Haymarket agrees sale of PistonHeads to CarGurus
Discussion
sorrel said:
No problems here, Chrome with AdBlocker on Win 8.1
Actually one of the quicker sites I use..
I have Windows 10 & Firefox with adblock. And agreed, quick, easy to read, no dross like sigs, pointless avatars and the like. Actually one of the quicker sites I use..
I like that, and of course the content. The loons are easy to avoid.
jagnet said:
The search function just needs to post a site: search to Google. I doubt anything developed in house us going to surpass Google's efforts.
I know years ago you used to be able to pay Google to host a site specific search function using their servers and tech. I don't know if that's still something they do.
The google engine is very powerful, and on our invision site we do have a google powered search.I know years ago you used to be able to pay Google to host a site specific search function using their servers and tech. I don't know if that's still something they do.
However you also want to be able to search forum areas, by username, etc is useful.
Daniel
I completely agree that the commercial value is in the data, well beyond transactional stuff. Opinions matter a lot, and on this forum it is fairly easy to analyze the members demographically, by location,income, politics etc. Marketing gold.
As for the future I just hope it’s about cars in the main. The best postings for me are about real people doing real things. LowDrag on Jags for inatance, or the posting about restoring an Alvis Stalwart. Dr GN building models and so on
There is a wealth of knowledge here. I am mainly a Porsche person and have some , and value to opinions of better drivers than I will ever be like Steve Rance for example.
Maybe having a few posters like this now and thwn have more profiles of their experiences would be good. I love Petrolicious but it’s not a cheap proposition to do vids of that quality. Maybe some members vids would be fun
In the end the value for me is a vibrant and knowledgeable community that is also slightly anarchistic would be perfect.
As for the future I just hope it’s about cars in the main. The best postings for me are about real people doing real things. LowDrag on Jags for inatance, or the posting about restoring an Alvis Stalwart. Dr GN building models and so on
There is a wealth of knowledge here. I am mainly a Porsche person and have some , and value to opinions of better drivers than I will ever be like Steve Rance for example.
Maybe having a few posters like this now and thwn have more profiles of their experiences would be good. I love Petrolicious but it’s not a cheap proposition to do vids of that quality. Maybe some members vids would be fun
In the end the value for me is a vibrant and knowledgeable community that is also slightly anarchistic would be perfect.
jagnet said:
Lemming Train said:
Let's have a look at Car Throttle shall we, to see what we're missing : https://www.carthrottle.com/community/
I'm sure that Car Throttle would love to have the problems that PH has with threads getting beyond 500 pages putting excessive strain on the servers.edit: pages, not posts
Edited by jagnet on Friday 7th December 14:59
768 said:
Chrome tells me it's 6.7 seconds. 65Mb connection.
That's an eternity.
Brave is 700ms.
Chrome desktop, W8.1, 8 Mbps connection, 16 GB RAM, i7 4770k :That's an eternity.
Brave is 700ms.
Just turned off my ad blockers to experience the pain. Opened the Chrome console and did a forced refresh on this page (page 26).
It's now 9.8 MINUTES in loading the page, 351 requests processed, 2 MB transferred and still not fully loaded the page!
WTF!Adblock and uBlock Origin switched back on :
Page loaded in 2.18 seconds, 95 requests processed, 685kb transferred.
No-brainer isn't it.
akirk said:
Lemming Train said:
phoenixz said:
The posting you are referring to was in regards to the front page. Not the forums.
The rest of your argument is moot
My visiting the forums is now mostly an annual pilgrimage, like going home to see the parents
If Car Throttle is done so well and the front page is how PH should be in your opinion, why is the rest of the site dead? The front page is the 'door' to the rest of the site so if everything behind the door is dead that tells you that the front page isn't working as it's not drawing anyone in.The rest of your argument is moot
My visiting the forums is now mostly an annual pilgrimage, like going home to see the parents
A cut and paste of your posts :
phoenixz in 2016 said:
To be perfectly honest, the biggest disappointment this year (for me) has been pistonheads itself...
whilst other car sites have come on in leaps and bounds, embracing social media, making big changes and invoking involvement from their members in many exciting and creative ways, pistonheads seems to be stuck in the dark ages of the internet.
the forums are dwindling, the articles are lack luster and the interest in members is minimal at best.
