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It's ironic that many of those in favour of subsiding the magazine are unable to read and understand the OP.
I don't want to quote everything that @thegeneralist wrote above, but it does encapsulate my thoughts.
The whole concept of a magazine feels completely outdated when I can find many relevant product reviews online, I can get all sorts of up-to-date technical advice, route suggestions, condition reports, fitness tips etc when I want them, not take pot-luck to see what's published in a magazine and whether or not it's relevant to me.
Take my money, fix the forum.
Take my money, fix the forum.
Pleeeeeeeease fix the login issues. Still having to double log in every time I visit. Totally agree with concept of forum only. The STW hive mind is a special thing that no amount of freelance commsissioned travelogue articles in a glossy mag can beat. Sorry ed team, it's just the way it is. The forum started at the right time, right place and it drives the interest in the site.
I treat the digital only subscription as a forum subscription, and apart from the time taken to post and the silliness of the quotes function the forum works well enough for me. I'm happy, happy enough that I donated on top of my annual membership when \Mark appealed at the start of the cost of living crisis.
As for the mag, I just don't ride mountain bikes much anymore, mainly ride on road. I think the mag in itself is pretty well written and has high production values, trouble is I'm not a hardcore rider planning multi day trips in foreign climes. I ride locally and trail build. I'd like to see a lot more content aimed at the average rider that's not so aspirational and maybe more insight into everyday riding, go out with some real riders to see what there local loop is actually like (I hear there's some good local trails behind the Nationwide in Swindon). Also be nice to see some stuff on how trails are built, how the contractors do it, get the Forestry Commissions take on biking, hell come and spend some quality time with the active local trail builders, the Gisburn group has been going for 15 years and Singletraction longer than that, I don't think many riders have any idea how much work and thought goes into building sustainable trails.
Maybe an article or two on how people often start to migrate to road as they get older, seems to be a common theme on here.
Apologies if all that is in the current mag, haven't really been interested for quite a while which is why I ditched the paper mag, I am never likely to end up bike packing in the Alps
"Thats pretty much how I see it. I value this place and don’t want it to go bust hence paying for a subscription. I’ve no interesting in the magazine at all"
I agree with TJ shocker. I view my digital subscription as supporting the forum indirectly as if the magazine went bust the forum would as well. £25 a year is worth it for a place as useful and entertaining as the forum.
A pity it is so hard to post pics here compared to any other forum but that's just old ground I guess.
Take my money, fix the forum
How much software dev can you buy with £40 or whatever your subscription is?
I also think that a pay to use forum would die on it's arse with too few users. What makes STW so unique is the large diverse range of posters, of only a small number of which would probably pay for a members only forum. You need lots of free users to provide content for the smaller number of paying users.
On the topic of images, the reason you can't upload your images to the forum is not a technical one. It could be done easily. The issue for us that we'd be hosting your images on our server and that isn't without risk. I have legal concerns in the undoubtedly fringe cases where we are found to be hosting copyright material. Other platforms can kind of skirt around that by claiming they are NOT publishers but just platforms. We, most certainly ARE a publisher - so that makes me nervous. In the classifieds we sort of cover ourselves (Maybe) by insisting you tick a box asserting that you have all the rights needed to publish images. Not much a problem there when the vast majority of images are the ones taken by the person posting the ad. On the forum I'm not so sure it wouldn't lead to some issues we'd need to deal with. So it's less that we can't do it and more that I don't want the agro. Maybe I'm worrying over nothing though so I'm not ruling that out.
I would happily pay on top of my subscription for photo hosting. But I understand the copyright thing would certainly keep me up at night. I do also read some of the reviews and some of the articles in the mag.
FWIW.
I've subscribed for years.
Digital only because I really can't be arsed with the magazine. Don't know why because I used to read it cover-cover. I do occasionally read the web review-type articles (those on the right-hand side -> ).
Happy to pay to keep the forum and the family going.
In terms of magazines, the only ones I read now are WSC (When Saturday Comes) and Private Eye. I get the CyclingUK mag too - and do read their tech articles. Dan Joyce is a legend, and I miss Chris Juden.
WSC is a weird one because I don't watch football and my interest disappears above the 4th tier (Scottish League 2 for example) - but they do some superb articles on the ethics and finance of the game, and there's a light touch of humour too.
