New ARC Network Discussion Forum

This month the ARC Network took a huge step in introducing a new discussion forum. Many people liked the old format of the forum and it has been one of the most visited areas of the ARC Network. Because the ARC Network is generating so much traffic on a monthly basis (over 800,000 hits per month), the old discussion forum (built with Microsoft Frontpage) kept breaking and needed continued updating to work to keep it running. The ARC Network needed a stable forum to support our members and users. We spent many months looking for the right discussion forum. The biggest hurdle of launching any new area of a web site is the learning curve involved. We tried to pick a discussion forum that had the right balance between ease-of-use and functionality.

The new discussion forum is much more advanced than the previous one in that you are in total control of your listings. Once you post to the discussion forum you can go back and edit your post or even close it out so no one can post anything more to it. Another important feature is you can subscribe to the discussion forum. Doing this enables the discussion forum to email you every time there is a new post. This way, you do not have to keep going back to see if there is anything new to read. Some other areas include instant messaging, HTML compatibility, and you can even insert pictures to your post.

With all this being said, one important aspect to make this discussion forum work, is you need to register with a username and password to use it. By doing this, you effectively set up a profile for yourself. This profile can be as simple as a username and email address to a full listing about you and your company, complete with biography, web site links and instant messaging. Your profile also keeps track of the posts you made.

Although it might take a few extra minutes to register and learn the navigation structure, the benefits and power of this new discussion forum should far outweigh it. As always, if you have trouble with any part of the ARC Network Discussion Forum, please contact the ARC Network and we will walk you through it.

Here is the link to the new forum: www.accidentreconstruction.com/forum/

We also have an FAQ (frequently asked questions) page set up at: www.accidentreconstruction.com/forum/faq.asp

Please send all feedback to arc@accidentreconstruction.com

Return to December 2002 Newsletter