PDGA Website

[Flash]

PDGA can we get a website that can handle at least 50K hits? I mean can the NT's really bring the website to a screeching hault. I would of posted this on PDGA.com if it would load!

[Bullseye]

I agree. We've put with this crap for long enough.

[NWDiscer]

yea makes me look forward to giving them $$$ for what......:rolleyes2: :headbang:

oh yea so i can play in the Fling



anyway how is it that they can not handle the load and y the F was there no DGPtv coverage of the Masters Cup NT Event yea lets not broadcast this 1.....glad pdga is spending the same as before :whistler:

[Bruce]

I could be wrong, but I thought they weren't broadcasting at the Master's so they could do the Fling? Budget and what not?!

[NWDiscer]

I could be wrong, but I thought they weren't broadcasting at the Master's so they could do the Fling? Budget and what not?!


i asked why no MC coverage on borgbook and here was the answer.....


We'd love to do all the NTs, but it was just not in the budget for this year. June promises to be a great month with plans for the KC Wide Open and possibly Beaver State Fling! Thanks for your note thought Scott. --John D

[Flash]

Broadcast aside, why can't we make this website work? Its a giant pain in the browser. I understand the DGTV budget and selecting certain events to broadcast and that is their deal but the PDGA website should work 90% of the time not 10% of the time.

I mean how many people were really checking the website for the Masters scores at the same time 20-25K. I don't care if 50K are checking it there should be more fluidity. If the database that houses the data for these events is slow and out of date then replace it or create a temp data database and a permanent data database. This entire debacle is a ridiculous problem to have. If volunteers can not get it done in a reasonable amount of time then pay someone already. At least if we are paying we can make proper demands.

Man what would major sites like ESPN do if they could only stream video to 20K users? We are not even streaming video its simple static pages updated from a database. Where is the cache to handle the load. Arrggg!

[leefou]

I hear change to the website is coming soon!

[Tanya Spence]

I hear change to the website is coming soon!

Let's hope it is for the better!!

...I would love to be able to PDGA stalk my friends a little more efficiently.

[Scott]

I hear change to the website is coming soon!

Last I heard, it would completly re-vamped by Nov 2011. :chinscratch:

[Tanya Spence]

Speaking of... the site is currently at a crawl.

All I want to do is waste my morning looking at tourney registrations and ratings. Why can't the PDGA give me that!?!?

[CMC206]

it is an epic fail. I dont see myself renewing next year.

[TreeLove]

I can't even get the home page to load right now. Tried many computers, many connections, many browsers...

[TreeLove]

I hear change to the website is coming soon!

You mean it's going to get even worse?

[Lund]

Well I just submitted a slightly amended RCO player list to the pdga site. The wheels are spinning maybe when I wake up it will be done uploading. Fingers crossed.

Should we be making plans to calculate our own ratings for the RCO and put them on rosecityopen.com? Jordan can we borrow your TDG files?

PDGA if that catastrophe you have going on is not fixed by Saturday can our players have their player fee refunded?

[Flash]

The PDGA made an official announcement today about the website outage over the last 2-3 weeks.

http://www.pdga.com/announcements/website-outages

I also received a very nice email from Steve Ganz about the issue. I am adopting a wait and see attitude at this point. Not sure what life Steve can breath into the old site structure that can keep it up to technology standards these days so I am hoping for a new site developed within the next calendar year.

[Bruce]

P.s. I hate all this follow on Twitter crap. Do live scoring like you used to so I don't have to sign up for some 3rd party b.s.

[Sausage Fingers]

Jordan can we borrow your TDG files?

you should be able to grab any round ratings file off the TDG group, delete the names, ratings and scores and enter the new data and be good to go. It won't be exact like the ones from the pdga website td report but it will be close enough.

:pirate:

[steveganz]

The PDGA made an official announcement today about the website outage over the last 2-3 weeks.

http://www.pdga.com/announcements/website-outages

I also received a very nice email from Steve Ganz about the issue. I am adopting a wait and see attitude at this point. Not sure what life Steve can breath into the old site structure that can keep it up to technology standards these days so I am hoping for a new site developed within the next calendar year.

