The watching 'vBulletin's market share nosedive' thread.

[HallofFamer]

Honestly, who gives a crap what the marketshare is?

Pick the software that is best for you.

I personally laugh a bit at boards that keep swapping software. This is not keeping up with the kardashians. When it does not work for you, switch.

I have had ZERO members ever ask me to switch from IPB to VB or Xenforo.

People will not join your site just because you use one or the other, they will because of content or the amount of folks who find it.

When you look at your site as a business... you look at things a tad differently.

Actually from my past experience, the choice of forumware does matter. Back in 2008-2009 I used to beat out a competitor because I was running superior forum engine(mine was on VB 3.8 and his was on zetaboards). Also I see tremendous boosts in activity and join rate once I moved from MyBB to VB 3.8. I am not sure how important it is for forums that are already popular, but for smaller forums and upstart forums, using a top notch forum software matters.

As a user, I would mostly refuse to join a forum if its powered by hosted forums such as proboards and zetaboards, since I see the forum owner doesnt know or care much about the forum. If there are competing forums running better forumware with more features, users may complain that your forum is hard to use and lacks certain features.

You dont use paidware over freeware for nothing, the amount you pay will be fruitful and lead to a better forum. Of course, this is assuming you are neither too good(so you can succeed with any forumware) nor too bad(so you can mess up even given the best forumware).

 

[Sherrie]

Old clunky forum software is less engaging.

 

[maksim]

Actually from my past experience, the choice of forumware does matter. Back in 2008-2009 I used to beat out a competitor because I was running superior forum engine(mine was on VB 3.8 and his was on zetaboards). Also I see tremendous boosts in activity and join rate once I moved from MyBB to VB 3.8. I am not sure how important it is for forums that are already popular, but for smaller forums and upstart forums, using a top notch forum software matters.

As a user, I would mostly refuse to join a forum if its powered by hosted forums such as proboards and zetaboards, since I see the forum owner doesnt know or care much about the forum. If there are competing forums running better forumware with more features, users may complain that your forum is hard to use and lacks certain features.

You dont use paidware over freeware for nothing, the amount you pay will be fruitful and lead to a better forum. Of course, this is assuming you are neither too good(so you can succeed with any forumware) nor too bad(so you can mess up even given the best forumware).

Ok... perhaps I should of spell it out 100%, although I think 90% of the people would already assume that.

For the folks here. I doubt many would consider a free solution that they have ZERO rights over.

whether you have VB, IPB or XF.... makes no difference to me whether I would register for the site or not.

 

[VICE]

Way overgeneralizing, ignoring the nuances and stark differences between communities. Back in the day, the community I used to be part of preferred vB4 strongly over early version of XF.

 

[maksim]

Way overgeneralizing, ignoring the nuances and stark differences between communities. Back in the day, the community I used to be part of preferred vB4 strongly over early version of XF.

But here is the key.... Would any of those people not join your forum because of the forum software you used or did not.

I bet the vast majority of the users don't even know what forum software is... at least in my categories. =)

Content is key by and far.

Like take this site for instance. I HATE XF.... I would never use it for any of my forums.... but I still belong to a number of XF forums.... because of the content.

At the same time, I have never joined any forums merely because they used one or another. =)

 

[VICE]

The key here is the need to distinguish commercial forum and community forum.

Nobody care what platform you are using when it comes to commercial interest. WHT using vB4 and LET using Vanilla has never stopped me from visiting their websites. Community forum on the other hand relies almost exclusively on the relationship between members and the platform they are using. For this reason alone, back in the day, many members prefer migrating (from vB3) to vB4 rather than the early version of XF solely due to familiarity. TAZ which is a semi commercial-community based forum is an exemplary reflection of this reality. At the time when the migration was done, vB name was already tarnished beyond saving but still the migration to XF was done with the utmost care to mimic as close as possible the old vB3 environment. Not until later when the members are finally settling in with the new platform that TAZ started to change and modernize the site one pace at a time.

 

[Alpha1]

I HATE XF.... I would never use it for any of my forums

I would much like to know what you dislike about XF. Because if you hate certain things about XF then others will do so as well and maybe it can be fixed/modified. Could you open a topic about this?

