DAU (daily active user) today vs 3-4 years ago

[Frac]

Glad to hear he?s doing well. Yes, internet is a time sink.

[Erni]

Lots of other internet based distractions nowadays. But still only 24hrs in a day

[ray1970]

I do not hate anyone.

Liar. Nobody likes everyone.

[theGinsue]

Yesterday I spoke with someone we all know who asked not to be named. He asked how the site was going and I expressed my concern over the lower activity, especially within the firearms discussions.

I'll be honest, I'm at a loss on how to improve the site or even bring it back to what it was a few years ago. Maybe it's just the times we're in and interest in this type of site just isn't what it used to be; I dunno.

We have no shortage on spammers coming to the site, but for every 30 new legit accounts we get maybe one of those members will actively participate. Along the way we continue to see many of our long-time active members just casually walk away.

I used to come onto the site every day and look forward to all of the fascinating conversations about general stuff as well as firearms-specific stuff from all of our members. Now I come to the site hoping that one conversation will be exciting and interesting, perhaps even informative.

What are we missing? What have we lost along the way that used to bring folks here to join in on the conversations or start their own topics? I'm truly interested in hearing everyone's thoughts on this subject.

[Delfuego]

Can you still only view the forum with a user account? If so that may force people away that are looking for quick shooting advice. Also SEO might be working against us if we don't allow the google monster to crawl the site.

[sbgixxer]

I think it's mostly the state dismantling what keeps the hobby interesting. It used to be that whenever I wanted to try a new firearm, I could usually find one for sale here. I'd meet the seller somewhere discreet, we'd chat and make a deal. I'd try the firearm out and if I didn't like it then it'd go up on the site again for someone else to try. I was buying and selling all the time w/o losing money to fees and time driving to specific FFLs (sometimes twice) and waiting around a gun shop for the state to do what they require. Add in ammo prices ($500 range days?) combined with not knowing what will be illegal next week has just made the hobby tiresome. Things as they are now, I've probably purchased one firearm in the past five years. I spend very little time with the it these days and that's a huge bummer.

As for the site, there's little to do. You guys do a great job, the site runs well. You try to make it better but can't keep up with how quickly Colorado is ruining it.

[kidicarus13]

I think it's mostly the state dismantling what keeps the hobby interesting. It used to be that whenever I wanted to try a new firearm, I could usually find one for sale here. I'd meet the seller somewhere discreet, we'd chat and make a deal. I'd try the firearm out and if I didn't like it then it'd go up on the site again for someone else to try. I was buying and selling all the time w/o losing money to fees and time driving to specific FFLs (sometimes twice) and waiting around a gun shop for the state to do what they require. Add in ammo prices ($500 range days?) combined with not knowing what will be illegal next week has just made the hobby tiresome.

Yes.

To get more people in the door, although probably not all quality posters, open up the Trading Post now that Armslist requires a monthly fee. COAR's advantage over national firearm sites is that the majority of posters live in Colorado. I personally would much rather do business face-to-face with someone local (and likely with feedback) than some stranger on another site from another state with transactions including shipping fees and the potential for misrepresented products.

I've read it many times, "We'll shut the Trading Post down..." Why? Who's harmed by someone buying or selling through COAR without the minimum number of posts/time on keyboard? Odds are, some of the new members will turn out to quality posters that stick around for years.

Building personal relations through many face-to-face transactions and unaffiliated events has kept me coming back to COAR to discuss firearms, local/regional/national topics, and to share information. I tend to visit other national forums for the expert firearm opinions and product reviews. Although there are some very knowledgeable members on COAR, it's hard to compete with national forums with hundreds of thousands or millions of members.

My $.02

[GeorgeandSugar]

I use the Tapatalk app to access the various gun forums. I have been thinking the same thing for about a year now.

Does not seem to be as many posts from the AR-15 CO forum. Actually, I don?t see them showing up on the Tapatalk feed. I have to go in and click the app to see what anyone is posting.

We left 2 years ago and moved to AZ. Now, we are heading back for family. New granddaughter. We are moving to the Colorado Springs area.

We sold our home here. It has all worked out far better than I could have ever expected. House on market for 6 months. We threw in the towel in late April/early May. We get a call a few days later buyers wanting to know what happened. Long story short, we received a full price offer.

We will be area in August and we look around for a home. The housing market is shifting. More inventory coming on the market and some price decreases. Homes in CS are expensive.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[<MADDOG>]

I still pop in from time to time, and I too have noticed the decline of posts.

I think some of the locales of the people posting on the forum are telling - CO has went down a path that most of this board do not wish to tolerate, and some voted with their feet (myself included).

As a point of observation; I notice that within my current region, the gun forums are very active, and I do not think it has anything to do with firearm selling/trading, etc. Its the amount of people (much like this one was), and the variety/civility (for the most part) of conversations. My $.02

[Bailey Guns]

I think gixxer, kidicarus and MADDOG nailed it. Natural beauty aside, Colorado sucks as a place to live for gun people.

It wasn't too long ago if someone talked about moving they were called "cowards" and members here accused them of "running away" instead of "staying to fight". I got that a lot. Now I see some of those same members have either disappeared entirely or have changed their tune and bailed to another state. Unless you're a hard-core liberal there's little to like about Colorado any more. It's sad but true.

I love the forum and I've had a great time here over the years. But I can log on after a day or two and nothing's changed...maybe a few new posts. The OK Shooters forum reminds me very much of COAR and it's VERY active all the time, in a state with about 60 percent of the population of Colorado. It's like going back in time...same people bitching about the same things (usually related to liberals) and the same arguments about what gun is better, etc. Literally hundreds of new posts in many of the forums every day. It takes an hour to catch up on everything of interest. Really reminds me of the past days of COAR.

And, their classifieds are VERY active and open to new posters. Yeah, sometimes that's all they do is post in the classifieds, but so what? OK Shooters also has a process to donate to the site to keep it operating. It's not mandatory at all and you won't get hassled if you don't donate. The site has several nice touches, too. You can "Like" posts, a member's feedback for buying/selling is displayed under their bio, there's little badges for reaching posting milestones, etc. Not saying it's better than COAR, but it's a nice site.