stats from the HTML:
Threads: 8,807, Posts: 182,243, Members: 999, Active Members: 136
How does this place go from 1000 members to no one posting for a day?
Only 136 active members?
Something happen in the past that I'm not aware of? Fill me in.
Its not the same around here without "meatwad" .
The active member count is the amount of members you have logged in during the last 60 days I believe. That number was never higher than 300 or so. There's lots of people who probably signed up, and never came back.
I neglected the site for a while when I put the rc hobby on the back burner. I have no idea what cause people to leave or stop posting. The amount of traffic is has been on a downward trend for the last year almost two years. I'm working on a redesign right now and looking to vastly improve the site and turn it more into a rc website + forum, versus just a forum. I hope it turns out good.
I've been trying to do better about updating the homepage and get on here and post more often to see what's going on, but it may be too late. The only thing that'll bring the site back is what got it going in the first place, word of mouth promotion.
If you could sort the member list by post count you'd see that 600 of the members have zero posts beccause they are signed up by spam-bots.
Remeber the poll asking "Is the RC scene cooling?" ..... it is.
Did Dimo even log on when that poll was posted? lol
But yes the RC scene is cooling off, as the old guy's in the hobby are doing other things, and the kids don't have anymoney to get into the hobby as their parnets can't afford the hobby right now. But once the econ comes back up and people have money again you will see more people into the hobby again. That and I also thing that being that people tend to cry about nothing, and then a flame war starts when someone asks a question to shine light on the problem at hand (happens on almost every site, but in most cases it is only 2 or 3 memebers per site that are a problem), then other people think what is the point of going on-line if there are just going to cry about nothing (every RC forum has lost memebers over the past few years).
I wonder what this summer will bring. I've stopped by Rt 83 and St.Charles rd a few friday nights last summer, and it hardly seemed as if the hobby is dying down. There were a lot of guys running top dollar equipment. (at least that what is seems like to me 2.4ghz radios and what not-more than my budget)
I'll work on stopping by there a little more this summer and acutally taking some action pics and posting them up. I'm sure just by posting more content by members will increase the site traffic and posts should go up.
Also, a think that the lack of racing "scene" (in my opinion) or track near the western suburbs (RC hobbies in Naperville and Hobbytown in schuamburng/stcharles al's in elmhurst all which sell an abundance of r/c cars but really no where to run 'em)- I beleive the closest track would be in Joliet. Which, is a nice facility but, it's far.
If the R/c companies could try to target their demographic to kids in college that still have somewhat of a disposable income, can afford this hobby. For example, RV tires in my business used to be a great seller, but now my shop has shifted into a younger community that has money and no problem to spend $2k on wheels and tires. I may be in the wrong by saying this, but I remember back in the day that most of the "racers" at the track were an older crowd. (i'm only 29 now)
I entered this hobby at 11 years old. It was crazy to see my moms jaw dropped when we dropped almost $500 bucks on a toy. SO generally back then it was mostly for an older crowd due to the price.- btw it was a Nitro Brute. So, not too much has changed with the prices.
I Remember back in the mid 90s that Radio Active Raceways would be packed on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays. Even in the early 1991 there was a track in Carol stream next to augusinos. That track too was busy. It would be great if an indoor/outdoor track would open back up in the western burbs..(on road carpet track would be ever so sweet)
There was a track in Carol stream? By the fire dept??? Cuz thats kiddie corner to Augustinos!
That lost just next to Augustino's would be a great place to hold lot races now that I think of it!
I think it was always a carpet wholesale place but back then (91-92) it was a neat little oval track that they used to put pvc pipe under the carpet to make jumps. I remeber a ton of Tamiya and kyosho trucks used to run there. And when it was just on road, it was mostly the rc10L. Good times.
There was also a track in Lombard that used to run at the Holiday Inn (IIRC) on Finley and roosevelt. -the hotel is now a different name. It was held in one of the conference room and used to run a ton of different classes, but the cool class was the running with the Kyosho optima mids. There was also a slot car place around lombard too.
I sometimes drive by the carol stream location and think about stopping in (it's still a carpet place) and asking about racing there. I'm sure it's all filled as it is a warehouse.