rcflyer727

My Feedback: (2)

I am not sure of all that has changed, but I assume someone got greedy, and screwed up a good thing. Shame on you, rcu !

Flyfalcons

Is there anything constructive you can suggest for improving the site? If you give it time, you will get used to the new format and better features. Many features from the old RCU are being hacked back in.

Mike in DC

I don't know why this comes up again and again, but I'm going to respond to it again and again. I have watched Marc's actions and read his words since RCU started, and to call him greedy is just ignorant and unfair. He has put his heart and soul into this site, and has facilitated more community interaction than all the other similar sites put together. Now, he wants to make a go at a business, to see if the RCU community can (or will) support the site financially. That doesn't make him "greedy" by any stretch of the word. He has listened patiently, he has improved the site, he has responded to many complaints, often expressed with hostility, vagueness and ignorance.

Give it a rest, guys!

mvigod

If you think RCU was changed out of some recipe for "greed" then please go back to the very first thread in suggestions forum and then read all the way up to today. Then look at the old RCU and then the new one. What you will find is I simply listened to the members and created what they asked for.

For spending 6-7 days per week and 12-16 hours a day RCU must generate money to pay the 4 employees (including me) to run it and maintain its infrastructure.

There is an old saying "you get what you pay for". Well in this case RCU is 100% free. Forums are free. Buying is free. Only thing that cost a dime is that sellers pay a small fee to unload their stuff. Ebay and other sites charge to sell. This is not a new concept. In addition RCU's fee to sellers is miniscule.

It is amazing how some people believe that nobody should get paid for running this site and spending their time working on this. I ask the original poster "do you go to work everyday and tell your company not to pay you any wages for your work?" RCU is not a sideline to the 4 employees who work for it. We are all full time and none of use are retired or independently wealthy so we cannot support the site out of our own pockets nor can we work for free. If that is an unacceptable concept for you then there is nothing that I can OR will do to change your mind.

7th Angel

My Feedback: (5)

I'm not a big fan of the new site either, HOWEVER, the owner has a right to do as he pleases because it's HIS site. Did he screw up a good thing? Maybe, but that's his choice. Is he greedy because he wants to be compensated for the endless hours I'm sure he spends on this site??? HARDLY! "Shame on you, RCU"??? NO WAY!

If you don't like it, there are other sites that look like the old RCU. I've signed up for several, but I keep coming back to RCU to look around. The more time I spend here, the more it grows on me. Who knows, before it changes again, I might even like it more than the old place...

I agree with Mike in DC, "Give it a rest, guys"!

Doug aka 7th Angel

mvigod

Thanks...

BTW..the only changes we are making on this site is implementing the features and functionality members want.

We uncluttered the homepage a bit today. Bolded threads. Changed colors. etc...

we are coding like madmen to add some of the old behaviour from the old RCU forum back in this. fixes come in almost every day for various things...the harder stuf in another 1-3 weeks or sooner.

I will say that a few bugs were expected and we are addressing them all as they roll in. No software is ever perfect out of the gate. Our last board I spent countless hours coding in, applying patches and so on. The core code change 13 times with bug fixes between the time RCU started and changed to this one. Nasty but I kept up with it and will on this one as I always do.

tinman

My Feedback: (13)

things seem to running much smoother now marc.... i believe pm and posting/email probs are fixed....

vkernus

My Feedback: (1)

Personaly, I believe Marc and all the rest deserve a great deal of thanks from each and every one of us. They provide a forum to help advance the hobby at ZERO cost. They do this not out of greed, but as I believe, a strong dedication to the RC Hobby.

They original site was great, and I have no reason to believe that the new site won't be better. As with everything there are going to be growing pains. Since the launch of the new site, they have worked hard, harder than I belive most of us really know, to address each and every legitimate issue with the change over. Change takes time, its not going to be the same over night, but as I said, They are building the infrastructure for improving the sitebeyond what any of us imagined when we first logged on.

Anyway, To Marc, and all the rest, THANK YOU

Plane Insane

My Feedback: (4)

Marc,
What software are you running for the forums now?

Mike in DC

Another thing I'd add is if you think greed is behind the changes to RCU, you have very little information about Internet business, and the very unlikely chances of anybody getting rich providing almost free services. Marc and the others are taking a fairly big risk as well as working their butts off. I can guarantee you that there are a LOT of easier ways to earn a living.

ewspears

My Feedback: (12)

The best way to fix the new site would be to bring back the old site. I thought it was the best site on the internet. This new site isn't near as well laid out.
It's got nothing to do with money. I'd have been happy to pay a sellers fee with the old site!

mvigod

ewspears - old site won't come back but this site will have all of the forum features the old one had and then some.

