FEEDBACK Cmon Folks!!! Wheres all the people? Just a year ago this site..

Mar 30, 2016
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I would like to point out that although I am loving the site and check in daily, when I started out here what frustrated me the most was the missing links. Someone would post an answer with a link to follow but it is a dead link. I think this should be fixed especially for new members cause not everyone is as patient as most of us enthusiasts who don't mind. Just my :twocents:
 

djthumper

Administrator
Nov 20, 2011
14,950
North Las Vegas
If you don't report a broken link we cannot fix it.
 

swede

Member
Jun 22, 2014
1,576
Its not so much the GMTN FB group, but the Trailblazer, Envoy, etc Fan FB page. The FB page was started by someone who is not affiliated with this forum. That FB page receives way more traffic than the GMTN FB page, I assume because many people do not know what a GMT is. The other FB will come up when searching any of the GMT360 models. Most of the questions that are posted there have been cover by threads that are already started here or could be better answered by starting a thread here.

I think the thought process behind creating a GMTN FB page was to get the word out about this forum and not to be used as a way of posting technical questions. After being apart of either group for a while, you will start to see the same questions over and over. All of the information is lost after a couple weeks. You cannot search the FB for help like you can a forum.

I think that both FB pages are better suited for posts like you would see in "What did you do to your GMT today thread".

On the other hand, there are WAY more ACTIVE members on the FB groups than here on the forum. The appeal is greater to be able to make a post and have it be seen by a couple hundred people in a matter of seconds versus waiting for responses on a forum or even taking the time to search. Personally, I receive notifications on my phone when someone makes a new post on either one of the FB pages, so I see the questions almost instantly.

FB posts seems to be the #1 go-to research resource for the younger generation. Hell, even a simple Google search would answer their questions and save time from posting on FB.

For the most part, anyone asking for help, receives help. If the technical questions get too in-depth, need wiring diagrams, pictures, part numbers, etc, most of us will direct them to this forum.

I totally agree with dmanns67 in everything he sad, you get an notification as soon as anybody post anything in a FB page or group you're a member of.

Plus in my opinion this forum have the wrong name to attract new members who is searching for Trailblazer forums on Google. I typed "Trailblazer forum" in Google search box and GMTNation did NOT come up on the first page. First hit was on second page and it was about information on the new 2017 Trailblazer, not exactly the information a new owner of an old trailblazer is looking for.

I like the GMTNation name but I seriously think a name change is due if we are going to attract new members who have absolutely no idea what a GMT is. Any kids today who bought a Trailblazer 2002-2009 model are searching for info about a Trailblazer and not info about a GMT.

Another thing you might to take into consideration is spending some cash on Google ads (Adwords), I used Google adwords to promote my business and web page here in Sweden and it generated a lot of traffic and cash flow for me. Plus you get this forum above the old site on Google search engine.

But mostly a name change will get GMTNation above the old site on a Google search and hopefully it will generate more members and more traffic.

How we are going to get all the members from old site to this one is a question I don't have an answer for yet.

gmtnation.jpg
GMTNation on page 2

trailvoy.jpg

Old site on page 1
 
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Mar 30, 2016
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I totally agree with dmanns67 in everything he sad, you get an notification as soon as anybody post anything in a FB page or group you're a member of.

Plus in my opinion this forum have the wrong name to attract new members who is searching for Trailblazer forums on Google. I typed "Trailblazer forum" in Google search box and GMTNation did NOT come up on the first page. First hit was on second page and it was about information on the new 2017 Trailblazer, not exactly the information a new owner of an old trailblazer is looking for.

I like the GMTNation name but I seriously think a name change is due if we are going to attract new members who have absolutely no idea what a GMT is. Any kids today who bought a Trailblazer 2002-2009 model are searching for info about a Trailblazer and not info about a GMT.

Another thing you might to take into consideration is spending some cash on Google ads (Adwords), I used Google adwords to promote my business and web page here in Sweden and it generated a lot of traffic and cash flow for me. Plus you get this forum above the old site on Google search engine.

