Time to break down the Camp Kitchen forum

[Dead Man]

It sounds like a fine idea. I haven't experienced it any other way so finding what I'm interested in is finding what I'm interested in. If it changed to this other option I can't say if I would like it or not. Still, "sounds" like an interesting option. Wouldn't complain either way.

[Gresh]

Break it down kinda like the "Long Distance Travel with A Hammock" sub-forum. It only sees (on average) about 45 new threads a year. A subforum for recipes and one for cookwear at least would be AS popular, if not more so.

While the stated goal in the ToS may not be to grow the forum, growth is inevitable. Beyond that, when you break down and average out the donating vs. non-donating forums you end up with 30 non-donating forums (not including trips/trip planning/for sale areas) which average 1585 posts per forum and 9 donating forums which average 1488 posts per forum.

Camp Kitchen is second only to "DIY," Roundtable," and "General Hammock Talk" in terms of popularity, one of which (the lesser of the three top forums) is broken down into two sub-forums already.

Let's face it - this may be called Hammock Forums but it's definitely not JUST about hammocks (if you're willing to pay to access the whole site). Of the roughly 6720 members with 10 or more posts to their username (a total of almost 35,000 users are registered for the site, however), I would imagine probably between 25% and 50% are donating members (that's an enormous range, because I don't actually know...much like MOST of this post except for the hard numbers) which means that there are gracious plenty folks out there who don't think that HF is just a hammock forum. Folks pay for the privilege of accessing the site in it's entirety - the ONE part of the forum folks pay for should probably be the ONE part of the forum that HF and the powers that be should be most willing to make requested changes to.

Just my wholly unsolicited $0.02

[DanglingModifier]

Personally, I'd love it if we had at least a sub-forum for recipes under camp kitchen. Then metadata would allow sorting by the activity of the thread and good submissions would probably be easier to browse and find than they are now.

Recipes are something you might reference often, and they don't get dated the way some of the hardware posts do (Gear item X is the best thing around, right up until Gear item Y is invented and makes it obsolete). Every big backpacking trip you might want to review the list of recipe posts and try something new. That's a little different than posts about stoves or water filters, where you learn something from the thread the first time you interact with it and then tend to move on and not need to reference it often, or ever again.

I understand the site is hammock focused, and I appreciate that, but we already have categories that have nothing specifically to do with hammocks. Those off-topic categories are a major reason I help fund the site as a donating member. Making some of those resources easier to use by breaking them into sensible and more focused topics makes sense to me.

Edit: Gresh just beat me to a couple points.

[humer91]

I think breaking it down into subforms is a great idea. The trick is to keep the information organized without it becoming too fragmented. 3 or 4 sub categories should be sufficient. I suggest, Stoves & Cookware, Food & Recipes and Water Treatment & Storage.

this has my vote

[Demeter]

Yes, yes, yes!! I am all about the recipe section!

[silentorpheus]

If this happens, is there a way to not have a parent folder, but just the sub folders?

For example, take a look at the Bottom Insulation forum. There is an UQ sub, and a Pad sub, but there is still the general Bottom Insulation forum. Some folks make sure to post in the one that applies, but some just post in the general Bottom Insulation folder. This means that either the goal of organization is not met, or a mod would have to go through and sort/move stuff.

So my suggestion (yes, I'm somewhat for it, since that is a forum that's a catch all for any and all threads that have to do with food, stoves, cooking, pots, water filtration, etc.) is:

Either only have a few small subs, like Recipes and Water Filtration, and let the general Camp Kitchen forum be for all other stuff like stoves, pots, etc.

OR

Find a way to make it that when you click on the Camp Kitchen, there is a list of smaller sub forums, but no ability to post unless you pick one

[DuctTape]

I am not a fan of it. The stated reason for subforums is for categorization and ease of searching. I do not find these reasons compelling. The only reason I would see as compelling is if a specific forum became so popular with a variety of topics that any newish topics scrolled off the first page to quickly. If and when that happens, then a new subforum might be advantageous. Prior to that it only satisfies those who have the incessant need to subcategorize everything.

[TallPaul]

I'm a strong proponent for this one.
I like eating new DO recipes at group hangs. What can I say... My stomach wins.

[AdventureMyk]

As far as I can tell hammocking in this forum is generally more the backpacking / multi-night than the back yard variety. As such, recipes, cookware, water treatment, etc. would appear to me to relate directly to hammocking in the way the bulk of members do it. Either that or people simply choose not to eat/drink for days on end. Me? I happen to like eating when spending time out on the trail. 3-4 sub-forums related to key items would seem to make it a lot easier for new people to hunt through and find what they need rather than try to search 500,000 unrelated posts based on a key-word.

[tlfillingim]

I'm new to HF, but Camp Kitchen is one of the go-to forums for me already. I'm not going to complain either way, but my vote is for a few subforums, with Recipes being one. I'd be happy with just a General Camp Kitchen forum with just a Recipes subforum under it.