Website New Direction - Important please read

[daddyone]

Hosting offered to MAD4IT - free of charge courtesy of a business I am involved in.

Development is needed to migrate existing club to something newer than Vbulletin, something I wasn't sure I could help with but have (in the last 3 minutes) realised I can.

I'm willing to put a few developer days into migration to a suitable forum plus free hosting, to keep it the GTIROC and not change or merge the site.

I think the merging of the club with other models / makes will detract from the fact it's a one model (albeit dwindling) club, at the moment.

Just my 2p and offer.

LG

 

[Fire & skill]

the GtiR is coming up on 25 yrs old and that means it will FINALLY be legal to import and register in the US in every state except California.

This is a very valid point! and likely attribute to a huge increase in price. the gtir is a bit of a cult car here in the UK but overseas its seen in a different light

 

[Fire & skill]

I'm happy to pay for membership again, if it helps keep the gtiroc going. £20 is a small price to pay for all the help and advice that's available here

 

[stevepudney]

Ok,

Im getting very mixed views about what direction the club should go in. Personally I want to grow the club and involve ourselves with other car enthusiasts that we have something in common with and the best I can think of is Nismo. I think this is the best long term solution for the club.

The gtiroz is a fantastic site and I wish our UK gtir community was as one like theirs.

Setting up the new forum has cost me around £200 alone before add ons, hosting and time so I suppose the question is if we want to keep the gtiroc alive, are we all prepared to start paying for membership?

As others have said I think it would be a mistake to change the name in the hope of attracting the so called reborn Nismo mark.

Reading the thread, I think it's fairly obvious people don't want the OC to change, but as you say are they prepared to help out ?

I think if the software was changed from VB to something free and up to date, then as Shalom suggests, have transparent donation based funding in place.

Shalom, in all seriousness, is their any way you could help with the hosting ?

Steve

 

[vpulsar]

Hello chaps I've not posted on here in ages as my new pulsar still isn't ready and I've had plenty going on in my life like divorce, custody battle moving house and work, my two pence worth is I wouldn't like to see it merge with another site but I'm all for innovation and am open to new ideas, but for the mean time you could take the offer up of free hosting or I don't mind paying for my membership again, give it another year or two and I think we might see a turn round in fortunes.

 

[PobodY]

The membership fee was always a bit like a donation anyway. - Maybe it's just re-branded in the new software and people chip-in if and when they want to?

 

[Mad]

Big thanks to daddyone for the offer of hosting.

Im ok with the hosting atm as the site is small and doesent use much data so costs are minimal. The biggest problem and cost is development and maintaining the site but I'd certainly like to chat about your kind offer again.

The best thing I can do is to setup the new forums on the new software and keep the club gtiroc and will setup a donations page as opposed to membership.

Our current software is old and has some serious issues like the Google redirect which every time is fixed cost me around 50usd so best to move as soon as I can.

Dangerous Dave made a good point about posts. Many of us are long in the tooth but it's important that to keep this club alive, we all support and help each other and that means being a bit fluffy with new members too lol.

The new software makes integration with Facebook and Twitter so much easier too which will hopefully bring more people over.

Moving forward, it is obvious that there is a lot of passion for these little pocket rockets but it's important and I must stress that to keep this site and club alive, it requires input from everyone and not just a small selection.

Let's keep things as they are for the time being and I will start prepping the new software.

Regards

dan

 

[fast eddy]

Hi guys, I do not come on here much anymore, but still have my 3rd Pulsar gti-r and have owned them for 15years!
As said, they are a special car and to dilute that would be a shame by bringing in other models that are completely different.
I understand the reasons for this discussion being in business myself and costs have to be met.
I think the way to go would either be to keep the name and try to sort out the problems/hosting at minimal cost and try to promote/market the new look hoping that with the US market opening up it would get busier
The other would be to open up the club to just the High Performance variants of the new Pulsar as they come in, but as said would dilute the uniqueness of the gti-r.
At the end of the day, the wealth of knowledge and info on here must not be lost
Eddy

 

[daddyone]

Just had a chat with a developer who I work with. He's scanned the site and reckons it would take him a day or so to migrate and upgrade the database, moving it all over to something CMS fed. Performance and things such as image and file attachment uploads would no longer slow. Pop something like Varnish on the front end and the site would be damn fast, which would also help google rankings. I fully believe the USA will embrace these rockets as "baby Skylines" and the forum will start seeing new members very soon...