Thanks for keeping the faith, Michael. Last week was a nightmare filled with hardware failures, hacker attacks, and very little sleep. The good news is no data was compromised and we were finally able to get to the root of the problem on Thursday afternoon. The better news is that we identified some critical areas for performance optimization (which is something I've been spending a lot of time on over the past few months). After days of system tuning and refactoring code, the site was fully stabilized on Friday morning and has literally never been faster. It's most noticeable when viewing a player's statistics page. It is now an average of 200% to 300% faster than it was a month ago at this time.

I've said it before, and I'll say it again...thank you for your continued patience. I know it's worn thin. Mine was too and that it why I decided to join the PDGA as Technology Director in an effort to make all of this better. I won't stop until the job is done.

[steveganz]

Well I just submitted a slightly amended RCO player list to the pdga site. The wheels are spinning maybe when I wake up it will be done uploading. Fingers crossed.

Should we be making plans to calculate our own ratings for the RCO and put them on rosecityopen.com? Jordan can we borrow your TDG files?

PDGA if that catastrophe you have going on is not fixed by Saturday can our players have their player fee refunded? We had everything fixed just in time for the long weekend. I hope everything worked well for you. Let me know if you had any problems during the tournament.

[steveganz]

P.s. I hate all this follow on Twitter crap. Do live scoring like you used to so I don't have to sign up for some 3rd party b.s. You don't have to sign up for Twitter to follow the updates and we still do live scoring the way we used to! Whenever there are tournaments with live scoring available, a big shiny red button that says "Live Scoring" appears on the home page.

By the way, this weekend we'll have all sorts of coverage from the Kansas City Wide Open including live streaming video from discgolfplanet.tv

[Matt B.]

Welcome to this forum Steve, and thanks for joining the discussion. I think it's taking a while for everyone in the disc golf universe to understand that it really DOES seem like we finally have someone at PDGA.com who is diligently working to solve the problem and is openly communicating about it. As you know, you inherited a huge mess that festered for years and that heritage is going to be with you for some time. Many if not most PDGA discussion forum users gave up reading that forum because of the website problems, so they haven't seen you communicating regularly on the topic.

Please continue your good work and know that people do appreciate it. And please check in here once in a while and keep answering questions. If you wanted to (you might not want to) you could start a "Ask PDGA Technology Director Steve Ganz" thread, and then set up notifications for that thread so that you could know when someone is asking PDGA website or tech questions.

Thanks for what you do!

[Lund]

We had everything fixed just in time for the long weekend. I hope everything worked well for you. Let me know if you had any problems during the tournament.

Steve-
The website performed perfectly during our event this past weekend. Uploading scores took but a minute each time, including once from the course using a portable wifi hotspot device that utilized a cell phone signal.

Thanks for the improvements, your feedback and communication here, and for absorbing the criticism along the way.
-Eric Lund

[steveganz]

Thanks for the support, guys. The PDGA Discussion Board in it's current state will likely go away once we are able to provide better ways to communicate on the new platform.

I'm subscribed to this thread and would be happy to field any questions you might have right here.

Looking forward to seeing everyone at the BSF!

[essjay]

Steve, do you think the technical issues could have resulted in some loss of data? I'm just wondering because I was looking up some statistics and noticed that there was missing information.

[steveganz]

No data was lost but please email me at sganz@pdga.com with details so I can investigate.

[Scott]

Pretty sure I was a 1000 rated player before the crash. :D

Seriously - thanks to Steve for taking on a thankless job. :cheers:

[mowens404]

Has anybody noticed how smoothly and quick the website has been recently, even during worlds!?! good work guys.

[steveganz]

Has anybody noticed how smoothly and quick the website has been recently, even during worlds!?! good work guys.
Thanks! We're seeing record breaking traffic too. Upwards of 80% more than the last combined Worlds.

[Jeff Hemmerling]

Has anybody noticed how smoothly and quick the website has been recently, even during worlds!?! good work guys.
YES, YES, YES!! ;)
It has been great during worlds. Also loving the live update to keep track of the lead cards. Thanks Steve Ganz!

