Our Forum Status.
Dec 30, 2004 06:25 UTC, by Chris Simmons, Senior Journalist
From the corner-matrix department...

I've decided to implement a comments system for the site, for registered users only, such that it will be like a "forum-lite", and not a full-blown forum as one would expect from something like phpbb. The reason for my decision is mixed, and though I am not entirely happy with the circumstances which have led me to it, I believe I am taking the best course of action for this website and the community it serves by enhancing it in this way.
 
On the one hand I thought it was great that we used phpbb for a while, and it looked to be doing its job well enough for our needs. Traffic was moderate, not excessive nor heavy, and the forum was a nice place to voice ones ideas. Truth be told, I don't think our forum was ever as widely popular as for example BeGroovy's, or even the message board at OSNews, but that wasn't the original intent either, so I don't feel guilty for taking this feature away while I work on my idea(s).
 
It seems to me that today, more than ever, there are numerous problems with public forums, but I'll only go over two points. There are malicious people in our world who think up nothing better to do than to create destructive bits of code or hackery that end up wasting a lot of people's time. Dealing with the latest santy/code red/nimba virus or patching third party software on a regular basis is just not my idea of fun. I have had it with that kind of mentality, and I really yearn for the day when software was written well to begin with. (Hey, its almost the Be Way.™)
 
The second problem is that it is simply not possible to be as up-to-date as one would like when running a public service. Don't kid yourself if you think otherwise. And don't email me either with your claims that "it's easy to be up-to-date ... you're just a noob/loser/uneducated windoze heathen" etc etc.
 
Whatever. :) I'll have you know I despise windoze just as much as you, but it does serve some needs well enough. Right tool for the job, and all that.
 
Indeed, it is enough to simply go through your responsibilities in daily living, and also work with posting new news items, be a part of the community, for there to be time to patch and test against the myriad of viruses in the wild. These sort of upgrading operations are best left to the staff already providing the connection and hosting service, leaving us "webmasters" free to be more creative and caring for the website content. Remember "content is king"?
 
Ok, back to the point I was trying to make. I have quite a lot of experience with php/mysql, and after working on my own stuff (this site, and more) for years, have decided to use these skills to extend this website with a commenting feature. Stay tuned. Oh, and you can email me if you like, I'll just ignore anyone who is a knob.