Hey All,
My name is Jeff and as of last Thursday, my wife Kristen and I are the new site owners.

We are still coming up to speed on things--we just got the last half of the login credentials Monday, and so most of our time so far has just been resetting passwords, updating contact info, and exploring how the software that runs this site is architected. A lot more exploring left to do on that front...

The primary thing I wanted to say in this post is that my wife and I *care* about creating a good experience for users and staff, and starting right now, we are here to support you.

I'm not sure exactly what a good experience for users and staff looks like long term--a lot of questions that need answers first--but in the short term, the obvious highest priority thing is implementing better anti-spam measures. Spam sucks. We haven't ever tried to architect anti-spam features before so if you have suggestions on what to do, use this thread: http://www.rockclimbing.com/...ost=2637993;#2637993

My wife and I both work full time, so it's not all going to get fixed tomorrow or next week or even this coming year, but we're gonna start chipping away at things.

I have a bunch of questions for you guys about the history of the site and where you'd like to see the site go in the future. I would love your help, but I also totally understand if anyone decides to hit the eject button because there's a new owner.

Right now, the plan is:
1) finish the technical aspects of the site transfer
2) get spam under control
3) understand current site staff structure & remove people who no longer want to be involved
4) Have a discussion with the community about where we are now and where we want to take this site--I've got lots of ideas, and I've no problem being a benevolent dictator when needed, but setting future direction of the site is a conversation, not me showing up in my dilbert costume saying "I'm the new owner, now we do things my way" (at least not too often)
5) start to evaluate the current software platform--what parts can we modify, what parts need to be completely swapped out (have you seen http://www.discourse.org? it's light years better than our current forum software, although integrating it with the other parts of the site would be a very complex project)

Regarding site culture:
There are just a couple of things that are non-negotiable based on who I am as a person and what kind of site I want to be associated with. You can sum most of them up as be friendly, treat people, including women, with respect, don't be a jerk, and treat others how you'd want to be treated. The rockclimbing community tends to be a little rough around the edges, thrill-seeking, rules-pushing, heart-pounding awesomeness. No problems there--I was the kid growing up who drove the town roundabout backwards every so often just to feel like a rebel. But I'm not going to tolerate sexually crude remarks or slamming n00bs. People who want to do those things can go find another site. I haven't seen problems with these things so far, but just wanted to set the ground rules.

As far as who are we--my wife and I love the outdoors, particularly the mountains--I grew up in the North Cascades north of Seattle, and my wife grew up in the Rockies of Colorado and although we currently live in Silicon Valley, our hearts pine for real mountains with rock and snow. We're also both pretty nerdy and we like to push ourselves physically and mentally. Kristen's done a half Ironman and I've hiked 50 miles in 24 hours.

[image]http://www.rockclimbing.com/cgi-bin/forum/gforum.cgi?do=post_attachment;postatt_id=6667;[/image]

I first got exposed to rock climbing when I took the Mountaineers Basic Climbing Course in highschool. My current favorite climb is probably the summit pyramid on Mount Challenger, which is only rated at 5.6 if I remember right, but climbing 5.6 in plastic mountaineering boots is a whole different level of difficulty than doing it in rock shoes. Plus it was a difficult two-day approach through some of the most heavily glaciated terrain in the lower 48, so my friends and I definitely felt legit on that one.

If you have questions for me/us, post them in this thread.

Cheers,

Jeff and Kristen

Hi Jeff.

I sincerely hope that you are able to turn this site around, but I am not optimistic about your chances. This site has gone from being a thriving community resource to a wasteland. The majority of the moderators haven't logged on in months and the quality of the discourse in the forum is extremely low. There are other climbing sites that are working great at this time and getting users to come back to RC.com is going to be a challenge. I will look forward to seeing what you can do for this site and wish you much success.

Edit to add -
It has been over 9 hours since the OP and you have had 4 responses. That speaks volumes about the state of this site...

Hi Jeff,

Once upon a time, I ran the day-to-day RC.com operations. I don't have a question, but I do have a suggestion. Don't try to be everything to everybody. Initiate your rules to bring about your goals and the enforce them mercilessly. Don't waste time explaining your decisions to people. Ban anybody who gets in your way. In short, don't be the nice guy. Be the guy for whom his vision of what the site can be is far more important than any one person (or small group of people).

Counter intuitive? Yes. Stands a chance of being effective? Yes. The alternative is to slip into the same trap that everybody who came before you fell for, including me.

