Open Letter to the Backroads Touring Kansas Community

[troy]

An Open Letter to the Backroads Touring Kansas Community

Let's develop a path forward that best serves the local dualsport community.

For those of you who may not know, over the last 15 or so years backroadstouring has inspired hundreds of riders to get into this dualsport thing. I bought a KLR650 and put the gravel in my travel about 12 years ago mostly because of the inspiration I found at backroadstouring.

The backroadstouring community has been led by Roger Baugh of Wichita, KS, a man many might consider the grandfather of dualsport in Kansas. Surely not the first man to spend all day on 2 wheels riding gravel roads, but Roger built a community, led hundreds of rides, inspired other ride leaders with his example, shot a few thousand beautiful photos of the KS landscape, and curated them all on the backroadstouring website. For over 15 years, Roger has been working to inspire the community to get out and enjoy the backroads and the beauty Kansas has to offer. All Kansas motorcycle dealers that sell dualsport machines should probably send Roger a fat commission check!

Here is picture of Roger with his KLR on maybe the first ride I did with him on August 28, 2005.


From that same ride, here is a picture of me (left) and my brother, Kyle with our KLRs.


I recently discovered this topic on the Backroads Touring Kansas forum:

Volunteerism And The Future ....
http://backroadstouring.net/phpBB/viewt ... sc&start=0

Unfortunately, like all communities, if people do not participate, share, and step up to lead, the community fades. Roger has seen this fade and is apparently considering options that include stepping out of a leadership role, finding others to take over the system, having others create an entirely new system, or even shutting down the site completely. The good news is that there appears to be a small contingency of folks in that community with both the desire and technical skills to either take over the existing system or create a new system.

An option I’d like to put on the table is to merge the 2 communities...

I launched RideForum.NET on November 30, 2006. So in a few days, we celebrate 10 years of community! I launched the site to fill the gap left when Roger shut down backroadstouring. After we launched, Roger started backroadstouring back up--I assume because of public outcry as many riders found themselves without an important ride organization tool and community. So Kansas has had both systems for the last 10 years: Backroadstouring serving primarily the Southern part of the state (based out of Wichita) and RideForum.NET the NE part of the state and into Missouri (based out of Kansas City).

Both systems use the popular phpBB forum system. RideForum.NET is kept up-to-date using the latest version of the software. Just a few months ago, we installed a modern, fully mobile-responsive theme so the forum looks and works great on mobile phones. We created a RideForum Calendar where all ride events and other events of interest are easily found and sync’d to your own calendars.

We made it easier to directly include photos in your posts at RideForum--no need to use your own or 3rd party photo hosting system. Embedding a YouTube video is as simple as pasting the YouTube URL in your post.

Why a local community forum at all?
Why not just use the amazing AdvRider community? Signal-to-Noise Ratio! AdvRider is awesome, and you won’t find a better community to research bikes or gear, sell a motorcycle, or enjoy ride reports from all over the world. However, if you want to have a focused discussion with local riding buddies on a handful of things and organize a ride or two, the information gets quickly buried in chatter/noise. With hundreds of replies in just a few days in a single thread, it can be difficult to discover the critical event details.

So I believe there is a place for both--an AdvRider global forum system as well as a more local rider community forum. So HOW local is the question? I think it comes down to signal-to-noise ratio. In KS, I think our community is relatively small enough that the entire state can be easily served by a single forum system without too much noise for the members. This can be further alleviated by using more regional sub-forums.

Finding the forum balance
Currently there are only these 3 main forums at RideForum.NET:

Ride!
Are you planning a ride? Know about a ride? Post it here to invite others.

Rider’s Lounge
Pull up a couch. It's cool in the Lounge. Just remember to be a good neighbor.

Classifieds
One man's junk, another man's treasure.

