Other Forums slanted towards the US

[Deane]

Being a new Atom owner in the US, I notice that this forum is mostly UK owners. The North American Atom is somewhat different and the model numbers are not the same between the two companies. So I have attempted to sign up with the site Ariel Atom Chat. Is anyone here on that site as well? It seems like it has been deserted. Only 4 new posts since April. I signed up for it but it has a strange requirement that beginners must post on a special page first. But when I go to that page there is NO way to bring up a new posting window. Also the rule summary says I do not have permission to post. Does anyone know anything about how to get past this roadblock? I have sent 5 messages to the Admin but with no reply. This is the problem page. If someone sees a New Post button here let me know with a screen shot please.
Deane
https://www.arielatomchat.com/forums/forum25.html

[John Scherrer]

Hello Deane

Another US owner posted the same question earlier this week ..

viewtopic.php?f=19&t=18046

It looks like the site has been pretty dead for a while now. Users who are already registered look like they can post the odd message and receive replies.

Once you registered, the site admin would send you a verification email but it seems that process has stopped.

If you can logon, here's where the Post New Thread button is located :-

PostNewThread.jpg (71.18 KiB) Viewed 943 times

[Crit]

It's hard to understand why the forum is dead, I'm also in the US and there is definitely a lot of demand for US atom forum. I'm wondering either if there's a legal issue or site owner passed away and there's no other admins.

[hamtt]

Nothing to do with that. The US chat forum was set up by a Bolus and a few other owners who used to post on here.

Back in the day (and I suppose still now) there used to be some very passionate owners and a lot of heated debates used to happen generally between US owners who were happy to modify and change thir cars and criticize any weakness and UK owners who preferred nothing but what the factory supplied and too any criticism of the car personally.

In those days the UK owners significantly outnumbered the US so and I suppose Bolus felt stifled and and set up the other forum where he felt he and fellow like minded owners could discuss things without getting censored or attacked.

This was over 10 years ago and forums take a lot work sometimes to maintain and its a thankless job. Over the years Bolus and the other admins have just sold their cars or lost interest and moved on. Its as simple as that.

[cvjoint]

I do feel like I am talking to myself on AAC. Some of the low foot traffic is due to technical neglect, I receive many PMs from would be users who just cannot register. That doesn't mean it's altogether of no use. I've made several connections there but carried them over to calls or emails.

[Anon]

Why not create a new forum? using 1 of many CMS's free solutions out there. i.e. WoordPress, Drupal or Joomla! etc. I could help if you want, I work at a small software company where we produce software like Windows, XBOX and Azure.

[Steve Gibson]

I suspect the US forum suffers from the same malaise that this one suffers from. Facebook is pulling people away from club forums because it offers, by comparison, a 21st century interface where users can post text, image or video very easily. It's not a change I want to see, because I don't want Facebook to become the place where ALL enthusiasts of anything gather, but it's clearly FB policy. They have been going after clubs of every kind for a while.

Putting their expansionist policy aside, their platform is useless for searching and locating information. It's a 48-hour exchange space, like most social media.

If you could build a platform with the hierarchical organisation of a forum and the interface of Facebook, you'd be onto something.

[Deane]

Thanks everyone for the update. I have visited the page that John Scherrer posted an image of on 2 different browsers and 2 different computers and the Post New Thread box is missing in all. This is a fault of mismanagement or neglect I would guess but it does explain why there are no NEW members since April!!!
It is really too bad that the absent Administrator does not transfer power to someone who cares. I have volunteered this to them in one of my 5 inquiries.
As far as FAKEBook, I would never be found on that Russian Trolls paradise!

NO BUTTON.jpg (246.28 KiB) Viewed 812 times

[John Scherrer]

Sadly, No ‘Post New Thread’ button will be displayed until their admin sends you an email with the required verify email link.

[Karl V]

Here is the guy that currently owns the domain, just in case anyone wanted to try a different angle of making contact...

https://www.linkedin.com/in/sjjenkins

https://whois.domaintools.com/arielatomchat.com