To all LPU staff

[quote=Luke Dampney-Williams]To add my 2 cents - I haven’t been on the LPU forums for maybe several months now.

For me personally, I find the forums clutted, full of repeated topics, spam, and old news.

I go to lplive or other lp fan sites to read the forums and discussions on the latest news or rumours.

I believe that LPUHQ need to find that “something new” to bring the community back. I don’t know anyone else on here besides the small group of friends that I met at the Sydney Summit.

Visiting the chat? I don’t bother these days as no one is ever online.

What grabs my attention, what keeps me coming back paying my yearly membership fee are the videos!

The exclusive LPU videos are what keeps me part of the LPU. They are windows into the bands life, and as a fan that is exactly what I want.

BUT recently the last year or so, the LPU videos have become too short, and less frequent. We’d be lucky to get a video for months, and even then the video is less than 2 minutes. (This is during recording and touring season too).

With the cost of living rising everyday, it’s now that I am thinking twice about repaying for a LPU membership.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m as big of a fan of LP as the next guy but I don’t see where my money goes and what I am paying for.

Hopefully LPU HQ wake up and get back to work

LPU online exclusives do not exist anymore due to people sharing them online seconds after they’re released. Even the band chats are uploaded.

With the LPU’s main focus being around serving fans at live shows/Summits/Meetups with all the exclusives and with an overwhelming number of our memberships comprising of people who only use LPU for tickets/MNGs, I don’t see LPU competing with fan websites as far as news goes.

Really good post, agree with all the things you mentioned!
and sorry I did not see this thread and opened this one

on the other hand the chance for it to get seen and hopefully stuff changed/added is bigger now!

derek, what about the website itself

we are not asking for exclusive shizzo all that much
because you have good point and you know it, we all know it, nothing is exclusive on the internet really
but i think a lot of us are wondering why there isnt much going on , on the website itself

like inside entertainment? not sure what or how to call it really

like for example, even though its beside the entertainment point right now,
some of said the forum is messy and you cannot deny that im afraid, nobody can deny it cause its right in front of us, we all see it.
(this is not to you personally, im trying to say something in general so please do not take it personally)
and the messy boards doesnt make it more comfortable or more fun to go through the forums really

i think a lot of people are just seeking for more website inside entertainment
like what people get on really popular forums ,you know?
ugh i dont know how else to explain it

In my opinion, I just don’t think your going to get that here. It seems the past few years LPU’s direction is all about getting the best experience at a live event as you can. That’s what they want to provide. Everything is just icing on the cake. Yes, the forums are messy. A mass cleaning is coming soon, trust me. Considering it’s not my area I do not know if anything is coming in the future to draw people to the site or not, but I doubt it. I could be wrong and I hope I am.

In my opinion, LPU should not focus on live experience too much. Because I guess only a small group of fans around the world in all their different countrys with all their different incomes is able to to join a LP show or even several shows regularly. For that reason Communication, making friends, getting LP news primary etc. should be first priority for LPU. And after that, the live experience benefits should be the icing on the cake and not the community itself.

who agrees with the above a 100%?

I’m sure LPUHQ is doing the best they can. I just wish more people would go into the LPU chat… [neutral]

I’ve just read the whole thread. I believe that people only join to get the M&G or Summit passes. I don’t think that’s wrong, but it affects the community and the direction of the LPU. If most people only want a M&G, LPUHQ is going to focus on that direction. I personally think that the old LP Family (as it was called) is almost dead by now.

I wish they could make it even for people who had been members for years against the ones that have joined a few weeks before the show in his/her country.

I’ve just read through the whole thread, too.
I’m pretty new here, pls don’t judge me, I’m not that “since-2000” fan, but I really love LP and thought long about joining LPU. I finally dedided for it just to meet more “totally” LP-Fans, maybe even find new friends and meet them in real life too. That would be great.
If there’s someone to chat with I would be glad Just sometimes maybe there’s just a topic needed. Otherwise I think it would be just like: “Hey, what are you doing?” “idk, I’m typing.” “yay, great”

Yeah, that’s it.

I’m not sure if this is feasible or not, but I wanted to throw an idea out there since LPU XIII went live yesterday. My idea is quite simple…An auction for an additional signed LPU / HARD ROCK Poster (created by LPU member Andhika Nugraha) with 100% of proceeds benefiting victims of Typhoon Haiyan. This would follow LP’s Music for Relief campaign and would re-ignite the LP Auction block simultaneously, since activity has been stagnant since June 2013. Again, just an idea for LP and ground control to consider. I for one have already donated to disaster relief to the Philippines, but I’m sure additional revenue has the potential to be raised here. Thanks for reading in advance!