[NWDiscer]

steve if you can please next take care of the glitchy dgptv coverage, so i have a reason to maybe give them my money next year.

i followed the twitter feeds today and on my end it seems to update almost as fast as the live dgptv feed from kc earlier this year.

[Wes Hansen]

Steve,
Perhaps you could tell us something of the mindset by the PDGA to TRY to make us pay to view Worlds. I can't for the life of me figure how anyone thought this was a good idea, particularly after the poor web service we have all been receiving until recently. Was this a PDGA production? Seems the production and PDGA have a lot in common....
Next year I'll trade - the PDGA can keep the marginal magazine and let me see the one event of the year I'd like to.
After 10+ years as a member I'm beginning to wonder if the BSF is the ONLY reason to join each year. It is the only one I could come up with.
Sure, charge non-members to see Worlds, but PDGA membership should have SOME worthwhile benefit for ALL members.
I'm more confused then ever about what the PDGA is TRULY doing for its membership.

(Annoyed, but happy to listen to reason.)

[ski2man]

Steve,
Perhaps you could tell us something of the mindset by the PDGA to TRY to make us pay to view Worlds. I can't for the life of me figure how anyone thought this was a good idea, particularly after the poor web service we have all been receiving until recently. Was this a PDGA production? Seems the production and PDGA have a lot in common....
Next year I'll trade - the PDGA can keep the marginal magazine and let me see the one event of the year I'd like to.
After 10+ years as a member I'm beginning to wonder if the BSF is the ONLY reason to join each year. It is the only one I could come up with.
Sure, charge non-members to see Worlds, but PDGA membership should have SOME worthwhile benefit for ALL members.
I'm more confused then ever about what the PDGA is TRULY doing for its membership.

(Annoyed, but happy to listen to reason.)

I have the same thought...often about my own membership in my association. There seems to be no benefits except it provides money for the courses (as far as the local organizations) but that hardly seems enough when plenty of people play without paying. I feel like a sucker at time with both my group and the PDGA. I echo your concern.

[Scott]

This is really not that hard to figure out. DGP tried the business model of giving away the product and asking for donations. That model didn't work. They had two choices: Stop broadcasting, or charge a fee.

Is $8 really that big of a deal? Where else are you going to see live disc golf coverage?

[Wes Hansen]

A response from someone that works for the PDGA is what I was hoping for.


Who is DGP? (Meaning the people paid behind the company.)
Why do they look like the face of the PDGA? Who are they working for? DGP or the PDGA?
By paying $8 am I paying PDGA staff to do a second job when I've already paid my PDGA dues so a select few folks can be at events? There's a bit of crossover I'm unclear about.
So it's not just $8, it feels like $58.
As I said, I'm a 10+ yr supporter of the PDGA... but I'm beginning to wonder who is benefiting from the monies sent to the PDGA and DGP. Is it the local PDGA member or a select few folks.

It really isn't that hard to figure out.

Also, TV was free for over 50 years. Commercials paid for production and airing. That business model worked well.

[runnaman]

The only problem with commercials paying for broadcasts is you have to have the audience to attract advertisers. The only businesses disc golf can attract right now are disc golf companies, and they don't have that much money for advertising.

So maybe in the future, once the audience for live disc golf broadcast, it can attract bigger advertisers and be supported solely by commercials.

I will also say that I have no problem paying the $8 to watch the coverage all week. Sure there have been technical difficulties, but they are broadcasting live from withing a forest, so it's to be expected. It's a huge step from 4 years ago and in the next four years, who knows, maybe it will be commercial driven, but I think supporting discgolfplanet now will result in free broadcasts sooner.

[Jason Philips]

I think Steve is the wrong person to ask about general PDGA information and this is probably not the best thread to ask these questions.


In regards to the $8 to watch the Disc Golf Planet show, I think it is shite. I paid for a membership viewing it as startup fees. Then I made an assumption (I know about assumptions) that the website would do like most broadcasters do and solicit advertising to pay the cost of the broadcast. Further the quality of the broadcast is severly lacking. I think for what they are doing and how they are doing it, they are doing the best they can. If you want to charge me beyond my annual membership and give me the same quality of coverage you always have why should I pay for a PPV event no matter how much.

