AULRO or Facebook ?

[gromit]

In recent years there seems to be much less activity on AULRO, certainly in the Series sections.
There are some very knowledgeable people on the forum but not the activity there used to be.

I've advertised parts here with zero response (yes, if nobody wants it then I'll get no response), I post a wanted advert and often no response.

I'm not on Facebook but one of my boys is and he's on one of the Series Land Rover groups. I asked him to post up some parts I need to sell and pass on my email to anyone interested. Same parts advertised here with no response, Facebook post led to me being inundated with replies and I've made multiple sales. Most buyers were local but I have also shipped Interstate.

I like the format of AULRO where I can just read particular sections that interest me, also easier to find information about vehicles I'm interested in. From what I've seen of Facebook posts come up and quickly move down as more posts are made. I guess the aim is to make you keep going back in case you miss anything.
I was able to access a Facebook Series section until it was made private, if I saw anything I was interested in I got my son to message the person.

It seems that there are a lot of people out there restoring Land Rovers that are very active on Facebook but not members of AULRO. I'm aware of a couple of people who were active here and have disappeared but are now active on Facebook.

I'm still resisting joining Facebook (but instead using my son to keep me to date and advertise parts for sale).

Has membership of AULRO declined ?
Is it just that the younger generation prefer Facebook ?
How can more people be encouraged to join ?


Colin

[1950landy]

I have noticed this also especially with the SLOWS if I post anything I am lucky to get one reply , I don't get to many events these days with looking after my wife & rely on peoples postings about what is going on . I am on booth AULRO as well as three Series LR & S1 Facebook group's & find the Facebook postings a lot more informative & there are new postings every day.

[tc_s1]

Personally I am in that demographic which avoids Facebook like the plague that it is, 99% of the time. I login a few times a year to an account I have to scroll through messages and see what a few people are up to (who mostly are the opposite of me and only publish or interact on fb). When I bought my first rover with an Isuzu 4bd1 several years ago I was looking for knowledge and friendly mentors and this is certainly the place for that.

Many people have built this up into the great community it is, but I am not selling, and it would make sense that to sell, the larger the audience, the larger the target market of buyers and therefore likely more response.

I don't know the numbers here, there or anywhere, but even on other platforms on which I am more active I cannot imagine a higher quality of people, information and a helpful nod when needed than is available here and for those reasons (along with the affinity it generates) I renew my membership annually here and look forward to scrolling through on topics without the 'noise' and risks of other platforms, weekly if not daily.

[JDNSW]

I'm another one who refuses to have anything to do with Facebook. They are simply to unethical to even think about dealing with.

Any business that insists I use facebook does not have me for a customer.

[Slunnie]

FB, the root of all evil! :lol2: I think its great!

Nobody is forcing anybody to have FB, but if you dont want it then you cant complain about what you miss out on.

[RobMichelle]

No face book or any other social media in our house,

[Tombie]

I'm another one who refuses to have anything to do with Facebook. They are simply to unethical to even think about dealing with.

Any business that insists I use facebook does not have me for a customer.

Sadly (and I agree with your stance) this may soon mean you’ll have nowhere to shop.

I cogitated this one. Every place I deal with has a FB presence. Sadly, not embracing these platforms now means almost certain death for some businesses.

[loanrangie]

It's the age we live in, no longer can be scour the trading post for bargains (or tell em they're dreaming) .
It's gumtree,eBay and FB marketplace.

[incisor]

AULRO.COM membership dropped a little when I introduced subscriptions

It took 12 months or so to rebound

Since then average readership/ membership has declined about 10%

People come and go as their lives change

Subscriptions continue to grow and costs have increased substantially

Monthly readership is still up around 2million + pages views per month

Facebook has its place... everything there is in the now and once stuff is a few days old it gets really hard to find

Here things from years ago can quite easily be retrieved

Many forums died due to Facebook but so far it has helped this place overall

IMHO covid has been a bigger problem for this place than other social media

People not having a job or place to live will be the issue affecting AULRO.COM over the next few years I believe..

