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Hi everybody,
Dry Eye Zone forums have been live continuously since 2005! We're closing in on a 20 year anniversary, and getting ready to launch our new new thing.
While we've continued to make the domain and the forum available, the activity has been very low for a long time.There's lots of reasons for this - the preference for Facebook groups, and the forum software not quite keeping up with the times, and the difficulties of staffing the moderator functions. Also, I haven't been able to be personally active here in several years due to simply having too many other responsibilities to be able to focus on it.
However, I have always felt very strongly about the unique usefulness of forums like this compared with other platforms. A custom forum for dry eye allows us to create detailed personal profiles so that we can find similar people to connect with - a very common need in our community. Moderated forums help ensure everyone that reaches out for help gets a response, and that self-promoters aren't tolerated, and that the level of discussion maintains a high quality. Additionally, this particular forum has always functioned with a highly organized library, where dormant topics get filed in a way that makes it much easier for people to find all the discussions on a given disease or treatment topic. And it's easier to maintain anonymity (and medical privacy) in forum software than Facebook.
So where do we go from here?
Aidan and I are working on a new forum setup in different software that will make it easier for us to manage the forums and also to integrate the forums into the Dry Eye Foundation's website. We hope to have the earliest version of this available by the end of July (which is Dry Eye Awareness Month).
Once the main forum is all set up and running smoothly, we also plan to import the archives from this forum. We know there's a treasure-trove of information and stories here that we don't want to be lost!
Moving to a new platform means you will need to create a new login and password on the new platform. If it is important to you to maintain the same username in the new one, you'll want to create that login as soon as possible after we launch, or reach out to us for help beforehand. PLEASE KEEP AN EYE OUT for a message about this and a link - we'll try to give you some advance notice so you can create your account before we announce the forum to the broader community.
Thanks and if you have questions please email me at info@dryeyefoundation.org rather than private messaging in this forum.
Dry Eye Zone forums have been live continuously since 2005! We're closing in on a 20 year anniversary, and getting ready to launch our new new thing.
While we've continued to make the domain and the forum available, the activity has been very low for a long time.There's lots of reasons for this - the preference for Facebook groups, and the forum software not quite keeping up with the times, and the difficulties of staffing the moderator functions. Also, I haven't been able to be personally active here in several years due to simply having too many other responsibilities to be able to focus on it.
However, I have always felt very strongly about the unique usefulness of forums like this compared with other platforms. A custom forum for dry eye allows us to create detailed personal profiles so that we can find similar people to connect with - a very common need in our community. Moderated forums help ensure everyone that reaches out for help gets a response, and that self-promoters aren't tolerated, and that the level of discussion maintains a high quality. Additionally, this particular forum has always functioned with a highly organized library, where dormant topics get filed in a way that makes it much easier for people to find all the discussions on a given disease or treatment topic. And it's easier to maintain anonymity (and medical privacy) in forum software than Facebook.
So where do we go from here?
Aidan and I are working on a new forum setup in different software that will make it easier for us to manage the forums and also to integrate the forums into the Dry Eye Foundation's website. We hope to have the earliest version of this available by the end of July (which is Dry Eye Awareness Month).
Once the main forum is all set up and running smoothly, we also plan to import the archives from this forum. We know there's a treasure-trove of information and stories here that we don't want to be lost!
Moving to a new platform means you will need to create a new login and password on the new platform. If it is important to you to maintain the same username in the new one, you'll want to create that login as soon as possible after we launch, or reach out to us for help beforehand. PLEASE KEEP AN EYE OUT for a message about this and a link - we'll try to give you some advance notice so you can create your account before we announce the forum to the broader community.
Thanks and if you have questions please email me at info@dryeyefoundation.org rather than private messaging in this forum.