I know that drive tribe are technically a competitor, but where is the pistonheads tribe? why are they not top of the bumps per day?
where is the fast updating news feed of car related articles from around the world? there are plenty of sites that I use regularly that link their posts to other car sites and simply attempt to have all car news (verified and unverified) in one place. why doesn't pistonheads have that?
there should be 10-20 articles a day with featured/stickys given to featured articles.
where is the personal look at member vehicles and stories (see car throttle for examples)
for reference of doing it right: look at car buzz, car throttle etc...
maybe hire someone that was born this century? some of them are 16 now.
whilst other car sites have come on in leaps and bounds, embracing social media, making big changes and invoking involvement from their members in many exciting and creative ways, pistonheads seems to be stuck in the dark ages of the internet.
the forums are dwindling, the articles are lack luster and the interest in members is minimal at best.
I know that drive tribe are technically a competitor, but where is the pistonheads tribe? why are they not top of the bumps per day?
where is the fast updating news feed of car related articles from around the world? there are plenty of sites that I use regularly that link their posts to other car sites and simply attempt to have all car news (verified and unverified) in one place. why doesn't pistonheads have that?
there should be 10-20 articles a day with featured/stickys given to featured articles.
where is the personal look at member vehicles and stories (see car throttle for examples)
for reference of doing it right: look at car buzz, car throttle etc...
maybe hire someone that was born this century? some of them are 16 now.
phoenixz in 2017 said:
Another year goes by and pistonheads is still the biggest dissappointment for me.
I have gone so far as to remove it from my bookmarks. It has now become the yearly nostalgia trip. The site i check up on once a year to see if there has been any change or improvement.
After last year's rant and being PM'ed by the editor, i had high hopes that at least some of my suggestions would be taken on, most of which were simple and cheap to do. Evidently the PMs were just to stop the public bashing of pistonheads on their own site.
Car Throttle will continue to grow, Drivetribe seems to have invaded all parts of social media (however unwanted at first), even Petrolicious (which used to just be fantastic clips for occasional watching) has become a bigger reference point and thus more relevant.
I wish PH and the team all the best, but at the moment the only future i see for pistonheads is obscurity.
Regretfully,
Phoenixz
Petrolicious is another site that's dead. Gimmicky layout with too many 'like' buttons and Facebook style commenting. Checking a handful of articles the average number of comments is 3 I have gone so far as to remove it from my bookmarks. It has now become the yearly nostalgia trip. The site i check up on once a year to see if there has been any change or improvement.
After last year's rant and being PM'ed by the editor, i had high hopes that at least some of my suggestions would be taken on, most of which were simple and cheap to do. Evidently the PMs were just to stop the public bashing of pistonheads on their own site.
Car Throttle will continue to grow, Drivetribe seems to have invaded all parts of social media (however unwanted at first), even Petrolicious (which used to just be fantastic clips for occasional watching) has become a bigger reference point and thus more relevant.
I wish PH and the team all the best, but at the moment the only future i see for pistonheads is obscurity.
Regretfully,
Phoenixz
. That's some real progress in 2+ years! PH should definitely watch their backs.Drivetribe has gained some traction I'll admit, but just look at the state of their site
. It's one huge mess of stuff all over the place in no order whatsoever. Checking a handful of articles, sure, they have a fair number of comments but it's same boring one line or one word replies, completely devoid of any discussion points or debate.As someone said a few pages back, PH has become more of a 'life' forum than just about cars. I wouldn't be at all surprised if the off-topic Pie & Piston sub-forums are busier than all the motoring forums put together. Where else on the internet can you get advice all in one place on the best family estate under £5k with 200hp+, tips on how to shave your nob without slicing yourself open, advice on best teaspoons, advice on the best log-burners, advice on marriage/relationships, advice on employment/tax/legal matters and the opportunity to get balls deep in arguing about Brexit, Trump or Islam and your post still be there 10 minutes later? All this with some of the most passive and laid-back mods that the internet has ever seen. It's like one big digital pub and sure, it could do with freshening up with a new carpet and fresh coat of paint on the walls but everything else needs leaving alone as it just works.
