A year ago this week, I launched the not-for-profit and ad-free pipwerks E-Learning Development Forum. It was mostly intended to be a way for me to answer questions about some of my projects, such as the SCORM API wrapper, SCORM ActionScript classes, and my many Captivate hacks. The forum wasn’t a vanity project so much as an attempt to avoid email… I’d rather post answers online where everyone can see them than reply to individual emails. I had also hoped other people in the e-learning community would get involved and ask/answer questions beyond the scope of my pipwerks projects.

Now that a year has passed, I decided to step back and evaluate the success of the forum. The numbers aren’t bad: over 200 members, over 550 posts. Of course, it isn’t about the numbers, but about helping people; I’d like to think that most of those 200 people found the answers they were looking for. This is great, and makes me happy. If I helped even one person, the forum can be considered a success.

However, I also noticed a considerable lack of participation from others. Aside from a few helpful folks, I wound up answering most of the questions myself. This means it wasn’t so much a forum as an “Ask Philip” column. Not exactly what I had in mind.

When combined with the effort it takes to maintain a website (security patches, compatibility issues, styling, etc.), the forum started to feel more like a weight on my shoulders than anything else. So, as of today, I have closed down the forum and moved over to a Google Group: the eLearning Technology and Development group.

I’ve been using Google Groups for over a year with the SWFObject Google Group and Aaron Silvers’ Flash For Learning Google Group (no longer online). It isn’t a perfect system, but I’ve learned to enjoy its simplicity. It’s also free and relieves me of administrative hassles such as applying updates and backing up data. Sweet. Plus you can use Google Groups via email, which means you never even need to visit the site. Bonus.

I’d like to say thank you to all the people who posted in the pipwerks forum, and invite you to join me in the new eLearning Technology and Development group.

I’d also like to ask anyone and everyone who develops e-learning to drop by and sign up for the eLearning Technology and Development group. Ask questions — lots of questions — and let’s see if we can get a good community going!

PS: If you’re wondering why I bothered creating a new group considering there are many other discussions groups/forums out there, the answer is simple: no product favoritism and no advertising. Product forums by vendors such as Adobe and Articulate are focused solely on their products, while bulletin boards by organizations such as the eLearning Guild tend to have a ton of ads and a focus on their events and sponsors. I’d like less clutter in my life, and a simple Google Group (even with the AdSense ads) is a nice clean way to handle discussions. Hope you agree!

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