AVENUE VIET

LadyDragon · Site Administrator Joined: 02 Mar 2005 Posts: 290

Hello dear friends and members! Very Happy

Today we celebrate our first anniversary. balloons

We managed to survive a whole year! Let's eat and drink to that! Cake

Now's the time to look at the future of our forum. We've been doing ok. We have a good server that (knock on wood) hasn't failed or locked us out accidentally, we have a small community of friends, we have lively discussions, but not enough, in my opinion, of any of that. We don't even have half the number of members that we had on EverythingViet when the decision was made to close EV down after two years of good activity.

So I'd like to take stock and ask your opinions on a couple of things.

First, what are your suggestions to help make the forum livelier and better-attended? In other words, what would you like to see more of? Pictures? Cartoons? Member photos? Should we expand our photo gallery?

Would you like a section with short stories, fiction, tales and legends, essays, to which anyone could contribute?

Would you like more current event news, other than political? Right now our most active and animated forum is the Politix one.
L'Avenue is doing all right too, and I encourage you to participate more to it, come in and post anything of interest or concern to you.

The Entertainment forum is doing well, but could use more contributions also.

Despite some members' best efforts, it seems The Funnies and Food for Thought don't attract many readers. Do you think we should integrate those into L'Avenue and have those topics consolidated? I remember someone once complaining that there were too many places to visit on the site. I'll point out however that those last three forums are open to non-members and were kept as such so as to attract more posts. I don't know how well that worked.

I'm glad to report that I've had nothing to add to The Void in recent months and that the War Zone has been quiet. The animated discussions we've had on Politix or on L'Avenue have all stayed within bounds.

My second question has to do with funding and recruiting.

Recruiting: I'd like to attract more participants to our debates and need your help for that. So if you like AV, pls tell your friends about it and encourage them to join. Also, post more often yourselves, if you can.

Funding: Although we admins can handle the financial aspect (renting the hosting services and domain name from the server) - actually, right now our funding is courtesy of one of our members who wishes to remain anonymous, with a little help from two of the admins - I was thinking it would help build up a sense of community and solidarity if each member gave a token contribution. The suggested amount would be $5.00 (or less or more according to your means and degree of commitment). We accept US dollars or the equivalent in foreign currency from our overseas members. wink

What do you think of the idea, and would you be willing to contribute?

A copy of this post will go out in a collective e-mail. You can respond to it either here, or by answering the e-mail, or both.

All suggestions to better the site and forums are welcome.

I'm looking forward to many more years of fun and chat and debate and laughter. Thank you all for your contributions to date. wave hello goodbye

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She Who Must Be Obeyed - because - Fire cannot kill a Dragon. Rong

LadyDragon · Site Administrator Joined: 02 Mar 2005 Posts: 290

I forgot to specify: Any financial contribution is PURELY VOLUNTARY. We can get through without help. But help would be appreciated. Thank you. Smile

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She Who Must Be Obeyed - because - Fire cannot kill a Dragon. Rong

Xuân Phong · Joined: 05 Mar 2005 Posts: 921 Location: All over the place

Happy Birthday to you
Happy Birthday to you
Happy Birthday, dear AV
Happy Birthday to you! Music

Sorry I don't have time to chat more, chi. MC, but I'll be happy to contribute. The check will be in the mail soon (honestly!) Smile

Keep up the good work! clap

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vroom

dzu · Herald Joined: 03 May 2005 Posts: 1381

Sure, I'll contribute. It's a good idea.

I remember how a group of us chipped in to send a present to Mat Hi Cuoi when she was so sick and just out of hospital. How we can do less to help the forum we all know and love (or love to hate as the case may be)? wink

Happy Anniversary, AV! Cake

Cowboy · Joined: 07 Apr 2005 Posts: 821 Location: The Wild West

I like music Music

and songs of all sorts. Especially cowboy songs of course, but anything musical and poetic in any language will do.

I and a few others posted many in the music and poetry forum but no one else seems to pay much attention. Is there a way to get more music-minded people to join? If people have common tastes, they could get together one-on-one and swap music files.

Saigonnais suggested a "music file bank" a while ago, but X countered with copyright infringement problems and technical difficulties. But if we did it privately, by e-mail, we could set up something. Anyone interested?
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Music

I'm a poor lonesome cowboy
And a long way from home Music

Enornymous · Joined: 21 Oct 2005 Posts: 128

XưngPhong · Joined: 20 May 2005 Posts: 5

Cowboy · Joined: 07 Apr 2005 Posts: 821 Location: The Wild West

Cowboy · Joined: 07 Apr 2005 Posts: 821 Location: The Wild West

Pols_R_Us · Joined: 07 Mar 2005 Posts: 2595 Location: Wherever

On EV chi. MC used to post VN folk stories and book reviews. Maybe we could have more of that, in the Entertainment forum for example?

Way back on VS there was much more discussions on books, from Harry Potter to books by VN authors, to science fiction and other subjects. Seems there aren't many readers on this site, apart from LD/WF, Seed and myself - and maybe Pem when she does come in.

Personally, I read a lot and would welcome reviews and comments on books like we have discussions on newspaper and magazine articles.
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satisfied content