socorob Posted June 12 Share Posted June 12 Hypothetically, most of the Z forums nowadays are pretty dead. There may be a handful of posts on each one every day. Even though a lot of the information in forums is old, there is still a lot of relevant information on them. It would be sad to see it all get lost. I guess social media or smart phones are to blame. I'm not sure if there was an app for each forum (like a hybridz app) if that would help at this point or not. Everything that is posted in social media pretty much gets lost and is very hard if not impossible to find again, and its mainly just pictures and comments, nothing too technical. Does anyone think that there would ever be a world in which forums would merge before they got totally lost? Like several of the Z forums combining into 1 large Z forum (if that's even possible with the different software they use) to get the handful of people on each one all together so there are decent numbers on one. I worry that one day several of the old forums will cease to exist and all the information in them will disappear forever. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Derek Posted Saturday at 10:30 AM Share Posted Saturday at 10:30 AM I've been doing the best I can on FB to try and encourage people the return to the forums to no avail. The general attitude is, and I quote, "too cumbersome". People would rather have the wrong answer in a hurry than the right answer that takes a little work. There are so many FB groups for the S30 that there is no way to get any kind of quality answers. I don't know how many times I could of contributed to someones question but didn't because I knew the answer was easily found on one of the three forums. You are starting to see that AI is burrowing its way into the FB groups as well. Sad times these are. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dat73z Posted Saturday at 03:39 PM Share Posted Saturday at 03:39 PM I doubt we'll see a resurgence of forum activity. I agree with @Derek, the trend since 2010 or so has been towards short-form social media, soundbytes, instant gratification scrolling, and now AI. Unfortunately e-commerce has basically all but migrated to other platforms as well so it's near impossible to fully unplug if you're looking for parts. We're a small remaining userbase but I think we can at least keep the HybridZ discussion boards alive. Which are good reminders, just put in my donation to HybridZ operating costs and time to put down the phone 😁 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NewZed Posted Saturday at 05:12 PM Share Posted Saturday at 05:12 PM Ask one of the AI's and see what it says. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
calZ Posted Sunday at 09:28 AM Share Posted Sunday at 09:28 AM Whenever I answer something on Facebook that has been discussed thoroughly or answered on here, I try to provide a link and mention the name of the site. Maybe "brand awareness" will gain us a few users. I don't think it will ever come back, though. Attention spans are too short. I always have hoped that Dan would give a warning before shutting the site down so that I'd have a chance to download it in full. Maybe I should just start doing a backup every few months just in case that doesn't happen. There's too much valuable stuff here to lose it all. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
socorob Posted Monday at 01:27 PM Author Share Posted Monday at 01:27 PM If I know the answer to a facebook post is on here, and I'm not busy at the time, I'll try to put in the link to here, or say its on Hybridz. I don't know if that makes a difference. Once a few years ago, someone asked "What's Hybridz?" 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
socorob Posted Monday at 01:31 PM Author Share Posted Monday at 01:31 PM On 6/15/2025 at 4:28 AM, calZ said: Whenever I answer something on Facebook that has been discussed thoroughly or answered on here, I try to provide a link and mention the name of the site. Maybe "brand awareness" will gain us a few users. I don't think it will ever come back, though. Attention spans are too short. I always have hoped that Dan would give a warning before shutting the site down so that I'd have a chance to download it in full. Maybe I should just start doing a backup every few months just in case that doesn't happen. There's too much valuable stuff here to lose it all. How do you download it to back it up? 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jhm Posted Monday at 04:51 PM Share Posted Monday at 04:51 PM On 6/15/2025 at 5:28 AM, calZ said: Whenever I answer something on Facebook that has been discussed thoroughly or answered on here, I try to provide a link and mention the name of the site. Maybe "brand awareness" will gain us a few users. I do the same thing, and I think it has been effective to a degree. We're still getting a handful of new members every month that seem genuinely interested in the forum, and all the technical data contained therein. As most here have seen, one of our biggest challenges is that a lot of the "older" posts and discussion threads are NLA or contain broken hyperlinks, since Dan has had to rehost the forum a few times on different servers/different forum software, etc. Most of the social media crowd won't look beyond those broken links before giving up. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
calZ Posted Monday at 08:09 PM Share Posted Monday at 08:09 PM Yeah the broken thread links stink. The pictures might be even worse. I always upload my photos to the site rather than link to a hosting service. Threads that are 20 years old still work great if the poster did that. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
calZ Posted Monday at 08:12 PM Share Posted Monday at 08:12 PM 6 hours ago, socorob said: How do you download it to back it up? A single page is easy to do by just downloading the html from the menu. Doing the whole site you need to use some tools that will go through the whole directory and do each page individually for you. I haven't done it yet, so I haven't worked through it fully. If/when I do, I'll make a post so others can do the same. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ben280 Posted yesterday at 09:16 PM Share Posted yesterday at 09:16 PM On 6/16/2025 at 9:51 AM, jhm said: As most here have seen, one of our biggest challenges is that a lot of the "older" posts and discussion threads are NLA or contain broken hyperlinks, since Dan has had to rehost the forum a few times on different servers/different forum software, etc. Most of the social media crowd won't look beyond those broken links before giving up. Searchability, and the loss of a lot of photos because of imgur/photobucket policy changes have been hugely detrimental. Even back in the day, I would use Google to search HybridZ, rather than use the forum search tools. It's tough for sure. I think the forums that are thriving right now have had a strong social component, rather than just knowledge, and don't have a facebook/instagram equivalent. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zetsaz Posted 20 hours ago Share Posted 20 hours ago (edited) Broken photos and links is honestly one of the biggest detriments separate from the attention span and social media issues. Most forums barely make enough to sustain themselves so the self hosted photos are always quite small and it's a bit frustrating when you're trying to see something in detail. I've been thinking of hosting my photos elsewhere but a lot of places like imgur could end up suffering the same fate as photobucket someday. That being said I'm still regularly updating here and directing people here when I can. I'll say one last thing that's a praise of forums and makes me hate social media lately - AI accounts and scammers making the 50th shitty group called "S30 240z 260z 280z and 280zx lovers and owners group" with stolen photos from reputable people make me want to blow up some Facebook servers. Drives me insane. Every few days lately someone posts about how someone scammed them out of money from some group. If you're even remotely active online the accounts have so many red flags too, so it hurts to see. Edited 7 hours ago by Zetsaz 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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