We could have created even more niche focus by creating these sub-forums:

• Off-Road Rides
• Street Rides
• Dualsport Rides
• Day Rides
• Multi-Day Rides
• Morning Rides
• Afternoon Rides
• Rides with Mud
• Rides without Mud
• Experienced Rider Only Rides
• Noob-friendly Rides
• Rides with lots of photo stops
• Fast Rides with few stops
• Rides > 100 miles round-trip
• Rides < 100 miles round-trip

Uh...you get the point. The community simply isn’t large enough--there aren’t enough rides going on to warrant this separation. It did and does make sense, however, to separate general chatter and classified ads from posts about actual ride events. The simple 3 forums have served our community well for 10 years. If that changes, we can easily re-organize the forums.

So what would it look like to merge BackroadsTouring with RideForum? Well, not much difference really other than a larger, more active community of riders with more rides being shared.

Can we save the rich BackroadsTouring forum history?
Since both sites use the same back-end system, it is technically possible to merge the data. However, since the BackroadsTouring system is using a very old version of phpBB, we’d need to run the database through several upgrades to get the data ready for import. I speak SQL fluently, so I can do it. (That’s geek speak!)

What about other content such as photo galleries?
Yes, that content can be migrated to the RideForum system.

What is the ultimate goal of a dualsport forum?
The primary goal is to get folks out riding! This means being a resource for riders--especially those new to dualsport. A forum accomplishes this goal by facilitating information sharing amongst a group of folks that share a common interest. That’s it!

I invite the Backroads Touring Kansas Community to consider locking arms with RideForum.NET to provide the best information sharing tools that inspire local folks to RIDE!

Let's hear from the community!

Thanks!

Troy Wolf
troy at rideforum.net

[Harvey Mushman]

Good of you to make this offer Troy. I think your idea(s) have merit. I slip over to BTK every now and then to see what's happening and it's been pretty dead for some time, kind of sad to see. I think Roger had done a great job with it but peoples priorities change, (along with energy level). When I stumbled across BTK many years ago I was glad to find some other guys that wanted to ride gravel. I remember when there was a big contingent of DS riders in NE Kansas a number of years ago and it was common to ride a couple weekends a month and sometimes more. We all get older and I've tapered off on my DS riding over the last few years but now that I retired this year, I've been doing more. Merging the two sites does make sense and I suspect you have contacted the folks at BTK that are trying to reinvent the site and have started a conversation. I wonder if some riders are communicating more via Facebook rather than message boards now. I know there is a KS/MO Advrider's Facebook link. Good luck in your efforts.

[troy]

Thanks, Mushman.

I have not directly reached out to anyone in the BackroadsTouring community. I posted this open letter with my contact info and hope the message reaches the right people.

Yeah, I got into DS at a very active time for KS, I think. We had Dave Hemphill leading rides out of the Lawrence area at least once a month. Others like Chris Greenhoot were pretty active leading rides as well. Riders like Larry MacGillivary and Luc Valentin out in Manhattan were leading folks on great dualsport routes in the Northern Flint Hills.

Roger and others were leading frequent rides in the S part of the state. I rode down to enjoy many of those rides, too. Not many folks seem willing to travel very far for a good dualsport day, but that's OK. I'm from Wichita, so it was easy for me to overnight down that way by staying with family or friends.

It didn't take me long to start leading rides. In my dualsport heyday (2005 & 2006), I was leading 2 rides a month (sometimes more) when the weather was good for riding. My daughter was born in spring 2007, and subsequently my dualsport weekends were few and far between. As she's grown older, I'm back to riding a lot, but my preference has shifted to off-road riding. Of course I still enjoy a good dualsport on KS gravel, but when given the choice, I usually pick the off-road option. Or, I do a 3 day or longer camping adventure on my F800GS!

RideForum.NET tries not to be too focused on a specific niche. I would say our focus has been on all motorcycle riding that includes off-pavement. So dualsport, adventure, and trail. I'd love to see some trials riders get active on the forum--that's an even smaller niche of riders. Backroadstouring, on the other hand, has had a strong dualsport-only focus.

