Transparency On The Future of ATS

a reply to: SkepticOverlord

Thank you for the response, it is both informative and appreciated.

Let me work with some folks to put together a list of objectives (i.e. a list of what our goals are, and are not). Hopefully, this will give us a starting point for discussions. We (likely myself) will PM this information to you. It should be brief to start. We can then exchange more direct contact information (email, phone, etc.). And hopefully we can move forward from there.

We will be more than happy to enter into NDA's, I would expect no less.

Best regards,

FCD

originally posted by: Willtell
a reply to: Flyingclaydisk

You can't name the forum?

I can, but I elected not to for a couple of different reasons. First, I plan on discussing this matter with the individual I referred to and didn't feel right about mentioning the forum here until I have done this. Second, it's not really relevant because the subject matter of that forum is considerably different (not conspiracy related in the least). Third, the subject matter of that forum would be a dead giveaway for the larger website / forum which I also referenced. I will say this; the larger website is a considerable business venture first, and the forum is just a sideline to this business (which is where some of the issues originated that led to some of the members creating another website). It's complicated, as always.

I posted the comparison principally to illustrate the similarities with what is happening here on ATS. The larger collateral website was only mentioned for background and context and I would prefer they not be involved. The smaller forum-only website is similar to ATS in that it is not a revenue site, just a friendly discussion forum site like ATS.

I think I will leave it at that.

P.S. - One afterthought I will point out though is heated political discussion does take place on both of the websites, and it has not detracted from their overall membership and/or participation. But, like ATS, these discussions are marshalled into politics specific sub-forums on both websites. Unlike ATS, one of the big forum differences (for both) is that neither of them have any sort of a post ranking system (i.e. stars and flags), so as a result there are no aggregation pages which show the most popular posts (i.e. like "Top" and/or "Live" with 'most flagged', etc. Posts are just ranked by OP date, and then last response goes to the top of the page (below stickies of course).

FWIW, ATS (S.0. and owners), have you ever considered dropping the ranking system for posts on ATS? This often seems to cause more trouble than it's worth.

originally posted by: SkepticOverlord
There are only two options:
1) Find a suitable buyer with the resources to invest in growth.
2) Slowly fade away until revenue can't support hosting.

I hope Option 1 succeeds...

I've spent more hours on ATS than I'd like to think about. ATS isn't perfect and it has always had a lot of unfulfilled potential, but it's has enabled more in-depth discussions than is common on some competing formats for UFO discussions - such as Facebook or, yuck, Twitter.

The ability to easily embed photos and videos has meant that threads on ATS could include more multi-media than "old-fashioned" email discussion threads.

Perhaps ATS's time has passed. Trying to keep ATS alive may, unfortunately, be a quixotic endeavour - at least without some investment to repair/develop features here. My subjective impressions is that for a considerable period there have been fewer new members, lower search engine result rankings (particularly on Google), an inability to easily post threads on Twitter/Facebook with a relevant thumbnail, some apparently broken features (such as the U2U envelope not apparently lighting up any more when a message has been received) and, well, apparently less energy in the UFO forum than a few years ago. I hope that ATS survives and that a new owner or owners means some growth.

If Option 2 becomes more likely, I hope that there will be a real effort to preserve some of the work posted by members here. I'd be happy to help with any archiving project - although I hope this will not become necessary.

a reply to: Komodo

… Take what you started and take it serious or give it to someone who can and $$$$ won't be an issue to support it.

All due respect, but you could have saved yourself a bunch of typing (above the quoted statement) and just opened your post with..."I didn't read the OP, or anything else in this thread, but..."

The site started to go downhill as soon as it became a left/right forum. It is supposed to be about conspiracies, not US politics.

a reply to: blackrabbit1

You're right. We should have never allowed the JFK assassination, or MKUltra, or any other political/governmental topic on the site. What were the owners thinking...conspiracies in politics...like that's ever happened.

originally posted by: Flyingclaydisk
I'm beginning to think there is no real appetite in preserving the ATS culture and philosophy by ATS ownership, and rather more of an interest in just making a membership buyout impossible in order to market the name and website for a quick profit.

Let it die... It's worth zero dollars dead. Consider that when making an offer to buy out 'an idea' somebody commercialized and rode the whole distance.

I've got a rusted-out pickup truck with 250K miles on it back on the old farm. I'll sell it to you for a million bucks (great stories to share with you about it). Once you've transferred the funds I'll make an offer to SO to buy-out ATS. At least you'll have a rusted-out pickup truck to look at when it's all over.

Good day all...

I was referred to this thread by one of our Members. Honestly, I hate to see this happening. ATS was one of the "founders" of Conspiracy discussion, I spent a lot of time here many years ago!

As the owner of the highly successful beyond-the-fringe.com, I feel somewhat obligated to see if there's something I/We can do to help? Finances are no issue. I am not interested in out-right purchasing ATS, but if the Owners have an interest in some sort of collaboration/merger to effectively keep the ATS 'family' together, I am sure there is something we can do.

If not, I wish you all the best of luck!

Best regard!

Its been a heckuva ride. Thanks for everything. Good luck, ATS.

a reply to: bigfatfurrytexan

They were actual conspiracies though.

Not infantile BS.