As for SLOw.inc, while things have been quiet, some of us have been working in the background to get things moving again and that should pay dividends in the near future so hang in there if you can

Cheers

[350RRC]

The LR section of Pirate in the US suffered greatly with the GFC and is pretty much worthless now it's fb format.

DL

[TasD90]

I feel this Forum is more personal with no "bling".
I won't be changing.
Peter

[Homestar]

No face book or any other social media in our house,

Apart from AULRO?… [emoji16][emoji56]

[Saitch]

I would consider a 'phone as an example of a social medium. [wink11]

[V8Ian]

I would consider a 'phone as an example of a social medium. [wink11]
And smoke signals?

179609

[windsock]

https://learningneverstops.files.wordpress.com/2014/05/20140503-160029.jpg

[350RRC]

https://learningneverstops.files.wordpress.com/2014/05/20140503-160029.jpg

And a copy of 'The Whole Earth Catalogue' was the equivalent of the internet.

DL

[Tote]

I'm on some Facebook groups for Jeeps and for the marketplace. Unfortunately FB has taken the vast majority of the sales entries from sites like AULRO, Gumtree and Ebay so if you want used bits it really the only place to go. I completely agree with Inc's point about historical data being only easily findable for a very short time. I have documented a couple of Jeep projects on there and a week later they are effectively gone. The other thing I've noticed is that the level of knowledge on Facebook is dramatically lower than on here where a difficult technical question rarely goes unanswered.

Regards,
Tote

[DazzaTD5]

As some have said, it's your choice to use or not use a particular social media platform.
As for the ones that deem FB to unethical to use (again your choice) but does the ethic standard apply to other companies or organisations?

*YouTube
*VW group (a convicted criminal organisation).
*JBS food group - might be a hard one to avoid as they are one of if not the largest meat food processing companies in Australia (search jbs foods corruption)
*Do we dare mention Toyota, Hino?

Not even mentioning oil, tobacco, chemical and pharmaceutical companies.
There is no poster child of unethical companies and I find it a bit odd to single out one social media scumbag company while eating meat, buying a car and fuelling it up and then going off to work for a mining company.

[tonguewink]

[loanrangie]

As said already the biggest drawback to FB is if you see a post then want to go back to it, good luck finding it again.

[JDNSW]

As some have said, it's your choice to use or not use a particular social media platform.
As for the ones that deem FB to unethical to use (again your choice) but does the ethic standard apply to other companies or organisations?

*YouTube
*VW group (a convicted criminal organisation).
*JBS food group - might be a hard one to avoid as they are one of if not the largest meat food processing companies in Australia (search jbs foods corruption)
*Do we dare mention Toyota, Hino?

Not even mentioning oil, tobacco, chemical and pharmaceutical companies.
There is no poster child of unethical companies and I find it a bit odd to single out one social media scumbag company while eating meat, buying a car and fuelling it up and then going off to work for a mining company.

[tonguewink]

You have a point, and it would be easy to add to your list - but it is hard to think of any company that has deliberately and directly used the knowledge they have gained about their users and the users' contacts illegally and against the users and contacts interests on anything approaching the scale of facebook's actions.

[RobMichelle]

In my way of thinking, (which I’m thinking is wrong now) that social media was the likes of Facebook tick tock, tweeter etc, but after a few posts here is anything where you post or read a post social media?
I don’t buy a paper any more just read off phone news app, and AULRO of course, weather app.

[JDNSW]

The term "social media" is not defined to have an exact meaning, but for those discussing the technology it is usually thought of as being those online "media" that have a mass market audience (at least potentially) and where the customer is an advertiser or a buyer of private information, with the users being the product.

Typically the term is used to mean facebook, twitter, tiktok, youtube and similar, although the boundaries are not clear. Subscription "media" such as AULRO, news services (even if they have limited non-subscription services), and those with restricted membership or very limited focus are not usually included, but the boundaries are not well defined.