 

[keastygtir]

My feeling is that after bottoming out in terms of prices and reputation the tide has begun to turn and with the new car on the horizon this is only going to improve. I would like to keep our identity as Group A specials like ours are rare and should be prized. You can see the amount of restores and back to standard work that's been going on in the last year or so backs up that opinion.

I for one would happily pay a few to keep us exclusive

 

[Richard_Sideways]

I put my hand in my pocket to post on 2 other forums I belong to so I wouldn't be adverse to contributing.

 

[fubar andy]

I'm glad to see that people are happy to keep the GTIROC name!

I'm keen to see the forum move to a new forum software, I think we genuinely need it.

Hopefully this will get rid of all the bugs we have.

The forum will always have its place within the Facebook generation, however as mentioned as there are less and less cars on the road, it makes sense that the forums are quieter.

We are still the original forum, have a massive wealth of information online and through our members.

I'm looking forwards to the updates and new software!

 

[gtircrazy]

Keep it alive guys. Do not merge it. I have not voted as i think the options offered are no good. Keep it the same, on a new software platform.

 

[warpspeed]

My opinion is that a forum/club catering for the forgotten heroes of group a i.e. gtir, gt4, 323, legacy etc would be the way to go and I also think paid membership is the answer provide accounts are transparent, paid membership would allow for events to be organised giving a club greater buying power.
I think it's better to have 50 paid memberships that are genuine enthusiasts trying to save and improve the cars rather than 500 that are along for the ride while the cars are/were cheap relatively speaking.

I would rather go to events with half a dozen of each car and share knowledge/enthusiasm with genuine owners, track days could be fun having a bit of banter with other owners about which car is better and together all the cars could be improved for the future, might even improve the image of the different cars.

I hate the 'stance' scene but that's not to say we couldn't welcome owners of lower powered Nissans, Datsuns, Mazdas, Toyotas etc whose cars may be even rarer than gtir's and therefore sacrelige to modify too much other than coilovers and wheels.

We could achieve all the above fairly easily I think but would need an 'umbrella' type forum/club open to more people but with sub forums for the technical side of things.

 

[keastygtir]

group A homoglation specials?

 

[warpspeed]

Aye but could also cater for the oddballs of the Jap car scene, was at Shelsley Walsh yesterday for the Retro Rides meet and there was a few oddball Jap cars there.
I would think there's not enough numbers of each car to warrant a club/forum for each one and they have tagged on to the closest group to suit their needs, gtir's are the oddballs of the group a specials anyway along with 323's, GT4's etc so we know what it's like to be the outsiders..

 

[lakeview]

That was the route the original group b car club went.eventually opened its doors to other cars and became the 200 club or something like that.though think that eventually folded as most went to specific car clubs instead

 

[saddler]

I would have voted if there was a vote option for keeping Gtiroc name ! As I see it the car in unique so needs to be kept that way..

 

[johnny gtir]

I agree keep the name as is as said a lot of v v good information and well pleased with the way it was updated a while ago so if it can be moved via a It side of things great. I don't post a lot as my opinion gets taken the wrong way as I am a mod of another forum and I am sure there are a few members on here that no longer speak or bother due to this when Infact there no problem with them from my side but that's not what this topic is about . As for facebook it's something I never had nor will so sites like this are hard work to run but as a R owner I personall really app all the hard work put in to keep it running

 

[keastygtir]

Well I have used the contribute button!