Brian Tomlin wrote:

>there are plenty of such forums around, and maybe that's part of why
>things are so quiet here now. But the atmosphere of most forums is
>different and you risk losing direct contact (or at least feeling)
>with prominent participants. Kom is more about Francois and Nigel
>than about Ventoux and Rosedale, if you get my drift.
>
>Other such groups are feeling the pinch too. My suggestion would be
>to merge with some similar group and try to regain critical mass
>without losing all identity.
>
>An obvious candidate is Eurobike, which is in many ways a sister
>group, with many common posters, very similar interests, fairly
>similar atmosphere, identical location on yahoogroups and similar
>(although not yet as severe) problem of declining volume of posts.
>Eurobike has a strong tradition of getting members together to ride
>and is also a bit more sophisticated about "forum" features like
>photos and votes. It might be a profitable marriage for both groups.
>The alternatives look bleak to me.
>
>Thoughts, anyone?
>
I know what you mean about the other forums available. They tend to be
racing-orientated, and look down upon touring, and riding just for fun!

They also seem not to take seriously issues which I take seriously such
as problems with motorized traffic.

The Yahoo groups web interface is very clunky compared to the more
modern forum software available. the php forum software used by
veloriders and others maintains threads ordered by date of last posting,
so that current discussions stay at the top of the first page until they
drift down.

A few cycling forums (cyclingplus.co.uk) have attracted resident
petrolhead trolls and have become unfriendly.

I like the idea of a merger with Eurobike - European touring appeals to me.

Speaking of which, who wants to take over the Trento Bike Pages? Andreas
Caranti has stopped maintaining them, and nothing new has been put on
them for months!

Nigel

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