STH was mentioned in LinusTechTips video today

[MikeWebb]

Funny to watch.....was like a fan boi gushing over his bounty. Like "wow" this enterprise grade gear is balls and so is my ISP. I'm looking forward to the future videos of success and failure.

And that quickly glossed over comment about the second hand switch and putting another OS on it. hello, do tell.

 

[Waterkippie]

Linus does have a fair point though, the name Servethehome does not really do enough credit to the very high quality articles about commercial grade hardware that appear on this site. Also, it might be an idea to integrate a different way of commenting below articles. I'm always surprised how little comments there are.

 

[StammesOpfer]

The name hasn't fit for almost 8 years. Everyone was ok with it then... I am still ok with it.
https://forums.servethehome.com/index.php?threads/servethehome-com-forum-name-change.28/

 

[Terry Kennedy]

Linus does have a fair point though, the name Servethehome does not really do enough credit to the very high quality articles about commercial grade hardware that appear on this site.

I believe the STH name dates from a time when having this sort of stuff at home was a "big thing" and people who were doing it needed a place to hang out. For example, back in 1997 I had a T3 to my house as well as my own fiber from my house to my office a few blocks away. Most of the existing forums were either vendor-based and covering specific hardware, or were generic "how to build your own PC / install a non-Windows OS" type stuff.

As another example, SmallNetBuilder is also a name that's not entirely appropriate any more, but still "sticks" because people are used to it.

Also, it might be an idea to integrate a different way of commenting below articles. I'm always surprised how little comments there are.

The main site's article commenting is pretty dead. Some time ago, Patrick added a forum area for discussing those posts, and he or the system creates a thread there for each main site post. I think the main site is using WordPress and the forums are using XenForo (skinned to look like the main STH site), so there probably isn't a way to redirect people who want to comment to the forum thread, rather than using the WordPress comment system.

 

[eva2000]

The name hasn't fit for almost 8 years. Everyone was ok with it then... I am still ok with it.
https://forums.servethehome.com/index.php?threads/servethehome-com-forum-name-change.28/

@Patrick maybe do something like what Anandtech did in the paste have a enterprise.servethehome.com subdomain ???

 

[Patrick]

@Terry Kennedy you are 100% right that it is an artifact of being over 9 years old. A lot has changed.

Linus does have a fair point though, the name Servethehome does not really do enough credit to the very high quality articles about commercial grade hardware that appear on this site. Also, it might be an idea to integrate a different way of commenting below articles. I'm always surprised how little comments there are.

On the article comments, you are 100% right that we do not have a lot. I looked at putting Discourse as the comment system like some of the other sites. That is still possible.

STH is a bit of an oddball. Our traffic is now above several of the second-tier consumer sites and is above basically all of the data center hardware focused sites. Storage Review is the only one that is somewhat close now. They have a slightly different focus. At the same time, most of the data center sites are seeing their traffic shrink. There are a number of enterprise IT communities that are bigger. There are also a number of "top 10 certifications" sites that are pretty big.

Despite the fact that our traffic is healthy (although cyclically slow in the late summer), we get many fewer comments than consumer review sites with similar comment systems. My sense is that a large number of the STH readership is reading at work, so commenting is not as frequent.

My other hypothesis is that our articles are less focused on the latest release. If you think about it, while our traditional "home" users want the newest Xeon D's, those do not make it into products for several quarters. People are less likely to comment on an older article. It still happens, but less so.

 

[kapone]

@Patrick - To your point above, I think one of the major reasons you don't see more comments on your main site posts is because...well...I believe, your userbase is much more technical/tech savvy than other sites. Most of your users go "Oh cool, didn't know that was there" (I'd suspect) when they see a new "deep learning..gazillion GPU beast" and probably start doing more research into it, vs commenting ______ (fill in the blanks)

Other sites will review a new laptop and you'll get 50 comments "Holy $#@! a matte screen!". I'm not even sure it's worth having those comments.

 

[mstone]

the biggest issue with commenting is that the forum tends to draw discussion away from the story comments. what's the point of commenting on the story if there's a thread on the forum that crosses several articles and actually has a back-and-forth dialog? also, right or wrong, my perception is that @Patrick is more likely to respond and engage in the forum than in the comments...

