RWO for Sale

[ScottH]

Free to good owner.

It's been 8 years since I took over from Des.
Been a lot of fun. It's been technically challenging at times. But mostly I've enjoyed it.

I've tried to run the site as best I can. Minimising costs whilst making sure the site is usable.
Managing and dealing with people is not one of my strong points and I've not always enjoyed my time in charge.
Thankfully I've had some good people who were willing to take up the slack in Frog and Liz.
Liz has been here for the long haul and I thank her very much for her assistance.

I have one final challenge left, and that is to see if I can get the wiki running again.
There was a lot of good content in their, but given only 2 of us (Thank Ugg) updated it I still wonder whether the effort is worth it.

My Reasoning.
I'm tired. I've found other interests in life, and I've spent many hours and late nights devoted to RWO over the years behind the scenes.
I'd prefer to start devoting more time to my other interests. I'd still be a regular here, just on the other side of the fence. I might actually read more posts and post more often like I used to.
Some of those interests involve projects for RWO which I never have time to complete, but would like to finish.
I get distracted easily!!!
I've been considering this for a while. I just wanted to make sure I was sure!

I feel the site is in it's best possible state for someone to take over.
Things are running smoothly, (except the wiki )

There is enough money in the kitty for another 6 months or so.
RWO is a very generous community, and we've never gone short of donations.

I've chosen now as this time of year there is a larger audience, so I may get some decent responses or proposals.

It doesn't have to be one person it can be a consortium.
It can be a slow hand over too, as I'd want to make sure you are comfortable with things before I hang up my "Admin/Owner Hat"

Skills that would be nice to have, but are not required are:
some vbulletin knowledge (most important)
PHP
MYSQL
Linux (only a minimum)

I had no idea about any of these 8 years ago.
I taught myself.
I'll always be around to ask for help or advice.

Someone must be interested.

[desredandwhite]

I'm excited!!!!

Scott, you've held on far longer than good sense or sanity would indicate. We can now form an ex-RWO-owner's club! There should be a badge! Maybe a secret handshake!

Who's going to step up?

[Go Swannies]

Scott, both you and Des have done a great job of running the site - I don't know how I'd have enjoyed the Swans so much without RWO. As you'll see by my postings I've endeavoured to pull back on my obsession a bit, too so I'm not in the market.

But if you'd like to have a round of fund raising so you're handing it on with an extended future, just let us know. Hopefully I'd be able to contribute in cash in Melbourne next week.

- - - Updated - - -

I'm excited!!!!

Scott, you've held on far longer than good sense or sanity would indicate. We can now form an ex-RWO-owner's club! There should be a badge! Maybe a secret handshake!

Who's going to step up?

Dead Swans Society?

[Conor_Dillon]

Matt80?

[DamY]

Can't really assist much in terms of web administration, but willing to help out in other ways such as help raise funds, promotions/marketing, maybe help with the wiki.

Should have an election haha

[Xie Shan]

First of all, I just wanted to thank Scott for all his efforts running this site over the years (as well as ugg and liz for their work behind the scenes), I think what you've done has been nothing short of amazing, especially the Wiki which never even existed before. I'm a mod on another site which isn't always an easy job, and that's without having to worry about the site admin side of things.

I definitely don't have the skills in PHP/SQL and I don't have the time to commit to this fully to give it the attention it deserves, but a couple of words of advice to the incoming owner, whoever it may be:

1) Define what it is that people want from a forum like this one. I've been a part of RWO for a number of years and enjoy the site, but no-one would have dreamed back in 2003/4 that social media would take off the way it has, and with that the role of a messageboard / supporter website like this one has changed dramatically. Some sort of mission statement or purpose would be good, to define what RWO will 'look like' going forward. For example, do we just want a place to chat about the Swans? A repository of information? A place where people can create and post their own Swans-related content (like podcasts!)? Maybe open it up to Swans supporters on BigFooty who are looking for a sanctuary from all the crap that gets posted over there? More meet-ups? Perhaps you could invite interested parties to post a short proposal outlining their vision for the site.

