Freedom Reborn Archive

Freedom Force Forums => Freedom Force Discussion => Topic started by: Previsionary on March 14, 2008, 09:12:15 PM

Title: Wha?
Post by: Previsionary on March 14, 2008, 09:12:15 PM
Hey gang,

just found something interesting on the net. Seems peeps all over the net think FFVTTR's modding (loosely used to include all modifiers) community has died and some people are even showing off my/conduit/other people's modding pics (http://img136.imageshack.us/img136/9687/sampleom8.jpg)

Color me uber shocked.
Title: Re: Wha?
Post by: stumpy on March 14, 2008, 09:14:41 PM
Where are people making this claim?
Title: Re: Wha?
Post by: Previsionary on March 14, 2008, 09:45:23 PM
I can't give you specifics right now as firefox just crashed and erased my history (GRAH!), but Gamespot, quatertothree (http://www.quartertothree.com/game-talk/index.php), this post (http://www.ttlg.com/forums/showthread.php?p=1681856#post1681856) on a bioshock thread, Zeq2 (where i found that pic), here (http://forum.rpg.net/showthread.php?s=fcc8412d7a088fabb1068311befdcb26&t=338792),  etc.

Basically, everywhere over the net where FFVTTR seems to be mentioned is full of ignorance from what I've seen. Mentioning things such as a non-existent lawsuit from marvel and DC to the modding community is gone and even stranger things...and those are just from 2007...December even.
Title: Re: Wha?
Post by: stumpy on March 14, 2008, 10:53:58 PM
Jeez. That's a lot of bad information floating around out there. This is why it's so hard to deal with the discussions on the net: there are too many people who throw out random crap they've heard or just plain made up without checking it.

It's too bad FR doesn't come up on the first page of a Google search for Freedom Force. That would help people who are looking for information to get here and help limit the spread of baseless rumors.
Title: Re: Wha?
Post by: Lunarman on March 14, 2008, 11:58:40 PM
But people do still find us here, so all is not lost. It's just really weird that people though the freedom force community has died out. Although, in a way I guess it kinda has :s
Title: Re: Wha?
Post by: the_ultimate_evil on March 16, 2008, 03:54:15 PM
Quote from: stumpy on March 14, 2008, 10:53:58 PM

It's too bad FR doesn't come up on the first page of a Google search for Freedom Force. That would help people who are looking for information to get here and help limit the spread of baseless rumors.

is there anyway we can change this
Title: Re: Wha?
Post by: Epimethee on March 16, 2008, 06:16:16 PM
Quote from: the_ultimate_evil on March 16, 2008, 03:54:15 PM
is there anyway we can change this
Yes: search engine optimisation. Since this is a subject which touches my job, I'm reasonably familiar with it. There are quite a few things which could be done to improve our ranking. However, it would take time and since FR doesn't appear in the top first 20 pages (!) for the "freedom force" query, I'm not sure we can improve results sufficiently. But this is weird; not being in the first 200 results is a bit excessive... of course the numerous hacking must not have helped.

If people are interested, we can start a thread to discuss this, see if the site admins are favorable (this would ideally require some code update to the home page etc.) and try to get some linking love from community people with good "pageranks" (the basic measure of linking value to Google, grosso modo) to add or make the Freedom Reborn.net link more proeminent.
Title: Re: Wha?
Post by: BentonGrey on March 16, 2008, 08:10:13 PM
Well, this is actually something I've been thinking about a little.  In trying to drum up interest for the DCUG I've been frequenting certain blogs that have a pretty good amount of traffic.  I had already planned to let them know about the release, but I was debating about linking back to FR considering the community's checkered history with comic companies and hackers.  I'm not saying that my efforts could have any significant impact one way or the other, but if the community would feel safe, I'd be happy to ask that the bloggers link to FR.
Title: Re: Wha?
Post by: TaskMasterX on April 03, 2008, 04:19:41 AM
From this thread:
http://www.quartertothree.com/game-talk/archive/index.php?t-32804.html (http://www.quartertothree.com/game-talk/archive/index.php?t-32804.html)

it looks like peeps think :ffvstr: killed the mod community because of the incompatability with mods.  :huh:
Title: Re: Wha?
Post by: catwhowalksbyhimself on April 03, 2008, 05:02:46 AM
I bet that person that said all the forums were gone had bookmarked a direct link to our old forums, rather than the front page.  I wonder how many people never realized that our forum is back up again because the direct forum link is different.
Title: Re: Wha?
Post by: Alaric on April 03, 2008, 08:12:32 AM
When you guys come across things like this in online forums, why not simply post in that forum with a link to these forums? It would probably be the best and simplest way to get more accurate information out there.