Best of luck!
Jay

And that advice would result in creating another "Mountain Project" type site, complete with its heavy-handed moderation and censorship. If that's Jeff's vision, I suppose it's fine to go that route, but this website has always struck an interesting (and I think proper) balance between anything goes and excessive moderation. I think there is some risk in radically altering that balance, in terms of losing long time users who make meaningful contributions.

Curt

Good luck with the project!

Hopefully you have some concepts in mind for bringing up the levels of interrelatedness with the various social platforms. Seems to me that rc could have brought back to life some interaction had they leveraged those connections(367 Twitter Followers, 1872 on FB, last posted to on, humorously enough, April 1st. No Pinterest or YouTube/Vimeo profiles...).

Another thing I see as having the potential for improving people's experiences would be the ability to develop feeds through the use of network groups.

What RC currently is, is hanging on by a string, as was said earlier. Not a go-to place anymore. Hell, nobody even posted about the El Cap Pirate's accident, and I am pretty sure that nobody reading this post hasn't heard about it. Made page 1 of Reddit, there are Response videos to Ammon's video of the carnage being created on YouTube and it went unspoken about here.

yes - that was my point.

The spam almost ended it for me.

And keep folks from linking their blogs/personal websites. If they want to post something, post it!

Doc

+1

Agreed, these are spam, pure & simple. As are the front page pics that are voted in by the submitter and two of their friends as soon as they are submitted; working the system for free advertising.

Good luck.
Find mods that will cut down on sexist/racist crap, but leave the honest n00b bashing. Gotta learn somehow. I did.
Make 'campground' controversial again. Consolidate it and the soapbox, and use it as a dumpster for non-spam shit. Cagefighting if you get my meaning.
Better User Interface.
Don't try to be a mountainproject, where everyone is friendly and spraying about the routes they've photographed. Don't try to be a supertopo; the last bastion of the california hardman. Bring rockclimbing.com back to its shitty awesomeness.

And keep folks from linking their blogs/personal websites. If they want to post something, post it!

Doc

The majority of those left pre-spam era did so because they got tired of everything being an axe murdering fest or dick measuring contest. I too have grown tired of all the constant bashing, which is why I dont visit this site very often anymore.

Registered: Nov 5, 2007, 6:40 PM
Last Logon: Nov 2, 2013, 11:57 PM
Posts: 2622 (1.2 per day)

FWIW I think many of the people who post on here like that things are a little more "raw"...

IMHO there is a SMALL minority of users that revel in being rude and sometimes abusive.

There seems to be this "common knowledge" that there was a massive exodus from the site before the spam flood. Does anyone have any numbers to back up this assertion?

Dude, you post almost every other day or two.

And take a look at this: http://www.rockclimbing.com/...y;sb=post_time;mh=25
That;s what you call not very often?

There seems to be this "common knowledge" that there was a massive exodus from the site before the spam flood. Does anyone have any numbers to back up this assertion? Yes, there were a few high profile departures, but an awful lot of the same names remain and still post. And assigning reasons for mass departures is even more suspect.

IOW, I just don't buy that answer.
I also agree that both turning this site into the over-moderated spray-a-thon of MP or the school-yard free-for-all of supertopo would remove a lot of the reasons why this site is a viable alternative.

Last, MP.com is not a mod-heavy communist society.

Of the 750 posts I have on there, one was edited by a mod. They used to throw the gavel around, but they dont throw it around nearly as much anymore.

A community that tries to appeal to everyone appeals to no one, so there *will* come a time when I have to make some decisions about this site's direction/culture in the future.

When that happens, I'm sure some of you will choose to leave and others of you will choose to become more involved. That's just the way it goes...

Ah, one other thing.... The star rating system. That's gotta go. Time was a random percentage of users each day could rate a couple posts with a trophy or poo, and iirc you could see who did it. The stars thing was a plan of j_ung's that was started but never fully implemented due to him being shown the door. Plan was to have it be a way to bias search results on a topic, to make searches more fruitful. Instead it never got fully fleshed out and became subject to abuse (which I admit I was party to.)

Gah.... Here I was thinking I had finally gotten the RC monkey off my back, only to be sucked in again thinking how good a resource it could be. Damn you Jeff!

On a side note, Jeff, I might still have flat file copies of most of the threads in The Lab I was involved with, and if DDT is indeed out of the picture might be willing to pass them along to rebuild what I had been doing there.

they always come back (TM)

Remember when the servers were so sluggish and bogged down that it was nearly futile to navigate the site, and often it was down completely? To me, that was the first obvious move away in numbers, and that was before DDT and Sangiro bought the site.

