What's so special about Digital Point forums? I am familiar with DP since I purchased Optigold as a billing system to run my hosting company 10 years ago. I can remember when Shawn (DP owner) didn't even have the forums. He only had a majordomo mailing list to discussion future developments of optigold. I recall the many times suggesting that he should move over to a forum based solution, and now we have the DP forums. Now it seems as everywhere I go people are referring to the DP forums. Is it really as good and/or bad as the hype? It seems as if it is more popular then the sitepoint forums.

I'm a little reluctant to start aggressively posting to the DP forums since the good majority of threads just don't have any substance. Is the forum mostly paid posters? Another reason is Optigold has went downhill in the last few years. Shawn has promised a rewrite to MySQL/POP & upgrades time and time again that have never been released. I can understand if a product goes dormant, just don't promise the rewrite and upgrades! I feel it's just a matter of time until this forum project of his goes down the tubes as well.


Does anyone have any feedback as to how Shawn has made such a name for the DP forums? Do you feel he started out with or still does have paid posters? Why is it that everyone seems to love the DP forums?

because the topic are truly interesting and its fun...

Originally Posted by potchie

because the topic are truly interesting and its fun...

Yep! I 100% agree with you.

Dave: you're clearly an independent thinker, which is why you can't understand the hype. It's precisely that; hype. Basically, DP is a board that caters to forum spammers, paid posters, and others who offer next to nothing of real value or substance as you pointed out.

There are about a dozen posters here alone who offer more than the entire board could put together. People like chrishirst, vangogh, Learning Not-Even-Close-to-a-Newbie, LadyNRed, ForrestCroce, mgraphic, st0x, Websavvy, and a few others whose board names escape me could chew up any DP member and spit him/her out without even trying.

I'm not familiar with Optigold myself; I've heard of it, but don't know that much about it.

Originally Posted by ADAM Web Design

It's precisely that; hype. Basically, DP is a board that caters to forum spammers, paid posters, and others who offer next to nothing of real value or substance as you pointed out.

There are about a dozen posters here alone who offer more than the entire board could put together. People like chrishirst, vangogh, Learning Not-Even-Close-to-a-Newbie, LadyNRed, ForrestCroce, mgraphic, st0x, Websavvy, and a few others whose board names escape me could chew up any DP member and spit him/her out without even trying.

Precisely what I thought. Thank you for the feedback!

Dito@Adam. Stick around here and you won't be disappointed.

There's one of the names I forgot! Republikin! (Sorry, dude.)

davet: no problem!

Thats OK Adam, my head doesn't need to get any bigger than it already is.

I occasionally post on DP, But i agree with adam.

So many times on that forum i see complete misinformation. It's got to the point where people who could teach them something don't bother because they wont listen anyway.

Webmaster-talk is a 4 hour seminar at Google.
DP is a $10 ebook that was downloaded from a one page sales site.

Originally Posted by stOx

So many times on that forum i see complete misinformation. It's got to the point where people who could teach them something don't bother because they wont listen anyway.

That's been my experience exactly. Ask a question over there, and the answer is invariably to build a hundred sites on different Class-C IP addresses and interlink them. Really doesn't matter what the question is. Over here, at least from what I've noticed, you have to wait longer to find an answer, but the one you get actually depends on the question you asked.

I have a friend who's a freelance writer. I referred her to their forum for that, and it dropped her jaw. Quantity over quality. McDonalds versus a home cooked meal.

And I'm not saying all of this to pat WMT on the back ... these are just the reasons I prefer it over here to at DP.

Digital has the advantage of having a large community with some knowledgeable members, and a lot of people like that.

I personally don't find dp all that great, and as far as big sites go I would go for sitepoint. I actually prefer smaller, more intimate webmaster forums. I think once forums pass a certain size it's just a bit overwhelming (to me at least).

I've never visited DP but read plenty about it, and know about the hype and the spam. The only two forums I even participate in is this one, and ihelpyou.com's forums. IMO, these are the two better forums around.

