I would think that there are many people out there who share similar views to those on this site, but where are they?
Is this really close to 'it', as far as those English-speaking people who are interested in investigating strange phenomena in a rational way, and ideally testing your ideas against people who are skeptical of such ideas?
It seems like such a great idea! Skeptiko was a great place, it still is alright, but that was part of the allure back in the day.
I'm sure we're not alone, but we're probably spread around in different places, not necessarily communicating with each other.
Well, books on the various topics do sell in quantities, so there is obviously interest from other people. I guess they are distributed across many different locations.
One example, there have recently been a number of interviews with Dean Radin on a number of different podcasts or sites. There may or may not be discussion areas associated with each. Then there are other forums, but with a different emphasis. One which I read relates to a particular interest of mine, reincarnation. There are other forums, maybe some place the emphasis on self-help, others on spirituality, others on scepticism. (There are other categories too) This site (and Skeptiko in its own way) may cover all of those, but maybe it is the role of our forums to rest on a knife edge, balanced between full-blooded commitment to wholesale acceptance or rejection of particular phenomena, but trying to give a fair hearing.
There is also the not insignificant matter of people having busy lives, other matters may take priority.
Maybe we could come up with a list of other different forums or discussion platforms. I know places like Facebook, and youtube comment serve as discussion areas but I tend to find them unsatisfactory, for various reasons.
(2018-06-24, 07:31 AM)Max_B Wrote: [ -> ]Psiencequest isn’t ranked high enough on Google for popular search terms. That is due to a whole host of problems.
What would you say those problems are, Max? We've done a few things to try to improve our ranking but so far have had little success.
Thanks, Max. I think a lot of the problem is that our forum is relatively new, so it's as you say hard to catch up with sites that already have a lot of traction. The SEO methods that you describe whilst effective are unfortunately kind of difficult to implement on a forum, where content is generated by members and the structure is generated by the forum software, rather than by admins with SEO in mind, but if you have any specific suggestions that you think might work for PQ, then I'd love to hear them.
(2018-06-24, 03:50 AM)darkcheese Wrote: [ -> ]I would think that there are many people out there who share similar views to those on this site, but where are they?
Many people have no interest in the internet and I myself am beginning to lose interest. It's like TV - it keeps me away from living in the real world and even if I don't have a reason to use it, I use it anyway just as a lazy way of killing time.
Perhaps we could all do more to circulate links to the site - for example in bloggers' "rolls" and so on. In the past I've posted some links to relevant PsienceQuest threads on the SPR Facebook page, but as I've now deleted my Facebook account I won't be able to do that in the future.
(2018-06-24, 07:31 AM)Max_B Wrote: [ -> ]Psiencequest isn’t ranked high enough on Google for popular search terms. That is due to a whole host of problems. Basically we can’t be found unless one already knows exactly how to find us.
It depends what the
aim of the forum is, too wouldn't you agree. I think it's been a success and will probably continue to be, so the membership should grow. One of the obvious problems is that a lot of the topics have already been covered many times, 'squeezed' is a decent analogy. But there is always a bit more juice left in there.
(2018-06-24, 09:08 AM)Laird Wrote: [ -> ]What would you say those problems are, Max? We've done a few things to try to improve our ranking but so far have had little success.
One should wonder why lurkers prefer silence rather than participation? For example this thread. Understanding how to invite participation would boost ranking.
(2018-06-24, 12:19 PM)Steve001 Wrote: [ -> ]One should wonder why lurkers prefer silence rather than participation? For example this thread. Understanding how to invite participation would boost ranking.
OK, I'll bite. Why do lurkers prefer silence to participation, and how can we invite participation?