Where is everybody?

Welcome to the postcard.co.uk board, for discussion on all aspects of the hobby. You'll need to register to post but this only takes a few seconds and gives you access to more of the features and options available. Please read the the HOW to REGISTER article first. thanks

Moderator: MichaelDay

Andrew
Posts: 95
Joined: Tue Dec 12, 2006 4:26 pm
Location: Gillingham, Kent

Post by Andrew »

[quote="tonymckendrick"]'Where is everybody?'
They're all looking for bargains on ebay I'm afraid.[/quote]

I've found very few "bargain" postcards on e-bay. Had far more success at BIPEX - numerically and financially.
OK - so I took three days out, but commuting to London each day means my travel expenses were already covered, and I can't say I get much of a "buzz" trawling through e-bay pages.

Furthermore, at fairs, I may come across cards that are outside my normal area of interest, but I decide I want to buy anyway - whether for myself or someone else. That doesn't happen on e-bay.

The only "disadvantage" of fairs is that I often end up either spending more than I had intended, or have to choose what to buy and what to leave behind for another time.

Andrew
Posts: 95
Joined: Tue Dec 12, 2006 4:26 pm
Location: Gillingham, Kent

Post by Andrew »

I see the number of members has been cut from over 200 to 72. Presumably the ones cut out are those who have not posted at any stage.

Things have been quiet here too. Is there REALLY nothing happening in the postcard world? Has this place become a graveyard, or are there lots of people on holiday? Does anyone really care about the answers to these questions?

Answers on a (yes, you guessed it), postcard to ......

MichaelDay
Site Admin
Posts: 179
Joined: Tue Nov 08, 2005 11:31 pm
Contact:

Post by MichaelDay »

Andrew wrote:I see the number of members has been cut from over 200 to 72. Presumably the ones cut out are those who have not posted at any stage.

Things have been quiet here too. Is there REALLY nothing happening in the postcard world? Has this place become a graveyard, or are there lots of people on holiday? Does anyone really care about the answers to these questions?

Answers on a (yes, you guessed it), postcard to ......
The 'Memberlist' now only lists those who've actually posted. It's yet another measure to prevent bogus registrations (or at least hide them from view). The actual number of 'users' is at 369 at the moment but we are overdue a cull of the spambot ones which should reduce this down to the 200 (ish) mark, once again.

Neptune
Posts: 4
Joined: Mon Sep 03, 2007 6:14 pm

Post by Neptune »

I havent made a large contribution to 'chat' since joining - but do come on and cannot join in with debate, as yet - as I am still planning the post card side of my business. Members on here have given me some good links to publishers and I am grateful for that.

I think this forum is run very well, I have moderated a few (to help out on occassions) and know the problems that spammers cause.

As far as I am aware - The computer generated password (that has to be entered by the applicant when registering) should stop the spambots.

MichaelDay
Site Admin
Posts: 179
Joined: Tue Nov 08, 2005 11:31 pm
Contact:

Post by MichaelDay »

Neptune wrote:I havent made a large contribution to 'chat' since joining - but do come on and cannot join in with debate, as yet - as I am still planning the post card side of my business. Members on here have given me some good links to publishers and I am grateful for that.

I think this forum is run very well, I have moderated a few (to help out on occassions) and know the problems that spammers cause.

As far as I am aware - The computer generated password (that has to be entered by the applicant when registering) should stop the spambots.
We've had the 'captcha' module in place for quite a while now, but the spammers have actually developed OCR tecnology clever enough to get round it. There are better versions available, apparently .. but all these extra 'Mods' to the software get increasingly difficult to manage as you add more.. Hence the software problem with got currently.

ECooper
Posts: 29
Joined: Mon Sep 03, 2007 10:52 am

Post by ECooper »

MichaelDay wrote:
Andrew wrote:I see the number of members has been cut from over 200 to 72. Presumably the ones cut out are those who have not posted at any stage.

Things have been quiet here too. Is there REALLY nothing happening in the postcard world? Has this place become a graveyard, or are there lots of people on holiday? Does anyone really care about the answers to these questions?

Answers on a (yes, you guessed it), postcard to ......
The 'Memberlist' now only lists those who've actually posted. It's yet another measure to prevent bogus registrations (or at least hide them from view). The actual number of 'users' is at 369 at the moment but we are overdue a cull of the spambot ones which should reduce this down to the 200 (ish) mark, once again.
Just a shame a few more of them don't post. Other boards I know have got going after a while but if thers not much to read or reply to folks get out of the habit.

Moonraker
Posts: 222
Joined: Tue Apr 24, 2007 5:23 pm

Post by Moonraker »

PC2007 wrote:... As their stocks are neatly arranged, it isn't too hard to find stuff initially...
Not always. There are a few dealers with idiosyncratic ideas about arranging and the alphabet. "Wiltshire" - my interest - sometimes drops off the end of the sequence, and is sometimes left at home (which one dealer has done at two successive fairs that I've attended). Some dealers will tuck a small county selection in an otherwise-loose box or a large selection into a box of its own.
And if the stand is busy, one can duck and dive between arms trying to locate the section I'm interested in. And now and then the dealer has some cards tucked away out of sight; my last big spending spree at a fair was from an album full of aviation cards, some of which featured Wiltshire pre-1914.