But mostly a name change will get GMTNation above the old site on a Google search and hopefully it will generate more members and more traffic.

How we are going to get all the members from old site to this one is a question I don't have an answer for yet.

View attachment 75744
GMTNation on page 2

View attachment 75745

Old site on page 1

I agree with Eric 100%. I was originally registered on TV when I got my TB. Due to it being a ghost town, saw some references to this site and thats how I came to know of this sites existance :compu-punch:. So originally I didnt even get a search result for this site. We need to put it top of the search results and I agree Google adwords is a great technique to do just that

Perhaps @Mooseman has a few ideas he would like to share. I see he's the only staff member online now :popcorn:
 
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Mooseman

Moderator
Dec 4, 2011
25,224
Ottawa, ON
Although the creators of this forum were from the jailbreak from TV, they wanted to try and appeal to all GM truck owners. Of course the majority of posts here are still about the GMT360/370.

Problem with our Google ranking is that TV is much older and has much more content than we do so naturally, Google points searchers to that site. I'm sure Google ranks sites more than with just the name. To change the name now would lead to much more issues like broken links and lost rankings. Although I personally think it was overambitious to try and be the "be all end all" of GM truck sites, what's done is done and we just have to live with it.

I'm sure the site owner is aware of Google Ad Words. If there is a cost to this, that could be a hindrance at the moment.
 
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To change the name now would lead to much more issues like broken links and lost rankings

I second that. I don't think a name change at this stage would be good.

Although I personally think it was overambitious to try and be the "be all end all" of GM truck sites, what's done is done and we just have to live with it.

TBH I think it is STILL a great idea to be a one stop source of all GM truck sites. Cause I have a TB and my Dad has a Yukon, so I know what a pain it is jumping from one forum site to another. One way I think we can improve in the other platform sections is to get a better Articles section. Most people aren't into discussing. They want to get the know - how and be good to go. So an improved articles section would get people on the site for quick DIY projects and maintenance etc. In the long run increasing traffic flow :twocents:. So all in all we can still do it. I am currently planning to put some articles in the Yukon sections soon :whistle:.

much more content than we do

Another good idea would be to have competitions of sorts to encourage people to write out about their mod projects or DIY maintenance. This could lead to people contributing more to the site. Have a prize at the end of say 6 months for most articles ( Constructively written, voted by the members/audience ). This leads to the social aspect increasing as well as someone stated earlier in the posts above.:thumbsup:

Sorry about the looooong post but I think it is full of great ideas :wink:

BTW who is the OWNER of the site. Just curious :tongue:
 
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swede

Member
Jun 22, 2014
1,576
Problem with our Google ranking is that TV is much older and has much more content than we do so naturally, Google points searchers to that site. I'm sure Google ranks sites more than with just the name. To change the name now would lead to much more issues like broken links and lost rankings.

Well you don't have to change the whole name, just add e.i Trailblazer and other Chevy Trucks forum

Like old site did, and that's one of the reasons it comes up in a Goggle search when you search on Trailblazer.


add name.jpg trailvoy.jpg
 
Mar 30, 2016
1,465
KSA
Well you don't have to change the whole name, just add e.i Trailblazer and other Chevy Trucks forum

Like old site did, and that's one of the reasons it comes up in a Goggle search when you search on Trailblazer.


View attachment 75746 View attachment 75747

NICE catch. I really didnt think about that. I guess too many chefs don't spoil the broth :rotfl::rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:. Sry I just had to :tiphat:.

Now to think of a catchy phrase :

GMTNation - Your one stop General Motors Page
GMTNation - The Premium Chevrolet and GMC Forum
GMTNation - Your Car, Your Forum

What do you all think :thumbsup:
 

swede

Member
Jun 22, 2014
1,576
The name should stand out to the members or cars we want on our forum. I think it's impossible to please the whole GM platforms. We have to specialize in a small group of platforms to be compatible with other forums out there.

We have to specialize in an area or an niche (spelling) to attract new members.
 