As for social media such as Facebook and Twitter, I'm no social media expert--heck, I don't even have a Facebook account (yet). I believe the strategy that works best is to have your own website (blog, forum, etc.) then as you post good content for your community, you "advertise" it on social media. So for example, when its time to get the word out about your 2017 rally, I think you should post up the content on your own community site. Then you post a headline, blurb, picture, and link on Facebook and elsewhere. Your social media posts should be teasers to get folks back to your site to see the full content. In this way, folks that prefer to "follow" a community via social media can do that to get the content. Folks who are fine with subscribing directly to the community site can do so.

The mistake is when you post all the content on Facebook. Where is the latest, most accurate info? The community website or Facebook? Members don't know where to go to get the content--and the website invariably suffers and goes stale. Use Facebook to direct people to the website. My $0.02.

[Harvey Mushman]

I agree with the preference of a website/forum as I have a FB account but really don't do much with it. When I was working I didn't have the time, that may change now.

[asis]

I just found a post on BTK mentioning this idea and is how I found this forum.
However it turns out, it is nice to find another resource.
I look forward to many more rides and sharing others adventures.

Scott

[troy]

I just found a post on BTK mentioning this idea and is how I found this forum.
However it turns out, it is nice to find another resource.
I look forward to many more rides and sharing others adventures.

Scott

Welcome, Scott! Glad you found us. Are you in the Wichita area?

[asis]

Bout in the middle of both forums....Emporia.

[kingrider]

Troy,
Thanks for the open letter and the invitation to join forces. I'm not a decision maker in the Backroads Touring community but as a member I think this could only help both groups continue to thrive.
I'm looking forward to seeing how this will work out for us.

Thanks,
Kingrider

[troy]

Bout in the middle of both forums....Emporia.

Perfect gateway to some Flint Hills dualsport! You will have to lead a ride in you backyard and get folks from Wichita and KC there for a day of riding.

Troy,
Thanks for the open letter and the invitation to join forces. I'm not a decision maker in the Backroads Touring community but as a member I think this could only help both groups continue to thrive.
I'm looking forward to seeing how this will work out for us.

Thanks to both of you guys for referencing this idea in the BackroadsTouring forum. Hopefully it reaches the decision makers so it's at least an option on the table. From what I could read between the lines, they may be pretty far down a path already with a new system. If so, that is fine of course. I'll be quick to join if/when they do. If folks think it makes sense to join together, I obviously think that's a good idea, too.

[ajayhawkfan]

I think merging the two is a brilliant idea. I wonder who posted it over there?

[Creekside]

I just don't think they get much traffic on the site. Maybe there is alot of PM posts of rides on there the rest of us just don't see anything? But that site goes dead for like months with 0 posts. And Roger single handedly runs stuff on there, not good either. Its got to be a group effort. And it needs more newbies & monthly events to keep it alive, and that site surely gets none unfortunately.

I have never been able to make some of their infamous rides (pie, flint hills, Eureka) and hear they have the good turn out and lots of fun. That would be terrible to see that end. Whatever happens I hope they still have those group rides. Run from here or on advrider? I think it would be cool to see one or some of those get more regional posting & higher interest/turnout. We should do what we can.

Keeping small regional boards going is tough. I have run boards like Troy (thanks again, I know its work, you do a great job!) for other hobbies and both died from lack of traffic as people moved to international boards. We here are just lucky this sport is local & requires physical participation. So even if we have not ridden together we have ridden with a friend of everyone on here at one point or another - its the personal bond that keeps this alive. It's just like brick and mortar shops, you have to cater to the interests of local users and fill a need, or your clientele is absorbed by the bigger ones online. Sorry if that sounds a bit gloom&doomy but its today's reality. On a more positive note look at the posts on this here. There is interest & that's a good thing.

[troy]

Thanks, Eddie! Thanks, Creekside!

It's actually not a lot of work to keep RideForum.NET going from a technical perspective. My laziness demands that I don't create a system that requires a lot of effort on my part!

The goal of this website is simple--facilitate community by providing an easy-to-use, effective communication tool.

My job is to try to make the tool as good as it can reasonably be. This includes keeping the software up to date and watching for new extensions that can provide useful features.

