Important: SatelliteHelp to move to Techwatch

[brian]

SatelliteHelp is going to merge into the forums at Techwatch this Saturday:
http://www.techwatch.co.uk/forums/

The result will be a bigger and richer forum covering a much wider spread of FTA and digital entertainment topics, which can position itself as a major UK site in this area.

BGonaSTICK will be leading the SatelliteHelp mods onto Techwatch, where the staff teams will be joined as well the overall communities, boards, and posts.

Nothing is going to be deleted from the SatelliteHelp forums, and the merger should run smoothly, with all boards, threads, posts, members accounts, post counts, etc, carried over without a problem into Techwatch.

A couple of pointers, though:

1. Passwords

After the merger, you'll need to set up a new password on Techwatch, as I can't import passwords from the forum platform from SatelliteHelp to Techwatch. I'll provide information and help as required to ensure I can manually set up member accounts for anyone with login/password problems;

2. Avatars

Importing the avatars and attachments may be tricky, because they are not stored in the forum database. While I'm currently making backups of these, if you love your avatar, you may want to ensure you have a copy easily available on your PC to upload after the merger, just in case I have trouble getting these associated. I'm also going to try and manually edit attachments into more recent posts where possible, if these do not transfer over easily.


I want to make it clear that it is precisely a merger of communities, with SatelliteHelp's extensive satellite expertise and Techwatch's extensive c@ble expertise complementing each other really well to create a bigger and better community for everybody.

I'll send out an email to all members on Saturday, letting you know when the merger is complete. I'll also be on hand to provide technical assistance if anyone has any logging in problems after the merger.

If you have any questions at all, please do feel free to ask.

[Analoguesat]

Just to back up Brians message, most of your current mod team is moving with the forum. I have already joined over on the TW forum to have a look around and they seem pretty friendly (something this forum already prides itself on of course). They dont know much about satellite over there so theres going to be plenty of new knowledge arriving on TechWatch at the weekend!

So dont fret - we will still be around to provide the best help we can for newcomers to the hobby, and not much will change for the average member - a new look, more sections to play with & a few more moderators to help keep things under control will be the most obvious changes for most of the SH members.

Its the start of a new era, but its going to be an interesting experience all round.

A/S

[Robbo]

Yes, I have also joined, and the aim is to keep the satellite section pretty much running as it does on here, with the same friendly approach all round.
We look forward to seeing you all over there, once the merger has taken place.
Robbo

[Unknown user #1]

A pity really... I prefer the 'family feel' on this forum. There are not many (virtually none, actually) small sat communities that are willing to help and support complete newbies without RTFMs and 'Google is your friend' kind of things. This forum is really unique in its friendliness and amount of support. Please continue your good job on TechWatch or wherever else...

I used to have my own video editing site and while I had quite a following (2-3M/hits month, 30GB/month traffic), my forum never really took off, so I merged it with some other much larger project, which got 6-digit user number. And it died then. Try not to follow my example

[Mship]

Well, as A/S says, the vast majority of mods are moving with the forum so hopefully we'll be able to carry on as normal

Personally, I'd also like to think that the current members will make the switch with us

Kev

[Analoguesat]

Just to make one think clear - your current moderator team will remain as mods on the new forum so our friendly staff team will still be around to help out and give advice to members of all knowledge levels

Newbies will still be most welcome, & encouraged in just the same way as we have done for the last 2 years or so.

[brian]

I'm genuinely hoping to ensure we keep a sense of family intact - I run a number of other forums, and all of them have managed to develop their own friendly feel, and it's the most valuable part of them. I see them as sort of "virtual pubs" to relax and hang out in, and I'm very keen to not lose that feel.

Moving to Techwatch is going to feel a bit weird at first coming from SatelliteHelp, but I'll see if I can code up a forum skin for members to select based on the SatelliteHelp colours, so that the move is made a little easier.

[Gav]

Sounds good.

Will we get an e-mail or something saying we need to reset our passwords, or will we have to re sign-up?

From what I hear, ImpEx is pretty reliable though, so there shouldn't be too much hassle for the administrators!

[Analoguesat]

Originally Posted by I, Brian

Moving to Techwatch is going to feel a bit weird at first coming from SatelliteHelp, but I'll see if I can code up a forum skin for members to select based on the SatelliteHelp colours, so that the move is made a little easier.

Please make sure there is also a neutral skin as well - that lurid yellow is hard on the eyes for us older mods!

[Robbo]

Originally Posted by TheRookie

A pity really... I prefer the 'family feel' on this forum. There are not many (virtually none, actually) small sat communities that are willing to help and support complete newbies without RTFMs and 'Google is your friend' kind of things. This forum is really unique in its friendliness and amount of support. Please continue your good job on TechWatch or wherever else...

I used to have my own video editing site and while I had quite a following (2-3M/hits month, 30GB/month traffic), my forum never really took off, so I merged it with some other much larger project, which got 6-digit user number. And it died then. Try not to follow my example

All the mods from here I am sure will agree with me, will do our utmost to keep the 'family feel'