Not for nutin'...

[+Harrald]

But when this was the northeast forum it was much more active.

[+MissJenn]

[Keystone]

Harrald, it's very nice to see you here again!

 

I attribute the decline in traffic for many of the regional subforums to the growing popularity of Facebook groups.

 

I continue to believe that forums like this one provide better tools for thoughtful Q&A, debate, sharing, and answering of questions. Unfortunately, many more people use Facebook -- so it wins the discussion traffic even though its tools are ill-suited to the great forum discussions of years past, where you were a valued participant. I have zero Facebook presence, and this is one of the reasons for that.

[+cerberus1]

Haven't seen the "Sunrise Step Off" in a while, but other than that it seems the same (yawn).

For some, being sent here means the end of the thread.

Facebook got popular with many and an email came just a few days ago saying some group from Jersey is now on twitter.

Seeing twitter in the heading, didn't bother to read further...

Even Off Topic regulars got a group forming elsewhere.

[+Michaelcycle]

There a number of pretty active local groups in the Mid-Atlantic. We have lots of cachers with over 1,000 posts (including yours truly) on the South Jersey Geocaching forum. That's where most of the people I want to communicate with can be reached.

[+briansnat]

Even the main forum seems to be less active these days. I think Keystone is right about Facebook groups replacing the forum. There are several pretty active ones out there.

 

Good to see you're still around Harrald!

[+Packanack]

Haven't seen the "Sunrise Step Off" in a while, but other than that it seems the same (yawn).

For some, being sent here means the end of the thread.

Facebook got popular with many and an email came just a few days ago saying some group from Jersey is now on twitter.

Seeing twitter in the heading, didn't bother to read further...

Even Off Topic regulars got a group forming elsewhere.

 

We were able to keep Sunrise Stepoff active for 4 years, and I believe there were more than 100 group hikes and more than 700 cachers who participated in total. Interest waned when caching converted from a hiking activity to a driving activity. Although some of the originals continue to knock out some adventures..

Young bucks like Weathernowcast, brianb and Waylesswood have put some impressive mileage into their hiking, becoming members of the Catskill 35OO club by summiting all of those peaks. polskikrol and wgrun pounded out some heavy hiking, George I believe is now doing NJSAR.

 

One thing that came out of Sunrise Stepoff is the number of people who have formed some real nice friendships, such as Weathernowcast and brianb and Waylesswood.

 

I count Ramapo and accbd and citicar and stillnoname among a select group of friends.

 

We also put together the High Mountain CITO, which is I believe the longest continuing CITO event in Northern New Jersey and through that an amazing result has been achieved. Weathernowcast continues to put it together and this year I believe about 40 people showed up, making it among the best attended CITO events.

 

Some of the old timers still get together and maintain the Blue Trail in High Mtn. Wayne. Last year some of us rode our bikes and camped on the C&O Canal Towpath in Maryland. We somewhat regularly get out and go. Some of us do a fair amount of bike caching. But many of the others who were regulars got caught up in other activities and children activities and are not that active in caching anymore. Of late the entire North Jersey Community seems kind of moribund. It is not that unusual for a cache to have but 3 finds in total, which tells me that interest is flagging beyond the initial FTF blaze.

 

So if anyone wants to join us tomorrow night for a 2 hour hike beginning at 6 PM, come to Chicopee Drive Wayne NJ and walk with us. There are a few caches, but the company is always nice.

And we might just start a new tradition.

Edited June 5, 2013 by Packanack

[+cerberus1]

We were able to keep Sunrise Stepoff active for 4 years, and I believe there were more than 100 group hikes and more than 700 cachers who participated in total. Interest waned when caching converted from a hiking activity to a driving activity. Although some of the originals continue to knock out some adventures..

I liked to see how folks got together and planned hikes in the "Sunrise" thread (even working parking fixes) and I probably printed out most of the maps.

The two hour drive was an issue for me, since many were held on Sundays.

Night-shifters playing on Sundays didn't seem to work out well for us and we even stopped going to events on Sundays quite a while ago.

The others, I felt uncomfortable attending, slowing folks down, accessing hides most found years earlier.

- I didn't want to be that guy.

[+Harrald]

When I was an active member of the community there were so many less caches, we had to travel more than 20 miles for 1000 caches. Now the local cache group is real local. I can see how these off site sub-forums became popular.

 

For Mopars surprise birthday party, there were cachers from 5-6 states in attendance. Most of us knew each other from the forums. Now a local group can be 50 members and be in an area one tenth of the size they were 10 years ago.

 

If Groundspeak has the server space, maybe some sub-forums here could bring members back. On your way to your "Northern New Jersey" forum, there's a chance you'll stop in the "Mid-Atlantic" (uggggg) forum and make a friend in southern NJ.

 

This was only an example. Maybe reaching out to the local caching groups and giving their admins limited mod responsibility (only in their respective sub-forum) would be a way to start.

[+BBWolf+3Pigs]

Harrald, it's very nice to see you here again!

 

I attribute the decline in traffic for many of the regional subforums to the growing popularity of Facebook groups.

 

I continue to believe that forums like this one provide better tools for thoughtful Q&A, debate, sharing, and answering of questions. Unfortunately, many more people use Facebook -- so it wins the discussion traffic even though its tools are ill-suited to the great forum discussions of years past, where you were a valued participant. I have zero Facebook presence, and this is one of the reasons for that.

 

I agree. If there is someone from out the area looking for assistance (eg. cache recommendations while ona trip to the area) you know have to search for an active group (either a web based group or a facebook group) to ask the question. In the past, it was very easy - you just went to the regional forum and asked. Now, when you ask, peopel point you to a bunch of different places, and most of those group sites are ghost towns.

[+Harrald]

It's nice to see the old "North East" forum back. It would be even nicer to see players return to the forums and make Geo-friends from outside their immediate area.

 

Cheers to GC.com