Should RB have a facebook presence?

[KingOfPain]

I was also thinking, being RBer and that, we don't need to use our normal accounts just to be different. We can create new accounts with our aliases.

Now to address the other questions.
RB has never went for any membership drives, nor do I care to see our membership go up just for the sake to say we are big. People come here not because of hype or false pretenses, they are here because they belong. I have always maintained "All we need is a few good men" to have a vibrant, active and friendly COMMUNITY. We are not big in a commercial sense but I think we are big (in many ways), and special for a privately ran site, that had endured the test of time for ~15 years. I chuckle when I see people post something to the effect of "OMG, we are losing members.... we must....".

RB should not be Civ (or any games) driven, tho it's somewhat civ centric for a long time (Damn you, Blizzard). My hope is that when we finally get this CMS running it would empower RBers to pick up the ball and run with IT. IT being whatever they have the interest to do in RB. For example, it would have been an easy thing to throw up a League of Legends sub site by the admins and maintained by a member or 2. Most importantly, it has to be easy to maintain by non technical people, and with no special tools. Each section can have multiple (probably preferred) over seers.

The plan also include an active front page with different staffs (also automatic in-site info gathering scripts) reporting on whatever you think is of RB interests - be it gaming news, humor and entertainment. I want the RB's front page, not the forum, to be the portal.

[thestick]

Definitely update the main page. It took me a while to realize that the community wasn't dead (since the last update was January 2011).

[KingOfPain]

Oh yea, hehe.... in the early days, I have even asked RBers and other sites NOT to link to us. We kinda wanted to remain off the chart; and bandwidth was expensive back then ;p

[Ichabod]

Well, a good front page could be very helpful to get new members interested in the things we discuss here. For example, if we took the PBEM/PB list info out from the Google docs document and into a section of the front page, with a link to the game thread, I'm sure people would find it and like it. We could do the same for other games (like listing Sucession Games played, variants played, etc.).

[NobleHelium]

There is no chance anyone is going to create a new Facebook account just for RB.

[BRickAstley]

I was also thinking, being RBer and that, we don't need to use our normal accounts just to be different. We can create new accounts with our aliases.

Well, I hear that and it still sounds like unnecessary work for very little potential payoff. I've said my piece, and if people want to do an RB Facebook that's fine. I just won't be a part of it.

RB has never went for any membership drives, nor do I care to see our membership go up just for the sake to say we are big. People come here not because of hype or false pretenses, they are here because they belong. I have always maintained "All we need is a few good men" to have a vibrant, active and friendly COMMUNITY. We are not big in a commercial sense but I think we are big (in many ways), and special for a privately ran site, that had endured the test of time for ~15 years. I chuckle when I see people post something to the effect of "OMG, we are losing members.... we must....".

I completely agree with this. I don't think there's any current need to force a growth of members, we have a good core of people and aren't in any danger of dying off.

RB should not be Civ (or any games) driven, tho it's somewhat civ centric for a long time (Damn you, Blizzard). My hope is that when we finally get this CMS running it would empower RBers to pick up the ball and run with IT. IT being whatever they have the interest to do in RB. For example, it would have been an easy thing to throw up a League of Legends sub site by the admins and maintained by a member or 2. Most importantly, it has to be easy to maintain by non technical people, and with no special tools. Each section can have multiple (probably preferred) over seers.

The plan also include an active front page with different staffs (also automatic in-site info gathering scripts) reporting on whatever you think is of RB interests - be it gaming news, humor and entertainment. I want the RB's front page, not the forum, to be the portal.

I think this would definitely be a good change, and one we should strive to enact soon. To have our front page up to date again, and have it reflective of the current activity going on here. Records of all of the various things that have been going on (short descriptions and links to all of those PBEMs? awesome!), and definitely a section for signups for any sort of game that someone would want to start. Not too sure on the article business, that could be hit or miss but if we have people that want to generate specific content I'd be willing to give it a try. Just show any passersby that we're here and going strong.

And to tie in with advertising, that's all the advertising we need anyways. People that are interested in the niche we have here are the types of people that will want to seek out if there is such a thing, and making it easier for genuinely interested people to see what's going on can only be an improvement.

[SevenSpirits]

I think we could use some articles. There are a lot of CIV/MP-related questions that get asked over and over, and it would be nice to have a good reference. I'm willing to do some writing and editing for this.

[Lewwyn]

I said black sheep. I don't really use facebook. I think my feelings have already been mostly reflected in previous comments.

[Ichabod]

I think we could use some articles. There are a lot of CIV/MP-related questions that get asked over and over, and it would be nice to have a good reference. I'm willing to do some writing and editing for this.

That would be awesome!

[Commodore]

This is an elitist community. That's a good thing.