 

[feldon30]

I would much like to know what you dislike about XF. Because if you hate certain things about XF then others will do so as well and maybe it can be fixed/modified. Could you open a topic about this?

He's still hoping IB will prevail in the lolsuit.

 

[vbresults]

I love it. DP's tracker was the unquestionable gold standard as long as it was showing XF increasing and VB decreasing. When it stops showing what the people want it to show, now they want to know why it isn't working right.

After the huge wave of migrations ended, I thought xF was flatlining, I did not know it was declining. I think what is starting to happen is more people are picking up vB5 than migrating, crazy as it sounds. Interesting.

 

[maksim]

After the huge wave of migrations ended, I thought xF was flatlining, I did not know it was declining. I think what is starting to happen is more people are picking up vB5 than migrating, crazy as it sounds. Interesting.

I actually looked at my VB 5 license today and amazed at the software... I recall when it launched, it was ahead of its time with many great features.... but too buggy.

Then you have XF... which was good but not a complete solution.... and now IPB 4.... which I think is what VB5 should of been.

Granted, a few vb5 skins and sites I have seen are pretty nice. Not amazing... but nice.

You do have hte folks on the bleeding edge, typically with smaller forums who are willing to quickly switch just to say they have the latest and greatest. Others.... they are still on the old versions.... just because it works and we do not want to disrupt the business we have built. Personally, while a few small sites and startups are on ipb 4.... my big boards are still on 3.4.... and waiting to upgrade once I know 100% there will be no disruptions.

I do understand the folks who were on VB 3.8 who did not want 4.0 or 5.0 and had to go to XF.

 

[HallofFamer]

Ok... perhaps I should of spell it out 100%, although I think 90% of the people would already assume that.

For the folks here. I doubt many would consider a free solution that they have ZERO rights over.

whether you have VB, IPB or XF.... makes no difference to me whether I would register for the site or not.

Well yeah whether you have VB, IPB or XF has little to do with whether users will sign up, because those forumware are comparable to each other in quality. However, if you pick a significant inferior forum software, it does matter, especially for upstart forums. If you pick VB/IPB/XF/Burningboard, you have a more attractive forum than a competitor running a free hosted forum such as proboards/zetaboards.

After the huge wave of migrations ended, I thought xF was flatlining, I did not know it was declining. I think what is starting to happen is more people are picking up vB5 than migrating, crazy as it sounds. Interesting.

Well there's no evidence that people are picking up more VB5 even if XF is declining. The total market share for VB doesnt increase a lot, and even if it does, you cant be sure people are moving to VB5 since they may as well use VB3 or VB4.

 

[is_it_me]

After the huge wave of migrations ended, I thought xF was flatlining, I did not know it was declining. I think what is starting to happen is more people are picking up vB5 than migrating, crazy as it sounds. Interesting.

It doesn't look like people are going with vB5, it still represents just 2.3% of vB sites.

 

[GhettoChild]

Content and user experience is everything. I doubt many members are going to care whether the forum is on IPB, XF or VB.

Only admins care about which forum app they're using. You're choosing the forum app that makes it easier for you to create content.

The members are there for great content and to engage with other members.

Pick the forum app that works best for you and focus on building a great site.

 

[Alpha1]

vbulletin declines further. XenForo declines a bit. Burning Board is gaining some. IPS is gaining now.

 

[BirdOPrey5]

vbulletin declines further. XenForo declines a bit.

That is an interesting way to phrase it.

In fact both VB and XF dropped by the same 0.4% but since XF has a lower overall market share a drop of 0.4% for them is a bigger overall percentage drop than for VB, so by all rights XF had at best an equally as bad a month as VB, and more truthfully, a worse month than VB.

 

[GhettoChild]

Xenforo is by far the better

vbulletin declines further. XenForo declines a bit. Burning Board is gaining some. IPS is gaining now.

Xenforo is by far the better forum app when compared to IPS.

IPS offeres a full website. This is why they're gaining some traction. You don't have to buy so many 3rd party add-on's to create a full site.

IPS makes it easier for less experienced web designers to build a full website.

