DAC Needs Help

Post by **King of Creation** » Sat Jan 12, 2013 9:46 am

[ Community -> Editorial ] - News related to <a href="http://www.duckandcover.cx/archives.php ... y=140">Top Story: DAC Needs Help</a>

Hi everyone,

Let me preface by saying that I’m not asking for your money in a crowd-sourcing campaign. Over the past 10 (!!) years that I’ve been involved with DAC in one way or another, we’ve gone through highs and lows, periods of intense activity and inactivity. Most of the time, I’ve tried to build up activity on the site, but in the last year or two especially, I just haven’t had as much time to give the site the attention that I’d like to – and that it deserves. With that in mind, I’d like to ask for help. I don’t really foresee me being as active as I used to be anymore, so in order to keep the site going we need people to step forward and help run it.
The most obvious position to help build momentum on the site is that of a Newsposter. Over the years, a lot of you have come forward to help out with news, but I need someone (or hopefully more than one) person to help consistently post news, editorials, original content – anything at all. There’s already a pretty established framework for exposure (via Twitter, the Facebook page, etc), so that end is fairly simple. It’s the synthesising and posting of news, rumours and speculation from around the internet on DAC that I need help with. It’s always been a big job, and I just can’t do it by myself anymore.
Newsposters are important, but the position that is most sorely needed on DAC is that of a technical administrator – someone who has the skills and knowledge to code. Specifically, we need to upgrade our forums – to phpBB 3 or something equivalent. We’re flooded with spambots, and our captcha-style defences just don’t work anymore. I’ve never had the skills to handle these sorts of things, and it’s showing more than ever. The site itself seems to work, but there’s always room for improvement.
There are other ways we can work together to improve DAC. We’ve had ideas in the past that semi-start, but then are never followed through. We had a big push to make DAC t-shirts a while back, as an example; lots of people talked about submitting designs and it seemed like it was going to be great, but then nothing happened with it. There have been weekly-features by members of the community that start, but then kind of quickly die out. There are some good features that are fairly consistent – I can think of Wasteland Radio as an example. That’s the kind of thing we need more of to survive as a site. I’m sure we can come up with some great ideas.
So, to sum it all up (TL;DR), we need technical-skilled people who can help upgrade the forums, newsposters who can consistently post news, and new ideas that are followed through with from the community. It’s been a while now since Fallout: New Vegas came out, so, with Fallout 4 on the horizon, let’s bring DAC out of this rut it’s been stuck in and into a new Golden Age.
-KoC

Post by **Dogmeatlives** » Sat Jan 12, 2013 2:26 pm

We kinda have been sucking as a collective lately. I blame myself for some of the failure to follow through on stuff like the t-shirts for instance. We do have an opportunity to start covering Wasteland 2 news but the ball has kinda been dropped there as well.

I can't really help with the technical bits, but with news and content I can work to be more active. I will try again on a t-shirt design I'm happy with, but like many others, don't have as much time as I did even a year ago.

PiP · Post by **PiP** » Sat Jan 12, 2013 3:00 pm

Sorry that I can't commit to posting news consistently. I'll buy a t-shirt probably once we get them

just making shipping cost reasonable.

SenisterDenister · Post by **SenisterDenister** » Sat Jan 12, 2013 9:46 pm

It seems like half the regular posters just ghosted and ran off, I don't think posting more news or something could fix that.

As for updating the forum, why? If it ain't broke don't fix it.

Wolfman Walt · Post by **Wolfman Walt** » Sun Jan 13, 2013 8:56 am

Unfortunately, we have a much high out going rate than influx. I'd say generating new content would be what we need to do, but I don't really know what? More space cat? I dunno.

Post by **King of Creation** » Sun Jan 13, 2013 9:43 am

SenisterDenister wrote:As for updating the forum, why? If it ain't broke don't fix it.

It's very, very broke. It's one of the main reasons why we keep getting spambots. phpBB 2.x is extraordinarily vulnerable to exploits. We've been hacked twice before (not just that codex attack). But in general, the technical side of things needs major overhauling - the gallery is something I especially want to look at for user-generated content.

POOPERSCOOPER · Post by **POOPERSCOOPER** » Tue Jan 15, 2013 4:34 am

I was going to post a reply a few days ago but I just got sidetracked which is kind of what I feel is typical now. I don't think just having news posters posting news is going to help now, you would need some consistent exclusive interviews to even make a dent in trying to get new users to the site. I think a lot of news posters have been discouraged when they make new content because there isn't a lot of people who comment on them even though the stuff I have seen is pretty good stuff.

