Animation Source Forums

Let's be honest here, some of the existing sites that are dead need to be removed from AS. Why? Because no one is clearly interested in them, and dead sites could potentially drive new users away (I wouldn't join a dead site). Some of the sites that I feel should go are: Cats Don't Dance, Princess and the frog, Anastasia and Mulan (which is the most inactive). I know Steet is against removing inactive sites, but we can't have a source for every film in existence. We need to focus on bringing in activity to new and established sites, not sites that have been dead for two years or more.

I don't think we need to remove them completely per say, but they could maybe be de-activated or something maybe to be revived later on if we think it would work.

To avoid having too many dead sites, the French sources force people to gather on a specific website each day of the month and organises many projects. We still have less popular websites, though. If nothing has been done to attempt to save them, perhaps the admins could try to bring them to life?

However, on both sides, I do think there are too many sources (and I don't really get why some of them were approved, but that's mostly because I either don't like the movie or don't think the fanbase is big enough), especially on the forums since some of them have no activity at all. It's great to have a place to send fanarts, etc. but perhaps deactivate the empty forums could help getting rid of this "ghost town" effect.

The idea of builders grouping together and working on dead sites is a new idea to me. Though, most of the dead sites on this site don't interest me, so I really wouldn't care to help them if that idea was carried over to the English side. Every site for themselves here lol But I know I do try come up with things for people to do on sites that I'm a builder on. As for the admin thing, you guys still have admins on each site? We used to do that over here, but not anymore (not since 2011). I believe it had something to do with people becoming power hungry and causing drama.

I doubt there will be a day when the inactive sites will be removed (deactivated), but I think, as I've said before, could help with the inactivity. I also agree that some of the sites shouldn't have been accepted. While there's obviously limitations to what will be accepted, building sites for films and series that aren't well-known could be the death of AS. Only more popular movies and series should be accepted. There's also a point where a line has to be drawn for the amount of sites that are on here. While this IS Animation Source, we can't build sites for every known film out there.

While this is a bit of a separate issue from this topic, I think another issue that takes away from the site is the characters section. Most of the people who join AS only seem to join for the characters. It's a distraction, as these people create characters, then mate contests (which seem to be against the rules, yet are accepted), renders, etc. If I'm correct, the characters section was created for people who write fanfiction to link their characters. There was also a time when the contests section was rather locked down in what was allowed.

I agree, despite the rules, there are way too many fan characters on AS (probably because member have to make a page for their character before adding their self-inserts, adoptables and next generations characters in their fanworks).

It would make sense to avoid making new sources for barely known movies, unfortunately, it seems that the only requirement to make a new website is to have someone willing to make it. Perhaps Steet shouldn't approve of new sources until the members have been asked how interested they would be to contribute to it?

I think adoptables should be banned on AS. They're a distraction, and they make the site seem more like a virtual pet site (which seems to be spreading like a fire). There are also people who just make characters for roleplaying purposes as well. I guess you can say the characters section is being abused all around in different ways, causing any activity to be more private, rather than being more open to the public.

I think asking for opinions isn't that bad of an idea. It wouldn't be 100% fool proof, but I think it would help.

I once joined the seasonal contest on French side and it was a lot of fun. I think Hecate told me that someone once tried to make something similar on English side but there was too little interest.
And now, looking at the weak popularity of site-related contests and projects, I think a project on less active sites may have only a few, in any, participants...

I didn't think about that issue, our contests and projects are still quite active (but our forums are dead and the most popular contests seem to be the one in which people can send renders) but I guess it's more because the younger member actually want to do something for each website. I was very surprised to activity on The Aristocats Source for instance, the movie was not bad, but it's not the best Disney ever made and it's not the most popular.

From what I've understood, there are still dozens of Sources to be built on both sides, I don't mind it honestly, but I think that less popular website should be deactivated after a while to let others thrive. And I'm saying that as someone working on a Source, I would be sad to see a Source I worked on have no activity and be deactivated (or at least closed, a "read only" website), but I don't see the point in keeping a dead website.

Sources about recent movies / series are going to be popular at first, but I think some of them will eventually have less activity because the hype doesn't last forever. It's not a big issue, but when we make sources about older movies, we should know how many people it can attract.

Also, it seems that forums are not very popular among younger users, many seem to prefer using chatboxes and comments to talk, I personally find it less convivial but I guess that makes me old . Why is there a forum for every Source? It makes the forums looks very big and awfully empty on both sides. I really think that if every website is kept, some forums at least should be removed if no attempt at reviving them succeed (I know I've tried to create games on the French Bambi Source and nobody replied in months...).

I agree. Making sites on films/series that are all the rage at the moment should be avoided. I think a film should be at least FIVE years old before building a site for it... There should also be research done to see if there's a decent size fan base behind it before proceeding.



With popular sites such as Facebook having the ability to create fan pages, I think fan sites are becoming a thing of the past. Back in the late 90's and early 2000's, there really weren't any social media sites to speak of. The only places people of the same interests could interact with each other was on forums and web pages (if the site was advanced enough to have a comment system). Of course there are other factors that don't need to be discussed here that play a role, but I would like to believe my theory holds some water.

I agree that the forum section is rather long, but I don't agree on removing them (if a site is deactivated, then that's a completely different story). I think the forums just need to be setup a bit better to make the forum seem less like an endless sea of dead boards. Like the way the Balto and Lion King section is setup, maybe doing the same thing with the films would look better.

To be honest, I don't see how adding more sections to an already-dead forum will help to boost activity, especially if people are migrating to the main site for most of their activity. There's really no need to add anything to the site right now--if anything, as has been said, we should deactivate or remove the inactive sites.
As I scroll through the forum, I count 13 forums that have less than 10 topics, with the average being 6. Granted, most of these are the four or so newest sites on AS, but if a site is worthwhile to make, you'd think there'd be an explosion of activity. Yet Tangled, for example, still has no posts despite being active for months.

If the goal is to attract new members, or at least to keep current members, the general consensus seems to be that we need to deactivate most of the inactive sites. I haven't seen anyone in this topic who is opposed to doing that, and I believe it's better to have a site that looks mostly active than one which is mostly dead. (I've seen it said that no one will join a site they think is dead, and I agree with that sentiment.)

All that remains would be to determine which sites should be deactivated. Personally, I feel that we should get rid of the ones which have had little no to activity in the last four months or so. (This would exclude the newer sites, and I think four months is a reasonable time period for a site to show signs of life.)

My suggestion wasn't to add more sections to the forums, but to place all of the films under one section (like the way the Balto one is setup). But at the end of the day I don't feel this is a big deal. However, if a site has been dead for a long time and no one cares about it, then BOTH the site and forum section should be deactivated.

An "explosion" of activity on AS is likely to never happen again. With past events that have happened on this site a lot of the users have been driven away. And like what I said above, I think a lot of people use Facebook and other social media sites to fulfill their needs anymore. I'm not suggesting that drawing them to AS is a lost cause, I'm just throwing that out there. That being said, you can't really say a new site (or any site) is dead by looking at the amount of topics the forum section has. I know NIMH and Minions aren't the most active right now, but they aren't dead either.



The sites that I feel should be deactivated are:

The Aristocats Source
Princess & The Frog Source
Cats Don't Dance Source
Mulan Source
Anastasia Source
Rio Source
The Jungle Book Source
Tangled Source
Frozen Source - There's really no one around here, maybe besides one person, who actively talks about the film. Otherwise the site itself seems to be dead.
Robin Hood Source