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The name should stand out to the members or cars we want on our forum. I think it's impossible to please the whole GM platforms. We have to specialize in a small group of platforms to be compatible with other forums out there.

If it could be implemented than it could mean the demise of the many many different forums a GM family would have to go through. But I think we should prioritize and have the name "addition" on top of the list
 

HARDTRAILZ

Moderator
Nov 18, 2011
49,665
I can see an addition working in our favor. The site was meant to grow and encompass more platforms, but has seemingly not done too much in that direction and has stayed fairly well specific to the 360-370s
 
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I can see an addition working in our favor. The site was meant to grow and encompass more platforms, but has seemingly not done too much in that direction and has stayed fairly well specific to the 360-370s

Judging by that "our" most popular are GMT 360 - 370 and then full size Yukon / Tahoe etc. Acadia / Traverse are barely relevant. Now this is up to the admins and mods. Are you still planning to keep this as a site for all platforms or remove others and stay for only GMT 360 - 370? Then after that's sorted out we can put a poll out and have a vote for the name addition ?!?!?!
 

mrrsm

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Because I value my privacy... I use the Search Engines "DuckDuckGo" or "Disconnectme" on TOR which have no trackers. This generally prevents the success of the driving mechanism of Google's AI Algorithm built upon using the "Internet Herd Mentality" from only showing what MOST people are either using or believe as a group that have either social or economic relevance. Google's Artificial Intelligence Company "Deep Mind" also prevents us from getting to view anything other than the most common links and data that boil to the "Top of the Soup"... bought and paid for by the companies with the "Big Bucks".

But I have noticed in the last few weeks that when I use these unique and important search apps and just type in "gmtnation" or "gmtnation.com" ...the only things that are immediately there are either a primary link to GMT Nation's Facebook (which I never use because I have neither a Facebook account nor a Twitter account) or shows links to videos by @MAY03LT or @Capote 's Youtube Videos... and in order to get to GMT Nation Dot Com... I have to search towards the bottom of the page to get one of the sub-links leading to gmtnation.com... I wonder what's up with that?
 

HARDTRAILZ

Moderator
Nov 18, 2011
49,665
A poll for what?
 
Mar 30, 2016
1,465
KSA
Another Idea would be to add a picture frame with a slideshow of member builds, rides :

Screenshot (351).png

A poll for what?

Two things in my opinion:

1. Whether to keep to all GM platforms, or specialize
2. Name Addition ( I am guessing this is going to happen sooner or later )
 

mrrsm

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Hey... Yeah...!!! Khalid is RIGHT... He makes an interesting suggestion here because right now... Google's primary visual search mechanism does not rely upon "words" because it's Visual Learning Algorithm uses IMAGES ONLY to do the searches! To prove this idea to you... if you just google "gm front grill" and watch how FAST that Search Algorithm responds... its amazing that it is actually "thinking graphically" rather than using "natural language" to bring the data to the Top of the Search. And so Khalid's suggestion makes perfect sense....especially if GMT Nation "Borrows" the one or two meaningful images that the search I just mentioned that will "visually tag" back to this site! But... Notice that if you change the search string to "gmt front grill"....NOTHING THAT LOOKS LIKE A GM TRUCK WILL COME UP ON SCREEN!

JUST IMAGINE HOW MANY HITS GMT NATION WOULD GET IF YOU CREATED AN IMAGE OF A GM FRONT GRILL AND HAD "GMTNATION.COM' SUPER-IMPOSED OVER THE CHEVROLET LOGO!

