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Does a site hiatus affect your opinion of said site?


Rivfader
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So my site opened during the summer in 2018 and we had a very active member base until about September/Early October when college started to take over all my time - I had made the mistake of staffing alone and then I just didn't have time to find some help when I needed it - and things started to die. I hadn't lost interest in the site at all though, so now that I have more free time again I decided to bring it back. However after a few days of advertising on directories, tumblrs & other forums, we haven't had one new member or guest that has joined the discord or made a claim, or any of that jazz, which is unusual for this site and any others I staffed in the past.

 

So while I'm aware this time of year can be a bad one for new roleplays, I'm also wondering if the fact that a site has had a hiatus or quiet period in the past would affect your opinion of the site as a prospective member. Would you view it as a warning that the site might not last again the second time? Or would you wait until it seems their activity is up and remains steady?

 

I've been completely transparent with my old members - I told them what was going on when activity levels were going down & let them know again when I decided to bring the site back, however only two of the old members still have time for the site. I'm hoping our activity & daily IC posts are noticed by guests. 

 

Thanks in advance! : D

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For me personally, yeah. I see it as a red flag for any community. Whether it's an RP forum, a discord server or even a deviantArt group. It means the people who run (ran) it have shown that they aren't up for the task, as least in the past.

That doesn't mean they haven't learned from it, and things might have changed. I'd wanna know what happened and what has changed to prevent this from happening again.

 

Unless they come with a really strong, honest story, I'd probably sit back and wait till is at least up activity is up.

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4 minutes ago, Pinkykins said:

It depends on how transparent the staff have been about it. If a site goes on hiatus because life circumstances become too much then I would be more forgiving then say if the staff/admins had been focusing on another hobby/project they run. That's not because I think people should be limited in their hobbies or that they should feel compelled to dedicate all their spare time to something but rather that it suggests that they're fickle. Trying to take on too much at once (for example running multiple boards) for most people isn't going to end well. Part of preventing burn-out and/or keeping your community engaged is being aware of your resources and where they're best spent.

I'd definitely be suspicious if staff tried to brush the hiatus under the rug or pretend that it hadn't happened. I'd worry that they either didn't value me as a member or that they aren't prepared to treat me like an adult. Stuff happens, sometimes hiatuses are necessary and if someone needs to take some time off from rping to clear their head, I'd absolutely stand by them on that. But if you just pop back out of nowhere and go straight back to serving enthusiasm, it's going to feel fake. I don't need to know the nitty gritty details of why it happened but I think it's important for a community to recognise that it did. There's no shame in it. Just a simple 'Sorry, life got complicated but we're back and we'd like to focus on looking forward' would reassure me that their intentions are in the right place.

I'm actually coming out of a similar situation myself and whilst getting back into the swing of things was super daunting, reflecting on what mistakes I made previously was helpful. I now know that instead of worrying about my activity, if I fall into a similar pattern (I'm recovering from mental illness) it's more important for me to use what little energy/time I have on communicating with my members. People are often reasonable and forgiving, they just don't like being left in the dark - which is completely reasonable. We lost members due to my silence, which felt devastating but I understood why. Now I finally feel like the traction we had is building up again but it wasn't easy and didn't happen overnight.

You've been advertising and it's great that you're putting the site's name back out there. But it's also important that members (both new and old) have something they can come back to. Whilst you wait for new members and characters, get involved with the ones you already have. Dust off that old thread and inject some new muse into it. If you're by yourself, write with yourself (as awkward as it can feel) so that prospective members can get a taste of what their characters can join in with. Start conversation in the discord and look at other ways you can bring back the excitement to your site - whether it's building up a new event, introducing a new way you can play/write or adding a new twist to the site's plot. 

Give yourself small targets and be sincere in your efforts to meet them. If you know you can only do site maintence or updates once a week be open about it, but cut yourself some slack in the progress. Not every idea will land and sometimes you'll miss a target by a few days, don't beat yourself up over it. As long as you are persistent and patient, you'll grow again.

Lastly, I just want to say kudos for solo-staffing as long as you did as doing everything yourself takes a ton of time and energy. Best of luck in reviving your site! You can do it! 👍

 

Thank you so much for the thoughtful reply! I definitely agree with focusing on the members I have rather than trying to put all my effort into finding new ones - I've been writing daily with the two active members we've still got from before so I'm hoping that visible activity in the IC areas will be noticed by guests! 

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I accept a quiet period, because many sites have this. I don't accept a hiatus and a reborn, as in Site 2.0. I accept a 2 hours hiatus for installing a new skin, but nothing more. 

 

Don't reopen it until you find a partner to staff together! Never staff alone again, and choose staff who is less likely to be as busy as you at the same time (e.g. not students at the same Uni).

Edited by Elena
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Yeah.... I’ve tried the hiatus thing. I never come back. So I kinda feel like if an admin is going to do that, they’re really not feeling it. I’ve never actually seen a site come back from a hiatus either but that’s just personal experience. 

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It's not a big thing for me when I see something in hiatus because I understand that real life comes first and that can sometimes take time. We're human and don't spend every waking moment online. So I don't immediately discount that, but if there hasn't been anything for a few months without anything there I might be steered away from a place. I tend to look at things overall before I decide on something or don't. 

