membership

[charlie]

Hi all , i`ve noticed on this forum we have a membership of 967 strong, it should be interesting if the executive will publish how much of this number are carded OVAS members, i will be shocked if it`s a third of the 967.
Regards

[Seanc]

i think it would be closer to 100+/-
300 sounds a little high, we rarely get more then 50 at a metting

[UCGrafix]

Interesting post.

I would like to know as well.

I have been scratching my head on this one for a while.
There is mention of 967 total members, but there is no mention any where, of how many have a paid membership card to support the Board / Forum, so I wonder how many uses the service, and how many contribute.

This is one of the best Fish Board / Forum I have seen, and the first day I logged in, I paid for my membership, specially with the PayPal thing, it's real easy.

The quality of the information circulating, the many knowledgeable people who share time and experience has and should account for something, to maintain and grow a Board / Forum of this nature, a lot of work goes into it.

Many are unfamiliar with the many aspects of the running of such a service.
For instance, the people who visit each store to get the discounts that are offered, scheduling of the meetings that take place, the many moderators that devote time and patience to run these services, web team ( David ) way to go David on the many days ( if not weeks ) in putting together this new format, the maintenance, meetings facilities and set up, auctions, the new video aspect of showing your tanks and so on, everything takes time and effort, the only way to maintain and grow a service such as this, is to support it by buying a membership.

Many other Boards / Forum limit the services of non paying members, to support those who support the service, non paying members can only read certain threads, not allowing posting, viewing of the classified areas is limited to paying members, meetings have charges for non paying members, if auctions take place, item are sold and carry a 25% surcharge, and so on.

The quality of a service, is as good as what goes into it.
I support the Board / Forum, do you ?

Regards,
Denis

[artw]

Hi, we have 135 paid members as of this week.   How many of them are active on this Forum,  and vice versa, we don't know.  out of 957 members on the Forum,  probably half of them have zero posts.   so if you go into Stats and look at everybody with more than 5 posts and consider them active posters,   it may be pretty close to the 135 number I quoted at the beginning of this post.

[Seanc]

i'm pritty sure we have more then 135 active users.

[darkdep]

That 967 number will be trimmed soon; I'm planning to remove all accounts that have not logged in for a certain time frame.

[cory]

thats a good idea. No use having an account if you dont use it. True ovas people know who they are.

[BigDaddy]

We have 150 users with 20 posts or more.  I'd be willing to say at at least a third of those users are either now

1) inactive
2) not OVAS members
3) both

It looks like of the "regulars" (which is the first 100 or so top posters), without having a firm grip on EVERY person who is a member, I'd say that probably a good 80% are OVAS members.

In Sept, when its time to renew memberships, we will make a point of asking if people are on the forums so we can identify them as OVAS members in their profile

[Underwater]

Is it possible to have certain fields, such as real name or such as viewable only to verified OVAS members?

It's confusing calling everyone by their screen name here and first name at the meeting.  However, I don't want just anybody to get at my personal info.

[artw]

I just call people at the meetings by their screen name. Heck, the Executive meeting minutes have DarkDep and BigDaddy all over them.

[darkdep]

It's true.  I don't think Art has ever called me by my real name.   

Now, in his case, if you call him "art-wuh" you end up looking retarded tho.

[BigDaddy]

It's true.  I don't think Art has ever called me by my real name.   

Now, in his case, if you call him "art-wuh" you end up looking retarded tho.

Why don't we just call him "Dub-ya"

[darkdep]

LOL I love it...dub-ya is art's new official nickname.

[artw]

artw "dub-ya" tugmaster.   ADT.   Hooray. I have my very own acronym.  (BD, APW, PFG, etc.)

[darkdep]

Sorry dubya, you do NOT get to invent your own Acronym.  You're a poser.  True acronyms need to be assigned by others...all the cases you illustrate were given by others.  You can't give yourself an acronym.  That's just silly.

[mseguin]

Just like nicknames like "The Duke". You can't give yourself one.

[artw]

ok I will remain known as Dubya.

[PaleoFishGirl]

Sorry dubya, you do NOT get to invent your own Acronym.  You're a poser.  True acronyms need to be assigned by others...all the cases you illustrate were given by others.  You can't give yourself an acronym.  That's just silly.

Haha, pure pwnage!!

[UCGrafix]

I just call people at the meetings by their screen name. Heck, the Executive meeting minutes have DarkDep and BigDaddy all over them.

That's so funny.

When I visited Art the other day, he says " so your UC ", I king of like it, why not, it's funny.  lol

[pegasus]

That 967 number will be trimmed soon; I'm planning to remove all accounts that have not logged in for a certain time frame.

What will be the new number after a purge of the 6 months, one year of not posting?  400?

I just call people at the meetings by their screen name. Heck, the Executive meeting minutes have DarkDep and BigDaddy all over them.

And how do you call the other 5-6 exec that are not in the forum? Many other OVAS members are not on this forum, so I would not be supprise to see only around 80 OVAS members here, on line.