Honestly, I'm tempted to do click those links and do that myself, but it would proabbly be better coming from someone who's actually still playing the game. (Some day, I'll either find my missing  :ffvstr: disk or buy a new one...) While the FR mod community seems to be a little smaller than it used to be (not surprising, comsidering the amount of time involved), from what I can see, you guys have been doing truly amazing things with the game, and people should know about it.
Title: Re: Wha?
Post by: Previsionary on April 03, 2008, 09:43:10 AM
Quote from: Alaric on April 03, 2008, 08:12:32 AM
When you guys come across things like this in online forums, why not simply post in that forum with a link to these forums? It would probably be the best and simplest way to get more accurate information out there.

Honestly, I'm tempted to do click those links and do that myself, but it would proabbly be better coming from someone who's actually still playing the game. (Some day, I'll either find my missing  :ffvstr: disk or buy a new one...) While the FR mod community seems to be a little smaller than it used to be (not surprising, comsidering the amount of time involved), from what I can see, you guys have been doing truly amazing things with the game, and people should know about it.

One reason why people aren't doing that is because FF sites and forums, other than FR, are barely active or known about. FFans and FR (+variants) have always been the most active in regards to FF and the other sites were just there with very little activity. I've just found these sites from a random search and most of those posts were done earlier this year or prior (last year and further on back), so posting now is necroposting and of very little worth. If we could catch the posts when they were fresh, a lot of the false details could be dispelled when the discussions were still relevant.

I don't know how many people check the wikipedia entry and such, but there's a direct link to several ff fan sites, this one included, but many of those sites are dead now.
Title: Re: Wha?
Post by: Alaric on April 03, 2008, 09:50:17 AM
Quote from: Previsionary on April 03, 2008, 09:43:10 AM
I've just found these sites from a random search and most of those posts were done earlier this year or prior (last year and further on back), so posting now is necroposting and of very little worth.

I disagree. If you just found those posts, it's always possible that other people will stumble onto them, as well, and this seems to me to be a case where necroposting is justified. At the very least, I don't see how it would hurt anyone to do so.

at the very least, you could start new threads in those forums discussing the issues invovled. If they don't get read, they don't get read, but at least it puts more accurate information out there in more places where someone might stumble onto it.
Title: Re: Wha?
Post by: Previsionary on April 03, 2008, 05:04:35 PM
"we" may think a necropost regarding a game we have an attachment to is justified, but that's not the case for people who can care less about it. IIRC, this forum has a rule against necroposting, if not, it annoys people here. That sentiment carries over into other forums and people even get banned for it. That's my reasoning for it being not so worthwhile or justifiable in the long run and why fresher posts are easier to intercept with correct information. That and several of those sites don't see any real traffic anymore as I found a few of those sites on like page 6-8 of a google search and they rarely get any new posts. *shrugs*
Title: Re: Wha?
Post by: Alaric on April 04, 2008, 06:51:53 AM
Quote from: Previsionary on April 03, 2008, 05:04:35 PM
"we" may think a necropost regarding a game we have an attachment to is justified, but that's not the case for people who can care less about it. IIRC, this forum has a rule against necroposting, if not, it annoys people here. That sentiment carries over into other forums and people even get banned for it. That's my reasoning for it being not so worthwhile or justifiable in the long run and why fresher posts are easier to intercept with correct information. That and several of those sites don't see any real traffic anymore as I found a few of those sites on like page 6-8 of a google search and they rarely get any new posts. *shrugs*

First of all, I have to say, I've never understood the strong negative reaction people often have to "necroposting"- at least, in cases where someone has something legitimate to add to an old post (admittadly, a raraty, but still...) There are cases where it's both simpler and more informative to add a post to an old thread than it is to create a new thread, and so long as the poster a) has something legitimate to add, and b) makes it clear that they are in fact resurecting an old post in order to add it, I don't understand why it bothers people. Of course, when a new forum user starts going through large numbers of old threads and replying to them as if they were just posted, with short, two-word replies, that's something entirely different.

In any case, though, I specifically gave an alternative that didn't involve "necroposting"- posting a new thread instead. If any of these forums ever get new posts, that means it's likely that someone's still reading them, and I don't see why there would be anything wrong with posting a new thread on this topic for at least the occasional vistor to see. It may very well help get the word out that the mod community is in fact alive and well.