They realise how pointless the activity is.
I’ll try and explain again why I don’t think forum only membership works . Although I accept that I could be wrong because I’m a teacher whose never run a business
let’s imagine the you can buy a forum only membership or a digital subscriber membership
Which would you charge more for?
Well I’m guessing the marginal cost of a adding a forum only membership is more than assuming a digital subscriber
That’s because both memberships cost in terms of less web adverts. But the digital subscriber increases magazine advertising revenue the forum only subscriber doesn’t
So a forum only membership costs more
Now I realise there’s another argument where you say forum only membership shouldn’t be expected to prop up the magazine. Well the team seem fairly determined to keep their jobs and run things with a team. It’s their business I support them
Unless I'm mistaken they've said many times they're not interested in running the forum without a mag, forum-only subscription would be a slippery slope towards that so never gonna happen surely? So all complaining fairly pointless 😀
FWIW I think the forum has gotten much better & it is quasi-usable most of the time now, yeah there are things that could be better but nothing [I]really[/I] worth moaning about (except the ridiculous delay when committing a reply, what is up with that?! 😂)
I stopped subscribing when something or other pissed me off - can't remotely remember what it was - but I started again in response to Mark's recent plea and have been pleasantly surprised by how much I like reading the mag. Of course I could find reviews and trail reports using Google, but that does not have the same element of happy serendipity. Also, the article by Niels Amerlinck (sp no doubt wrong) was worth any amount of subscription.
FWIW I love the magazine and have a love/hate relationship with the forum.
I look forward to the paper mag dropping through the letterbox and almost always read it cover to cover.
The forum has quirks and foibles that can at times be frustrating, but the people that make up the depth of knowledge that are it’s heart are like old friends I’ve never met. It’s worth far more than the admission price.
If my print subscription keeps the wolves from the door then I’m glad it does. I’m perfectly happy to pay more for that product because I value it more than it costs me.
And no, I don’t have money to burn, I just spend it on value for money items.
FWIW I love the magazine and have a love/hate relationship with the forum.
The forum has quirks and foibles that can at times be frustrating, but the people that make up the depth of knowledge that are it’s heart are like old friends I’ve never met. It’s worth far more than the admission price.
It seems that what you're saying is that you love the forum content and the people/ knowledge that fill it.
But you hate the actual forum software?
No entirely, no.
I much prefer the two forum topics of Bike & Chat to other forums 16.54 million sub topics. I much prefer the new classifieds with photos rather than the old style of “vague description, email me for photos” only to find out the item is not what was described or not what you want.
I value the opinions of everyone on a variety of topics. I just don’t have much truck with the same dozen “trolls” on the political threads who just argue and bait each other for no other reason than to bait or troll each other. Most would make perfect career politicians with their ability to not answer a question.
But that’s my problem in not being a tolerant character partly due to my spectrum disorder.
Post crashed whilst reading
had to login in again
watch as each letter takes a second to show as I type
wait 30 seconds for the post to submit
also Haven’t used classfiied since it’s was “upgraded” to be shit
dont read the mag, I’m here for the users and the content they create. For free. STW facilitates that community I suppose. This forum is the worst I use functionally, it’s customer experience is terrible. Paying for a slightly less worse experience is a strange business model
least I’m not getting entire page adds trying to sell me expensive watches anymore
My Forum experience is quite different to that. I’m logged out maybe every 3 months. Text appears instantly
I had difficulty with quotes and cut and paste on my phone once 3 days ago. It’s ’s slow to post comments
But other than that’s it’s fine. That’s currently chrome on iOS or windows 10. But it use to be chrome on android
yeah that's your computer/phone I thinkwatch as each letter takes a second to show as I type
I've been here since the GoFar days, before there was a magazine. I'm always a bit baffled by the people who go on about how shit the forum is. I read it daily on 2 different Windows versions, 2 different Android versions one of which is very old, and I used to read it on IOS and MacOS too. Apart from the odd update bug where we had to login every day, and the times when the hamsters are really tired, I can't say I've ever had a problem with it - certainly not enough of a problem to get annoyed. And I'm on here a lot , hours every day (sad, I know). I just don't understand how some people's experience is so different.
Aesthetically I think it looks fine, better than most forums, and as everyone has agreed, the community is fantastic. So thanks, Mark and the team, keep it up!