[Slunnie]

Online forums like this are one of the original types of social media, except back then they were known as bulletin boards or forums. I would argue forums like this and email based discussion groups prior to forums launched the concept. The term social media wasn’t used then as it was really just email groups or forums, but since it more broadly expanded to include other platforms like MySpace, Facebook, Twitter, SnapChat, Instagram etc, then they collectively became better known as social media. Online forums like this are 100% social media, there is zero question about that!


What is social media?Social media is a collective term for websites and applications that focus on communication, community-based input, interaction, content-sharing and collaboration (https://www.techtarget.com/whatis/definition/collaboration).
People use social media to stay in touch and interact with friends, family and various communities. Businesses use social applications to market and promote their products and track customer concerns.

[gromit]

I'm not on Facebook but have joined LinkedIn (I'm in Industrial Sales and it's a good way to get contacts !).

At the moment I have membership of AULRO and get my son to post adverts on the Facebook series forum as a much greater response than on AULRO.
Never seen the point of Facebook although I have mates who have joined so that they get reminders of birthdays etc.

Considering joining just to get access to the Series Group but having read some of the posts, before it went private, I'm not so sure.


Colin

[austastar]

Hi,
Tried FB a decade or so ago but found it more annoying than useful.
Took a few years before they stopped 'missing' me.
Cheers

[1950landy]

I am on our local FB group , it is a good way to find out what is going on the local area ( crime) & finding local trades people to perform work . I am also on a couple of Series LR FB groups which also have members on AULRO . I find them a lot more active & willing to share than most on AULRO & there tends to be a lot more parts available on FB.

[goingbush]

I use facebook groups for everything I'm interested in , I run a few groups , Theres zero tolerance to bull**** & spammers. if your into Old cars or Series Land Rovers & your not on Facebook your missing out big time.

Im not as active on AULRO for this reason & because The way LandRover has gone, Im just not interested in any of the modern LandRover products which the vast majority of AULRO seems to be about.

[V8Ian]

Define modern. I wonder if similar comments were made in 1971 when them flash, new fangled Series llls was unveiled. [wink11][biggrin]

[goingbush]

Define modern. I wonder if similar comments were made in 1971 when them flash, new fangled Series llls was unveiled. [wink11][biggrin]

Modern ugh, the rot started with P38/ FreeLander ,
anything with a different stud pattern to a Series One is out, RRC , D1 are ok, D2 upwards = no .
Im not keen on Puma but they scrape in as it has the traditional stud pattern.

[scarry]

We use Messenger,which as many know is part of FB,for talking between family members.

Even overseas family,it's easy and simple,probably one of the best ways to stay in touch.Even the oldies seem to use it easily,post pics,etc.

But you don't have to have FB to use messenger.

[Slunnie]

Modern ugh, the rot started with P38/ FreeLander ,
anything with a different stud pattern to a Series One is out, RRC , D1 are ok, D2 upwards = no .
Im not keen on Puma but they scrape in as it has the traditional stud pattern.
Of course, the best ones had Lucas electrics. :lol2:

[BradC]

Facebook has its place... everything there is in the now and once stuff is a few days old it gets really hard to find

This has come up on pretty much every non-Facebook "group" (forum, mailing list, whatever...) I've been a member of whenever it's brought up.m Transient communication is what it was built for and that makes it extremely difficult to locate embeded or archived knowledge.

In that context, using it for buy/sell is fine, but trying to build a body of knowledge.... If all you know how to operate is a hammer...

[drfish]

Part of the problem causing lack of response to sales and wanted adverts on AULRO may be that these threads don’t work in the app (not sure why this is the case, perhaps Incisor can advise). I know a lot will use AULRO on a computer, but there are probably a lot like me as well that only use the app, so will miss these.