When DDT came on, the repair on servers was appreciated, but momentum had been lost.

Maybe somebody will dig up the site traffic history statistics that have been posted.

Funniest part is that is actually quoting Lena_chita from my FB feed.

But, yes. I'm a recovering RC addict. Hopes are up given the ownership change, but I'm withholding judgement until I see what direction Jeff takes.




Btw- Who's 1-starring my posts? Seriously, it's been *years*, and USNavy and I have long since buried the hatchet and might even consider each other *friends*. So it's not him. Is there someone else needing a hug?

lena stole that from me. trademarked it years ago!!

lena stole that from me. trademarked it years ago!!

I didn't steal it. I was quoting you, and considered it self-evident that everyone in that thread knew the source of the quote. I guess not...

I honestly don't see a way to save this site. It is a tarnished brand and a joke. What's more, it does not have a single reason to visit other than the forums.

Forums are essentially bathroom stall walls. People will write bullshit just to see their own bullshit. I'm as guilty as anyone. Not everyone wants to see that. Look at MP.com, I know very few people who post there yet nearly everyone I've met uses the site. What reason does anyone have to use this site if not to post?

Finally, if you do want to save the site, lets be perfectly clear. jt512 has driven more users, some quality, away from this site than any other problem. Of course this is anecdotal but I believe it to be true. When he gets going, he provides a truly close up look at mental illness. Had he never visited the site, I bet we'd still be seeing 2010 type of traffic.

I never noticed the spam, it was harmless and funny.

God damn... This place is worse than smack. All over my FB feed, I'm here again for another hit....

I've been clean for almost 4 years (minus a few drive by's).

Maybe that goes to show that there still is interest in this site.

I didn't steal it. I was quoting you, and considered it self-evident that everyone in that thread knew the source of the quote. I guess not...

I think the main strength of RC.com is the database of routes. But it isn't as meaningful as it could be. I'd like to see more detailed beta on routes, such as mountain project offers. For long routes, we need more than a route description, we need suggested gear, pitch-by-pitch descriptions and descent beta. Users could provide this in the Ascents Recorded feature if a norm developed around that issue. Maybe some kind of reputation points would work like they do on some IT sites, like stackoverflow.com.

Also, I imagine the spam and trivial discussions are probably driving away your more experienced climbers. Again, some incentive to keep them involved might help.

I know social media is trendy, but I don't think it's a substitute for a void of expertise and helpful content.

Again with the 1 star?

Sigh. The stars were such a great idea. If only they had been fully implemented.

Hey all--I'm traveling for my day job this entire week, so my response times are going to be slower.

I hid a bunch of posts in this thread because they were totally non-constructive.

This thread is for folks to chime in with their thoughts on the future of the site and to ask me questions.

I'll be PM'ing a few of you shortly with more explanation of why I hid your posts.

As far as a more general update--Kristen and I spent a bunch of time this past weekend working on stuff. I'll try and write an update on our progress later this week.

Cheers,
Jeff

I think the main strength of RC.com is the database of routes. But it isn't as meaningful as it could be. I'd like to see more detailed beta on routes, such as mountain project offers. For long routes, we need more than a route description, we need suggested gear, pitch-by-pitch descriptions and descent beta. Users could provide this in the Ascents Recorded feature if a norm developed around that issue. Maybe some kind of reputation points would work like they do on some IT sites, like stackoverflow.com.

Also, I imagine the spam and trivial discussions are probably driving away your more experienced climbers. Again, some incentive to keep them involved might help.

I know social media is trendy, but I don't think it's a substitute for a void of expertise and helpful content.

Regarding the route database, there is a thread in the S&F forum with some thoughts - hopefully more will be added and the route section will be improved.

This thread has actually been one of the best in sense of community I have seen on RC.com for a long while. The community is what made this site what it was, and why it's been falling apart.

For me, the best part of this site was always getting to know people and then making an effort to meet them and go climbing when I was in their area. This is the stuff that kept/keeps the prominant posters.

There are some forum and topics where there should be heavy moderation, but in general you want people to talk with each other, not at each other, and thread drift is an indication that this is happening.

i agree with gg, this thread....all posts... has brought back a sense of community. most of the posters have been through the many changes of management and have a lot to offer.

looks like my first post was one of the posts to go. my point was !.this ship is sinking fast, if you're going to get change implemented, it has to be sooner than later.