Why not get rid of the US politics, hyperpartisanship and places like the mud-pit which have killed any chance of having a constructive debate and are driving users, posters, thread makers and advertisers away? People pointed out this was a major problem a few years back and the quality of content has decreased rapidly as people aren't going to waste time and effort making a high quality thread when 90% of replies are one line dismissals of the topic because of assumed political views or 'gotcha' style putting words in other posters mouths.

a reply to: IsaacKoi

If no buyer is found, they could conceivably just remove off all forum features and have the site as a purely "read only" archive for research purposes.

The hosting cost would be minimal, even less so if you removed all images stored. Hey even charge people small access fees if necessary to cover that minimal amount of hosting, other archives such as lobster do this.

I have a feeling from some of the responses by SO however, that they are done and even ATS as an archive of posts is of little interest to them.

originally posted by: 111DPKING111
Not true if browsing the site from the phone, Ive had to shut down the browser many a time due to malicious ad content here.

Who is your service provider? It's widely known -- and we've proven it -- that mobile service providers are injecting their own ads into mobile web browsing. It's one reason why I simply don't use my phone for web browsing anymore.

a reply to: bigfatfurrytexan

So how does the old coffee shop, with all the old retirees sitting at a table swapping stories non-stop for hours on end and then when done the six of them each hand a dollar to the waitress stay in business?

First it is not just the six. There are ten seats at the table and people come and go all day to ask questions of where to get a repair done, what materials you need to patch a hole in drywall, etc. the 20 or so throughout the day is another $20 that you didn’t see as day wore on.

People also sit at nearby tables when they can’t fit and the old guys table. Will order lunch or pie to wait their turn at an open seat. Maybe they are just introducing their lunch partner to the old guys and since he is a stranger they sit at a nearby table until the new guy has earned the right to sit at the old guys table. We generally just means sharing some stories of their own or giving good advice on a project.

That coffee shop doesn’t make a dime from the old men. They probably drank $5-10 in coffee each but only paid a dollar. But it does make money on the people that interact with the old men. That is the difference between an old coffee shop and modern cappuccino bar.

The core of ATS isn’t the subject matter it is the community. Now that said if people want coffee and all they can find is drywall screws, then that won’t work very well. But so long as there is coffee to be had and the community (the old guys table) is there, then it works.

But as SO has pointed out, the only means of monetization has baulked (for whatever reasons) and we just can’t keep the lights on with what little money they let trickle in. The changes are more than the owners wish to endure without knowing if they will work.

originally posted by: blackrabbit1
The site started to go downhill as soon as it became a left/right forum.

So... 2003 was the start then?

originally posted by: pigsy2400
If no buyer is found, they could conceivably just remove off all forum features and have the site as a purely "read only" archive for research purposes.

The hosting cost would be minimal,

Only marginally less. The majority of "hits" on the site are non-human automated bots/spiders. Those would keep hitting pages.

There are parallels here with the music industry.

Simply put, streaming ripped the income out of it.

So bands adapted. They make money from tours, merchandise and a little from sponsorship now instead of relying on singles and album sales. They understand that only the die hard fans buy the records. There are a few massive sellers still, but not as many as you might think.

So the question is this - what do you want ATS to be?

If you want it to be essentially a politics site, its doomed. Every site with a comments section is a politics site. No USP. Politics is akin to Spotify

If you want it to be a conspiracy forum, then there is a chance it will pull through but it still needs an overhaul and the everyday bickering politics needs to go. The weird stuff is the USP. People would likely come here to escape the politics that infects every where else.

Let me put it another way - when we were doing ATS Live, we could fill three hours of conversation on esoteric subjects that came from the top picks of the forums and mostly off the front page. Occasionally we did a politics angle, but it was rare and usually based on a world event. We ran a weekly show for five years on that basis, and there was still great stuff we left behind because we didn't have time to fit it in.

Trying to do that now would be impossible. It would be a US politics talking shop.

Anyone taking over/thinking about taking over the site needs to bear that in mind. The place needs a reset. Carrying on carrying on isn't going to be an option. It needs a sound business model, patience and a ton of time.

On another note, I'm eternally in debt to Mark, Bill and Stephen for the opportunities afforded to me via this site. I wish I could help. I'd love to buy in, but the money isn't there for me barring a lottery win.

Seems like ats has been targeted by more powerful people who dont align with a majority of the sites members.

This is going on across many forums.

Liberal silicon valley will break you

a reply to: SkepticOverlord

there's no injecting with traffic going over https. the evil, scary https you should have implemented on this website years ago. the industry goddamn standard.

i just tried to quote your post 3 times. 3 times, no luck. the whole website still crawls like sh.t, and you expect it to generate any sort of revenue?

what the hell happened, SO? you had what seemed like a serious technical team, whole site was redesigned, everything worked like a charm, and then things started going downhill - why? you provide transparency about the future, but where's the transparency about what caused all this mayhem in the first place?

because it's surely not all about adblockers, you had plenty of time to act, yet you elected to ignore it. check the thread from my signature, signs were here many months ago, yet you're telling us now that the house is on fire.

guess what, we've noticed.

sorry for the snarky tone, but i'm just honestly pissed at how this was handled over time. SHTF long time ago, yet you've waited until now - do you wanna have remote chance of saving ATS, or are you just eager to sell it and be done with it?