That means the ONLY difference between the two is the top navigation header and we may bring an option to let guys use the ugly old text links (to each their own) and the marketplace which will remain in its current format regardless. So many people love the new site, layout, look, classifieds that we will not abandon it. Like politics we cannot make everyone happy.

One thing we have seen is that guys who were angy and resistant to the changes in the first week have now come around after learning the new digs here. If you spend a week here I think you might find it a bit more pleasing. Keep in mind many of you had over a year to get comfortable with the old site. Now in one week you are ready to toss this one aside in favor of old and inferior technology for which a bright future of RCU could NOT be built. Any other site going down that path is destined to follow the same hurdles and fate should they ever grow into what we did.

Remember...we are at 65,000 members and grow over 200 members per day. Our next closest competitor is at 20,000 users and that took them 7 years to get. RCU took under 2 years to get to this level and some of what was old could not stay the way it was for RCU to thrive.

ekrcflyer

Guys:

I think we all should be thankful for the existence of the RCU. Yes it is NOT PERFECT, YES IT HAS BUGS to work on (which is totally OK for the new system of this complexity), but this is a great place for us to meet, talk and sometimes “clash� about something that we all like – the RC hobby.

For those of you who were not in this hobby “before the Internet� (does this make me sound like a dinosaur? ) I can tell – THIS IS GREAT TOOL, it saves us a lot of time, energy and money (just consider even one engine lost because it was not “broken-in� properly because there was nobody to ask questions)….

As to the format – well RCU team (just 4 guys) made their call, and now it is up to the rest of us (the rest of the “Universe�) to help them to shape out this site the way WE like it to be. These guys will listen… But bashing…. It’s a destructive force… Not helping…

Thanks RCU team!

toy264

The entitlement mentality of all the venom-spewing ninnys with apparently boundless keyboard kourage, would be laughable if it weren't directed at an individual. I don't know Mark, but the folks on this board whose' opinion I respect, seem unanimous in their characterization of him as a man of integrity, and I suspect these polemics must hurt.

I suggest rcflyer727 take a deep breath and reconsider the propriety of personal insult to a man who has spent a big chunk of his life building up a resource which will be vital, usefull, and more the the posters point, self-sustaining.
John

easysport

My Feedback: (2)

WOW that was a mouthful of profundity if I ever heard it(or read) and I agree wholeheartedly I still want my RCU no place better in the universe.

jboy381-RCU

i agree with you vkermus...

thank you marc and friends!!!

john

vanman

My Feedback: (2)

I finally find myself in the frame of mind to respond to all of the negativity. I have to admit that I resisted the urge to like the new site, the old was comfortable. Having spent hours on the site once again as I did in the old, I find that I like it just as much as the old and I am sure that with all that is happening I will continue to like it even more.

For those that can not find anything nice to say, I say "DON'T SAY ANYTHING AT ALL!!!" If you don't bring solutions to the table with your complaints then you are of no use to anyone, you are the problem!

If you have some constructive criticizm I am sure that Marc and the rest of the RCU crew are ready and willing to hear it. How many times do they have to say it?

By the way, how many of you grabbed right ahold of the new WINDOWS when it first came out? It had and still does have bugs, the difference here is they don't give a squat whether you like WINDOWS or not, they have truck loads of money and buildings full of people sitting around programming and they still have a product that everyone loves to hate and that is still full of bugs. So now that my analogy is done, GIVE EM A BREAK!

Or you do have the right to start programming right now, or pull out your wallet and pay someone to program a sight that has half the features that this one has. I would be willing to bet that in either instance you either give up trying to do it yourself, or your wallet will run WAY out of money long before you get where RCU is or was for that matter.

Marc you said it all with the simple question - Do you tell your employer that they dont have to pay you for the work you do? I think not

Keep up the great work, there are more of us that appreciate the usefulness and information that is provided here on this one site than there are of those that have nothing good or constructive to say.

I for one have gotten more useful information here than anywhere else I have gone, including my club field and local hobby shop! I say THANKS Marc and RCU Crew!

flytheedge

My Feedback: (84)

I agree. Marc HAS poured his heart and soul into this hobby supply site. He's done more for us than most of you guys realize. If we, including myself, would have sent donations according to his set up plan, this would have NEVER have happened. I agree, this site isn't as good as the other one by far. On the old one, you could track your PMs, posting was simple, etc. The list goes on. Marc has just set up this site and is continuing to add new things. It's not FINISHED yet!! This kind of stuff takes time.

