Posted on 06/30/2025 5:37:20 PM PDT by airplaneguy
Does anyone know how old the Free Republic software is? Doesn't appear to have been updated in at least the 20 years that I've been here. It would be nice to have hyperlinks and better interfaces and a better search function. Not just text and photo files in line. It looks like Craigslist looked about 25 years ago. Anybody with software experience have any thoughts on this?
It’s never had an outage. But on a few occasions, it has merely reminded me to get out and go for a walk.
If it’s a feature, do you think it’s working?
He probably thinks Chuck's raw burgers with cheese on top is an "updated" menu item.
Oh boy. We’re old, Antiquated and we’re going to do it the way we’ve always done it because by golly that’s just the way things should be. Yikes.
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You’ve received some criticism with your posts here but I think most of it was not deserved…. You are just raising some legitimate questions that need to be asked from time to time.
I fall into the camp of “I like it simple and I like the broad mix of politics, general news, religious discussion, science information plus stuff that is quite interesting and helpful and sometimes entertaining in my day to day life.” Any person who spends much time here is going to leave being smarter than when they arrived. Having said that, a posture of ‘no change’ (for anything) is dangerous because it leads to a slow death. That is just a fact…. For this reason, I could never be part of any school of thought that suggests “Don’t change a doggone thing.” I’ve watched way too many good organizations eventually have to wind it down because there was no one that wanted to make necessary changes.
A few posters here have made reference to the ‘average age of the Freepers is going up’, the number of postings is falling etc. etc. I don’t know what the facts are with those things but as any business owner should do on a regular basis, ask the basic questions… Are we still relevant, what do we have to do keep staying relevant, should we be growing, if we should be growing what should we be doing differently to make that happen? On an even more fundamental level, are we still doing things that are worthwhile, are we making a positive difference… in whatever sphere one wants to consider that to be in.
For those Freepers who are so adamant about their position of ‘it’s perfect, leave it alone’, the question has already been asked…. Where will FreeRepublic be in 5 years? If an evaluation (however that could be done) suggests that changes have to be made to ensure its longterm viability, do you still want to take that “don’t touch it” attitude?
I like the simplicity...only thing I change is to darken the white background(hard on my old eyes)...which is easily done inside firefox/settings.
I can’t respond to all these replies but I will to some. I think your reply is hyperbole. Tech doesn’t really ruin everything. That’s simply not true. Some changes are better and some aren’t.
In the name of Microsoft Office....let’s totally screw it up!
THANK YOU!!! Yours is the first well thought out response that wasn’t just “it’s fine the way it is”. “If you don’t like it leave”,etc...
The world changes. The premise of my thread was exactly what you said although less eloquently. Essentially saying and asking if FR could modernize and use newer web tools and improve the site. Everyone seems to losing their minds about any suggestion that this site update or change. Change is inevitable. My Suggestion was not that this site totally abandon its purpose but suggesting that the site gets a few better functions.
and I dont think that’s an unreasonable question.
It. Ain’t. Broke.
Simple, reliable, works on low-bandwidth connections.
I can use it easily on Lynx, a text-only browser.
Renders quickly on a notepad. Some “fancy” sites take up to 20 or 30 seconds to render and display (not JimRobs problem). Irritating....
Leave It Alone.
Thank You (me grabs drink....)
That’s a perturbing example. I noticed that you didn’t make reference to the Constitution of Our great Republic which also has a process for change. In fact it’s been done 27 times most recently in 1992. Should that document from 1789 be the same as it was written then?
How so? It’s not the end of the world to get better software.
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Define “better”....
Fracking newbies, always against tradition...
If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it!
Simple is fast.
Another poster totally missing my point. Essentially you’re saying if you don’t like it leave. Super tolerant of you. You suggest that is free for all to say as they wish etc. but then immediately attack me for making suggestions. This isn’t Democratic Underground. The post wasn’t that FR should be shredded and rebuilt. It was suggesting that the site get some new tools to make it better.
HAHA. Look, if you’d like to insult me at least be clever and witty. That remark is neither.
“That just happened recently at both my local Walmart..”
They just started doing that at my local Walmart too.
Plus they have started a project to expand the store. all kinds of material and fences in the parking lot blocking me from all of my favorite parking spots.
It’s a mess.
Ya almost 30 years. Almost half of the world’s human population is younger than that. 4 billion People.
> Yours is the first well thought out response that wasn’t just “it’s fine the way it is”. “If you don’t like it leave”,etc...
So I conclude you didn't bother to read my posts, since you didn't respond to them, and I finally got cranky. Well, look, we've both been here the same length of time and presumably seen many of the same things happen on the site.
I suggest you consider these points:
So what? As so many have said, it works well enough for its purpose, which is communications and conversation between Conservatives.
So I ask you: Please enumerate the improvements you would propose, that would continue to support the above points, and the charter of the site as described on the Home page. Explain how much each one would cost to implement (programmer time/expense), how much each one would cost to support in the webhost environment (if it needs server-side support0, and won't require any additional moderator time.
The ones I can think of are pretty minor UI tweaks, and as we all know, one man's UI tweak is another man's WTF. BTW, "edit previously posted comment with typo" is NOT among them, that's a helluva change. As someone else posted, "Hit Abuse on your comment and ask the Mods to fix it".
I look forward to your reply.
The automatic closing of open HTML tags was a big plus.....
I'll withdraw it. Please see my comment #198. Thanks
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