BRFCS Relaunch

[Glenn]

On 28/07/2021 at 11:48, J*B said:

I know people are talking about AdBlockers - to be absolutely clear, if everyone on the website runs an adblocker the site will go under. It costs money to maintain and if you don’t see the ads, we don’t gain the revenue to pay the bills. The ads are the main source of income.

I can't echo this enough, once Josh has his freemium ad-free option available, please please please switch to that if you use an ad-blocker. The site is only just self sustaining as it is (and then only everyone gives their time for free), that ad-revenue, whilst tiny per person, is what keeps the lights on. We became masters at making the money go as far as possible, but ultimately there are bills that need paying just to keep the site running.

[Mattyblue]

IMO, the adverts on the forum are now less invasive, as they are stacked at the bottom of the page instead of those pop ups (seems to be less of those?).

Edited July 28, 2021 by Mattyblue

[StubbsUK]

Thanks to everyone for the kind words, it's been hard work to set this up, I know it won't be to everyone's taste but the positive feedback is most welcome, as are bug reports of things that don't quite look or work properly & thanks to those who have submitted them.

Without mentioning the word "advert" or any synonym, is there anything you'd like to see on the site? Something cool another club's fan site does that we could have a look at for BRFCS?

[Glenn]

Ooh, I get to comment on stuff like this now 🙂

Rescue the History and Jack Walker Sections, there was a huge amount of stuff of genuinely historical significance in them. Biddy's 92 Club too.

BTW This iteration of the size is brilliant. Great work everyone! 

Edited July 28, 2021 by Glenn

[Gav]

3 hours ago, J*B said:

You would be open to paying for a small monthly fee for an ad-free version, then?

Yes

[JacknOry]

Might just be my end (though never had this problem before), and I have not really spent much time testing it (busy at work) and normally just flick to the forum every now and again. But, I don't think I'm getting any new notifications until I refresh the pages. Normally I would get the bedulp sound, flick over and I would have my new notifications at the top, or if I'm in a thread, it would tell me there are new posts. Not getting that at the minute, but when i refresh the page the notifications appear at the top of the page. 

[StubbsUK]

5 minutes ago, JacknOry said:

Might just be my end (though never had this problem before), and I have not really spent much time testing it (busy at work) and normally just flick to the forum every now and again. But, I don't think I'm getting any new notifications until I refresh the pages. Normally I would get the bedulp sound, flick over and I would have my new notifications at the top, or if I'm in a thread, it would tell me there are new posts. Not getting that at the minute, but when i refresh the page the notifications appear at the top of the page. 

If you're viewing the magazine part of the site you won't get any bedunks, but you should still get them if you have the forum open, I'm getting them as this thread updates.

[StubbsUK]

46 minutes ago, Glenn said:

Ooh, I get to comment on stuff like this now 🙂

Rescue the History and Jack Walker Sections, there was a huge amount of stuff of genuinely historical significance in them. Biddy's 92 Club too.

BTW This iteration of the size is brilliant. Great work everyone! 

The 92 Club is definitely on our list of things to do. It broke a couple of forum upgrades ago unfortunately, but it will more likely than not be back. Where did the other 2 used to be, I've not seen them at all, drop me a DM ....

[JacknOry]

4 minutes ago, StubbsUK said:

If you're viewing the magazine part of the site you won't get any bedunks, but you should still get them if you have the forum open, I'm getting them as this thread updates.

No, I'm just in the forum. Maybe it is something my end then. Will have a play around a bit later - perhaps something in my notification settings or something.

[StubbsUK]

Just now, JacknOry said:

No, I'm just in the forum. Maybe it is something my end then. Will have a play around a bit later - perhaps something in my notification settings or something.

There was a forum update a couple of days ago, there was nothing in the notes about any notification changes but you never know. Try logging out, clear the cache and all the usual stuff tech support tells you to do 🙂

Send me a DM if it's still not working.

[Wheelton Blue]

4 hours ago, J*B said:

You would be open to paying for a small monthly fee for an ad-free version, then?

Yes. I'd rather the money went direct rather than through Google or whoever.

[den]

59 minutes ago, Glenn said:

Ooh, I get to comment on stuff like this now 🙂

Rescue the History and Jack Walker Sections, there was a huge amount of stuff of genuinely historical significance in them. Biddy's 92 Club too.

BTW This iteration of the size is brilliant. Great work everyone! 

I was around when FourLaneBlue put an extraordinary amount of work into the history section. Is he still around?  That alone is worth preserving if possible.

As for adverts (sorry) Admin must do whatever they need to do. It’s fine by me. I’m just grateful this site is still in existence.

[Glenn]

21 minutes ago, StubbsUK said:

Where did the other 2 used to be, I've not seen them at all,

Oh they got lost in an update or redesign years ago, it's not something you've done.

This old archive.org snapshot has them though

https://web.archive.org/web/20050305162048/http://www.brfcs.co.uk/history/historymenu.php

[StubbsUK]

11 minutes ago, Glenn said:

Oh they got lost in an update or redesign years ago, it's not something you've done.

This old archive.org snapshot has them though

https://web.archive.org/web/20050305162048/http://www.brfcs.co.uk/history/historymenu.php

*yoink*

[Polky]

2 hours ago, J*B said:

It’ll be circa £3 / month and released as soon as we can get it ready. That £3 is roughly what each member generates in ad income each month for the site. 

