Were the Visordown forums ever any good?

[trevor saxe-coburg-gotha]

I fetched up on Visordown recently, having followed a google link to a review of a bike I was momentarily interested in. The review was good - apparently objective (i.e. critical), humorous, well-written etc. (better than a lot of shit on MCN). And linked to other decent Visordown articles.

And yet the forums are graveyards. Weird.

Did they used to be any good, and if so what happened?
____________________
"Life is a sexually transmitted disease and the mortality rate is one hundred percent."

Mobylette Type 50 ---> Raleigh Grifter ---> Neval Minsk 125

[wizzzard]

I used to like them very much. There was the split to the rev counter after some BCF style internal conflict and then the owner sold it to a magazine at which point it all went to shit for me.

You know reading another bike forum is technically cheating on us don't you matey? I feel used and dirty
____________________
And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage?
Zeitgeist / Addendum / Moving forward

[hellkat]

From what I remember it was mostly fast-moving and testosterone-driven smart-arsed one upmanship.

Hated it.
____________________
Not nearly as interesting in real life.

[fatjames]

[trevor saxe-coburg-gotha]

[hellkat]

It was as if every person on there was some evil Frankenstein cobbled together with parts of Ste, Bazza, Sickpup and Luke VFR - although that was back before I spent more time on BCF and came to know and love* those particular gentlemen for their personal quirks



*using this phrase under advisement, of course
____________________
Not nearly as interesting in real life.

[hellkat]

Yeah, I'm registered on The Revcounter as well (under a very different name ) but despite popping on and off occasionally in the last 5 years or so, I haven't really got a feel for it. I know a couple of people on there who were on here originally (Mad Liz and Paivi), both of whom I get on well with ... but I just don't seem to have settled there very much. I might go and have another look, but I get the impression its a bit of an older population...?

... and I quite like the idiocy of the youth on here (sometimes) - watching them go from being complete and utter cockwipes to reasonably acceptable individuals.
____________________
Not nearly as interesting in real life.

[stinkwheel]

It was so full of trolls you couldn't sort the wheat from the chaff. WIlly waving was rife, newbies had no chance and there was so much shitposting, keeping up with the forum would have been a full time occupation.

If you ever wanted an example of WHY BCF has the karma system enforcing some degree of grammar and punctuation, control of nested quotes and has severely restricted avatar and signature rules, you just needed to visit visordown. You'd get five people in a row posting in reply to a post and their flashy, animated signature was so large you'd only fit four posts on the page.
____________________
“Rule one: Always stick around for one more drink. That's when things happen. That's when you find out everything you want to know.”
I did the 2010 Round Britain Rally on my 350 Bullet. 89 landmarks, 3 months, 9,500 miles.

[DrDonnyBrago]

I used to like it, preferred it to BCF in fact. Not entirely sure why it died off so quickly but it went very shite around the time it was sold to a mag and everyone interesting jumped ship. There were a couple of complete twats but there used to be a lot less children on it than there is on BCF, although I couldn't tell you what it was like now. Last time I went on there it had about 3 members posting one word insults to each other.

Quite cliquey but it was entirely unmoderated, which I liked, although wasn't all that great as a noob.

[Ste]

[trevor saxe-coburg-gotha]

Yeah - I thought it used to be busy, that's why I was so surprised to find it as dead as it is.

Seems like there are contradictory lessons that bcf's learnt though. Otoh, limit nested quotes and have some kind of karma. Oto, the more commercial a board becomes...
____________________
"Life is a sexually transmitted disease and the mortality rate is one hundred percent."

Mobylette Type 50 ---> Raleigh Grifter ---> Neval Minsk 125

[hellkat]

Plus, they used a lot of stupid acronyms ...
____________________
Not nearly as interesting in real life.

[fatjames]

[map]

[hellkat]

[-]

It used to be busy before the sell out to Magelica or whatever they were called. At that point, the vast majority of regulars all jumped ship and went to TRC. I used to read both forums, but eventually VD became quiter and TRC became busier intil VD became the ghost town it is now.

I got driven out of TRC by a clique, which are mainly ex VD members who pay a subscription of about £20 a year to the admin of TRC.

There's a lot less of the ming-mong tedious arguments on here and a lot less bullying. This is partly helped by having a good mix of opinions on here, rather than the mainly left wing Guardianista pretentious clique of TRC subscribers. Having a seperate political sub forum helps.

There have been a few cases of serious stalking on TRC lately, effecting people's real life and work. I got targetted and the stalker and his assistant follwed me here, using an identity I used on TRC and other forums, with a photo of me as his avatar. I still have a case logged with the police just in case he tries it on again as it spilt into real life and crank calls.

I've noticed quite a few on here, who are obviously members of TRC too. They seem a lot more peaceful on here!
____________________
TZR250 2MA road, TZR250 1KT road, TZR250 2MA race, TDR250, YZF-750R Boost colours.
Jaguar S Type 3.0 V6 Sport R, VW Transporter T5 GP LWB Shuttle 140ps DSG.

[stinkwheel]

They did raid BCF on more than one occasion.

That's when you used to see the karma system really come into its own. They used to post in the same way as they did on their own forum and it would red-blob them within three posts. Then they'd rage for a bit about having to preview/spellcheck/lengthen their posts, give up and go back to their own board.
____________________
“Rule one: Always stick around for one more drink. That's when things happen. That's when you find out everything you want to know.”
I did the 2010 Round Britain Rally on my 350 Bullet. 89 landmarks, 3 months, 9,500 miles.

[Kickstart]

Hi

It managed to survive for a bit after it was sold on, but then they changed the forum software which really killed it.

Used to get about a page of updated threads a day in the workshop section. Currently there are threads updated on the 1st Jan still on the front page.

All the best

Keith
____________________
Traxpics, track day and racing photographs - Bimota Forum - Bike performance / thrust graphs for choosing gearing

[Clanger]

[sickpup]

[Rogerborg]

[Teflon-Mike]

It wasn't a 'forum' when it started, Visor-Down was a Bullatin Board!
I think I let my account lapse not long after millenium complient software let you post pictures!
It was good, a LONG time ago; but its only rivals at the time were American Chopper boards or 'Planet-Bike' where the US 'rice-burner' jockeys were forever besieged by folk telling them 1800cc of Milwake Iron would always kick thier ass!
Think I stopped using it around 2005.
Mind you... I DID turn up "the secret diary of Celephapod Molusk' the parody of teenage angst and misunderstanding, based loosely on composite of Visor-Down charecters.... actually I have a feeling it was Smiler, made me remember it and go looking.... a while back.....google it; may still remain in the sedimentary deposits of cyber detritus! Though you may have to also find the original postings of NSR125Kid, for the parody to be fully appreciated!
____________________
My Webby'Tef's-tQ, loads of stuff about my bikes, my Land-Rovers, and the stuff I do with them!
Current Bikes:'Honda VF1000F' ;'CB750F2N' ;'CB125TD ( 6 3 of em!)'; 'Montesa Cota 248'. Learner FAQ's:= 'U want to Ride a Motorbike! Where Do U start?'

[hellkat]

I was using those names simply as an analogy of the type of outspoken-regardless-what-people-think characters of BCF, not as a lumpen group of some pungent sub-clique. Ergo I had to lump the good with the, erm, bad, ugly or ginger
____________________
Not nearly as interesting in real life.

[sickpup]

[Fruit'n'nut]