to draw attention to what they're doing. A private discussion with a couple of their top people might be quite informative, if you haven't already.
People do have a point in caution over some content being posted elsewhere. If I post an essay advocating the 'pro.' side of shark feed diving on Facebook, and someone copies that to some Facebook scuba-related page, and a dozen Facebook warriors attack and vilify my name there, I can't defend myself unless I'm on or join that platform.
But someone could post on FB that SB has a discussion on shark feed diving, pro.s and con.s debated. That can already happen, done by any user. As for trip reports, how often do some of us mention reviews on Undercurrent? There'd be more if they didn't rely on a paid subscription model.
While the pandemic threw a wrench in the gears, the Invasions and Surges are post-worthy.
So there's a difference between posted Scuba Board content on Facebook, for example, vs. posting on Facebook that there's a topic of discussion and linking back here. And some trip discussions and get togethers might be sharable.
If you have social media accounts I think it is a fairly standard expectation that you should post an announcement about site problems.
Social media could be the means to attract more eyes on SB, so I don't necessarily see that as evil. After all all content on SB is publicly viewable and searchable anyway. Maybe occasionally posting interesting links to the discussion on SB I might not object to if there is an overall benefit to SB. Or better still, post links to some thoughtful curated content by the staff to generate some traffic.
Just to be sure, I'm not talking about moving content over, using SM as an alternative to forums, or spending huge amounts of time on SM. I'm talking about occasionally promoting the charms of SB to a wider audience as well as practical announcements like site outages. Two primary usages.
You might ultimately find little benefit in your analytics for traffic originating from SM and decide it's not worth the effort, but please at least provide site status updates regardless.
Social media could be the means to attract more eyes on SB, so I don't necessarily see that as evil. After all all content on SB is publicly viewable and searchable anyway. Maybe occasionally posting interesting links to the discussion on SB I might not object to if there is an overall benefit to SB. Or better still, post links to some thoughtful curated content by the staff to generate some traffic.
Just to be sure, I'm not talking about moving content over, using SM as an alternative to forums, or spending huge amounts of time on SM. I'm talking about occasionally promoting the charms of SB to a wider audience as well as practical announcements like site outages. Two primary usages.
You might ultimately find little benefit in your analytics for traffic originating from SM and decide it's not worth the effort, but please at least provide site status updates regardless.
One challenge that faecesbook may bring is people with no longer term interest in Scuba. I did my PADI on holiday and here’s my pictures, please like me.
Whilst we all love beginners — we were all beginners once — the thing that attracts us to ScubaBoard is developing our scuba careers. We’re a bit geeky about it too and are here for the long term. Faecesbook will be like a fox in the night; steal the food you left out for the hedgehogs and take a dump on your lawn, never to be seen again.
Or, in a more polite way, I don’t want to invest my time and effort trying to compose a helpful informative reply with the aim of educating a newcomer only to see them disappear as quick as they came.
But yes, you have to deal with the avaricious ephemeral vultures from social media land even though it is playing with the devil.
Edit: didn’t say narcissistic. That’s better.
Whilst we all love beginners — we were all beginners once — the thing that attracts us to ScubaBoard is developing our scuba careers. We’re a bit geeky about it too and are here for the long term. Faecesbook will be like a fox in the night; steal the food you left out for the hedgehogs and take a dump on your lawn, never to be seen again.
Or, in a more polite way, I don’t want to invest my time and effort trying to compose a helpful informative reply with the aim of educating a newcomer only to see them disappear as quick as they came.
But yes, you have to deal with the avaricious ephemeral vultures from social media land even though it is playing with the devil.
Edit: didn’t say narcissistic. That’s better.
Born after 1980, do use social media, but prefer to keep the spheres separate. Not sure how much I'd interact with SB on FB.
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