A day later than planned, but here is Part 3 of the Interview with Admins follow up from the original interview back in 2003. If you missed Parts 1 & 2 you can catch up by clicking here for Part 1 or here for Part 2.
Why did you choose Invision as your forum software, and are you happy with that choice?
Steve - We have been on Invision Power Board for the better part of 7 years now, and I feel we've also played a part in the direction it has taken, I don't regret the choice, but who knows.. Maybe it's time to move on?
What tricks proved to be the most useful when modifying the software to improve performance?
Steve - I think I'll let someone else answer that question.
Redmak - We have disabled some features for guests, like dynamic updating of the mini spy, and turned off the online list under the topics for members, because it's a server intensive task.
How much do you have to prune the forums?
Steve - We never prune the forums.
What qualities are you looking for in moderators, and how do you select them?
Steve - Moderators are selected by vote from the current moderating staff. Usually that person has already been a long term member and shown maturity, a level head and leadership qualities.
Daniel - First and foremost for me it has to be a high level of maturity and good common sense. Neowin is the sort of job where every day is different and presents a new challenge, we have lots of guidelines to help but there are plenty of times it comes down to judgement and character. Oh and being able to be polite and courteous even when its 10am on a Sunday morning and one has a nasty hangover is always handy.
What would be your advice to someone willing to create a technology news website ? Do you consider this market saturated?
Steve - To anyone that is thinking of doing the same, be patient; Neowin didn't get big overnight. Listen to your community, staff and move with the times. Accept that not everything about the site is going to be what you want personally. As far as market saturation, you can never have enough good sites in my opinion.
Daniel - There are allot of news sites and blogs now, when we started it wasn’t that way and I’ve seen allot of sites come and go over the years. My best advice if you’re serious about starting a site like Neowin is getting a position on another blog first. Take some time to see how things work and if you can commit the serious amount of time it takes. If after 6 months you still want to, go for it.
What can you tell us about the future improvements of Neowin ?
Steve - We already created our own Content Management System that is also owned by Neowin, I'd like to think we can license it off in 2011 and maybe even create a forum extension for it too.
Watch out for Brad Sams details on stuff we're giving away during the month of October too; later today.
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