Marc, thanks for the great effort and thank YOU for helping me sell these items and giving me the opportunity to meet new people and share new ideas, good or bad. I'm sure you're a wonderful man who absolutely loves this hobby. I coulnd't imagine someone doing this for no love for it. Thanks again, Marc.
Clint a.ka. Extra_230

trey3670

My Feedback: (10)

this greed thing is silly yes he has right to make money off of the site i mean we want the quality right? but if the new "improved" clasifieds are so great where is all the stuff? heli sections a graveyard(except for the comercial stuff,that was a a good idea i like that!) and the trade section is gone,theres alot of good deals we wont be able to get now,yes this site has grown and its been fun,might still be ill stay around for awhile an see,but the paying to sell stuff is a bad idea,it just ran off a buncha folks
wes

ekrcflyer

Well said vanman-RCU!!!

As always my position is - if you don't like something - say it, try to thelp to fix the problem. If you REALLY hate something - you are free to go out and CREATE something better (if you can). Bashing IS destructive, thus have no use to creative people, like RC builders.

mvigod

First let me say thanks to all the posters above who expressed their support for the site. It is very much appreciated and believe me our signups have been way up which indicates to me that some of the griping is largely a function of human natures fear of change. Very normal and of course expected.

To trey3670. You said the marketplace isn't busy but in reality we have logged just about 1300 new ads. MOST of these are in fact not commercial in our classifieds. We have not yet begun to fully crank up the auction side of the site as we focus on our core strenghts first which are the classifieds and forums. The rate that items are being added to the market is within comparison of the old site. What is deceptive on old RCU is that the thread listing counts and reply counts encompass 3 months to 6 months of ads while here we wiped the slate CLEAN and now you see just a bit over a week. Also you must realize on our old system "reply counts" don't mean ads. Only the thread count means ads which is always orders of magnitude lower than the reply counts.

On launch somebody emailed me and said "where did all the engines go? There are none in there. Well of course! We just opened our doors. All our members aren't coming back on day one to relist their stuff! Today we have 136 motors in classifieds and 36 in auctions. Anyone want to guess where they will be at a month from today?

This system is different from the old buy/sell forums in that they are not kept online for 6 months inflating the numbers. I mean is an ad really relevant after 30 days? Probably not except for reference as a pricing guide (but we are building one of those...stay tuned).

Just some facts to keep in mind.

rcflyer727

My Feedback: (2)

I DID send in the money suggested by the old rc universe!!! I respect the time that was put into rcu. My comments ARE NOT personal.

The fact remains, I go and look for engines, there are not many, and THEY ARE ALL SOLD.

I loved the old rcu! If it was not paying its way, oh well, things change.

What I see here is someone unhappy with new site being shouted down.

To those who put so much time into the old site, you did a great job, I loved it, I thought it was a labor of love, and this new site looks like someone trying to take advantage. No one should work for free, I agree. But I have a right to say that so far this is not working well at all.

Perhaps if a bit more was done to allow users to understand the changes, that would have helped.

I do not mean my comments to be personal, If they are taken that way, I retract the "greedy" comment.

All most all the rc'ers I have met are great guys, and I'm sure that applies to most all of you too.

Lightfoot

My Feedback: (1)

Let me explain what I see in this change.

First of all, I was asked to be a moderator only shortly before the new RCU switch was thrown so I have not been in a position to see all the workings in the background so I can't verify any of what I am about to say except from my own experience.

I started reading R/C forums almost from the day that RCO was converted from a bulletin board to a forum. I have been a registered member on RCU since 11/30/2001. I was a moderator on RCA and had a couple of pleasant conversations with Michael and numerous emails. I don't know Marc or Michael well enough to call them friends. As a matter of fact, I don't know them well enought to call them. On the other hand, I have an opinion of both of them based on contact with them. I see both of them as men who love this hobby, men of vision and entreperneurship.

The vast majority of forums are based on vBulletin. Anyone with average intelligence can set up a forum using vBulletin. As proof, some of you may have been around when a 12 year old young man first got into R/C and started visiting forums. Before he had even completed his trainer, he was advising others on how to get started in R/C with a lot of incorrect information. This young man caused so much trouble that he was eventually banned from every active R/C forum. In under a week, he had started his own forum using a free bulletin board service and within a month had set up a second forum using vBulletin. He was able to do this on his own but he could not gain any interest and both of them died.

When I first visited RCA, I was not impressed. There were a lot of options and basically no content. I skimmed through it and went back to RCO. As the bells were tolling from RCO, I went in search of new forums. I went back to RCA. When I started looking at the different portions of RCA, I thought, "If this place lives and gets contributioins from other modelers, it will be the most benefial source of R/C information on the web." I was a diehard RCO fan and reluctantly started visiting RCU strictly as a lurker. I watched RCU grow from the outside looking in. I saw RCU evolve to replace and surpass RCO. I saw RCA expand slowly but with the same obvious ingenuity with which it opened.