I know people are talking about AdBlockers - to be absolutely clear, if everyone on the website runs an adblocker the site will go under. It costs money to maintain and if you don’t see the ads, we don’t gain the revenue to pay the bills. The ads are the main source of income.
 

So I would hope everyone would either put up with the ads to help us keep the site alive… or sign up for the ad free version when released. 

This makes sense, the website looks great 👍🏻 

[Bigdoggsteel]

Great progress made over the last year or so. Fair play to all involved

[bigbrandjohn]

Well designed shirts, well designed site, all we need is a well designed team and we are in business🤔

[Biddy]

Personally, I think the new website looks top quality. It now looks like a landing page that will have content to draw you in. I think the partnership with 4000 holes is an inspired decision.

I'll echo what Glenn said earlier that over time, keeping BRFCS running for just about the 10 years I was involved eventually grinds you down and you lose the love for it.  I still remember the over-nighters trying to recover old backups as the shoe-string server had broken again.  Time moves on and family (and work commitments) became more important.  We tried to hand over the reigns a couple of times but the rewards in this business are scarce.  Safe to say, I was delighted when @StubbsUKcame along and has literally made it his own.

It really does feel good to be able to just enjoy the site again.

I am delighted that the site has now moved on and is looking stronger than it ever has with a great team with great ideas and hopefully many more to come.  Thankful to you all for the hard work I know you are putting in to this site on a daily basis.

 

[Ulrich]

Well done to all involved, it looks great and please do yourselves a favour and charge at least a fiver a month, we'll all happily pay it.

[cmb211087]

There is an issue on mobile in that the brfc.com/magazine link (I assume the logo image?) overlaps the back navigation menu so when you try to navigate back to the forum - in here it would be Blackburn Rovers Fans Message board - it instead takes you to the magazine link.

Very annoying having it happen more times than not.

[K-Hod]

22 minutes ago, Ulrich said:

Well done to all involved, it looks great and please do yourselves a favour and charge at least a fiver a month, we'll all happily pay it.

I wouldn’t be so sure that everyone would, but as long as people understand that the site being free without adverts isn’t happening, that’s the best we can hope for….

[Roth]

38 minutes ago, cmb211087 said:

There is an issue on mobile in that the brfc.com/magazine link (I assume the logo image?) overlaps the back navigation menu so when you try to navigate back to the forum - in here it would be Blackburn Rovers Fans Message board - it instead takes you to the magazine link.

Very annoying having it happen more times than not.

Thanks - should be sorted now.

[bluebruce]

12 hours ago, J*B said:

You would be open to paying for a small monthly fee for an ad-free version, then?

A lot of people saying yes, and I'm sure this won't be popular, but no. And if the ads become too annoying, I'll just stop coming.

Sorry. It's not to demean anyone's work, and I know the site costs to run, etc etc. But I'm neither going to pay for a forum I contribute to, nor put up with invasive ads. I don't mind there being ads, I just don't want them to be intrusive (I'm not going to read or click them either way, so them popping up in my face doesn't help the ad companies). They've been mostly fine in the past, out in the sidelines as banners etc. And if I remember rightly there is merchandise for those who want to contribute further?

Again this isn't to criticise you or be ungrateful, I'm just being honest about the reality of how I'm willing to spend my time and money. My browser is blocking them without me having done anything anyway, but it still brings up an annoying box about it to click off.

As I say, I'm sure I'll catch flak for this but have my honesty.

Edited July 28, 2021 by bluebruce

[Herbie6590]

9 minutes ago, bluebruce said:

 

Sorry. It's not to demean anyone's work, and I know the site costs to run, etc etc. But I'm neither going to pay for a forum I contribute to, nor put up with invasive ads.
 

If I can be equally honest in return…how can we monetise your contributions so that we can renew the licence & pay the hosting company ? 

[Stuart]

12 hours ago, J*B said:

You would be open to paying for a small monthly fee for an ad-free version, then?

Sounds like something Boris would say! Take away what you had and then offer it back to you at a cost. 🤔

It won’t be a surprise when I say this but the ads were bad enough when you first switched them on, now they are so obtrusive it’s not funny. It’s a full page one at the top and about 2-3 at the bottom of every page, then about every fourth post, and also pop up every time you change thread. Impossible to ignore - and still nothing I would ever purchase. Is there no limit to how many? Will we have them after every post soon?

The fluff piece in the LT said the site is non-profit and the ads generate money to improve the site. Yet, at the same time they make the forum experience poorer. The functionality is worse than it has ever been over the last 12 years or so. Don’t ask me to list all the minor forum downgrades over recent years, there are a lot and they are little things but they all add up.

At least it mirrors the state of club though so that’s good.

What has changed since Ste and Glenn ran the site in terms of costs? Have server cost increased that much, relatively speaking?

Because, on the face of it, it seems that you are sacrificing the forums to fund the site becoming news-centric. There are zero ads on your home page or articles page - or even the articles - let alone the intrusive ones we have to leaf through.

So to turn your jibe to Rev on its head, are you going to start paying forum posters? After all they are content creators and wealth generators for the site (as the advertiser target audience that you have selected).

At the end of the day, it’s your site now and you can do whatever you like, and I can either put up with it or walk away. Very much like how Waggott has treated us all as fans: “Pay up or F off”

That aside, congratulations on becoming formal owners of the site.