Amputee Forums

[kapteenkoukku]

I am not sure how many internet amputee forums there are on this planet, but I know (or have known) three (3) of them.

I think the first popular (or populous) forum was Heather Mills Amputee Forum which I also joined. That was at the time when I was fairly new amputee. I quit participating in that forum as I did not quite feel at home there, it was very insular and the people there (at that time) ignored people other than US American and I got into arguments with that inner circle because I brought up comments that were outside their comfort zone. I think that Heather Mills never meant that the forum is hijacked by one kind of people only, she must have meant it to be international. Sad!!!

Then I joined Amputee On-Line (a forum started by Ian, an AK from Vancouver). That forum as we all here know (as most of members of this forum are ex Amputee On-Line) gained popularity and increased its numbers of membership very rapidly. I guess that the reason for that was the forum's openness for everyone & anyone to bring up their opinions, regardless. That sparked interesting discussions and even debates. And I think most of us enjoyed the variety of topics being discussed as it was allowed. Now that forum is gone because of some maintenance problem... well, it still seems to be there, acessible in the internet, but no participation and was also momentarily hijacked by spammers after its abandonment by its members. (I have been peeping in).

Ok, now we have this forum where I am writing now that was meant to replace the Amputee On-Line after its death. The members are to some degree old members from Amputee On-Line, but the membership remains very low. Which means that the attempt to pull the people from old forum here was not successful. Also, the discussion seems somewhat jammed, very little new topics popping up and if there are, they are like forcibly brought up just to make it look like the forum is alive.

Now, I think it is time for the existing members to try to think of ways to bring life to this forum and ways of making it attractive to get more new members join. If the discussion remains lame as it is, this forum will die as the Amputee On-Line did, but not for same reason.

I am sorry for bringing this up, but I think we need some brain storming in this and hope that some bright ideas will surface.

At the moment I do not have many ideas myself but perhaps to think of more sub-categories of discussion. Maybe we could sign in to Amputee On-Line just to have a peep on what the sub-categories were?? And some other things from there that could be useful.

Or should we try to bring Amputee On-Line back from its coma??

And one more thing, we should agree to disagree and even allow heated debates at times, to certain point. Just as Amputee On-Line did.

[stonecutter]

I won't comment on the health and/or validity of the amputee-online forum. I'll leave that to others.

But what I can tell you is that if you have any ideas on the forum and/or subforum that you'd like to submit, please do so in the "About These Forums" section. We'll let the membership discuss and I'll be happy to make changes as the membership directs.

This forum, unlike other forums does not belong to anyone in particular. It doesn't belong to me, and it doesn't belong to AllenUK. We set it up with continuity in mind, and although there are people with moderation rights to keep the peace, the forums themselves belong to all who are members here.

That being said, ideas for increasing membership can also be discussed in the "About These Forums" area.

Thanks for your input!

[allenuk]

Jukka:

Generally yes to all you said, but with a couple of modifications:

Patience! It HAS only been six months since we set up this forum, which isn't long in forum terms. Yes, it would have been nice if it had been livelier, but I'm not unhappy with the last six months' progress.

We did in fact get probably 80% of the ACTIVE members of the AOL forum to transfer with us to this place, maybe 85%. Some of the rest were personal friends of Ian, who probably wouldn't have moved out of loyalty, some we couldn't contact in time (when that site was on-line/off-line so frequently), and some people just don't like moving. Fair enough. And there's been quite a few brand new members, either coming through word-of-mouth or from the Facebook clearing-house.

As far as open debate goes, well, there are very few rules here, and there is MOST certainly no 'personality' in charge - the only reason Trevor and I are nominally 'in charge' is because Proboards want two mugs to take the flak, if there ever is any.

But by all means try and stir things up! It's your forum.


Allen, bka, London.

[kapteenkoukku]

Thanks for your replies Stonecutter and Allen.

Let us think of something on "About These Forums" area.

[snowyh]

Jukka, thank you for voicing your concerns. I think all of us would like to see this forum become a useful and well-regarded resource for amputees worldwide. I think that, because this forum's initial member base was populated by former members of Amputee Online (AOL), we had already asked all the questions we wanted to ask, and posted all the topics that we found interesting. Sadly, when we left AOL, we left behind a lot of good discussion threads that it would have felt stilted to bring up again here.