I know this all sounds a bit wanky, but for whoever the person is that takes over the site, I figure it would be helpful to define what RWO will 'look like' going forward, to help you get the members you want to get, so all that effort isn't in vain.

2) Put a team together to divide up responsibilities and spread the load, rather than having 2-3 people doing all the work themselves. We are all busy, we all have other responsibilities in life. I'm not in a position to put my hand up obviously time-wise but could help out in certain areas if I were part of a larger team, and I'm sure there would be others in the RWO community who feel the same. I think DamY put his hand up to lead the marketing committee

[RogueSwan]

....2) Put a team together to divide up responsibilities and spread the load, rather than having 2-3 people doing all the work themselves. We are all busy, we all have other responsibilities in life. I'm not in a position to put my hand up obviously time-wise but could help out in certain areas if I were part of a larger team, and I'm sure there would be others in the RWO community who feel the same....

I have been a mod for a little while now, but my usage is inconsistent. I am happy to continue in this rule a pick up some extra responsibilities. I'd to be able to code, really, but I don't know if I have the time to learn.
I will join Xie and DamY on the RWO board.

[Beerman]

I'm fairly new to the site, so my first thought when I saw the headline was "RWO makes money?" If Microsoft can pay $2.5bn for Mojang, surely they could stump up $500m or so for RWO? Thanks so much for running the site, Scott. Your efforts are much appreciated.

Unless there's more COBOL coding involved than I would expect, I don't have the skills (or time) necessary. I have excellent MS SQL Server coding skills if there's any SQL to be cut, but not so much on the admin side.

Sorry.

[Auntie.Gerald]

Scott yourself and Liz and Frog have done an incredible job

Mate i am not a wiz on computers but hopefully a Swans fan has these capabilities and is keen as mustard

Thank you again for creating a great environment and sense of community for us Bloods fans to connect !!!







katy-perry-birthday.jpg

[Hotpotato]

Have no idea how you have found the time and energy to take on the learning curve to run RWO for 8 years.
Hope someone will take the baton, you have paved the way and made it much easier for the next owner.
Could someone write a short Biography about Scott please , that would be great.

[dimelb]

You've done a great job Scott. Thanks also to Des and Frog for the work they put in.

I'm sorry I can't do the stuff needed but am ready to back whoever takes it on.

[Danzar]

Scott and all admins - you've done a wonderful job. I don't post here as often as I used to, but I post nowhere else either.

Scott, can you tell us how much time you think a new RWO owner needs to invest to keep it running and well looked after? Putting aside any new face or revamp, just what's needed to run it well?

[ScottH]

Thanks all for the support!!
As I've said I've had a great time running it. Learnt a truckload of stuff, but time to move on.
If some one wants to take over as Site admin first, then progress to site owner, I'm willing to go down that path.

Frog and I both jumped in blindly with support from the current and past admins.

I'm fairly new to the site, so my first thought when I saw the headline was "RWO makes money?" If Microsoft can pay $2.5bn for Mojang, surely they could stump up $500m or so for RWO? Thanks so much for running the site, Scott. Your efforts are much appreciated.

Unless there's more COBOL coding involved than I would expect, I don't have the skills (or time) necessary. I have excellent MS SQL Server coding skills if there's any SQL to be cut, but not so much on the admin side.

Sorry.

Would be nice if Bill or Mark or the new Steve were to make me an offer like that. But I doubt that would happen.

I'm a COBOL coder too. Knew very little about the web stuff before this.
I'm admin on one other site ATM, but have been admin on several in the past 8 years.

Have no idea how you have found the time and energy to take on the learning curve to run RWO for 8 years.
Hope someone will take the baton, you have paved the way and made it much easier for the next owner.
Could someone write a short Biography about Scott please , that would be great.

A bio on me??
That may be kind of boring!!

Scott and all admins - you've done a wonderful job. I don't post here as often as I used to, but I post nowhere else either.

Scott, can you tell us how much time you think a new RWO owner needs to invest to keep it running and well looked after? Putting aside any new face or revamp, just what's needed to run it well?

