Website Activity

[NinjaGo]

Hi guys (specially to the Mods)

First off i'd like to thank the volunteer mods who have been trying to help prospective doctors like me through this website. I salute you for all the effort you've been showing.

But it's been my observation that it seems like this particular forum is not that active anymore. Aside from occasional post by prospective test takers looking for study partners and such, but most of the stuff i'm seeing lately were mostly spam posts by reps of review providers posing as test takers. There are no more comprehensive posts being made about USMLE/ECFMG updates and active discussions about techniques, new media sources, matching news and such.

Is it because of the time of the year? Or things about The Boards have been stagnant lately? I hope to be enlightened cause there are more way active forums out there of even mundane topics like cats or toy helicopter hobbies. I personally feel our forum should be more active that it is right now.

Again, it's just an observation and real inquiry of the reason why.

[admin]

Hey there,

Thanks for the feedback.

Do you have any suggestion on getting the forum with more traction?

The community can feel free to post here with any suggestions and we'll see if we can make any changes to bring activity up.

Ed

[NinjaGo]

Originally Posted by admin

Hey there,

Thanks for the feedback.

Do you have any suggestion on getting the forum with more traction?

The community can feel free to post here with any suggestions and we'll see if we can make any changes to bring activity up.

Ed

Hi Ed

Thanks for the support and the service you've been providing.

The thing it's a bit hard to pinpoint the reasons why mainly perhaps because of a number of compounding reasons.

The funny thing i was just talking to a local buddy just last week who is also about to start the Steps and part of our talk was about updates on usmle- focused forums. And USMLE-Forums was one of the places i mentioned to him. His reaction was for me not to even bother because of "sharks" (his word, not mine) reps posing as test-takers and such flooding this website with spams. He basically said he got turned off by this website and a number of people he knew who also have been preparing because of that one reason alone.

And he was right, a simple click of New Posts will show the usual suspects posting the same stuff, easily burying legitimate posts/inquiries/experiences that could help and even inspire people.

Perhaps, even before discussing the website's dated format and other stuff, I personally think it would be of great help if those kinds of spamming posts be weeded out regularly and the accounts of those "users" be disabled/ booted off after a number of warning from the mods.

Not only because they cause wastage of this website's bandwidth and space, they literally bury useful posts and real inquiries. It's not only annoying but also frustrating.

I'm not sure about the exact number but i read somewhere that a typical website user's attention can only be kept after only a limited number of clicks or searches. Beyond that certain number, the typical user just basically gives up and moves on if nothing comes up that interests him/her. And the probability of him/her visiting that site again goes way down. That's the principle most social media websites operate . And the last time i checked, USMLE-Forums is social media website, too, albeit by busy professionals.

Just my two cents.

[admin]

Awesome,

Thanks for the suggestion, I'll take a note of this.
Anything else you have in mind?
I'll see if the spam management is intact but I'm pretty sure its on.

New users cannot post links, photos or a huge amount of text unless they have a certain amount of posts.

Ed

[USMLE2011m]

I joined back in 2011 for my step 1 and this forum was bustling and so much was being done and discussed and it really helped me prepare.
Fast Forward to 2018 and it is very dead. It makes me sad, how unuseful this platform has become.