Just remember one thing here... the "visual thinking" side of Google...is actually LOOKING at every single picture in their HUGE Data Farm that has ever been posted and comparing this "IDEA" of what ANY tagged grills might look like to search and locate and show ANYTHING that has a GM Grill...anywhere in the images! It is weird how good it works...and they only started using it around a year ago...just after purchasing "Deep Mind" from a combination English and Canadian Think Tank. Try out this link and you will see what I mean:

https://www.google.com/search?q=gm+...ved=0ahUKEwiAmsba9KnMAhVEkx4KHUUrAYYQ_AUIBygC
 
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Hey... Yeah...!!! Khalid is RIGHT... He makes an interesting suggestion here because right now... Google's primary visual search mechanism does not rely upon "words" because it's Visual Learning Algorithm uses IMAGES ONLY to do the searches! To prove this idea to you... if you just google "gm front grill" and watch how FAST that Search Algorithm responds... its amazing that it is actually "thinking graphically" rather than using "natural language" to bring the data to the Top of the Search. And so Khalid's suggestion makes perfect sense....especially if GMT Nation "Borrows" the one or two meaningful images that the search I just mentioned will "visually tag" back to this site!

Just remember one thing here... the "visual thinking" side of Google...is actually LOOKING at every single picture in their HUGE Data Farm that has ever been posted and comparing this "IDEA" of tagged grills to search and locate and show ANYTHING that has a GM Grill...anywhere in the images! It is weird how good it works...and they only started using it around a year ago...just after purchasing "Deep Mind" from a combination English and Canadian Think Tank. Try out this link and you will see what I mean:

https://www.google.com/search?q=gm+...ved=0ahUKEwiAmsba9KnMAhVEkx4KHUUrAYYQ_AUIBygC

It also makes good use of that redundant space available in the sidebar. Also although I am greatly annoyed when a site has a pop up asking you to register etc... I think we could use that ( MAYBE not 100% ) OR have a newsletter sent out per month with quick tips etc.

Another beautiful thing would be to gather data and have a quick self service area. Where visitors/members can get step by step graphically detailed general car servicing articles. Sure these would have to have high set standards and be only approved by the site admins/mods before appearing and be sort of a read only section. Thus allowing newbies and veterans nice detailed service articles as in changing brake liners, air filter, oil change, battery change. Stuff that service centers make a lot of money from !!

*EDIT* - Just another thing to say from what Eric stated earlier would be a better notification system. Email notifications are slow, and inconsistent. Another area for improvement there !
 
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shovenose

Member
Apr 24, 2016
318
SF Bay Area, CA
Not completely relevant to the discussion but this is a documentary worth watching: http://www.hbo.com/documentaries/the-last-truck-closing-of-a-gm-plant

Anyway, giving the page a title beyond "GMTNation" would be smart to improve SEO and to get people clicking on it. I use Bing and didn't bother trying Google but this is what it looks like http://i.imgur.com/z7QjdDW.png - if it was titled "GMTNation - Chevrolet Trailblazer, GMC Envoy, and More GM Trucks Forum" or something that would help people find it.

More unique content and articles will improve rankings. I know that's hard to do on the forum but banter won't do any good for the site while people creating quality content like how-tos, instructions to fix common problems, etc. will be very beneficial. Thing is, that all takes time which it seems nobody has anymore.

I have run forums in the past and still administrate several. All forums are seeing a decline in traffic and many forums that were popular just two years ago are now pretty dead. That's just the nature of people on the internet today, and there's not much that can be done about it.
 
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Bow_Tied

Member
Dec 21, 2014
453
London, ON
^ I agree. I'm admin on a different forum and the 'FB stealing traffic' is common topic. On one hand you need the FB page to generate the awareness of your forum and you want to be open and helpful so as to not be seen as old and stogy. Younger generations have no tolerance at all for grumpy replies like "Do a search" or "This has been posted many times already". And if they do go on the forum stringent rules like warnings for double posting in a thread will surely drive them away.

As much as I would love to ditch FB it seems to keep coming back to 'the need to evolve with the trend' rather than 'buck the trend'. We might not like change, but we'll like irrelevance even less.

Friendly posting of links to the forum that provide answers is like the best short term thing that can be done. It shows the data and the warm welcome at the same time. Promoting the knowledge stores is also good and making sure it is easily searchable help too.

