Borgs8472
04-06-2006, 11:42 PM
Greetings once again vb.org people!
Since my forum has achieved a fairly innovative AND stable look now, I thought I would present it for some feedback.
http://www.torrentforge.com/torrentforge.jpg (www.torrentforge.com)
First up, the site stuff. I used to administer a much larger message board, but we had a falling out and so I started my forum based on one of my favourite topics, bittorrent (http://www.bittorrent.com/).
This started the first forum (http://www.torrentforge.com/forumdisplay.php?f=4) and later spawned the guides (http://www.torrentforge.com/forumdisplay.php?f=16) forum when I had written enough guides. I hope to continue to add to that and fill my site with more unique content.
The two other main forums are Interesting (http://www.torrentforge.com/forumdisplay.php?f=10) for general links and news and Geek Stuff (http://www.torrentforge.com/forumdisplay.php?f=5) for geekier threads.
I have been doing a lot of promotion (well more than I've ever done) to get the site hits, and with much success. However there's a real lack of posting or community so far :( I hope to capitalise on major bittorrent forums where people ask questions about trying to optimise their downloads and not getting answers, joining my site. I expect I should try and define my goals a little better still. I am thinking of putting a forum description in the header still.
There are two hidden forums for people I know in real life.
===
On to the technical stuff.
The skin was brought from extremepixels (http://www.extremepixels.com/), a good investment I felt. I modified the CSS quite a bit, however the contrast of colour is still a little higher than I'd like. But it's sexy none the less.
The banner was made by shellspeare (http://www.best-board.com/member.php?u=6) over at best-board.com
I heavily modified the header/navbar placing the login box in the header and greatly shrinking the navbar, and effect I think is very efficient and looks good too.
For guests, I have a fading ticker (http://www.dynamicdrive.com/dynamicindex2/tickertape.htm) I found on dynamic drive encouraging guests to register. It's values still need a little tweaking.
I have a sidebar (separate template, called and cached in the footer) which has another 'please register' message. (currently it's saying unregistered posters should post due to the <1 post options, this needs tweaking still). Or it has a 'own posts' block based on my navbar hack if you're logged in. (see sig)
I have a modified random quote block as featured on vb.org, which fits nice random quotes on every page - a good placement I feel. I have some links, which the recipricols of which have got me a lot of hits! (if only I had ads, oh well...)
I have flashchat installed, as well as PaulM's 'who's in flashchat'. Registered users of a private usergroup see who has visited in the last 24 hours, however guests and normal users do not. I have an arcade with a stupid amount of games.
So... what do people have to say?
Since my forum has achieved a fairly innovative AND stable look now, I thought I would present it for some feedback.
http://www.torrentforge.com/torrentforge.jpg (www.torrentforge.com)
First up, the site stuff. I used to administer a much larger message board, but we had a falling out and so I started my forum based on one of my favourite topics, bittorrent (http://www.bittorrent.com/).
This started the first forum (http://www.torrentforge.com/forumdisplay.php?f=4) and later spawned the guides (http://www.torrentforge.com/forumdisplay.php?f=16) forum when I had written enough guides. I hope to continue to add to that and fill my site with more unique content.
The two other main forums are Interesting (http://www.torrentforge.com/forumdisplay.php?f=10) for general links and news and Geek Stuff (http://www.torrentforge.com/forumdisplay.php?f=5) for geekier threads.
I have been doing a lot of promotion (well more than I've ever done) to get the site hits, and with much success. However there's a real lack of posting or community so far :( I hope to capitalise on major bittorrent forums where people ask questions about trying to optimise their downloads and not getting answers, joining my site. I expect I should try and define my goals a little better still. I am thinking of putting a forum description in the header still.
There are two hidden forums for people I know in real life.
===
On to the technical stuff.
The skin was brought from extremepixels (http://www.extremepixels.com/), a good investment I felt. I modified the CSS quite a bit, however the contrast of colour is still a little higher than I'd like. But it's sexy none the less.
The banner was made by shellspeare (http://www.best-board.com/member.php?u=6) over at best-board.com
I heavily modified the header/navbar placing the login box in the header and greatly shrinking the navbar, and effect I think is very efficient and looks good too.
For guests, I have a fading ticker (http://www.dynamicdrive.com/dynamicindex2/tickertape.htm) I found on dynamic drive encouraging guests to register. It's values still need a little tweaking.
I have a sidebar (separate template, called and cached in the footer) which has another 'please register' message. (currently it's saying unregistered posters should post due to the <1 post options, this needs tweaking still). Or it has a 'own posts' block based on my navbar hack if you're logged in. (see sig)
I have a modified random quote block as featured on vb.org, which fits nice random quotes on every page - a good placement I feel. I have some links, which the recipricols of which have got me a lot of hits! (if only I had ads, oh well...)
I have flashchat installed, as well as PaulM's 'who's in flashchat'. Registered users of a private usergroup see who has visited in the last 24 hours, however guests and normal users do not. I have an arcade with a stupid amount of games.
So... what do people have to say?