Moonraker

User avatar
kevinramsdale
Posts: 156
Joined: Mon May 22, 2006 7:09 pm
Location: Lincoln

Post by kevinramsdale »

MichaelDay wrote: The 'Memberlist' now only lists those who've actually posted. It's yet another measure to prevent bogus registrations (or at least hide them from view). The actual number of 'users' is at 369 at the moment but we are overdue a cull of the spambot ones which should reduce this down to the 200 (ish) mark, once again.
Mike - nickyw_uk was the last new user to post and has been registered since last summer - are there people registering without posting, or are there just no new members joining now?

Seems odd that there were seven new posting members last June/July but nothing since.
Kevin

MichaelDay
Site Admin
Posts: 179
Joined: Tue Nov 08, 2005 11:31 pm
Contact:

Post by MichaelDay »

kevinramsdale wrote:
MichaelDay wrote: The 'Memberlist' now only lists those who've actually posted. It's yet another measure to prevent bogus registrations (or at least hide them from view). The actual number of 'users' is at 369 at the moment but we are overdue a cull of the spambot ones which should reduce this down to the 200 (ish) mark, once again.
Mike - nickyw_uk was the last new user to post and has been registered since last summer - are there people registering without posting, or are there just no new members joining now?

Seems odd that there were seven new posting members last June/July but nothing since.
The messageboard has been in a complete mess since we moved servers several weeks ago. Although it works ok for current users, a few parts including the 'Profile' and registrations sections aren't working.

Over the months we've had to bolt-on several 'Mods' to get on top of the spam situation, many of these conflict and the latest unforseen problem , which I assume was caused by the change in server configuration has capped it all off..

What I need to do is a fresh install of the latest version of the PHPBB software, add required Mods then attempt to backup and edit the current database and attach it to the new board... otherwise we'll lose all the current member details and posts.

I'm not sure how long this will take but it's a pretty tedious task and is likely to take several hours, not allowing for problems..

Meanwhile we have no new members registering... My apologies... hope to get to this soon but have just been to busy to atttempt it until now.

MichaelDay
Site Admin
Posts: 179
Joined: Tue Nov 08, 2005 11:31 pm
Contact:

Re: Where is everybody?

Post by MichaelDay »

five hours later... we've upgraded to the new PHPBB3. Hope everybody likes the new features. The old board seems to have transferred over ok but there were a few glitches. Please let me know by PM if you discover any problems. Thanks. Mike

User avatar
kevinramsdale
Posts: 156
Joined: Mon May 22, 2006 7:09 pm
Location: Lincoln

Re: Where is everybody?

Post by kevinramsdale »

MichaelDay wrote:five hours later... we've upgraded to the new PHPBB3. Hope everybody likes the new features. The old board seems to have transferred over ok but there were a few glitches. Please let me know by PM if you discover any problems. Thanks. Mike
Thanks for the explanation Mike - and the upgrade. :lol:
Kevin

jofus65
Posts: 4
Joined: Tue Apr 15, 2008 7:43 am

Re: Where is everybody?

Post by jofus65 »

Found this one interesting. I buy almost all of my bookmarks (postcard versions or otherwise) on eBay these days. eBay is the perfect place for the seller with just one or two bookmarks (or whatever) to maximise potential buyers, and there is a constant supply of decent stuff on offer, I find, which is certainly not true any more of book / postcard fairs. If I want to buy albums or pages, I trek across to York or Harrogate, but need to combine that with a day out to make it worthwhile. My worst beef about dealers are the ones who (because I collect bookmarks) manage to infuse the word 'novelty' with much the same tone as one might use to refer to a 'trash-can' or 'midden', implying that that really is a very odd (perverted even) collecting habit, but which is really their way of explaining that they don't have much, if anything, in stock. My wife thinks all collecting habits are odd (perverted even), and who am I to argue with such wisdom?

jofus

Abramoluna1
Posts: 1
Joined: Tue Sep 14, 2021 8:01 pm

Re: Where is everybody?

Post by Abramoluna1 »

Hello,
I'M ABRAMO LUNA,
NEW TO THE FORUM, AM FINDING IT HARD TO REPLY OR POST THREADS.

CollectIreland
Posts: 90
Joined: Mon Aug 10, 2015 12:17 pm

Re: Where is everybody?

Post by CollectIreland »

I have asked this question here before and to quote the postman in "Oh, Mr.Porter" when he observed Will Hay planting his lobelias - 'you're wasting your time'.

It has to be down to the age profile of postcard collectors, the laziness of the PTA dealers (the bulk of whom neither post here or respond to emails) and it ain't going to change. I have my own Irish postcard blog and a separate postcard forum (the latter to be discontinued shortly due to lack of participation and my not having enough time to drive it) but the blog gets plenty of visitors. Postcard collecting as a hobby will go the way of the Dodo if collectors and dealers allow it to.

oldpostcarder
Posts: 32
Joined: Sun Apr 26, 2015 11:11 am

Re: Where is everybody?

Post by oldpostcarder »

Haha!! I guess that they are too busy on Social Media to write something meaningful on here ... shame, but never mind, at least we hard core posters can enjoy the peace and quiet instead!

Happy Hunting! :-)

Post Reply