Kongmiami

I agree that the search feature is not as good, but only if you’re not part of all the groups. Once you join all the groups, one search gives you all the results...it’s priceless.

Plus, it has the added benefit of actually seeing who is giving advice and things. To me this is priceless, as random posters give ‘expert’ opinions on different subjects. This is probably the main driver of growth in FB groups

NoVector

Just to clarify, PCA is a non-profit org. But I get the gist as it's run like a corporation with a hierarchical structure and for all I know, heavily influenced by the "mother ship."


I haven't seen that in a long, long time. In fact, I think there's more interest in 924, 944, 928, 968 as they're not seen as often as the 996, 997, boxster, etc.

GregBBRD

It's pretty obvious that Porsche is making a major push to bring the "classics" (long in the hands of independent repair facilities) back into the "fold"...to help support their dealer network.

Very doubtful they want to be involved with a Forum that tells members how to fix their own cars....very counter productive.

rsabeebe

absolutely agree. a forum has a far greater capability to compile and reference data - FB turns into a stream of information that gets stacked and stacked and then buried. clearly, this still seems to be the best location for 928 information. some models tend to have that 'central location' where most of the knowledgable people hang out and clearly for the 928 that's right here. thanks!

linderpat

Disagree as to Facebook as a viable alternative, and I do not believe at all that it has "10X the activity" of this board. This is the oracle right here. FB cannot hope to compete with the knowledge base and searchable results (do a Google search - not one FB post pops up). I belong to the FB groups, and the activity is not what it is here; here the activity ebbs and flows. Also, there are many bad results/advice there as anywhere. The key guys there post here (Sean, Colin, Jake, et al), and have posted here for a lot longer than they've been active on FB. Also, there are many of the top 928 guys who are not on FB and probably never will be. This forum gives you everything you need. There is also a rennlist DIY forum that has great archival stuff. As an alternative, there is the 928 Owner's Club. Not an active forum by any means, but a good repository of critical DIY material - it's a great back up to this site. Once you are around here a little longer, you'll see.

997TTEQNY

No, this place is the best!

Kongmiami

Been reading rennlist since 2001, it’s got great information. It should definitely be archived. It definitely can’t be replaced. That being said, it’s the past and it’s limited to the US.

I’d join all the groups on FB, they’re growing daily. In 2-3 years, it’ll probably be the only choice going forward

hacker-pschorr

How so? There are a lot of international people on Rennlist, always has been.

Actually FB by design gets worse as it grows. There are so many 928 groups now it's borderline ridiculous. I now see on a regular basis people posting the exact same question to 6-7 groups all at the same time to get an answer.
The only way FB could get significantly more useful is if every 928 group banded together and merged (yes this is possible). A while ago threads were started suggesting the two biggest groups do just that, and the owners / moderators of those groups wanted nothing to do with it. It's obvious they each want their own "sandbox" to control.

There are also multiple private 928 groups made up of sub-clique's of people excluding those they don't like. At last with Rennlist / Pelican / 928 OC Forums they are at least read only to everyone. The private 928 gorups on FB you cannot even read or search the context.

The format of FB is archaic, reminds me of the early internet forums form the 90's with multiple sub-threads under main threads. It's very difficult to follow along with large subjects and quite often someone gets a bug up their butt about the direction of the thread and deletes their sub-thread wiping out the entire conversation! It's horrible.

FB is a "now" social media platform. It was never designed for long term diagnostic and archived R&D type of threads. Some of the most useful answers I see posted on FB threads are links to Rennlist....that says everything.

SeanR

Rennlist is always going to be the best resource for 928 information. It's got its issues and I've pulled back a ton of posting due to those but unless IB decides to yank it completely, it will continue to be the #1 place to go for information on our cars. I only started the 928 Docs group so I could get all the 928 stuff off my personal page and keep it uncluttered and use it for friends and family. The Docs group sorta of took a life of it's own though and am happy with what we are doing there and have to thank the smart guys for hanging out and having some fun in there, while making it useful to others. No way in hell it could replace this place though.

jej3

I enjoy seeing 928 content on Facebook but don't really give much credence to technical feedback there.

Facebook seems to be optimized for Picture-rich 928 social content and QUICK technical feedback, like what row of Home Depot to find a shut-off valve in place of your Heater Valve

Invariably, deep technical content on FB gets a link from RL shared there to redirect (or avoid regurgitating) the conversation. I honestly think any statement that says FB is where it's at and RL is dying or FB's 928 community is growing exponentially is pretty inaccurate.

Randy V

Easy answer

No

GT6ixer

I'll take a friendly wager on that not happening. And if that does happen, I'll be going real old school and mailing people invites to my place for technical GTGs/BBQs 4 times a year.

Bigfoot928

& how do I get preemptively added to the invite list?

siscogts

Fb is a good place for pictures, groups, 3rd category informstions(except Sean R docs group, very very good)... But on FB you will never be master in your own home. I hope you know what I mean.

NelaK

I've never seen a Facebook page show up when searching for information on the 928's or really any cars or anything else for that matter. Facebook isn't concerned with gathering information on your cars or retaining that information or even making it searchable over the long term, they're concerned with gathering information on you and your habits and your network of friends to drown you in advertising.... Facebook is a closed environment and anyone who doesn't have an account simply isn't allowed to even look in. I've never had a Facebook account and still don't but they continually make the news for major privacy breaches, spying, all the political nonsense and even for arbitrarily shutting down groups because a member posted some inappropriate content (I believe there was a group going around doing that on purpose to have a bunch of groups shut down).

I think in a perfect world, Rennlist would be run by a non-profit organization (unaffiliated and not controlled by Porsche so we can have open discussion) and Porsche would sponsor things along with other vendors and we'd have Porsche representatives on here doing customer outreach and support. It really bothers me that the experts on here are doing more to support these cars than Porsche themselves. If Porsche Classics was doing owner outreach and providing valuable information for the enthusiasts, I don't believe they'd be stealing away any business from themselves. You can search these forums and find detailed explanations on how to tear down and rebuild every aspect of these cars. The workshop manuals are easily available online. The same is available for every other model that Porsche Classics works with. What it would do however is establish their credibility and sell their services. I think they need to take revenue sources other than selling new cars more seriously.

Also! While we're on the topic, I really think there should be something like a Wiki to act as the repository of knowledge on these cars. There are so many useful pieces of information spread across thousands of threads and it would be great if there was a place where it was all consolidated into a consistent format.

Discuss on a forum, look up information on a Wiki, and social network on a social network.