Souds like everyone was quick to respond to your need. I think you have a lot of great ideas so I won’t flood you with anymore. I would like to assist in any way that I can. If you need me to write on a topic, comment on something, or do a review let me know. I may not have been a member until now but I occasionally look to see what’s changing in the world of setting. I know a lot of climbers that check it daily hopeing to see a video post of a boulder problem that they can then use as an idea to get the creative juices flowing. Let me know.

John

is there anyone there? (crickets)

this is london calling…

The good things are that the design and navigation aspects of the site are fantastic. Great job there. The information in the site is very relevant and the feedback and community is very positive and encouraging.

That being said, the first aspect I would like to see done differently is the time between when articles are posted. I would like to see more information added sooner.

The second and main aspect I would like to see happen is a “how to” section added. It would be nice for all of the experienced routesetters out there do discuss and show visuals -pictures and video- of how they force moves and define the differences between easy and difficult routes, how they set on flat walls, what they do on aretes and overhangs, the benefits and callenges of setting on entre prises vs. flat walls, etc…

One suggestion for maintaining funding for this site is to show sequences that can be made using specific holds from sponsors. It would be great to know what I could do with the latest hold to increase my desire to go buy it.

As a routesetting-interested reader I would like to read more about

1) International competitions (Gabor’s post).

2) Smaller/local competitions. Im very interested abut how the “human-being-not-certified” routeseters get it together, as I am one of those.

3) Climbing gyms have often limited space and resources, which makes variation a difficult mission. How do people in order to introduce more variation in their gyms. Comps? Funny routes? Special activities?

4) Is it time to try to gather more people at routesetter.com?

5) Why not trying to make a world wide organisation? Routesetting is a most important activity and many climbing gyms should be intereted in this kind of organisation. Beside gyms, IFSC, producers and nontheless climbers should be interested.

5) most of all. New grips an material in the routesetting world. Any ideas are welcome!

I really hope you reconsider your idea of closing the site. I will try to make it more popular in the future (through my personal blog) if it can be of any help.

Have a nice day.

Carlos

I think it would be neat to see maybe some timelapse footage as well as (as mentioned before ) climbers sending newly set problems to see if the sequence the setter used worked.

Keep up the good work Mike, this is a great resource that has lots of potential for growth.

do the website for a living
for money
for career advancement
or
because its a community service
for fun
to help the sport
bring like minded people together

if the latter group you are doing a great job! Who cares about numbers unless you need the money and lets face it if its money we want as climbers we would climb for fun and work some high paying shit job the rest of the time.

good luck i sincerely hope you hang in there

Mike asked what to do, I say let everyone pitch in & let this site live up to its full potential! What’s here is an awesome start, I’ll echo other’s comments when I say the site could use a new set-up. The blog style worked well in the beginning, but the site has just gotten too big. I don’t know if a wiki is the right answer, but it’s a step in the right direction.

As for what I want, I’m greedy I want everything, how-to’s, gear reviews, comp reports, gym profiles, history lessons, setter profiles… if it’s posted I’ll read it, enjoy it, & learn something. And to be able to access all this great information, how about using a tag based white paper system?

I wanted to respond to this article as soon as it was up, but a big question Mike posed was how “I” could help. I consider myself an OK writer, but as far as climbers go I’m a youngen, so I don’t feel qualified to write anything. Eventually I’ll have absorbed enough experiences and knowledge that I’ll join the ranks of the experienced setters, the beginning of a new generation, those who “grew up” with routsetter.com. In the mean time I’d like to volunteer to help edit the flood of articles this post is going to generate.

I’m also a member of Chief Delphi, a community site for the FIRST Robotics Competition, their site is an example of one direction routesetter.com could go. Chief Delphi started out as a vBulletin forum, and has grown from there, some of the better features are a well executed reputation system, calendar/events, and the media section. The media section is a very large & well organized collection of pictures and articles.

http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/faq.php

One last idea since this is already too long, what if routesetter.com & Climbing Hold Review teamed up together?

-Lindsey

Seriously, though, I dig this site and would love to see it live on. I’ll keep visiting, looking for insight and inspiration.

Thanks for all your hard work.

Julian

I’ve contributed one article and I’d be happy to write more or do hold/gear reviews – or something else.

Let me know if you would like my help. Thanks for all your hard work.

Since the site started I have been constantly surprised at the abundance of great articles and information. Over 200 articles related to route setting? WOW! 344 forum topics (and counting) …the total post count has to be at least 2500… So much information has amassed over the last couple of years in fact that it’s become quite difficult to find it all with the current website architecture. Both the articles and the forum need to be changed in some way. imho

I’ve been anxious to buy some ad space in the very near future too! (just noticed the ads are gone!)

As far as contributions… I’d love to contribute. In fact I’ve got about 5 rough drafts. But my writing skills are mediocre at best, and it takes me forever to get past just one paragraph. … took me two days to write this!

peace

I only have one interesting point to make. The challenge is if you need to sell ad space to cover the bills your are going to have to increase the traffic. The new content ideas and everything are great to keep us coming back but how do you get the average joe on here and keep them coming back?

The T-nut removal sounds so simple to us all but remember the first time you had to do it and how long it took. There are plenty of Experts on here we just need the people that want to learn from them and better leverage the site as everyone has suggested.

I would also suggest a partnership with some hold companies to get the name out there and generate some traffic. Imagine if every order that went out in 5 hold companies had Routesetter.com info attached.

Keep up the good work everyone!

I would be very sad to see this website go away.

My only recommendation I could give is a more user-friendly forum; one that keeps track of posts already read, editing capabilities, etc.

Thanks for all your hard work.

Thom

p.s. if I had something constructive to add beyond what has already been said I would. At this point all my ideas have been taken.