A reason folks also cite in favour of FB is the immense ease of photo hosting. People want to one tap upload from their phones, photo hosting sites for linking on forums is old fashioned now. This is a large of part of the social side of things that was mentioned earlier in this thread - posting of current projects. Could be simple as headlight swap or a fresh wash and wax or just new wheels. That stuff is more rewarding to do on FB.
 

Mooseman

Moderator
Dec 4, 2011
25,224
Ottawa, ON
Younger generations have no tolerance at all for grumpy replies like "Do a search" or "This has been posted many times already". And if they do go on the forum stringent rules like warnings for double posting in a thread will surely drive them away.

I can vouch for that having been accused of being unfriendly. The FB generation just wants to be spoon fed and not learn how to hunt (for information) for themselves. I generally answer the questions with links back to existing articles or posts. But these are people that just post a couple of times and never come back unless they have another problem they want resolved. True enthusiasts are getting rarer.

We do have articles and I post some here and there but we are getting competition on those from YouTube where people now prefer videos rather than the written word and pictures. We were supposed to have an organized articles section but has never come to fruition. We've also had problems with the picture gallery due to the software migrations and some have had their builds and articles ruined.
 

BlazingTrails

Member
Apr 27, 2014
19,409
I completely agree with the photo upload situation. I have completely lost interest in my build threads and creating how to threads because 1. The gallery disappeared and along with that everything in my build/tech threads.
2. Upload size and the lack of auto resizing software to keep uploads smooth and/or feasible.

Honestly since we lost tapatalk it has made the interface much more difficult. I am not a Facebook fan but now when I do something to my truck I upload it to the fb page. This is because it is nearly impossible to upload pics from my phone to the mobile site. The hassle of resizing every image to about 10% of the original size is not worth the trouble to me at all.

Imo the traffic could be improved greatly with the addition of a subtitle on the forum as discussed above. Anything that will get gmtnation.com on the first results page will help immensely.

User interface(!!!!) + Traffic = Revenue
 

littleblazer

Member
Jul 6, 2014
9,265
I had no issue with ditching tapatalk for the reasons already covered. But the manual resize of everything, even on the pc is so freaking annoying. Otherwise, Im okay with the Mobile site. It's one of the best I've used regularly.
 

dmanns67

Member
Apr 3, 2013
32,979
Ohio
Tapa was garbage for me for over the last year before ditching. I could never upload a pic.

To get around the picture upload size issue, I downloaded a photo compress app. It takes all of 10 seconds to select a pic and then compress it. You can also set it to where it will compress the pic down to 1MB no matter how large the pic is.

Then you can upload to the mobile site easily. Some times I email the compressed pic to my work email and just upload the pic from my PC. Its an extra step, but not a huge deal when uploading one or two pics.

If you were doing a build thread or a how-to article, I can see it being a PITA and not worth the time.
 
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Mooseman

Moderator
Dec 4, 2011
25,224
Ottawa, ON
Whenever I'm doing an article or write up, I use my PC and use Image Resizer.
Very simple to use. And I post images directly to the thread, not through the gallery. So far, all my articles are intact.

As far as the popularity of forums go, I hope that they don't go the way of newsgroups (remember those?) because I hate FB.
 
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mrrsm

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Like @dmanns67 ... In many cases... if the images I had were "borderline large"... I couldn’t "highlight and drop" multiple images and had to do the uploading One Image at a Time. You can understand what a Supreme Headache the Picture Re-Sizing issue becomes from looking at a few of my original posts where the topics are very broad and must have good visuals with no skimping. It became such a problem with the secondary effort that it was like running a "Three Ring Circus". I finally had to Dump the very stable Debian 8.3 flavour of Linux OS I was getting used to and adopt using Linux MINT out of necessity in order to take advantage of a decent compatible Bulk Image Re-Sizer Application called "EasyImageResizer3". It worked without a complicated set-up or Bells and Whistle... and "Shrinks and Dries" large numbers of images in mere seconds... Oh Yeah... ITS FAST!
 
Mar 30, 2016
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If you don't like it you don't have to use it. Whether it is enabled or not would not effect you in any way.