When I first joined here I couldn't believe how active this place is, and I still can't believe it. This is really an active forum and full of a lot of really nice and knowledgeable people.

It's nice to be able to find good topics everyday at either this forum, or IHY -- which is where I've been a member for 5 years now. sheesh. Where does the time go, eh?

Davet, I agree with the others -- you'll learn more here and what you will learn won't get your site banned in the SEs.

I think I must be a freak of a webmaster for not ever giving DP a second glance. I just checked, apparently I have a user account there (albeit with 0 posts), though I can't remember when or why I signed up.

I guess I've always had this place and never needed to find another

I am an avid Digital Point user. It is indeed a lot more popular, and a bit more successful (in terms of registration rates and posts) compared to SitePoint.

DP's pool of success came when SitePoint started charging its users. A lot of users fled from SitePoint to Digital Point, and what has turned from a webmaster's tool support community (for OptiGold and other Digital Point products) has become one of the largest independent webmaster forums.

Digital Point has a lot of great, resourceful information, and VIP members including the notorious Shawn Hogan (obviously, owner of DP), Shoemoney (very successful affiliate marketer who I see as making Azoogle a success), Matt Cutts (SEO guru and Spam Resistance Leader of Google), and many others.

If you're registered there, do check me out some time. My username is EGS there.

Originally Posted by ADAM Web Design

Dave: you're clearly an independent thinker, which is why you can't understand the hype. It's precisely that; hype. Basically, DP is a board that caters to forum spammers, paid posters, and others who offer next to nothing of real value or substance as you pointed out.

There are about a dozen posters here alone who offer more than the entire board could put together. People like chrishirst, vangogh, Learning Not-Even-Close-to-a-Newbie, LadyNRed, ForrestCroce, mgraphic, st0x, Websavvy, and a few others whose board names escape me could chew up any DP member and spit him/her out without even trying.

I'm not familiar with Optigold myself; I've heard of it, but don't know that much about it.

WOW. You can bash about anyone working for a rate? God you are truly amzing. Website Sellers, people who help posts (for money+backlinks=semi smart move***if you don't own a website you can promote**) I personaly did paid posting / article writing for a while and it only helped when I started working on my own,(not run all projects on ownlol) and so your wrong straight up.

I've been posting on DP over the past few days. I got a minor injury in a bike accident on Thursday and have been confined to home, so bored.

I'm working on a red reputation there. Every time I say something honest on Digital Point, something along the lines of "Google isn't evil; if you want to know what corporate evil is look at Enron" someone gives me negative reputation.

For entertainment purposes only, have a look at this thread, titled "Has anyone reported paid links?" The guy asks how Google verifies this, and "Holy crap think of all the time used to do this. " so I responded that in most cases it's pretty obvious when a completely unrelated link is a paid one for PR gaming purposes only, and that it's Google's job to decide Google's priorities. I got dinged with some red rep, twice, and a message I can't repeat, for saying this.

I think this is all pretty amusing. But I don't see much point to spending any time reading DP. Well, if an idea is popular over there, I try to avoid it, to keep my good standing with Google, so I guess it's a useful way to learn what not to do.

I am a member of DP forums however I love webmaster talk much much more there are less restrictions and they don't ban you for no reason I got banned from DP with no explanation why yes I broke a rule but was given no warning and the rules were so long winded lol.

Anyway WT is much better dont make u feel as restricted to what you can and can't do

~Rick~

i am a member also of DP, well i can say they are alot of spammers there and they sometimes don't even notice it.. but i enjoyed posting there they're not very strict in terms of posting but still they don't want to break their rules so alot of spammers are still get banned.

this threads a joke, i think jealousy rears its ugly head. DP forums are 10 times better then this place, and its better then site point.

yeah Davet stay here, don't go to DP, i would hate to see your bubble burst.

...and you're still posting here for what reason, sawz?

Forrest nailed it on the head...that place is just full of spammers.