2. i pointed out the absurdity of the statement of "being respectful to people, including women." and, that it might be better worded to "deal with sexism" on the site.

anyways, i've got a thick skin. i modded for many years.

good luck

but, you won't win any friends or favours by hiding posts you don't like

Regarding the route database, there is a thread in the S&F forum with some thoughts - hopefully more will be added and the route section will be improved.

I don't see how you link to the forums from the routes database, but anyway my point is that it doesn't happen on RC like it does on mountain project.
I know about adding to information to the the routes, I am adding to the routes data, but most users are not. In mountain project, almost all those who note that they climbed a route add some helpful information about the route. In RC.com the users typically just note that they climbed the route. They are ticking, rather than adding helpful information. If that were to change, I think it would make RC more appealing.

IMHO there is a SMALL minority of users that revel in being rude and sometimes abusive. For every user that likes it "raw" and has 1000s of intentionally inflammatory posts, there are 100s of users that would prefer to talk about rock climbing in the a more civil manner, similar to what we do when we meet face to face. By catering to the vocal minority, I think that you drive away the larger and more civil user group. I don't want to see a whitewashed and heavily moderated site, but don't particularly enjoy participating in a site where threads commonly devolve into insult contests. Although I do not have data to support this, I believe that the mass exodus of users happened way before the spamming. I quit visiting due to the site becoming progressively more toxic. I am sure others had different reasons.

+1

I have no problem with site users keeping each other in check. This site went well beyond that for quite some time. With everything there is a balance.

On another note, some people have suggested catering to the n00b. Moving away from the cliche "do a search" or "you're gonna die" replies would be nice, but you can't maintain a community around shoe and first rope discussions.

I'm having trouble remembering exactly when moderation was much heavier and inconsistently applied. I came over to rc.com after wreck.climbing was already well in decline in non-spam posts. (Seeing a trend in my patterns?) While I'm not a fan of back and forth squabbling when it's clearly stopped being productive or people being dicks for the sake of it, I'd be much more likely to bail if moderation is too heavy-handed.

On another note, some people have suggested catering to the n00b. Moving away from the cliche "do a search" or "you're gonna die" replies would be nice, but you can't maintain a community around shoe and first rope discussions.

+1

I have no problem with site users keeping each other in check. This site went well beyond that for quite some time. With everything there is a balance.

I'm having trouble remembering exactly when moderation was much heavier and inconsistently applied. I came over to rc.com after wreck.climbing was already well in decline in non-spam posts. (Seeing a trend in my patterns?) While I'm not a fan of back and forth squabbling when it's clearly stopped being productive or people being dicks for the sake of it, I'd be much more likely to bail if moderation is too heavy-handed.

On another note, some people have suggested catering to the n00b. Moving away from the cliche "do a search" or "you're gonna die" replies would be nice, but you can't maintain a community around shoe and first rope discussions.

My recollection is that a large number of regular users were disgruntled with the direction the site took when DDT took it over, and left the site soon after. But I could be mistaken.

Have to disagree on that point, as the existence of teen magazines is proof it's not true. It's that the user quickly outgrows the community, not that the community can't exist. The problem is striking a balance between making the community accessible to new folk while at the same time keeping the interest of the older ones. Plus with new ropes and shoes coming out all the time and the decline of brick&mortar stores, how else is someone new going to get opinions on their first pieces of gear?

what kept users coming to rc.com was a vibrant, sometimes bawdy, familiar forum known as community. i came to this site for climbing info but stayed because of the connections i made. through community i picked up some good climbing buddies and friends.........most of them i know only online and haven't met in real life. with changes in rc.com leadership and issues with the site, most of my interaction has switched over to facebook. give a look at the threads in campfire or soapbox, there is not much turnover in discussion.

i benefited from gear reviews and also swapping knowledge climber to climber, ie., what down jacket do you prefer, or what harness is more comfortable on a longer climb. it's these kinds of exchanges that keep users coming back.

as well, it has to be recognized that climbers are a rowdy bunch, there's going to be off colour talk and a few stfu noobs. just keep out the dumb assery sexist, racist, and homophobic crap.

Not sure if that's agreeing with me or not, Marge. But if not, I'd like to amend my earlier statement to bring it more in line with what I meant, which is what you stated better.

I don't think many people would consider that picture (Williams on the first nude ascent of Shockley's Ceiling) to be sexually explicit content.

I miss the gear reviews from John. He always did good work on those trade shows.

I never enjoyed the lab talk because I'm just not interested in the physics of everything and those conversations could get numb from the over-analysis of the numbers, but I think those conversations were a good part of the meat for a while, and I did learn something when someone finally wrote up a summary for dummies.