I’ve been trying to think of why this forum isn’t as buzzy as it used to be. I can speculate.

How do people make any friends here nowadays? I see a lot of ice-breaker threads but I don’t see as many people making cliques and communities. The next step isn’t being taken for some reason. The Mine Field’s gone. This has the potential to be a hangout spot for people with similar interests. If people are logging on to talk to someone they like then I think traffic will return here naturally. But that means people need to move on beyond ice-breaking. The chat is kinda on the right track but a chat room only holds one clique at a time. Bring the mine field back? That’s one idea I have.

Maybe the site isnt buzzy because the threads seem “spammy”? That’s not a great descriptive word because it’s not precise, but its hard to put my finger on. Maybe the threads linger on too long? Maybe threads dead for more than 3 months should get closed? But old LPU didn’t have that rule and it worked fine. Hmm. Old LPU also wasn’t slow enough to have the same old threads at the top of the forum all the time so maybe its warranted? Maybe spammy means that people posting in the wrong forum and they aren’t being moved to the right place? Hard to say.

And then there’s thing thing that bothers me specifically since the forum rebooted in LPU11: the site is really hard to read. It gave a fantastic first impression back then but then I noticed how hard it was to actually use in practice. There is such a huge difference between the size of the headers and the text to be read. I particularly like elaborating on what I say and now the font is so thin I don’t think a lot of people are going to bother reading anymore. I having a hard time proffreading my own post. (People replying to this point please remember that not everyone has the same monitor or posts in the same time of day). There are some places where there is too much negative space, and some other places where there isn’t enough padding by the edge of the screen. Seems like the site was designed to make a big impact upon first looking at it, but not designed to be read.

And there’s one more thing I’m going to try: just make myself come here once a week and try and rekindle some magic myself. Maybe all it needs to bootstrap itself off the ground. If everyone tried posting at least once a week maybe it will start being lively enough to come back for real. A start of a new year is a great time to try.

That, Kathy, is all great in theory, but it’ll take more than a miracle to get the boards back to what they once were.

One LPUX launched, and we lost Sparkart and the vBulletin forums, and the site was moved to lpu.linkinpark.com, everyone more or less moved on. The price hike that year was the straw that stirred the drink, I think. People saw that they couldn’t afford it, or, they found better ways to spend their money. The LPU took a back seat and they knew they had other platforms to fall back on.

Now that there are quite a few Facebook groups for the LPUers past and present, and we can all, for the most part, reconnect there, why would anyone want to come back? Unless the membership perks still mean anything to them.

As good as the website is this year, the forums got no improvements besides visuals, the forum itself is what I think is pushing people away, it seems lazy. There’s even existing features that are on these forums, that are hidden. There is a user title, similar to LPA and LPL’s under the person’s name and picture that consists of many different options like: Newb, Novice, Member, Old Timer, Original, Loner, Introvert, Extrovert, Popular, Party Animal, Broke, Making End Meet, Breaking Even, Rollin’ In The Dough, BOSS, Loner, Introvery, Extrovert, Popular, Party Animal, Silent, Quiet, Baller, Shot Caller, P.I.M.P., Shy, Less Shy, Talkative, Blabber Mouth
President Talks A Lot

The fact that “View New Posts” doesn’t work, signatures are not separate, they’re quoted, too, there’s no “View Last Page” button, and many other things make this forum seem worse than free website’s. I also like to see who is online or reading things, too, because it gives the feeling of a community knowing that there’s people online. And it’s a paid website, please don’t make us make sure we aren’t humans

[quote=LP13413]That, Kathy, is all great in theory, but it’ll take more than a miracle to get the boards back to what they once were.

One LPUX launched, and we lost Sparkart and the vBulletin forums, and the site was moved to lpu.linkinpark.com, everyone more or less moved on. The price hike that year was the straw that stirred the drink, I think. People saw that they couldn’t afford it, or, they found better ways to spend their money. The LPU took a back seat and they knew they had other platforms to fall back on.

Now that there are quite a few Facebook groups for the LPUers past and present, and we can all, for the most part, reconnect there, why would anyone want to come back? Unless the membership perks still mean anything to them.
[/quote]

Rekindling the LPU doesn’t mean bring exact same old people back. Even on the old LPU, the crowd posting on LPU 9.0 wasn’t the same crowd posting on LPU 1.0 by a long shot. New people come and form new groups. There were like only three people who were with it the whole stretch from 1.0 who lasted until LPUX hit. The point shouldnt be to grab those same old people: this should be a place where people can find new friends. Facebook now has control of reconnecting with old people, but social networks are not places to find new friends. Common-interest boards like the LPU are better at that job.

