Uhm. Hello?

The State of AO...

Well JP...

The last news reference is...

Quote:

---

This is our virtual scrapbook. Anytime we are mentioned in the press, we put the link up on this page:

April 24, 2002, AntiOnline featured on Tech TV's "The Screen Savers" as the site of the night.

---

Member stats of the year registered with posts over 50 by year...

2001...251

2002...314

2003...272

2004...121

2005...50

2006...5 ( and 2 of them were doppy and another whiz coming back ) ...at this rate they'll be less than 15 on this year.

given the stats I'd estimate the decline began around the same time you sold the site ( in around Feb 2003 ) and the news headlines became old news.

Quote:

---

AntiOnline Sold to Jupiter Media

AntiOnline founder John P. Vranesevich last week announced that he had sold the security and hacker information Web site to Jupiter Media, which owns Internet.com. The AntiOnline IRC server and e-mail accounts will be shut down, but Vranesevich says he is setting up a new IRC server, irc.securitalk.com. According to SecurityNewsPortal, there is no word yet on whether Jupiter will close down and remove all the hacking programs. Terms of the deal weren't disclosed.

---

http://infosecuritymag.techtarget.co...digest17.shtml
Security Wire Digest - Monday, February 17, 2003, Vol. 5 No. 13

Eg ;)

Naughty! Naughty! EG~ ,

Didn't your mommy warn you about "lies, damn lies, and statistics"? :spank:

Your members from 2001 have had five years to reach >50 posts, those from 2006 have only had 5 months.

Another thing to consider is the "non-sensical thread" which ran from September 2003 to July 2004. That had 10,469 posts when it was closed, and is bound to have skewed the figures for earlier years.

As for press coverage....................well, AO doesn't have anyone going out seeking publicity anymore, so that was bound to happen. When the press want opinions they tend to go to the security suite vendors these days.....................or, more likely the security suite vendors go to them.............it has grown into a mega industry since 2002.

Unfortunately, we don't seem to have the granularity of metrics to make many year-on-year comparisons, everything is either pretty much immediate or totally cumulative.

:)

Hi nihil,

I did take that into account...in fact I was going to graduate the stats from year to year...eg. 2001=400, 2002=300, 2003=200, 2004=100, 2005-6=50...but that seemed too much to bother with :D

but those stats are not as far off as you might imagine even with graduated results...the fact is there is a regular and steady decline from about the time JP sold the site and about a year after AO stopped making the news.

And I'm somewhat suspicious of all these low post count returnees cropping up all of a sudden...I've counted about 30 this month alone...I've been here getting on to two years and I've never seen so many people from 2001-2004 with less than 100 posts popping out of the woodwork in the course of one month.

It's like half the threads I've read this month were forgotten returnees with 10-50 posts....who suddenly decided to resurrect their accounts all in the same time frame.

Eg ;)

Hi EG~

You still have to take account of the "non-sensical thread"............... that was a major skew.

Also there was far more Trolling, post whoring and flame warring back then.

"The tundra is barren, and the bears are eating anything they find almost immediately" :D

The members have "shot" most of the recent kills as it happens.................I doubt if things are as indolent as they once were. I do not know when the antipoint banning at current thresholds came into effect.

Yes, I have noticed the "return" of long absent members. OK the ones with security, hardware and software problems I can understand. They only come when they need help, and if you are not careful and clued up, that is becoming more prevalent these days, with the increase in spyware, rootkits, adware and so on.

One might even argue that the return to "active duty" of these "lapsed" members is a positive sign? ;)

Another thing, as you obviously like playing the "numbers games" there is no significant difference between the proportion of non-posting joiners to posters before or after the sale.

As for new members:

2001 = 2,400
2002 = 19,700
2003 = 6,800 (pre-sale)
2003 = 20,600 (post sale)
2004 = 13,900
2005 = 7,800

Nothing there?

