Are webpages passe?

[K Barrett]

With the advent of smart phones, 3G networks, Facebook, texting and Twitter I wonder if societies can save themselves the expense and trouble of having a web page.

I did an experiment with one of the webpages I manage. I optimized information for viewing on a handheld device like a iPhone or Blackberry. It went over with a humongous thud. Mostly because I think my target audience didn't own things like smart phones at that time. But nowadays *everyone* seems to have some sort of a web enabled smartphone. Cellphone useage is so popular AT&T is petitioning the US government to allow them to drop landlines. Texting is so popular that ringtone sales have dropped - no one actually *calls* anymore, they text! County governments are asking their residents for their cellphone numbers so as to Twitter in case of disasters or other emergencies. (Twitter was used to alert the student body during the sniper emergency at a Virginia university a few years ago)

So why not ask the question: are webpages passe?

A Facebook page is easily viewed on a handheld device whereas a webpage may not be. And its free. And you can link to other society Facebook pages as well as Twitter any updates. I mean, bandwidth is being wasted by other meanigless communications, so why not add your orchid hobby to the global informational melee? *G*

Or maybe I've just been reading too many newspapers and this internet thing is just a passing fad.... *G*! Seriously though, the AOS is on Facebook, other orchid people & societies are on Facebook... I think the only thing holding us back is not realizing that we can use these tools for good instead of evil time sucking nonsense. Of course I say that fully realizing that I haven't looked at my own Facebook page in *months*! Precisely because it is a time suck and I don't quite grok how to use Facebook.

Well! If I don't Facebook then what am I blathering on about? Well, webpages cost money, which orchid societies may not have. As well as people to volunteer to run them, which orchid societies may not have. And if the internet world is evolving should we be static? Shouldn't we evolve with the technology, keep up with the times? That's all I'm wondering about and I'd like to see what others think. Hence this thread.

[K Barrett]

And "there's an app for that" Stanford University is offering free classes through iTunes University on writing iPhone apps. Surely there's an orchid app for that.

[Ricardo in PR]

Personally I would wonder if the most dedicated orchidists are among the "texting crowd". My younger friends are all ga ga over texting and twittering and generally oversharing their life to a scandalous and alarming degree. But only one of them is interested in orchids and the one that likes orchids has the situation that his studies prevent him from keeping more than a few plants. On the other hand the older orchidists barely touch the internet and only five or four of my orchid growing friends are ever seen on the internet with any frequency. I am sure that 99% of my orchid society would be baffled and/or utterly uninterested in texting, twittering or surfing the internet in their mobile devices. In fact I suspect if you invited them to an activity by texting they would consider it horribly impersonal and an affront.

Perhaps in a few more years everybody will be slapping their foreheads and saying "Why we didn't see this?" but for now it seems to me, that at least in my location, the bulk of the orchid growers are not in the mobile device craze just yet.

[fotofashion]

Well, maybe I'm an anachronism, but I don't own nor do I need, nor do I plan to buy any of those mobile devices. IMHO, everyone has gone loco over having the "latest" device. Nope, I like webpages just as they are.
Beverly A.

[K Barrett]

I'll bet if your friends want to show you pictures of their grandkids they're on a cell phone, *G*. So why not look at stuff you are interested in via a cell phone? That's all I'm saying. The day will be here sooner than you think.

[raybark]

My business is run off of a website, which means I get email inquiries all the time, so I bought a smartphone that allows me to respond promptly, even when I'm away from the PC.

I joined Facebook about mid-2009, but soon got fed up with some of the inanities others posted, so I shut it down.

[Marci in SoFL]

My comfort zone is limited to my good ole 'puter screen and/or a good old fashioned book with real pages.

[harveyd]

IMHO, no. I still see it's value in terms as a depot of information or a virtual agent/broker that represents you/business/institution in the internet. This is where existing users or new users (who "discovered" your site thru search/blogs/listing/recommendation/forums/etc) can visit and get the information they are looking for or conduct transactions that they need to do.

As for the new channels like Twitter, Facebook and such, these are recent manifestation of 'old' technology (RSS/Blog/Forum/Web groups) that is made better under a social networking umbrella that is topped with FREE light-weight applications for photos and games that draws people in like moths to a flame In a nutshell, the value they provide is quick interaction and the ability to push latest updates to a known followers/subscribers which is turn draws these users back to the source of the information (the publisher) if they need to know more. This can then be taken advantage by routing them to your website...

[epiphyte]

The advantages of a facebook page...

Interactiveness: Society members can easily add their orchid photos to and/or post orchid questions on the society's facebook page. It also helps to connect society members.

Exposure: When society members become a fan of their society's facebook page it provides additional exposure for the orchid society.

Skill requirement: It doesn't require any special skills for society members to update their facebook page while basic knowledge of HTML is required to update a typical society website.

Quality: A society facebook page looks far better and is considerably more user friendly than the typical society website. Many people (especially younger) will judge the quality of an organization/company based on the quality of their website.

Cost: As you mentioned, a facebook page is free while most websites are not.

The advantages of a society website...

Flexibility: A website can be precisely customized to exactly meet the information dissemination needs of an orchid society.

Income: A website with Google Ads and Amazon affiliate program can potentially generate a decent amount of revenue. For example, one society that I know of makes $500/year via the Google Ads on their website. That I know of, there is no way that a facebook page can help generate revenue for a society.

Overall...

For the large majority of societies, if they could either only have a facebook page or a website... it's far more advantageous and effective for them to have a facebook page. Many, maybe even most, society websites actually do more harm than good because they look shabby and are not that easy to navigate.

[fotofashion]

Cell phone? Why should I pay the price cell phone service costs? Yikes! I don't have any grandchildren to share nor do my friends. This is my comfort zone too, Marci.
I have friends (young, married, just starting out) that have three phones apiece. One personal and two for work. How do you keep that straight let alone find them in a hurry.
I see people here with their phone stuck to their ear, maybe they should have the phone grafted, driving, wandering in the store, in a restaurant with someone but talking on their phone still. It is like they have no other life but their phone and this applies to the other gadgets available now.
Beverly A.