1 year ago...
I woke up and told myself, I've got to make a change. Not knowing what to do, I decided, create my own forum. I had no experience, little ambition and money and most importantly, nothing to lose.
A countless amount of people told me to start a forum on my own. I was a webmaster of a friends forum who we both constantly fought. They told me to head my own way, and so I did. I began working on Rune Gear for a few days, not knowing what I was doing. So, I decided to begin to learn. I've constantly been a quick learner, always experimenting first, reading later. After a few days of development, Rune Gear opened its doors to visitors. We began promoting and working, and from day one we had young competition. A fellow website called www.runescapeforums.org was competing with us. Due to prior issues, the rivalry was fierce, and constant competition occurred. As time went by, we didn't stop. Rune Gear continued to grow, and by the first week we had 1,500 posts. We had a flock of users coming into Rune Gear, and our userbase grew. In just under 2 weeks, Rune Gear had achieved 100 members. http://runegear.net/showthread.php?tid=322
After about 2 weeks, we began to get attacked. http://runegear.net/showthread.php?tid=462 - People constantly aimed their attacks at Rune Gear. We were only a small forum, yet they gained ego by victimising our website. This didn't stop me. Users believed that a DDOS attack would diminish this forum, but it did not. We kept going. After the first wave of attacks, Rune Gear continued to grow, we wouldn't be stopped. By the 1 month mark, Rune Gear surpassed 5,000 posts. For such a young forum, it bloomed. http://runegear.net/showthread.php?tid=685
6 weeks in, it could be seen that the forum had potential, achieving almost 500 posts in one single day. http://runegear.net/showthread.php?tid=846 - Almost 2 moths later, with the forum growing at a substantial rate, we achieved 300 members and 1,000 threads. Here and here. After such a bloom in the forum, we were struck by one of the largest attacks we've faced. Here.
One of the worst occurrences faced by us was when the domain www.Runegear.net was taken away from us. Our registrar had locked the domain and demanded I pay $100, for what should have costed $40. I reluctantly did so, and began to bring back Runegear.net. This is one of the biggest feats we accomplished, as it had shown our true dedication in bringing back Rune Gear to it's members. Things looked to be going our way again, yet, this wasn't the case. We were vulnerable to hackers, and that's what happened. We were defaced multiple times, but all our users information was safe. After some help from Jesse Labrocca, the site was finally secured.
Things began to finally look positive now, with 45,000 posts being achieved just after 4 months of the opening, and around a whole month of downtime. http://runegear.net/showthread.php?tid=5931 - By this time, Rune Gear had merged with multiple competitors, Dark Forums (General Discussion), and Runescapeforums.org, our previous competition. http://runegear.net/showthread.php?tid=2624
As the new year rolled around, Rune Gear continued to grow, with the statistics being displayed here on the 5th of January 2011. Since then, Rune Gear kept on expanding and growing, we had an extreme traffic burst after a mass-promotion purchased from another forum.
Rune Gear has expanded in many ways, with brand new features, an ever growing user base and a dedicated forum team. We've been through many ups and downs, and have conquered them to get to the top. We are one of the fastest growing RuneScape forums, and have been expanding on a daily basis. We are continuing to do so, in an effort to provide our users the best we can.
In just one year, we've achieved so much. We rank on the first page for many keywords and search terms, and second page for others. We have an active and steady user base and traffic, and the activity is always at a high. We have constant contests and events to keep our users enticed and excited, and we continue to deliver amazing never before seen features to the forum.
In one year we've grown to over 200,000 posts and 5,000 members. What an achievement. It only just recently hit me regarding the size of this forum. We are extremely large, and also about to achieve 200 RG Elite users. In one year, we've surpassed all expectations, including mine. I opened Rune Gear with the motto, "To create a forum for members to participate in intuitive discussion with the community." Till this day, the mottos basis has not changed. We also used the forum description of, "All the experience of the masters, in the palm of your hands.", which can be seen here. Coincidentally, this was the truth from the beginning.
I still remember waking up in the beginning days of the forum, and getting a warm happy feeling inside. Doing what I love to do. I knew for a fact I'd keep this forum running for the years to come, and that hasn't changed. I'm confident in Rune Gear becoming one of the top RuneScape resource online. I'm in love with this community and userbase, and wouldn't sell it for anything. It's a custom to me, and it's definitely a part of me.
I'd like to raise a toast to this magnificent forum, for another fantastic year to come.
