PPCGeeks - Address to the site

Four Scores and Seven years ago, wait……. wrong speech, sorry guys got a little carried away. Just as the President addresses the nation I wanted to take this time and opportunity to address everyone here. First and foremost I would like to thank each and every one of you who return on a continuous basis and contribute to this site. It is you who make this site what it is and from the Staff I want to say thank you, without you we have no site.

PPCGeeks started out a few years ago as a small community with a few CDMA Chefs that were all about changing the look and feel of our phones. The site has since grown into what you see today, but just as the internet, technology, and everything else changes so must we to stay competitive and also to keep everyone interested in frequenting the site. Many of you have voiced your concerns recently on things you are not happy with, changes you would like to see and so forth. As a result of this the site owner Widewake and his trusty sidekick Mindfrost82 decided to bring me back as the User Experience Administrator. It is my job to continue to grow this community and ensure we continue to retain our current members and also bring in new users. This task is not going to be an easy one but with the help of the community I am confident PPCGeeks will continue to grow and prosper. No longer will PPCGeeks be a gateway to other sites!

I have spent the course of the past two weeks talking with many of you who are concerned about the site, listened to many ideas, and come up with some of my own. With that being said, I would like to share with you some things we are and will be working on to evolve this site into a whole new one.

1) New Changes already implemented:
a) Mindfrost82- Taking over as the head cheese. Wideawake will assume the role of CEO.
b) Mr. X – Promoted to Staff Admin. He will oversee the staff along with me.
c) tsowen- Promoted to User Experience Admin and will assist Mr. X with staff issues.
d) VIPs – VIPs now have a “Cage Forum” this is a forum that is exclusive to them and pretty much is an anything-goes forum so be careful when entering and posting.
e) Off Topic – More Off Topic forums have been created.

Now onto the new and exciting stuff. As I have said before, the site is about you guys, the chefs, developers and theme creators and it is my goal and intent to retain the ones we have, bring back the ones we lost and assist new and inspiring ones as well. So some of my changes are going to be based upon these principles.

1) PPCGeeks TV – We are looking at having a weekly 5-10 minute clip on news and events from OUR site.
a) I am looking for a few users who can scour the forums, put together a small video clip and will be entertaining yet informative on relevant information from PPCGeeks. We will also look at doing some interviews via Skype as well. More to come on this subject.
b) I will also be looking for someone who is good with video formatting.
c) We will also need someone for custom graphics and custom intro theme song.

2) Developer Program – Without going into too much detail on this we will be working on a developer program that will have many perks. Some perks we are looking at are:
a) Exclusive download link
b) Exclusive forum
c) Custom icon or badge beside name
d) Custom page with your name listed as a developer for the site.
e) Added privileges
f) More to follow

3) Retired Devices- We are looking at retiring some of the old outdated model phones. These will be moved to a separate part of the site in order to allow room for new devices and also to keep the site streamlined.

4) Front Page News – I believe our News Page should focus more on the site and content within the site along with the users from a new ROM release, to a new theme or application created.
a) We will be looking for more news writers as well along the same lines as the PPCGeeks TV. We need users who can scour the site and look for relevant information to be posted on our front page news section.
b) Being a news writer has its perks as well such as being able to conduct product reviews.
c) Many of you know that Jonathan Geller aka Boy Genius or BGR once started out as a successful blogger for Engadget and Engadget Mobile. With numerous breaking news articles and loyal followers who later moved to his own site BGR. This could be any of you who think you have what it takes.

5) T-shirts – We are going to look at having another t-shirt design contest and move forward with selling PPCGeeks t-shirts. Right now the owner has some of the old designs but we want to open it back up for a new and innovative design.

6) Device Search- As the site grows and many new users come to the site it can be hard at times to find your actual device and with the retiring of some of the older devices it may become even more challenging. With this we are going to create a search function at the top of the site that allows you to type in your device name and press search. It will take you straight to the corresponding forum.

7) New Theme – Our theme is not that old but as we grow and add more features and functions to the site we want to make sure everything flows together so we will be looking at creating a new theme and custom icons.
a) We will be looking for volunteers to assist with graphic designs and theme layouts. If you are familiar with PHP please indicate this as well.

8) Q&A- We are going to have a Question and Answer section where users can post questions. The community in charge of the Q&A will randomly select questions and answer them that week. The Q&A committee will also be conducting various interviews with staff, users and developers as well and posting them up.

9) PPCGeeks App – PPCGeeks will have its own app similar to Tapatalk that will be available to download in the market.

10) Staff Positions – As we grow we will have open and available slots for staff positions for those who have the free time to dedicate. If you are interested please send me a PM stating why you would like to be on staff, your experience and availability as well.

As you can see we have many new exciting things around the corner and more to come. I wanted to share with you a few ideas and where we are headed. All of these are works-in-progress and are subject to change. All of these changes cannot be accomplished by a single person so if you see something that excites you and you have the free time and experience in that area please PM an Admin and let them know you would like to volunteer. As I have stated time and time again it is you, the members, who make the site what it is.

Lastly, I would like to say my PM box is always open, comments and concerns are always welcome. If you have any feedback positive or negative please do not hesitate to let me know. The staff is here for you guys and to help make this site the best site on the internet. Our moderators devote countless hours for free to ensure this forum is spam free and what few rules we have are followed. Sometimes we forget this and overlook it and most of the time all the wrong things they do are pointed out and none of the positive things are recognized. Sometimes a simple thank you or nice job can go a long way.

In closing I would once again like to thank each and every one of you. I look forward to working with you and making this site the best smartphone, pocket-pc (or whatever you want to call it) site on the internet.