But I agree with the earlier comment that at least with Series stuff things seemed to have slowed up a bit on AULRO. I’ve posted a few questions in the past year or so that haven’t got a single response. Inc is right about Facebook though, things tend to disappear into oblivion after a few days…

Cheers, Matt


I'm not on Facebook but have joined LinkedIn (I'm in Industrial Sales and it's a good way to get contacts !).

At the moment I have membership of AULRO and get my son to post adverts on the Facebook series forum as a much greater response than on AULRO.
Never seen the point of Facebook although I have mates who have joined so that they get reminders of birthdays etc.

Considering joining just to get access to the Series Group but having read some of the posts, before it went private, I'm not so sure.


Colin

[incisor]

Because tapatalk doesn't support all of vbulletins features, so app users don't see the pricing and some other info in the listing's

Cheers

[d2dave]

I'm another one who refuses to have anything to do with Facebook. They are simply to unethical to even think about dealing with.

Any business that insists I use facebook does not have me for a customer.

Same here. I reckon social media is the scourge of the 21st century.

[loanrangie]

Same here. I reckon social media is the scourge of the 21st century.Unsocial media most of the time.

[Tombie]

Because tapatalk doesn't support all of vbulletins features, so app users don't see the pricing and some other info in the listing's

Cheers

Tapatalk isn’t working very well at all lately.
No notifications from AULRO have come through for months.

[DiscoDB]

The action Facebook took against Australian users in 2021 to block all sharing of information they deemed was “news” because of its spat with the Australian government was enough for me to decide never to use it again.

Shutting down charity organisations, or sites sharing vital public information to make a point was over stepping their power.

I was an early adopter to facebook, but once I deleted my account I have never looked back.

Tapatalk can be hit or miss - when it works it is very good. Occasionally I still check out AULRO from the web interface.

For expert LR advise you are mad not to be an AULRO member.

[prelude]

I have been at the birth of the "modern" internet and helped build it even. Way back when in the nineties I thought it had so much potential and was such a good idea. It did not take long (say late nineties) before I realized how much potential there was for abuse as well. Lowe and behold, the internet is (ab)used a LOT.

Hence, if you know my full name you will find one or two questions posted in a usenet group in said nineties but other than that you will not find me anywhere. I too have avoided facebook, instagram, twitter, etc etc like the plague. No, I do NOT have a linkedin page either.

I agree with most what has been said and have observed the same from the sidelines. All the social media (and no, I do not count a forum such as aulro as such with the exception of this general board perhaps) products are designed for transient communication, short attention span interaction and generally to maximize data mining and advertising as well as attention(which does not make it the best for communication even). For that reason I find an actual forum to be much more useful.

Havind said that [bigwhistle]

As some of you might know I am planning on a 5 year round the world trip in my car. Information about countries, border crossings, etc. used to be available on forums or mailing groups and although it still is somewhat, most of them too have moved to fb, insta, etc. so with a lot of reluctance I have begun to plan a system that I can register a generic account (just for this trip) which will attempt to limit tracking to the most of my abilities but that will enable me to make use of the product since there is indeed not much of a choice anymore in some regards.

Would it not be for my trip mind you, I would not register even maybe. So be it that I miss out and let's be fair, we all have mates who don't care and they send you a link something.

Also, although forums are a place where information lives on, I do find (both as a user and administrator) that finding old information is often hard because it is not easy to know what to search for and it can take a long time to find what you need. More often than not people ask the same question over and over and with enough banter in between the number of really useful, compact threads on any forum is limited.

So all in all my conclusion must be that some of the social media products have a purpose it's just that they are barely fit for it because of the underlying business model(s). The quality of pre-existing "media" like forums decline, not just because of the userbase but also because the attention span of people and the way that communicate has been "tainted" by the modern media.

Cheers,
-P

[V8Ian]

The Mods here do try to sort the banter from useful information, often moving the latter to technical or dedicated model sub-fora.
To be fair, General Chat has never been intended as a source of critical data.

[prelude]

I did not suggest otherwise :) You guys are doing an excellent job!

-P

[Saitch]

To be fair, General Chat has never been intended as a source of critical data.