Tapatalk was simple.

True not that I used Tapatalk but many people seems to like using it. One idea or work around would be to write up your how to or article on your PC / phone using Word etc.. And then just copy and paste here. So if anything goes missing you'll still have your work. At least that's how I do it
 
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BlazingTrails

Member
Apr 27, 2014
19,409
Is not that I need to know how to do a white up or how to upload pictures brother, my point is that it is not as simple as it needs to be. My other point was that I have complained about the gallery and my other threads to the point that I have lost interest, this is because the issues have not been addressed at all. At this point i'm not planning to renew my gold membership unless these issues are resolved.... what am I getting out of it?

It is my opinion that tapatalk needs to be on this forum. People like apps, they don't like websites, or learning how to navigate them. Why do you think millions of people are on fb? 90% of people never look at a computer screen, it's all smart phones. Adapt and survive. Period.

Not trying to sound ill so please don't take if that way. I'm just very direct in my thought process. ....engineers and such.
 

swede

Member
Jun 22, 2014
1,576
It is my opinion that tapatalk needs to be on this forum. People like apps, they don't like websites, or learning how to navigate them. Why do you think millions of people are on fb? 90% of people never look at a computer screen, it's all smart phones. Adapt and survive. Period.
I have to agree, I'm one of those ppl that don't like websites on my phone. I used tapatalk when we had it but i'm not using the mobile website these days. Sorry but I don't like it.
 
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Is not that I need to know how to do a white up or how to upload pictures brother, my point is that it is not as simple as it needs to be. My other point was that I have complained about the gallery and my other threads to the point that I have lost interest, this is because the issues have not been addressed at all. At this point i'm not planning to renew my gold membership unless these issues are resolved.... what am I getting out of it?

It is my opinion that tapatalk needs to be on this forum. People like apps, they don't like websites, or learning how to navigate them. Why do you think millions of people are on fb? 90% of people never look at a computer screen, it's all smart phones. Adapt and survive. Period.

Not trying to sound ill so please don't take if that way. I'm just very direct in my thought process. ....engineers and such.

No problem. I prefer people being direct in stating their opinions. I 100% agree that people love using apps instead of mobile websites on their devices. I for one don't mind the website for checking new posts and adding simple replies. But to enjoy the site fully I have to come to my laptop/tablet. Anyone here an app designer of sorts. Maybe we could create an app for GMTNation.

Another thing is I have never used tapatalk so how would you access this site from another app? If someone could clarify that for me that would be great
now coming back to the general discussion on how to increase GMTNations relevance in the age of FB dominance?!?!?!
 

Blckshdw

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Nov 20, 2011
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Tampa Bay Area, FL

HARDTRAILZ

Moderator
Nov 18, 2011
49,665
Glad tapa is gone myself and rehashing the past wont bring it back.

I only use photobucket for pics anyway, so i do not experience any pic issues at all.
 

Mooseman

Moderator
Dec 4, 2011
25,224
Ottawa, ON
Not trying to sound ill so please don't take if that way. I'm just very direct in my thought process. ....engineers and such.

No ill taken bro :smile:. Just a discussion is all it is.

Like anything else, nothing is simple but let's keep the discussion going. Once we have enough ideas, we could bring it all forward to Jimmy and get things moving again.

The whole Tapatalk thing you can blame on Tapatalk when they started charging the forums for access as well as the users. If we had the numbers, we could probably afford it but we don't.

I don't know the back end of forum software but maybe there is an add on that can do the resizing of images. Again, might come down to cost.

Only problem with Photobucket is if the account is closed, the forum is left with broken links. I've seen this so many times, it just sucks when you encounter it.
 
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HARDTRAILZ

Moderator
Nov 18, 2011
49,665
I have used photobucket for years. It is nice when a forum has issues and ends up with broken links from itself.

Either way there is a downfall. Pick your poison.
 

Mooseman

Moderator
Dec 4, 2011
25,224
Ottawa, ON
True that. Nuthin's perfect.
 
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