As for cost, well, I consider the cost to be about $0.00/month to keep RideForum.NET running. This is because web development is what I do, so I pay for IT infrastructure regardless. I run the system in the VERY low cost AWS ecosystem.

I have the system configured to allow self sign-up, so there is not much I have to do on a daily or weekly basis. Among other things, the main thing I do to prevent spammer accounts is to require approval for the first post from a new member. It takes me all of 3 seconds to know if a post is from a spammer or not. Once the first post is approved, the member can post all they want.

If participation dies, I want it to be organic--not because people hated using the website. If interest falls off organically, well, then the people will have spoken. Nothing I can do about that, and I have no reason to fight it. I have no personal agenda in this other than to support a passion of mine by helping others enjoy motorcycle adventure.

Motorcycle people are good people. I've almost never had to censor a post. "Policing" the community has not been a concern. I want the conversations here to be as organic as a real conversation. So if things go off-topic, well, that's a conversation! There have been a few times when I've collected a series of off-topic posts in a thread to create a new topic for them---not to police the original topic, but because the off-topic discussion became a valuable resource in itself and wanted to ensure people could find it.

I continue to think a forum is the best tool for the job. It allows for free-form conversations that are easy to follow, search, and reference. In a forum, people can share all kinds of things including pictures, videos, GPX files, etc. If you don't want to be bothered by notification emails, simply unsubscribe from forums or topics. Likewise, you can subscribe to individual topics or entire forums so you never miss anything. The system will only send you one notification until you actually visit the forum. So you don't have to worry about being spammed with notification emails if you don't want to visit the forum for a few days (or weeks!)

[Hank Moody]

Great idea Troy! Heck you could make regional forums for the northeast (KC area) , south (Wichita area), western (Manhattan area). This way the community grows state wide with a central point of access, RideForum.net. If it doesn't work out or if someone wants to start their own site
so be it. Live and let live, just get out and ride....

[bird man]

I too got my "start" backroads riding after hearing about BTK and joined Roger and a group on one of his Broom weed rides. Was hooked immediately. Have met a lot of nice people and had a lot of fun since. I have done several of the rides Pie, stampede and others. It seemed a lot of the rides offered on BTK were further than I wanted to go or due to time not able, to go on the ride. I eventually found ride forum and since most of the riders here are closer to where I live it just works out better. Not sure if the people in that area are still riding or total interest has faded out. For myself rather than wait for a group ride I just started picking a place I wanted to ride and either found someone to go with me or just went myself....sadly lately haven't been doing much of either. I like your idea Troy.

[nickb]

Troy,

Thanks for your invitation!

I'm one of the volunteers working to find a path forward for backroadstouring.org, and for my part I have advocated that we consider the option bringing our communities together.

There are pros and cons to doing so, right now my big concern is how our membership will feel about the loss of the distinct community.

[Savage]

IMHO the loss of a distinct community doesn't mean much. The site has been way too stagnant for far too long. I think if I was a newb there and I would post something and it just lays stagnant I would just never go back and revisit the site. Again, just my opinion.

[troy]

Troy,

Thanks for your invitation!

I'm one of the volunteers working to find a path forward for backroadstouring.org, and for my part I have advocated that we consider the option bringing our communities together.

There are pros and cons to doing so, right now my big concern is how our membership will feel about the loss of the distinct community.

Thanks for your input and commitment to this effort! Your technical skills will be a welcome advantage regardless of the path chosen.

There are options to consider if some separation or individual community identity is desired. My opinion is still that combined we are still a small community, and that division will not be beneficial. However, consider that phpBB, like other forum systems, can host multiple "forums". The hierarchy is:

BOARD > CATEGORY > FORUM > TOPIC

A "Board" can host multiple "Categories" and/or "Forums". Each forum can have many "Topics" (also called "threads").

When you land on the RideForum.NET homepage today, you are looking at the "Board" and there are 2 "Categories":

1. RIDEFORUM.NET COMMUNITY
2. TARKC COMMUNITY

Under each of these are related "Forums".

