Raivu for Admin

[Artificial]

Forum technology certainly isn't dead. Can you name a more efficient form of socializing? Besides social networking, and we certainly don't have site-specific social networks.

While a massive overhaul may be a waste, you do have volunteers, so it should be no sweat off your back. Let them try. What's the worst case scenario? No improvement? Because that's what's going to happen if they don't try.

Also, I'm a PHP developer. Unce, unce, unce, unce.

From a usability point of view vBulletin can definitely be improved. There's far too much going on, so many features that just aren't needed, and the features that are included I don't feel are executed properly. Traditional forum technology to me feels antiquated and clunky. I just don't feel like there's a natural progression or flow of conversation. Plus, there's a million forums out there - if we instead laid out exactly what we wanted to achieve, and built a system that nailed those specifications, we'd go a long way towards having a more sustainable website.

I like the idea of everything being integrated. High quality content, videos, reviews, trading, currency system, messaging, etc. communicating and working with each other. As it stands with vBulletin, you get the base forum code, and try to adapt generic standalone 3rd party modifications to suit a specific purpose. I think most people can agree that the current currency/trading system is terrible. And, I'm not sure how many of you have looked at it, but the coding infrastructure behind vBulletin is amongst the worst I've ever seen from such a large commercial PHP application. Extending vBulletin is really not an option.

The main issue with using inexperienced developers who don't have any experience building web applications is broken and/or exploitable functionality. However, if we can get a team together, I'd love to give it a go.

[GAMEchief]

From a usability point of view vBulletin can definitely be improved. There's far too much going on, so many features that just aren't needed, and the features that are included I don't feel are executed properly. Traditional forum technology to me feels antiquated and clunky. I just don't feel like there's a natural progression or flow of conversation. Plus, there's a million forums out there - if we instead laid out exactly what we wanted to achieve, and built a system that nailed those specifications, we'd go a long way towards having a more sustainable website.

I like the idea of everything being integrated. High quality content, videos, reviews, trading, currency system, messaging, etc. communicating and working with each other. As it stands with vBulletin, you get the base forum code, and try to adapt generic standalone 3rd party modifications to suit a specific purpose. I think most people can agree that the current currency/trading system is terrible. And, I'm not sure how many of you have looked at it, but the coding infrastructure behind vBulletin is amongst the worst I've ever seen from such a large commercial PHP application. Extending vBulletin is really not an option.

The main issue with using inexperienced developers who don't have any experience building web applications is broken and/or exploitable functionality. However, if we can get a team together, I'd love to give it a go.

Have you ever tried making a forum system? That shit is way, way, way, way harder than it sounds. Namely because of the tie it takes. You'll get bored of developing after a short while.
Though I do understand the concern with third party mods. They are rather shitty, especially for vB; but the useability of vB for the client is far better than any other current forum system.