Is CGN down again?

[pauly]

This cuts to the core of the issue.

Kestryl has been silent for months. Or if he's communicated I've not seen it. Lack of information inevitably fuels those negative things you write of above.

The core element of any online presence is the audience, and the CalGuns audience - the life blood of the site - have been neglected.

He's active in the Facebook group.

 

[ikeo1]

He's active in the Facebook group.

What was the latest status on the site conditions?

 

[mrider0]

I think there's some nuance to this. In general, people who spend all of their time on one site is dwindling as information becomes more available in more places and is crowdsourced on social media. However, these more localized groups can still succeed because of the limitations on the larger social sites.

With CGN I don't think the owner has the energy or commitment to rebuild the site to where it need to go. Starting over and opening up registrations isn't enough IMHO. As mentioned with community focus, the focus there is no longer on 2A and more historical data and current politics. That being the case, this site is seeing consistent month over month growth as people continue to hear that there's a California specific site to help new 2A enthusiasts get onboarded without being judged. Also we try to keep the format minimal so topics don't get drowned out. Social I consider as short form content, there's still the need for medium and long term content which is the void we're trying to fill.

Youtube & Instagram are persona/influencer led. Facebook Groups and Reddit are more community based like here, with FB you have to use your real name and with Reddit it's complete anonymity. What we're aiming to build here is the middle ground. On the large platforms all your data is harvested. Here, we try to make it as private as possible for members with only limited data available to the public for viewing. We don't grow as fast, but that's not my priority. The site IS fast and lean and shielded from a lot of scanners, which can be objectively seen with the low number of guests viewing the site. The feedback system here is also a key point for people returning. None of the big platforms really have that for their users.

Once the platform is upgraded and migrated, we'll focus more on getting the word out to people to hopefully grow this community with similar energy & spirit of how I remember CGN used to be. We're building a shooting team and will be hosting events. Hopefully I can find some people to help out with that. 2A is continuing to grow in CA as more people get P.O.'d with the state of the state. The members from 100-12,000 have continually helped to improve the site and I'm still taking input. As the site grows, it becomes harder to change things as you've seen with CGN, which is why we do a lot of front loading and constant upgrades.

Thank you for your service

 

[Subotai]

I've expanded my horizons. I come here, but also a lot of other sites. Why not.

 

[DB>)>]

What was the latest status on the site conditions?

There's no indication that the "activity" on FB is Kes related from what I can see...

 

[shoot-it]

I was on there since the beginning and its
Gone downhill with reliability. Too many excuses why they can’t get it to work.

A good it guy can have it going. Funny seeing many still think it will be good again and still believe it’s other related issues why it won’t work at the time.

I have been a member there since 2005 it’s only up during the morning it seems.

 

[Gat Man]

75% of the time the page doesn’t load at all.
25% of the time the pages load very slowly.
Not at all like it used to be. Thankfully when one door closes another opens which led me to Reddit and CA Guns. This site is so much better than Calguns ever was and the “app” is the cherry top.

 

[Vtec44]

It's typically down in the morning but works fine in the evening. I believe the web hosting company can't handle the traffic.

 

[krisdsa]

He's active in the Facebook group.

sent him a PM a week ago now. still nothing

 

[Makoman]

It's typically down in the morning but works fine in the evening. I believe the web hosting company can't handle the traffic.

My experience has been the opposite. Up in the morning and early afternoons, up until maybe 3PM, then down in the evenings. What a mess.

 

[shoot-it]

75% of the time the page doesn’t load at all.
25% of the time the pages load very slowly.
Not at all like it used to be. Thankfully when one door closes another opens which led me to Reddit and CA Guns. This site is so much better than Calguns ever was and the “app” is the cherry top.

It was really good it got us the Ar15 back by going around the loop holes and had lawyers helping .I had a lot of good laughs there ..but like anything else nothing lasts for ever..I found this because someone posted it there but we need another link on off topic there to get more here..I can start a topic there if it’s up.I also put a link on fb in the hunting section of all the hunting zones.Hopefully it stays up long enough.

 

[ikeo1]

It was really good it got us the Ar15 back by going around the loop holes and had lawyers helping .I had a lot of good laughs there ..but like anything else nothing lasts for ever..I found this because someone posted it there but we need another link on off topic there to get more here..I can start a topic there if it’s up.I also put a link on fb in the hunting section of all the hunting zones.Hopefully it stays up long enough.

I appreciate the enthusiasm, but we've been down that road. Many of the die-hards hate this place because it runs well and politicking is kept to a minimum here. We focus on building our 2A content and member base. You'll get all sorts of vitriol thrown at you AND they'll start calling you a lefty liberal soy blah blah. lol The amount of disdain they have is quite comical. Some even blame this site as the reason CGN is not working. As if I made the site slow all of a sudden and not the 3-5 years of yo-yo'ing.