I would actually suggest that the site has improved as it no longer posts current skiddie tools to attract them, and it does not have so many nonsense threads. Of course, that is just my view, but I am old enough to have rejected "things like they used to be"



;)

Hi nihil,

Quote:

---

Yes, I have noticed the "return" of long absent members. OK the ones with security, hardware and software problems I can understand. They only come when they need help, and if you are not careful and clued up, that is becoming more prevalent these days, with the increase in spyware, rootkits, adware and so on.

---

But...I have also noticed that a large percentage of these returning members are coming back to post nothing but nonsense or just to add their 2 cents to a thread.

As for the numbers ( thanks :D )...it reflects just what I said...

2001 = 2,400
2002 = 19,700
2003 = 6,800 (pre-sale)
2003 = 20,600 (post sale)
2004 = 13,900
2005 = 7,800

Quote:

---

Nothing there?

---

A new forum takes time to develop...so the low numbers early on reflect that...it reached it's zenith in 2003...and has been in steady decline since...

the fact is JupMed made a good business decision to buy AO to increase it's own influence and share...it went from a million dollar company to a 21 million dollar company since ( not all to do with AO or JP...but it helped )...

since the sale and JP's departure from the news headlines AO has become a white elephant...it no longer carries the weight it once did...nor can it influence and increase the popularity of JupMed like it used to...at this point I'd be surprised if they could sell it even if they wanted to...it simply is no longer a viable asset for sale or purchase...

unless JP wants it back ;)

Eg ;)

Bah its just JP wishing he had never sold the site. He does this every so often. He pops in and whines about how lame it is. But never have I seen a solution to this supposed problem offered. If you guys think its such a horrible site why do you still show up and post? Everybody has a complaint but nobody has a solution.

Quote:

---

Originally posted here by JP
Why did this place die? Who killed it?

:borg:

---

Censorship, and brow beatings.

:(

Quote:

---

Also there was far more Trolling, post whoring and flame warring back then.

---

I've looked back through a good many old threads posted while I was gone, and I would have to agree with this. I noticed that genuine trolls don't seem to last very long around here these days.

By the way, did anyone ever figure out who Tinker was? I think he made another appearance recently (SicWitt?), and he was neg-banned even quicker this time. This is the antipont system at its best.

As far as the site going down hill, I'm not sure. I think the main thing is, is the site serving its purpose? Can you come here and find information about securing your computer? Can you have a decent discussion about security? I would have to answer "yes" on both of those points.

I really don't think Jupiter Media has ruined this site.

Quote:

---

Originally posted here by ZomBieMann77
Bah its just JP wishing he had never sold the site. He does this every so often. He pops in and whines about how lame it is. But never have I seen a solution to this supposed problem offered. If you guys think its such a horrible site why do you still show up and post? Everybody has a complaint but nobody has a solution.

---

Pretty much. About once a year a thread is started, like that one asking for how to get more ads.... This one.. The other one saying it was broken. Every nyear, sometimes twice a year, a new thread is started with AO being broken, slow, full of ads, or something else.

And as you've pointed out, everyone jumps on the band wagon to whine too about the good ol AO... Like back in the day. No one says what we could do to make it better, just whining and bitching.

Or censorship... Yea I'm sure that's the reason. Not the fact that no one posts anything worth responding too, yup, it's ALL because censorship... Right..

A page full of swearing would have gotten you banned 3 years ago just as it would now.

If I can watch MY mouth sometimes it should be NO problem for someone else.

So we'll sit and reply top this with how AO sucks now, just whine like emo kids.

If a thread is actually made with a good chance to discuss something, generally it's gone after a few hours. You can't discuss something if you don't state how you feel about an issue.

And you sure as **** aren't going to get a discussion going here. If someone points out a Windows problem, they get called a basher and the thread goes to **** because the closet zealots can't shut the **** up and let people talk, if someone posts about Unix security, they are "elitist" or the thread goes to hell and back with people saying "This is just my OS is better bullshit".

So, everyone, go ahead, reply bitching and pissing how bad it is here, and do NOTHING about it. Worthless bastards.


Open Challenge:

http://www.antionline.com/showthread...hreadid=260637

Top me.

A security related thread with that many replies. More than a handfull of people told me it was the best discussion they'd ever seen on AO. So top me.

what up JP long time