which does make me worry about whether PH is really what it used to be 
In my line of work (webby digital consulting type stuff) we refer our clients to where life exists online - and two key locations are:
- PistonHeads for a predominantly male audience
- Mumsnet for a predominantly female audience
Pistonheads is really not just about cars - it is a community of people and relationships with all the ups and downs that you see in real life, just a few more virtual frozen sausages
There is also a very valid reason for leaving forums as they are - because they are a fantastic resource - Facebook is deliberately dreadful at going back through posts - I am a member of a couple of classic RR groups on there and they are brilliant for seeing someone's latest thought - they are useless to trawl back through and find info from the repository of knowledge that exists - apart from anything else, Facebook is so lacking in transparency and honesty in how it shows you posts that you have no idea if you are seeing everything anyway, it shows you want it wants you to see...
A big part of the future of online is in data - and there is a goldmine of information in forums online - to change that would be foolish... so there are things that could be done - but they are simply fixing the issues, and using a bit of modern tech where it doesn't change the rest of the experience - e.g. allowing image uploads to read from a phone camera / library is really simple - I have it on a private site I wrote for my book collections - a couple of hours of work - that kind of tweak to just make life easier would make sense...
PHs is still a great forum made by the members and their wealth of backgrounds and expertise. It also has a distinctive style set by Ted and maintained by the posters and the Mods.
Whilst it’s always evolving, it’s a worry when someone like CarGurus comes along.
Still, funding and development has been sadly lacking in the forums under Haymarket and the advertising is making the site unusable without installing adblockers.
Good luck all involved and hopefully we’ll be able to carry on with a bit more funds and support for the site.
Whilst it’s always evolving, it’s a worry when someone like CarGurus comes along.
Still, funding and development has been sadly lacking in the forums under Haymarket and the advertising is making the site unusable without installing adblockers.
Good luck all involved and hopefully we’ll be able to carry on with a bit more funds and support for the site.
El stovey said:
PHs is still a great forum made by the members and their wealth of backgrounds and expertise.
I agree. It's one of the few forums where you can get sensible and often well informed advice about almost anything you care to ask. If I have a question that someone with experience/skills or whatever can likely answer this is the place I post it..
99% of us on here normally try to constructively contribute when questions are asked or topics discussed that fall within our remit/interest.
Of course a small minority don't, but that's a small price to pay for the expertise and generally intelligent demographic that lurks here.
MrBig said:
I quite like PH for what it is. Granted, I'm not such a fan of the b
hing and belittling that takes place on some of the threads, but on the whole its a great resource for a demographic that doesn't really fit the FB/reddit etc. type model.
My worry is that CarGurus just want the brand to launch a classifieds service for the UK (and maybe Europe) and the forums will be seen as a liability. Hope to be proved wrong.
Mind you i'll save a lot of money on trainers, aftershave, headphones, watches, tools, cat6 and NAS drives (whatever they are)
Agreed, and you forgot torches, I really don't need any more torches. Oh perhaps just one more then, goes off to consider Convoy L6.... again.hing and belittling that takes place on some of the threads, but on the whole its a great resource for a demographic that doesn't really fit the FB/reddit etc. type model.My worry is that CarGurus just want the brand to launch a classifieds service for the UK (and maybe Europe) and the forums will be seen as a liability. Hope to be proved wrong.
Mind you i'll save a lot of money on trainers, aftershave, headphones, watches, tools, cat6 and NAS drives (whatever they are)
Lemming Train said:
768 said:
Chrome tells me it's 6.7 seconds. 65Mb connection.
That's an eternity.
Brave is 700ms.
Chrome desktop, W8.1, 8 Mbps connection, 16 GB RAM, i7 4770k :That's an eternity.
Brave is 700ms.
Just turned off my ad blockers to experience the pain. Opened the Chrome console and did a forced refresh on this page (page 26).
It's now 9.8 MINUTES in loading the page, 351 requests processed, 2 MB transferred and still not fully loaded the page!
WTF!Adblock and uBlock Origin switched back on :
Page loaded in 2.18 seconds, 95 requests processed, 685kb transferred.
No-brainer isn't it.
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