 

Like it was said before, focus on what you have while trying to draw in new members. Advertise and give new folks something to jump into. Anything else and I'm just repeating what's been said before.

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I agree that it all depends on the what's behind the hiatus. To give an example, my site takes a 2 month hiatus every year. From November 1 to December 31. We do this because a number of the members participate in NaNoWriMo. Then, we hit the holidays- from Thanksgiving to New Years Eve.

 

In the beginning of my site, the team of staff and I noticed that activity slacked during this time. One commented that we were competing with NaNo and the holidays. So, the decision was made to go on hiatus - as in not compete with the long standing events. It made sense to us and we still do it today.

 

Everyone knows to expect this break and why it happens. I think that having it as planned  makes a huge difference. Add in making an announcement post, not so much as a reminder but notifying guests, helps as well.

 

If it's planned in advance like a regular break, theoretically, it shouldn't hurt the site.

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People can be quite fickle sometimes. If it's been inactive for a time and people were used to it being active and it suddenly dries up, they might get fed up of waiting and go elsewhere and it's even more true if they've gone into another fandom. However, people might miss it and come back. I've found that personal problems among rpers are more likely to put people off from coming back to a site/fandom than an hiatus.

 

In my experience, what has bothered me about a slow site (rather than one where an hiatus was announced) is when staff are there, but don't post IC, and you find that they've gone on to making a new site as it seems they aren't bothered about their old one any more. If it's a legit reason like school/college, work, illness or family issues then I'd give it another chance.

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I'm sorry to say that it does change my opinion of the site. Like many have said, writers are fickle, but admins are writers as well. I don't how many times a site that I have been on the past has gone on hiatus only to never return. Perhaps, this has left a bad taste in my mouth for hiatus', but this is the case for many. Not only that, I have also seen sites come back from a hiatus only to die weeks later because the admins did not stick around yet again.

 

This is not to say that the same will happen to your site or that it is not possible to come back from a hiatus. I think that you're going to have a hard time getting members to start with, just because there is no trust there. There is no trust that you won't just shut the site down again . Chances are that there a number of writers just sitting on the sidelines waiting to see if the site dies because the staff bails again. No one wants to put their time and energy into something that is inevitably going to crash and burn. So, what you need to do is be transparent with the members that you have and just roleplay.

 

Members will come if they see that you are there, you are trying, and you are having fun.

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I think it depends, I don't normally put my sites on hiatus. What I do do is: From November to January I don't do activity checks because of the holidays. Then I do an interest check, no stress, just lemme know you're still around. When it comes to staff members. I tend to have a transparent request. I personally have an ailment that flares up and doesnt at times so when i'm going through infusions I let my staff and my members know that for the next week i'll be a bit sick and down but i'll be back shortly after. If I need a chance to recharge, I tend to talk to my admins and step back from admin duties for a little while, allowing them to work together and things things going. You need a good group of friends to run an amazing site without getting burnt out.

 

Normally for me though, when a site goes "offline" or "turns private and isn't accepting new members at this time" I rarely good back and look again. So I tend to try and stick away from using those options if I can.

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I have to agree with the people that my opinion of a board going on hiatus depends a lot on the transparency and reasons given for the slow down or pause. I have seen a lot of boards that suffer lulls after there has been a major behind the scenes OOC drama that split their player base. The admins and players get so caught up in dealing with the interpersonal fall out that they forget to post. And then there's just suddenly an Admin making an announcement about the board starting fresh and moving forward. That's always a warning sign for me that there might be stuff going on behind the scenes that I as a player am not aware of and so I get anxious about playing on those boards. 

 

I respect mental health issues (being on disability for them myself) and how it can be a struggle to keep a hobby moving forward. But clear communication and dedicated effort is generally rewarded. Even if your posting is slowing down if you keep your community alive and in touch then there's a decent chance your board will survive a period where the posting stride has gone off. 

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  • 5 weeks later...

I'm very pessimistic when it comes to rps. I've been around for long enough and I've seen more games fail than I can count. If I see 'hiatus' I expect the game to be dead, I'm simple.

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Recently tried the hiatus thing. We were shut down for Christmas break, staff as a whole were busy. It crushed us for a lot of reasons.

  • During that time our members got bored and looked around. This means they may have ultimately lost interest or found another place to go.
  • Losing the habit of running a site, staff struggled to get back into the swing of things and the absence of our members who said they'd be there made it even harder for us to WANT to make it work. 
  • We feel like members lost a lot of trust and faith in us. There is a hefty amount of dependability that members inherently look for. If staff have struggled in the past then members are likely going to be leery of investing time there.

I remember when your site opened 🙂 It did well, but maybe it's run its course? Or could use enough reworking to make it new again. Change it up and be sure you can do it again. 

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Hiatus or not!

 

Sometimes putting a site on hiatus is the only way for it to survive at all. I agree that it needs to be readily transparent and hiatus information should be updated.

 

I have 3 sites and had to take one of them down to move it and while it was down, my members and I decided that rebooting was a better idea over trying to force the old site into our pigeon-hole. We've stayed in contact and everyone is working on some aspect of the site's lore. We talk several times per week and when it does open, it's gonna be fantastic!

 

Personally, I'd rather see a notice go up and people take some time off rather than have them and the site implode and die completely!

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