note: This is The Column, a part of Apolyton where anyone can write about whatever he/she wants :) If you feel like writing, submit your article via the article submission page

PREVIOUS ARTICLES

#76 MY JOURNEY AS A GAMER Martin pours his heart out over his affection for Civ. #77 A CIVILIZATION 3 CHALLENGE Connorkimbro sets up a challenge for Firaxis. #78 MILLENIUM GAMING FRONTIERS DanQ passes his predictions for gaming in the years to come. #79 HOW CIV NEARLY TOOK OVER MY LIFE AND DESTROYED MY MORALS Alexander's Horse does not want anyone to lose sight of what is important. #80 HAVE THE FORUMS TAKEN OVER APOLYTON? Iain discusses the significance of the apolyton forums to the admins but also to the site itself COLUMN ARCHIVE

In the last two-three weeks, the number of submitted articles for the Column was one big zero, and I had started working one-two ideas for columns to write. But as Iain Lindlay submitted a column, I would like to reply with another one...

First of all, that article of mine Iain referred to was something written a bit quickly and wasn't very accurate about the "average day of an administrator". On the "How much time do the administrators spend on the forums compared to other parts of the site" question, I would actually answer "much less", especially when it comes to administrative actions. I'm glad to say that for the bigger part, I spend time on the forums not as an administrator who has to monitor the forums, but as regular Civer looking for news, information, and other Civers to communicate with.

Iain probably saw only the "site updates" box in the Civ2 section, when he talked about updates in the rest of the site. But Apolyton has many more sections. The Civ2 one has not been updated very much in the last months, mainly because of the other sections. Since the beginning of the year, we actually constructed from nearly nothing the SMAC and CTP sections, which means lots of time spent. If checking the forums (as an administrator) takes 30-45 minutes every day (in total), posting files, news, updating the various subsections can take hours. Making one news headline, of course, wont take a whole hour, but a SMAC HOF update for example can take quite a lot of time. Or organizing chats and interviews (you dot come up with questions that easily) are time consuming things. Much more than closing a forum.

This doesn't mean of course that there haven't been occasions that other things around the site were not done because there was something going on the forums. So Iain has in a sense a point that lots of time is spent for the administration of the forums, and that's why we have Ming in the OT, or Yin in the civ3 list forum (especially after Ottok appeared, Yin has been much more needed :))

As for the importance of the forums, I think they are playing two roles. One as it started when we first opened them, and the other as it is evolving the last few months. The first and main role of the forums was(and still is) to be a media of communication with other Civers. It was an addition to the other three services a fan site like Apolyton usually offers: news, files, information(that being strategies, problem solving, or anything else). For the bigger part, our forums continue to play that role, it can't be any other way. But we've been seeing another new trend that I can only characterize as wonderful. Some of the forums have also become a tool for the community in various efforts, which find their way to the "main" part of Apolyton. The most obvious example is The List of civ3 suggestions. Organized and created 100% on the forums, its final versions have their place in what could be characterized as the "static" part of Apolyton. The same happens with files in the creation forums. It's often to see files created by a group of people who discuss and organize the creation of a file in these forums. These files once finished will be posted in Apolyton's databases. I could go on with Velociryx's SMAC Strategy Guide (initially posted on the forums, soon to be posted on the SMAC section), with SMAC fiction, or with Scenario League's and HAC's contests.

Closing, I could say that Apolyton has now two parts: one static and one "alive". One feeds the other, in matters of both content and visitors. So, who's complaining? None I would say :)

---------
About the author: Markos, co-owner/webmaster of Apolyton Civilization Site, has been a webmaster within the online gaming community since October, 1996.

Want to comment on this article?

The opinions expressed on this page do not necessarily reflect those of Apolyton CS or GameStats. They are just the personal opinions of the writer.