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The Worst Things You Can Ever Do(tm)
filburt1
Join Date: Feb 2002
Posts: 6,144
Maryland, US
07-23-2003, 10:00 PM
What follows is a list of things that you should always do, except in extraordinary circumstances, when operating vBulletin. If you have any extra points, you can reply. While these are IMO, they're also commonly accepted. 1. Never ban search bots. They may use a bit of bandwidth when crawling your site, but you'll get more users when people find your site via Google, Yahoo, etc. 2. Always allow guests to view your site. You may get many registrations if you turn off guest viewing, but virtually nobody will post because the majority of registrants will simply view your site and leave. 3. Don't use a graphics-heavy layout such as those like Yaxay and other sites. Some people think they look good, but remember the majority of computer users are using 800x600 on a 56Kb modem. Also, remember that search engine bots can't index the text within images. 4. Always allow guests to view forums and threads, as well as clearly being able to tell statistics like the number of people online and the number of total posts. You don't need to give them access to attachments, the actual Who's Online page, or the memberlist. Do let them view profiles. If your forums offer special features such as a Tip of the Day, entice them by showing them the first several hundred chars of the tip, and then require them to register to view the rest. 5. Participate in your forums' discussions. This is crucial when starting out because it makes your site look busy. Once you get many hundreds of users, you can sit back some more. 6. Don't even bother considering promoting those who ask to be moderators. Instead, promote a moderator when you feel that (s)he is a great asset to the forum in a sense of maturity, responsibility, and resourcefulness on your site. 7. If you want to ban a person's IP, ban just that exact IP. Never ban a partial IP because for ISPs such as AOL and other dialups, you risk banning random users by accident. 8. If you do ban somebody, remain firm in your decision. Never let down! If they keep trying to register, keep banning. Most importantly, don't keep in communication with them. It only gives them further incentive. Publicly and privately with them, just pretend that they never existed. 9. Never, under any circumstances except for corporate websites, have another administrator. 10. Likewise, never turn on HTML anywhere, including but not limited to posts, signatures, and private messages. It opens up cross-site scripting vulnerabilities (XSS) which, simply explained, allows a user to inject malicious Javascript into a page and eventually steal your password. 11. Always stay up to date on your version of vBulletin. There are literally no exceptions to this. Always use the absolute latest stable (non-beta and non-RC) version which contains the latest security and bug fixes. 12. Never install a hack unless you need it. I guarantee you that you don't need a stock ticker, a weather display, a welcome panel, a massive list of useless stats, and a coffee machine all crammed at the top of the page. Any others? 
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#45
08-26-2006, 07:29 PM
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#46
10-26-2006, 05:39 PM
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I at one time lived by all these rules. On my second forum nonw, almost a 1000 members. 1 rule that I have broken that I think makes it better is this one.
2. Always allow guests to view your site. You may get many registrations if you turn off guest viewing, but virtually nobody will post because the majority of registrants will simply view your site and leave. I have found that if you have automatic login prechecked, the ability to show only post topics and not bodies, and make people to sign in that you will 1. Get more registrations (which is a no brainer) 2. Get more posts per user (has increased by 4 since I required) 3. Have a more active forum in other areas. The second thing I have found that I don't agree with now is this one. 11. Always stay up to date on your version of vBulletin. There are literally no exceptions to this. Always use the absolute latest stable (non-beta and non-RC) version which contains the latest security and bug fixes. My suggestion is not to use the newest one. Use a stable one. Use it for awhile, if you have alot of hacks on your board, don't change it. It will only cause headaches.
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#47
10-31-2006, 10:09 AM
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The Multi-Admin setup ONLY works if all the admins are completely on the same page. If you go that route you need to clearly define everyone's role from the beginning. The important part is to know who is going to retain the rights to the webspace if a separation or demotion is necessary...
I speak from experience that you need to have from the onset a protocol for dealing with a possible falling out. It will be much easier to part ways if you have openly discussed the doomsday scenario... I agree that only one person should have absolute access to the domain...
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#48
12-17-2006, 06:44 PM
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As one who is a second admin on one forum and root admin on another, I can understand the retisence of making admins, but it can be handy some times if you are not able to go online for any reason, at least your site can be 'looked after' but there has to be trust otherwise it wouldn't work well.
What does make it hard is if you are admin and the root admin dissappears on you, and can not be contacted. This has happened to me. And as the site was failing for want of a root admins attention, I ended up starting up again alone. And I am pleased to say we are still going! So there are good and bad things in any relationship, is basically what I am saying. 
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#49
12-18-2006, 12:09 AM
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In my opinion the worst thing you can do is neglect your site. If you do not have the time to make sure things are going smoothly then notify your members that you are going to take the forum down. I know of some sites that look legit, but have been havens for rip of artists and such. Although these people aren't the owners, they are letting it happen. I hate seeing stuff like that.
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#50
12-21-2006, 03:26 PM
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Two concerns:
1 "Dont pretend you are someone else". I am going to start my forum in a week or so and planned on making like 50 screennames, start making threads and posts and stuff, and change the dates around to make the forum look like it's been around for a couple weeks. I would probably spend a few days on this. This way, people will join because it looks to be a relatively popular forum. No one wants to join a forum with onnly 3 other members  2. "Stay true with your ban and dont give any explanation when rebanning." I actually had a case some time ago when I was banned unfairly, but the mods followed this rule and did not listen to me when I had created another screenname and just rebanned me with no explanation. I can understand this if the user is obviously a troll. But always? Other than that, great rules of thumb!
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#51
01-14-2007, 02:01 PM
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Nice tutorial, though the part about 800x640 and 56k is outdated; broadband is way more common, especiallyi n Europe, not to mention the increase of 1024x768 usage.
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