LPUX was devastating because they deleted the forum for a year (on top of the fact that the first half of the year wasn’t worth what it was priced). Of course the existing community didn’t survive! But like a forest fire, the forest grows back usually. Often not with the same trees, but still.

I still bet something else is off. It would be good if they fixed all the tech problems, but it would be better to try the tools we have at our disposal instead of banking on the LPU ever fixing tech problems because that rarely happened even when sparkart was around.

Also is it me or are there any Firefox users who keep getting unresponsiveness from the browser?

Kathye, long time no see

[quote=KATHYxx][quote=LP13413]That, Kathy, is all great in theory, but it’ll take more than a miracle to get the boards back to what they once were.

One LPUX launched, and we lost Sparkart and the vBulletin forums, and the site was moved to lpu.linkinpark.com, everyone more or less moved on. The price hike that year was the straw that stirred the drink, I think. People saw that they couldn’t afford it, or, they found better ways to spend their money. The LPU took a back seat and they knew they had other platforms to fall back on.

Now that there are quite a few Facebook groups for the LPUers past and present, and we can all, for the most part, reconnect there, why would anyone want to come back? Unless the membership perks still mean anything to them.
[/quote]

Rekindling the LPU doesn’t mean bring exact same old people back. Even on the old LPU, the crowd posting on LPU 9.0 wasn’t the same crowd posting on LPU 1.0 by a long shot. New people come and form new groups. There were like only three people who were with it the whole stretch from 1.0 who lasted until LPUX hit. The point shouldnt be to grab those same old people: this should be a place where people can find new friends. Facebook now has control of reconnecting with old people, but social networks are not places to find new friends. Common-interest boards like the LPU are better at that job.

LPUX was devastating because they deleted the forum for a year (on top of the fact that the first half of the year wasn’t worth what it was priced). Of course the existing community didn’t survive! But like a forest fire, the forest grows back usually. Often not with the same trees, but still.

I still bet something else is off. It would be good if they fixed all the tech problems, but it would be better to try the tools we have at our disposal instead of banking on the LPU ever fixing tech problems because that rarely happened even when sparkart was around.

Also is it me or are there any Firefox users who keep getting unresponsiveness from the browser?[/quote]

My only issue with FF was sometimes it was laggy or I’d get logged off. Chrome has had no issues …yet

Okai good to know

[quote=Darknessovrme]Kathye, long time no see
[/quote]

Allo : )

[quote=Derek][quote=KATHYxx][quote=LP13413]That, Kathy, is all great in theory, but it’ll take more than a miracle to get the boards back to what they once were.

One LPUX launched, and we lost Sparkart and the vBulletin forums, and the site was moved to lpu.linkinpark.com, everyone more or less moved on. The price hike that year was the straw that stirred the drink, I think. People saw that they couldn’t afford it, or, they found better ways to spend their money. The LPU took a back seat and they knew they had other platforms to fall back on.

Now that there are quite a few Facebook groups for the LPUers past and present, and we can all, for the most part, reconnect there, why would anyone want to come back? Unless the membership perks still mean anything to them.
[/quote]

Rekindling the LPU doesn’t mean bring exact same old people back. Even on the old LPU, the crowd posting on LPU 9.0 wasn’t the same crowd posting on LPU 1.0 by a long shot. New people come and form new groups. There were like only three people who were with it the whole stretch from 1.0 who lasted until LPUX hit. The point shouldnt be to grab those same old people: this should be a place where people can find new friends. Facebook now has control of reconnecting with old people, but social networks are not places to find new friends. Common-interest boards like the LPU are better at that job.

LPUX was devastating because they deleted the forum for a year (on top of the fact that the first half of the year wasn’t worth what it was priced). Of course the existing community didn’t survive! But like a forest fire, the forest grows back usually. Often not with the same trees, but still.

I still bet something else is off. It would be good if they fixed all the tech problems, but it would be better to try the tools we have at our disposal instead of banking on the LPU ever fixing tech problems because that rarely happened even when sparkart was around.

Also is it me or are there any Firefox users who keep getting unresponsiveness from the browser?[/quote]

My only issue with FF was sometimes it was laggy or I’d get logged off. Chrome has had no issues …yet

LP.com seems horribly made, and slow on whatever I use it on. When they had that Burn it Down game, it was slower than ever, and when they had BID released on the same page, they had the game still load, but it wasn’t accessible, so the page was even slower. The current LP.com also has a flash of an incomplete style while it loads that resembles the old design