It seems we perhaps need the newer members to liven things up by asking some questions. The best threads seems to be started this way.

The www needs a strong amputee forum. As you have mentioned, AOL has become a ghost town. I personally found Heather Mills' website to be cliquish & unwelcoming*, and full of threads that were not amputee-related. I'm a member of several other online amputee forums that never really even got off the ground--just a few initial posts (introductions mainly), then silence. We're doing quite well in comparison!

Helen

*They were mean to me because I'm devotee-friendly.

[billf]

I think that the largest problem of having a larger membership base is lack of exposure to the internet. Try Googleing our forum name or simply "amputee forum". I inspected several pages of Google output and found not a single instance of our forum being referenced. Guess what forum was at the top of the list? Someway we need greater internet exposure, like allowing the web crawlers snoop into out forum. I don't really like that approach because our posts more or less become part of Google searches, and the nature of some disussions are personal to our community. I don't know what limits can be placed on allowing web crawlers to find our site without crawling the detail messages posted within, but probably needs investigated.

BillF

[allenuk]

Hello Bill,

And yes, you're right. I even set up a Google Blog using THIS forum's name as the title, on the basis that Google would link to its own blog pages more than other sites, but no such luck.

There are now more members on our Facebook 'clearing-house' site than there are here, although there are virtually no messages, except those from me!

I shall send a message to all members on the Facebook site, reminding them of the existence of this place, and see if we can generate some chatter.

But I stand by my first point: given the very quiet way we were formed, and remain, I don't think we've done badly for six months. Compare our site here with the old AOL site, which has gone from almost message-free to almost totally moribund in the same period. We have a good constant daily visitor number, and the total number of members grows steadily month by month.

Patience, fellow patients.


Allen, bka, London.

[mom2noble]

I do agree that it is more quiet, but please believe me when I say that I love it here. You all have helped me out alot and reply with great ideas. I get the feeling that most amputees need alot of help and such at first, but then get into their own groove. My little guy is doing so great, I dont post anything unless I have issues or questions. I am sure that is the way everyone is. Keep this thing alive, it is a great thing! Know that you all that post on here and check it frequently are great and appreciated! You've all made a sizable difference in my families experience with amputation and prosthetics. Keep it up!
Mom to Noble

[stonecutter]

Thanks for the feedback mom2noble.

One thing that people should also keep in mind is that we keep the door around here locked. What I mean about this, is you can't just surf up to this forum and read its contents. You have to sign up, and then you need to have your account approved before you can see what's inside here. That means that when we go to Google and register this site to allow Google to send in their web "spiders" which catalogue the site and make it so it shows up on a Google search, they get turned away by our security that we've chosen to employ.

I administer another forum that does not have our level of security enabled and it shows up just fine on a Google search.

If an adjustment to the level of security we employ is required, it'll have to be proposed and accepted by the majority of members. Personally I'm indifferent, however I take my direction from the membership of these forums.

[allenuk]

Not sure whether opening up our doors to the Google crawlers would help. What we have here is 60 or 70 experienced (to different degrees) amputees, and I think if we had another 100 the level of input would be similar.

If all interested parties (that is to say, whoever has posted answers to this thread, PLUS all the 'moderators') got more involved it would help - by which I mean answering (or asking) questions as well as just reading them. I KNOW it's difficult, and there are 100s of other demands on all our time, but I think it's the only way to encourage more postings from the people who don't usually post.

Have a look, each day, at the very bottom of the 'Home' page - there are usually ten or more members who have visited the site in the previous 24 hours, of whom only 2 or 3 have posted.

But, returning (to the point of tedium!) to my original point, I don't think it's that bad, and I'd rather be amongst 60+ friends who were a bit quiet, than 600 noisey strangers.


Allen.

[abair01]

There are much better ways to get the word out about this forum. Send letters right to organizations and ask for their participation.

[abair01]

Right now I am in the hospital with my second BKA and I am in the process of making help videos and will be spreading the awareness of this online support wherever I can.

I already run a support board for mental illnesses and diabeties plays a big roll in that world as well.
so this will be a cool project