I, I, I............I'm shattered! :spudnikwowsers:

[Epic_Dragon]

Facebook and Instagram are quite good. Definitely a lot of annoying on it but more positive. I use them to connect with family in uk as I'm not born in Aus.
I have friends in America as well and all around Australia.
In a heck load if landie groups and actually found 4 other disco 2s with hand controls around the world!
I use it to network photography clients and also help those struggling in life to help them through.

Linkden or how ever its spelt I've never had a clue to what it even is.
Twitter I don't understand either.
Tiktok though is a fun way to be able to edit video and share with friends, it's also basically funniest home videos in your pocket.

[Roverlord off road spares]

Mario has facebook as this was easy for our son in Japan to ring through face book and talk to him and didn't cost any money. Mario still has his own Fishing Westernport page which he started up as he use to like talking about fishing and giving advise on Westernport. It was something that he liked doing as he could no long take his boat out. So there are good side and bad side to everything. He would not allow any fights or bulling or advertising, it was a family area that people and kids could put up pictures of there catch. He was still out there helping people even when he was so sick. And is still running today in this memory, with a couple of his friends running it for him. Heather

[gromit]

Facebook and Instagram are quite good. Definitely a lot of annoying on it but more positive. I use them to connect with family in uk as I'm not born in Aus.
I have friends in America as well and all around Australia.
In a heck load if landie groups and actually found 4 other disco 2s with hand controls around the world!
I use it to network photography clients and also help those struggling in life to help them through.

Linkden or how ever its spelt I've never had a clue to what it even is.
Twitter I don't understand either.
Tiktok though is a fun way to be able to edit video and share with friends, it's also basically funniest home videos in your pocket.

I keep in touch with people by phone or email....

LinkedIn is 'Facebook for Engineers'
Basically promote your company, promote yourself. I have virtually no details in my profile and get regular job offers.
Handy to get contacts at Companies if you're in Sales.


Colin

[Discosux]

I reckon the biggest problem with this site / forum is that's it's too fragmented - as in tech posted in say the D2 section will have relevance in the defender section and vice versa. Be stuffed if there's enough hours in the day day to browse all of them. And **** me the series section would be awesome if every post on there was visible on every other sub forum. They deserve it. Make them kings

It would be great if I could log on once a day or whatever and instantly see all the tech from everywhere (pre 2004 LR) without having to divert too much, nobody will do that. Even though I don't own a series now, I still want to hear their ramblings (as an example)

No idea how Facebook or tik tok do it, I don't do that stuff. But if you want to compete - change the format up a bit. IMO what's going on now is good, but it could be absolutely awesome .

[Tombie]

Tiktok though is a fun way to be able to edit video and share with friends, it's also basically funniest home videos in your pocket.

Tiktok is a massive data mining operation - accessing huge swathes of your phones memory / programs etc - far beyond what is necesary for making cute videos.

It is extremely intrusive to the phones OS, monitoring what porgrams you are running etc...

Not one I would even consider an option

[Slunnie]

I reckon the biggest problem with this site / forum is that's it's too fragmented - as in tech posted in say the D2 section will have relevance in the defender section and vice versa. Be stuffed if there's enough hours in the day day to browse all of them. And **** me the series section would be awesome if every post on there was visible on every other sub forum. They deserve it. Make them kings

It would be great if I could log on once a day or whatever and instantly see all the tech from everywhere (pre 2004 LR) without having to divert too much, nobody will do that. Even though I don't own a series now, I still want to hear their ramblings (as an example)

No idea how Facebook or tik tok do it, I don't do that stuff. But if you want to compete - change the format up a bit. IMO what's going on now is good, but it could be absolutely awesome .
You can. Just click on the “Quick Links” menu and select todays posts. This will bring up any new posts from all sections. That’s at least how I view the forums.

[3toes]

I use the same option as it opens posts about interesting subjects that I would otherwise never see

[JDNSW]

Same here.

[DieselLSE]

Ditto.