As a programmer under contract to the US Army, I have developed a software system for all branches of the service that is used for procurement of replacement parts. It has evolved over a period of four (4) years to a point that it has no equial. The GUI is basically the same as the original release but the users are amazed with its speed, simplicity, and versatility. There are a couple of other package that perform basically the same function but none have been adopted by any of the services. Even though, the very first version that was released performed all the functions that the different facilities wanted, I knew that I could continue to improve it in every aspect of its function. I have a vision of what I want it to be eventually and I still have not reached that point.

With this same vision, Marc and Michael came together, each having his own ideas and resources, but with a common vision; to produce an R/C resource that is without equal. The new RCU is not without growing pains. The administrators and developers of RCU have undergone tremendous hardships over the past few weeks and I feel sure that they are not nearly done; the vision has not yet been realized. The people have been trying to incorporated all of the requests of users for at least two (2) years and those that are still coming in. At the same time, they are trying to eliminate the elusive bugs that draw so many complaints. I feel sure that on several occasions they have reached a point of simply throwing up their hands and saying, "To H*** with it. Give them back the old RCU and just let them live with it." I have done that several times but the vision always gets in the way and I just continue to work against the complaints as I feel sure that the developers are doing here.

Given time, the vision will start to come into focus but it won't be tomorrow, it won't be next week, it probably won't even be next year. It if is, then Marc and Michael are a lot more short-sighted that I ever imagined. I feel that their vision reaches far beyond what any of us can imagine at this time. Regardless of what the doomsayers predict, RCU will flourish and we will be glad that we stuck together and encouraged the visionaries.

mvigod

First I must say thank you Howard for the support and wisdom you wrote above in post #23.

To rcflyer727 perhaps I can elucidate a few things. First you said you looked for engines and they are all SOLD. That is awesome. Why you ask? Because buyers are finding stuff more easily and this allows more stuff to sell faster. It is our goal to make buyers meet sellers as fast as possible. I've seen jets and planes sell in under 15 minutes on our system. What seller wouldn't invite that kind of action? It is great. Now for the buyer it means that you have to track things a bit faster here as the flow of information is far more efficient than a "forum" based site which is NOT designed for buying and selling. It is made for discussions.

You wrote that the old RCU seemed like a labor of love. Well I built it alone from day one (along with help from the entire RCU moderating team). I spent countless hours and sacrificed making a living for over a year to make something that I felt one day would add great value to every modeler. I built it because everything else out there (pardon me) sucked. I felt we as hobbyists deserved better. I built RCU and everybody came. They came like no other RC site ever in history. In 1.5 years we eclipsed our nearest competitor ezone by a factor of 200% and they had been around for over 6 years to get to just half our membership! With RCU's incredible growth and both my vision and michael's to create something better for RC'ers we joined forces to bring to the table the best of both our talents. Combined we have a synergy & are truly a 1+1=3 team.

If anybody thinks this is driven out of greed they are sadly mistaken. To date the owners of this site (of which I am half) are both out of pocket. How would anybody here like to make ZERO (goose egg, null, empty set, nada, zip) for almost 2 years of their lives. Then not only do you make nothing but you actually are out of pocket in the high 10's of thousands of dollars. Then try explaining to your wife and 5 year old son why you spend 16 hours a day 6-7 days a week on this thing and spend money on it instead of making a dime on it. Michael explains this fact to his 2 sons, daughter and wife. So, if this was driven by "greed" then the owners (michael and I) need some psychiatric examinations.

How many people are willing to make that sacrifice in the hope to bring a vision of something better to the hobby we are all passionate about? When the dust settles we may not even break even? Maybe we make a living? Maybe we make a good living? Who knows? We don't know but time will tell. In the meantime we just work hard, do the best that we can and hope people find enough value in this site & enjoy it.

If the ad sales and marketplace support us so we can continue to develop and support the best RC site out there then great. If not then everyone can go and use someone elses $200 forum software package and hope they get the giant bandwidth/hardware to support it, take the time to manage the site, write custom code for the 100's of user requests, manage moderators, manage users, provide tech support and so on. I noticed on another site the owner said "I'll get around to that after my 9-5 job". Well for almost 2 years this was both mine and michael's full time job (16 hour days). That is our dedication to this. I always do something 1000% and do it right or don't do it at all.

However it ends up playing out, it will play out but we will stay on the path to provide a website that is unparalleled in this hobby. Our signup rate which has risen almost 200% since launch is an indicator which tells us that we have done something right and the future of RCU looks to be a very exciting one for RC enthusiasts.

toy264

Your wives are obviously behind you or you wouldn't have made it this far, "pearls beyond price" I believe the Bible calls them. Kids are tougher to explain why daddy's so busy, but I can tell you from experience, it's harder on you than on them- they are resiliant beyond belief!
Hang in there, you have a large, loyal base who read but don't often post.
John