- The Elite
I woke up and told myself, I've got to make a change. Not knowing what to do, I decided, create my own forum. I had no experience, little ambition and money and most importantly, nothing to lose.
A countless amount of people told me to start a forum on my own. I was a webmaster of a friends forum who we both constantly fought. They told me to head my own way, and so I did. I began working on Rune Gear for a few days, not knowing what I was doing. So, I decided to begin to learn. I've constantly been a quick learner, always experimenting first, reading later. After a few days of development, Rune Gear opened its doors to visitors. We began promoting and working, and from day one we had young competition. A fellow website called www.runescapeforums.org was competing with us. Due to prior issues, the rivalry was fierce, and constant competition occurred. As time went by, we didn't stop. Rune Gear continued to grow, and by the first week we had 1,500 posts. We had a flock of users coming into Rune Gear, and our userbase grew. In just under 2 weeks, Rune Gear had achieved 100 members. http://runegear.net/showthread.php?tid=322
After about 2 weeks, we began to get attacked. http://runegear.net/showthread.php?tid=462 - People constantly aimed their attacks at Rune Gear. We were only a small forum, yet they gained ego by victimising our website. This didn't stop me. Users believed that a DDOS attack would diminish this forum, but it did not. We kept going. After the first wave of attacks, Rune Gear continued to grow, we wouldn't be stopped. By the 1 month mark, Rune Gear surpassed 5,000 posts. For such a young forum, it bloomed. http://runegear.net/showthread.php?tid=685
6 weeks in, it could be seen that the forum had potential, achieving almost 500 posts in one single day. http://runegear.net/showthread.php?tid=846 - Almost 2 moths later, with the forum growing at a substantial rate, we achieved 300 members and 1,000 threads. Here and here. After such a bloom in the forum, we were struck by one of the largest attacks we've faced. Here.
One of the worst occurrences faced by us was when the domain www.Runegear.net was taken away from us. Our registrar had locked the domain and demanded I pay $100, for what should have costed $40. I reluctantly did so, and began to bring back Runegear.net. This is one of the biggest feats we accomplished, as it had shown our true dedication in bringing back Rune Gear to it's members. Things looked to be going our way again, yet, this wasn't the case. We were vulnerable to hackers, and that's what happened. We were defaced multiple times, but all our users information was safe. After some help from Jesse Labrocca, the site was finally secured.
Things began to finally look positive now, with 45,000 posts being achieved just after 4 months of the opening, and around a whole month of downtime. http://runegear.net/showthread.php?tid=5931 - By this time, Rune Gear had merged with multiple competitors, Dark Forums (General Discussion), and Runescapeforums.org, our previous competition. http://runegear.net/showthread.php?tid=2624
As the new year rolled around, Rune Gear continued to grow, with the statistics being displayed here on the 5th of January 2011. Since then, Rune Gear kept on expanding and growing, we had an extreme traffic burst after a mass-promotion purchased from another forum.
Rune Gear has expanded in many ways, with brand new features, an ever growing user base and a dedicated forum team. We've been through many ups and downs, and have conquered them to get to the top. We are one of the fastest growing RuneScape forums, and have been expanding on a daily basis. We are continuing to do so, in an effort to provide our users the best we can.
In just one year, we've achieved so much. We rank on the first page for many keywords and search terms, and second page for others. We have an active and steady user base and traffic, and the activity is always at a high. We have constant contests and events to keep our users enticed and excited, and we continue to deliver amazing never before seen features to the forum.
In one year we've grown to over 200,000 posts and 5,000 members. What an achievement. It only just recently hit me regarding the size of this forum. We are extremely large, and also about to achieve 200 RG Elite users. In one year, we've surpassed all expectations, including mine. I opened Rune Gear with the motto, "To create a forum for members to participate in intuitive discussion with the community." Till this day, the mottos basis has not changed. We also used the forum description of, "All the experience of the masters, in the palm of your hands.", which can be seen here. Coincidentally, this was the truth from the beginning.
I still remember waking up in the beginning days of the forum, and getting a warm happy feeling inside. Doing what I love to do. I knew for a fact I'd keep this forum running for the years to come, and that hasn't changed. I'm confident in Rune Gear becoming one of the top RuneScape resource online. I'm in love with this community and userbase, and wouldn't sell it for anything. It's a custom to me, and it's definitely a part of me.
I'd like to raise a toast to this magnificent forum, for another fantastic year to come.
- The Elite