People will find out about this place over time. We're building along the way while that site continues to lose functionality. The pace we're growing works well for us. I'm able to adjust rules and technology without things getting too out of control. We have a major upgrade coming in the next week or two as soon as I get some bugs worked out of our search functionality.

 

[Makoman]

The owner has been running that grift for a few years now, and the die-hards and try-hards that refuse to accept what's happening. They prefer to make you the villain for the lack of care and concern shown by the site owner. Maybe it's easier to scapegoat than to accept their weird version of Stockholm syndrome they're experiencing. I've seen more than a few forums implode, I don't think I've ever seen anything quite like that before, though. The Calguns implosion has been a unique and fascinating thing to view.

Also extremely sad. Should have neve happened, but here we are.

While the site has been in technical decline the last couple years, it's been in a character decline for far longer. A lot of self-important know-it-alls over there that come off really condescendingly. I've seen new people come on asking for info or making incorrect statements about firearms, and instead of being kindly corrected, they are spoken to in a manner of "how dare you open your mouth without knowing what you are talking about. Now I, the omnipotent gun guru will correct and reprimand you for all to see and be in awe of my gun knowledge prowess."

These are the fudd types we all know about and try to avoid and probably do more to paint the
2A community in a negative light and drive new people away. You know, like the old guys that would hang out in gunshops back in the day and reprimand you for buying an unreliable, problem prone semi-auto, rather than a "proper" revolver, like all guns should be. I was a contributor over there for a
long time. Couldn't justify giving them any more of my money. I contribute to this site now and I'm glad I do. Much better site, and much better run. Much friendlier too. Hope it stays that way.

 

[shoot-it]

I appreciate the enthusiasm, but we've been down that road. Many of the die-hards hate this place because it runs well and politicking is kept to a minimum here. We focus on building our 2A content and member base. You'll get all sorts of vitriol thrown at you AND they'll start calling you a lefty liberal soy blah blah. lol The amount of disdain they have is quite comical. Some even blame this site as the reason CGN is not working. As if I made the site slow all of a sudden and not the 3-5 years of yo-yo'ing.

People will find out about this place over time. We're building along the way while that site continues to lose functionality.

If someone doesn’t take over calguns then it’s done it’s off line all the damn time.I left my number with a local because there was no way we could communicate on there.The joke we had with a few members I became friends with was we called it Calgays lol..kestrel got mad and banned him then threw fb I Iasked kess to let him back in and he did..I don’t know what happened I started pulling away from cgn over the years..so far I like it here I just have to learn how to use it.

 

[shoot-it]

I appreciate the enthusiasm, but we've been down that road. Many of the die-hards hate this place because it runs well and politicking is kept to a minimum here. We focus on building our 2A content and member base. You'll get all sorts of vitriol thrown at you AND they'll start calling you a lefty liberal soy blah blah. lol The amount of disdain they have is quite comical. Some even blame this site as the reason CGN is not working. As if I made the site slow all of a sudden and not the 3-5 years of yo-yo'ing.

People will find out about this place over time. We're building along the way while that site continues to lose functionality. The pace we're growing works well for us. I'm able to adjust rules and technology without things getting too out of control. We have a major upgrade coming in the next week or two as soon as I get some bugs worked out of our search functionality.

I found your site because someone put a link on cgn . I was depressed when I got on there because there wasn’t any other California gun sites left that I knew off ..thanks for starting this !!

 

[ikeo1]

I contribute to this site now and I'm glad I do. Much better site, and much better run. Much friendlier too. Hope it stays that way.

Thank you, we'll do our best to keep it that way. We want to keep this place informative and chill. Hopefully get it all buttoned up and smoothly operating for it to really get going.

 

[SaeMien]

I'm a member since 06

 

[Radman64]

I'm a member since 06

08 for me only to have had my account wiped out for some odd reason, i went dormant for a number of years like I did with many site's but once I reconnected CGN was the only one my account was erased even though when I went to create a new account I got a reply back I already had one.
Was told it would be corrected but never was.

 

[Warpspeed]

There are a lot of us that were there since the OLL craze kicked off. It was a great place to share all kinds of knowledge.

In the last few years, even before COVID, it started to become more about non-2A stuff and for me that was not what I was there for. To get called names because you don't agree and to see the vitriol thrown at someone, who they likely don't know outside of the WWW, was not anything I liked to see but there wasn't any other California focused forum to buy/sell stuff on or find out what non-sense was being pitched by Sacramento.

Then this place popped up.

Like ikeo1 said, We want to keep this place informative and chill.

 

[Makoman]

Thank you, we'll do our best to keep it that way. We want to keep this place informative and chill. Hopefully get it all buttoned up and smoothly operating for it to really get going.

Running pretty smoothly so far, so I'd say you're doing a good job. As long as you and your moderators, if you have moderators, keep being as proactive as you are, I think you have a winner of a site.