I have always loved DAC and have a lot of good memories but I don't see us being able to get to an active level unless they announce FO4 pretty soon AND we have a staff who wants to keep posting news. Lots of sites make more and do better content than we do, the main thing we really had was the hardcore community and the freedom they had to do what they wanted. I haven't visited NMA in a long time but they were always considered THE Fallout fansite even though I hate most of them there.

Now for some ideas to help lift the site up is to go all out Post Apoc stuff and cover Wasteland 2 like a mofo and get some real content but honestly I don't think we have anyone left with the drive to do something like that. I kind of remember sites that are a lot of user generated content that is completely created by community but we don't have anyone with the technical knowledge to do something like that. The other idea I thought about is consolidating the site with RPGcodex, convincing them to have a Fallout sub site of some sorts that we can have control of or have them heavily promote this site a lot through the form of having them post all the fallout related stuff on this site. Codex has a lot of active users and pretty much encompasses a lot of what we have on this site merely because of the fact the founding fathers are the same or are in the same circle. I see a lot of old DACKers on the codex quite a bit so I think we may be able to get some of the community support there and also we know DU.

I do admit I would miss all the stuff DAC recommends to me since I trust DAC 1000% than people recommending me shit on other sites.

Mad Max RW · Post by **Mad Max RW** » Tue Jan 15, 2013 5:16 am

I haven't seen DAC as a Fallout site in almost a decade now. After the whole FOBOS thing passed and Bethesda got the license it's been in limbo waiting for something to latch onto. Maybe if Wasteland 2 is good, but Brother None at NMA has his mouth stuck firmly to the asshole of that one. Eh, who gives a fuck if none of that helps the topic.

Stalagmite · Post by **Stalagmite** » Wed Jan 16, 2013 4:10 am

Fallout is dead. Sort of like the hammer-headed pussy Republicans.

Splatterpope · Post by **Splatterpope** » Sun Jan 27, 2013 5:56 pm

I'd love to help out with newsposting. Starting to get into games journalism (hah) so I'll see if I can swing some DAC clout around and get some interviews.

POOPERSCOOPER · Post by **POOPERSCOOPER** » Wed Jan 30, 2013 4:40 am

That would be cool, splatterpope. All the Tim Cains and Chris Avellones are fairly easily to get a hold of just can't ask them any questions they can't answer due to NDA's and publishers.

SenisterDenister · Post by **SenisterDenister** » Wed Jan 30, 2013 5:41 am

What publishers? The whole Kickstarter thing kind of removed that element.

POOPERSCOOPER · Post by **POOPERSCOOPER** » Thu Jan 31, 2013 3:47 am

I mean games that have publishers, they won't be able to go into super depth into stuff like that okay.

Post by **King of Creation** » Sat Feb 02, 2013 8:17 am

Yeah, Fallout is unfortunately still with Bethesda, but you might be able to get good stuff out of inXile and Obsidian.

Send me a PM and we'll get the ball rolling.

fallout ranger · Post by **fallout ranger** » Sun Feb 03, 2013 3:13 am

YouTube channel? Get more active on Facebook/other media.

Still want a tshirt design?

Splatterpope · Post by **Splatterpope** » Mon Feb 04, 2013 1:35 am

The youtube channel idea sounds good.
We could do a history of Fallout video, complete with tictacs and PoS betrayal. I personally don't think enough people know who Herve is, let alone the impact he had on the world.

fallout ranger · Post by **fallout ranger** » Mon Feb 04, 2013 5:21 am

Splatterpope wrote:I personally don't think enough people know who Herve is, let alone the impact he had on the world.

True, few now know of the dark days of Fallout.

We can grow other stiff in there like top 5 mods for Fallout 2/Tactics/3, gameplays maybe, funniest moments.

Even some tutorial stuff on how to use the F2 mapper would be cool, since very little is out there, and certainly none in video form.

Post by **King of Creation** » Mon Feb 04, 2013 8:01 pm

I definitely like the idea of a youtube channel. I'd still love a t-shirt design as well. Dogmeatlives was going to make one, but I think he's pretty busy. If you're up for it, I would definitely welcome it!

fallout ranger · Post by **fallout ranger** » Wed Feb 06, 2013 3:20 pm

Toss me any ideas ideas you may have via PM.

SenisterDenister · Post by **SenisterDenister** » Wed Feb 06, 2013 5:06 pm

I designed a shirt and posted it here a few years ago, I have no idea where it is on my hard drive, though.