TARKC stands for Trail and Adventure Riders of Kansas City", and is led by Randy Kidd. Randy wanted some separation for this community--a place to call "home" if you will. In my opinion, this separation has not been helpful primarily due to the relatively small size of the communities and the fact most of the "members" overlap both communities.

So one option is to create a 3rd "Category" for Backroads Touring Kansas Community. Under this category we can create as many Forums as we feel are necessary. We could even create a custom landing page with some community-specific branding and info. BUT, I don't think it's necessary. I definitely subscribe to a less is more philosophy.

Another option is to create additional Forums within the "RIDEFORUM.NET COMMUNITY" category such as "Southern Kansas" or "Backroads Touring Kansas Community"

In general, forum fragmentation is something I recommend against. It's way too easy to think it would be a good idea to create lots of specific forums: "All About Tires", "Bike Maintenance", "GPS Navigation Tips", "Day Rides", "Off-Road Rides", etc. However, this only fragments the activity and makes it harder to find what's going on so you can be a part of the conversation. I keep harping on this, but the size of our community and the level of activity is too low to demand forum fragmentation. LESS IS MORE.

So we have some options to consider. Nick, you would be welcome to an admin account so you can moderate and help if you want. Honestly though, there is almost nothing I ever do to keep this board running beyond an update to the software from time to time.

[Hank Moody]

Lets look at arguably the most popular message board for dual sport riders, ADV.com. They have a setup just like Troy described general topics like ride reports, GPS, photos etc... Additionally, they have regional forums which could be the southern Kansas forum where the BTK folks could post. But as Troy mentioned this will lead to more fragmentation of the board and would make it yet another click to find what you are looking for.

Why can't the BTK riders just post their rides under, go figure, the Ride forum of the current RideForum.net website? There is no cash or prizes involved here and there is no corporate involvement so what is the big deal about branding or a distinct community for the BTK? This is about riding motorcycles, having friends join in on your adventure and sharing motorcycle knowledge. Troy won't censor what you are posting (except for obvious things like pornography...) so what's the big deal???

[troy]

...Why can't the BTK riders just post their rides under, go figure, the Ride forum of the current RideForum.net website? There is no cash or prizes involved here and there is no corporate involvement so what is the big deal about branding or a distinct community for the BTK? ...

Thanks for this, D. Understand that "Backroads Touring Kansas" is an identity that has meaning to a lot of people. There is a lot of history involved. So I can understand the careful consideration of how to integrate the 2 communities without killing the "Backroads Touring Kansas" identity.

Interestingly, I had kind of the opposite idea with RideForum.NET. My vision was for it to be a platform for communities to host discussions rather than become a community identity itself. So I don't consider myself a "RideForum.NET Member" as much a member of the local dualsport motorcycle community who happens to use RideForum.NET to facilitate community discussions. This really is a nuance I suppose. I know some folks consider RideForum.NET to be like a "dualsport club" where they are a member, and that is OK. I feel like AdvRider.com is successful that way--people consider it a discussion platform more than a club to identify with (at least that's my perspective).

With my platform vision, RideForum.NET could host forums for multiple motorcycle-related communities. Not that I thought it would happen, but the name is generic enough to support communities for bicycle, equestrian, watercraft, roller-coaster enthusiasts, etc. (Any kind of "riding".) I don't really have an agenda, though.

One way to keep the Backroads Touring brand alive would be to continue the annual Flint Hills Stampede as an official "Backroads Touring Kansas" event.

We can create a page dedicated to the Backroads Touring Kansas legacy that includes history, links to the old ride galleries and reports, etc.? Nick and others can help me port that content over.

Really, this needs more input from active Backroads Touring folks to ensure the best outcome.

[Savage]

I concur with all the above.
I'm sure Troy is smart enough so that if someone were to google Backroads Touring Kansas they would land on this site.
They wouldn't have a clue what the heck this gay RideForum site is, but they would see the BTK category and click on it.
Go inside and it would look a little more like the BTK site.
Sounds like a great idea to me!

Good work all you computer-minded guys who make this happen!