You can spend as much or as little time on RWO as you please.
Depends on how much time you have.

On a regular basis there is:
Monitoring threads and posts. The more mods you have the less this is a task. We can go weeks or months without any form of moderation.
The Mods Email acct. 1-2 per week. some time none, sometimes more.
Reported posts. Very infrequent. You could get 5 a week, then none for months.
Twitter acct (as much time as you want to allow).
FB acct (as much time as you want to allow).
TLM (1 min per game)
Game Stats update (10 Mins per game). I'd be happy to keep doing this, I have a process in place to build the upload file. I also have plans to extend it.

On a less regular basis.
TLM countdown, and presentation creation. TLM countdown can be time consuming, but fun also reliving the games. And last year was better with several people doing the reports. Presentation can take a bit of time. Lots of cutting and pasting, but you do it at your leisure
Server Image (Copy the entire server) takes about 2 clicks and then 10-15 mins, but you don't have to wait.
Vbulletin upgrades. Very infrequent, once a year if that. could take a few hours including backups/uploads
Swans AFL Fixture. Once a year.
Keeping track of funds.

DB's are backed up nightly automatically.

Probably a few things I missed. but they are the main things.

I also revamped the site, building the stats page, and other bits and pieces. Those are fairly static now.
But that was my choice. You don't have to do those things.

I check google analytics from time to time and some other monitoring sites, but again minimal time required, or you can take an indepth look.

[ScottH]

First of all, I just wanted to thank Scott for all his efforts running this site over the years (as well as ugg and liz for their work behind the scenes), I think what you've done has been nothing short of amazing, especially the Wiki which never even existed before. I'm a mod on another site which isn't always an easy job, and that's without having to worry about the site admin side of things.

I definitely don't have the skills in PHP/SQL and I don't have the time to commit to this fully to give it the attention it deserves, but a couple of words of advice to the incoming owner, whoever it may be:

1) Define what it is that people want from a forum like this one. I've been a part of RWO for a number of years and enjoy the site, but no-one would have dreamed back in 2003/4 that social media would take off the way it has, and with that the role of a messageboard / supporter website like this one has changed dramatically. Some sort of mission statement or purpose would be good, to define what RWO will 'look like' going forward. For example, do we just want a place to chat about the Swans? A repository of information? A place where people can create and post their own Swans-related content (like podcasts!)? Maybe open it up to Swans supporters on BigFooty who are looking for a sanctuary from all the crap that gets posted over there? More meet-ups? Perhaps you could invite interested parties to post a short proposal outlining their vision for the site.

I know this all sounds a bit wanky, but for whoever the person is that takes over the site, I figure it would be helpful to define what RWO will 'look like' going forward, to help you get the members you want to get, so all that effort isn't in vain.

2) Put a team together to divide up responsibilities and spread the load, rather than having 2-3 people doing all the work themselves. We are all busy, we all have other responsibilities in life. I'm not in a position to put my hand up obviously time-wise but could help out in certain areas if I were part of a larger team, and I'm sure there would be others in the RWO community who feel the same. I think DamY put his hand up to lead the marketing committee

I've tried to make the site more than a message board as it used to be.
There are now 2 ways of posting articles, and then there is the blog. And then there is, or was the WIKI.
We also have the capability to host podcasts. No one has ever asked about it and I've never had the inclination to do it.
Since 2005/2006 the main writers have all moved on or stopped contributing as they used to.

Not sure what you mean by "open it up to Swans supporters from Bigfooty". We've never stopped people coming here from Bigfooty.

Point 2 is the best idea.
My concern ATM moment is I have no backup.
If I am incapacitated, who takes the reigns?? Who has the access to keep control??
No one.

[Sandridge]

I thought I was clever just working out how to add posts so I certainly don't have the know-how, or time, to help.

Would like to send a huge thank you, though, to Scott and anyone else who's made this site what it is today. RWO is an integral part of my passion for the Bloods and helps Swans fans from across the country share feelings and opinions and feel connected to each other.

Thanks Scott! Good luck with those other interests!