Xenforo require more effort and skill to create a full website.

The online store on IPS makes it easier for people to buy add-on directly on the site. Xenforo is a a bit of a mess when it come to purchasing add-on. You have to track down add-on'a across dozen's of 3rd party sites.

Xenforo desperately needs a centralized add-on store to reduce the pain of buying 3rd party add-on's.

I'm using Xenforo for it's superior interface. Xenforo also has significantly less issues with add-on's breaking skins on the site.

Xenforo needs to focus on making things easier for less experienced users going forward.

 

[Steve]

Xenforo is by far the better


Xenforo is by far the better forum app when compared to IPS.

IPS offeres a full website. This is why they're gaining some traction. You don't have to buy so many 3rd party add-on's to create a full site.

IPS makes it easier for less experienced web designers to build a full website.

Xenforo require more effort and skill to create a full website.

The online store on IPS makes it easier for people to buy add-on directly on the site. Xenforo is a a bit of a mess when it come to purchasing add-on. You have to track down add-on'a across dozen's of 3rd party sites.

Xenforo desperately needs a centralized add-on store to reduce the pain of buying 3rd party add-on's.

I'm using Xenforo for it's superior interface. Xenforo also has significantly less issues with add-on's breaking skins on the site.

Xenforo needs to focus on making things easier for less experienced users going forward.

IPS takes percentage of the sale doesn't it? I would assume something similar would need to be in place on XF.com for them to host the files and process payments. Also, with the way you have explained we (style and add-on) authors would have no idea who is a paying customer.

So all that to keep from having to sign up (takes mere seconds) on a 3rd party site where we have control who products are sold to, track issues, and interact with customers in a much more detailed way.

Are you willing to pay the difference of the percentage of sales XF would likely take from us authors? We are already tagged with PayPal fees and adding more would only increase the products prices.

 

[GhettoChild]

IPS takes percentage of the sale doesn't it? I would assume something similar would need to be in place on XF.com for them to host the files and process payments. Also, with the way you have explained we (style and add-on) authors would have no idea who is a paying customer.

So all that to keep from having to sign up (takes mere seconds) on a 3rd party site where we have control who products are sold to, track issues, and interact with customers in a much more detailed way.

Are you willing to pay the difference of the percentage of sales XF would likely take from us authors? We are already tagged with PayPal fees and adding more would only increase the products prices.

I would pay the extra costs. On average, the add-on's are oddly cheaper on IPS.

It's a huge hassle having to track 30 different websites everytime you have an issue to deal with.

 

[Alpha1]

That is an interesting way to phrase it.

In fact both VB and XF dropped by the same 0.4% but since XF has a lower overall market share a drop of 0.4% for them is a bigger overall percentage drop than for VB, so by all rights XF had at best an equally as bad a month as VB, and more truthfully, a worse month than VB.

Yes, you are completely correct. For both vb and xf there has been a small decline in the last month. And its not only the case that this minute negative change weight heavier for XF than for vb marketshare. For vb its a change from negative decline to pretty much stable, while for XenForo its a change from positive growth to pretty much stable. So in more than one sense its a bad change for XenForo.

I wonder to what extent the anticipation of XF2 is negatively affecting XF growth. I expect it has a major effect. People are not going to migrate to a platform that seems to be on the verge of releasing a major version. And while XF2 still seems all but imminent, that is the impression that many people have. Similarly; when IPS4 was announced to be underway for a long time this negatively affected growth. IMHO they would have done a lot better to stay silent until much later and to make sure that no one has a false sense of a new version on the horizon.
I would not be surprised that if XF were to release another significant 1.x release we would see the platform gaining a lot of marketshare again.

Similarly I wouldn't be surprised if the release of vb 3.8.10 has reassured customers that vb3 is here to stay and that new PHP versions are supported again. Sites do not seem to be upgrading between major vb versions. vb3 customers stick with vb3 and vb4 customers stick with vb4. vb5 still seems practically unused. I wonder why vbSolutions has not yet abandoned the vb5 project.

 

[doubt]

I would not be surprised that if XF were to release another significant 1.x release we would see the platform gaining a lot of marketshare again.

Agreed.