 

[markpower28]

I do believe the true beauty of STH is the rich content of the forum and the best community from SMB to enterprise. Lots of members remain anomonous to provide unbiased opinion which is by far the most professional you can get from any online platform!

 

[mackle]

I lurk more than anything because if I don’t have anything to add more than what has already been said... I don’t bother.

On other sites there is a lot of duplicate comments that don’t add anything at all.

 

[Patrick]

Just as another note. STH's readership demographics tend to show a crowd of more advanced years than the gaming sites. Looking back the filter between thought and willingness to add a comment online when I was 17 probably decreased on a non-linear scale marked by each decade thereafter. I may be an oddball, but perhaps younger demographics yield more comments.

I do tend to respond more via the forums so that is fair.

 

[Robert Fontaine]

I'm old at home and post too often. My homelab isnt nearly as well funded as some and I don't have a data centre at work to play with... Yet.. This is still the best forum on the net for us folk muddling along with homelabs. Building out at home is a slow process with lots of stops and starts. It can be several months between hardware purchases and just as long between installing significant applications so the real questions don't come very often. Watching the current hardware stack and reviews at the enterprise level keeps the motivation going between deliveries. There is still plenty of variety in the mix that I read daily. The "home" folk tend to focus on streaming movies and gaming ( Not that there is anything wrong with that). reddit's r/homelab is a decent addition for those of us in the junk market whether we want to be or not. Most everything else is very retail/soho focused.

TL;DR Keep up the good work. I like.

 

[EVOJEMM]

@Patrick : Good morning,

May I humbly suggest that you reach out to Linus Sebastian and invite him to tour the demo lab(s). He has a lot of younger viewers that will be transitioning into IT. Getting that exposure for STH would be awesome. Most of his server focussed videos have gotten > 1 million views on youtube.

- just a suggestion

 

[fohdeesha]

Just as another note. STH's readership demographics tend to show a crowd of more advanced years than the gaming sites.

And that is 100% the reason I'm here. r/homelab and LTT forums are a great place for "gamers" and other people maybe stepping foot into the enterprise hardware world, but the amount of just blatantly incorrect information being paraded around regularly drove me nuts (even in LTT's very own videos, like constantly mentioning how QuickAssist is going to offload anything - pfsense does not support or use quickassist). STH is the one place I can post and *know* I'm going to come back to some well thought out input

 

[Patrick]

@Patrick : Good morning,

May I humbly suggest that you reach out to Linus Sebastian and invite him to tour the demo lab(s). He has a lot of younger viewers that will be transitioning into IT. Getting that exposure for STH would be awesome. Most of his server focussed videos have gotten > 1 million views on youtube.

- just a suggestion

Perhaps one day when I bump into him again I will extend the invitation.

On the growth front, gaming is a much larger segment. I am, however, very happy about STH's growth rate.

 

[pricklypunter]

I've been pretty busy with work the last few months, so posting time is limited for me anyway at the moment, but I still read articles regularly and have a look over the forums to see if I can help someone out. I can't say that I read all the articles etc, because, well, I don't, but certain articles do catch my interest, even when I know little about the subject material. At that point I usually go off and read up further on it from manufacturers tech documentation, blogs and the like.

I love the forums and I think most folks here would agree, that there is just nowhere else that anyone with an interest in building, maintaining and upgrading enterprise level server gear at home, for whatever reason, would feel quite as "at home" as they do here. The willingness to help by others and wealth of knowledge here on tap is simply astounding. I learn something new on every visit pretty much.

I seriously doubt STH is going to have trouble finding visitors and new members. I do agree though that comments on articles are likely slim because most folks that do visit here, are technically enough minded to research what they might learn about here first and only then, if there are questions or comments to be made, will members here jump in. The difference though between here and other sites, is that folks here are giving considered opinions or asking sensible questions, something that usually comes with some maturity, they are not just spewing "yes it looks pretty" 50 times etc.

It's always good to see @Patrick jump in on posts in the forums too, bringing his experience to bear and being available to members when they might have questions about or issues with the site. I look forward to many more happy hours spent here