Not everyone is content just to see disc golf live. Some people believe in value of what they get and are not seeing the value in the additional cost. There are sheep and there are those that ask questions, I like to ask questions and so do others here.

[Simmeltron]

Steve,
Perhaps you could tell us something of the mindset by the PDGA to TRY to make us pay to view Worlds. I can't for the life of me figure how anyone thought this was a good idea, particularly after the poor web service we have all been receiving until recently. Was this a PDGA production? Seems the production and PDGA have a lot in common....
Next year I'll trade - the PDGA can keep the marginal magazine and let me see the one event of the year I'd like to.
After 10+ years as a member I'm beginning to wonder if the BSF is the ONLY reason to join each year. It is the only one I could come up with.
Sure, charge non-members to see Worlds, but PDGA membership should have SOME worthwhile benefit for ALL members.
I'm more confused then ever about what the PDGA is TRULY doing for its membership.

(Annoyed, but happy to listen to reason.)

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I am pretty sure that the PDGA and DGP.TV are completely separate entities. The PDGA is a founding sponsor of DGP but that is it. It is NOT Steve's job at all to improve their broadcast quality.

I do agree that the video quality could have been better but come on people, this is groundbreaking stuff, we had a LIVE broadcast of the World Championships for a week straight! Do you think THIS can be done for free? (http://discgolfplanet.tv/our-content/our-talent). To expect these people to sustain all of their costs, let alone pay their staff, on a $25 lifetime membership is ridiculous. I am sure as the sport continues to grow, and more money is pumped into revenue from advertising, things will continue to improve. The TV advertising model as somebody else pointed out just doesn't work until you have hundreds of thousands of people tuning in. Until then, the bills have to be paid some how. Unfortunately, $8, which is hardly anything to some, is apparently more to others. Let's think about it... Drink ONE less 6-pack/bottle of wine/pint of Jack this week. Oh wow, I'm rich!!! :trophy:

In the meantime I think we should all be happy with the blessings that technology has brought us. Sure it is not 1080p HiDef *YET*, but I still got to watch the best disc golf on the planet played LIVE from across the country. And for that, I salute you guys. :cheers:

[Matt B.]

I have the same thought...often about my own membership in my association. There seems to be no benefits except it provides money for the courses (as far as the local organizations) but that hardly seems enough when plenty of people play without paying. I feel like a sucker at time with both my group and the PDGA. I echo your concern.

NO benefit to being a member of your local club because "plenty of people play without paying"?

Friend, I don't know what club you feel suckered by, but paying $10 a year or whatever your club fee is, is well worth it to be not counted among the people who don't do sh*t except complain and take from your local scene.

There are people doing stuff to promote disc golf, events, and course development, and then there's everybody else running their mouths complaining. Paying a club membership fee is the bare minimum you can do to not just be a nother sh*t talking taker in the disc golf community.

[steveganz]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I am pretty sure that the PDGA and DGP.TV are completely separate entities.
You are correct, sir.

It is NOT Steve's job at all to improve their broadcast quality.
I would if I could!

[maynard]

You know its easy to be critical of anything that someone else is doing. The extra $7.95 was well worth it for me to support DGPTV and to be a part of this ground breaking exposure for our great sport. These productions cost a lot of money and I got to watch a lot of great golf. I have no complaints, I got my moneys worth. Cheap entertaiment if you ask me...

[Jason Philips]

You know its easy to be critical of anything that someone else is doing. The extra $7.95 was well worth it for me to support DGPTV and to be a part of this ground breaking exposure for our great sport. These productions cost a lot of money and I got to watch a lot of great golf. I have no complaints, I got my moneys worth. Cheap entertaiment if you ask me...


What is ground breaking about dedicated coverage to an emmerging sport?

And are you saying that people who pay a lifetime membership are not supporting Discgolf Planet enough?

I have a legitimate question, did non-members have to pay the pay per view price and the lifetime membership price?

[Bullseye]

I think it was a very bad idea for the DG Planet guys to EVER imply that we would get a lifetime of coverage in the first place, and I think that is the main beef most people have with this deal. If they had simply made it $5-$10 per event or something then people could have made their decision based on that. I would pay that much per event, but I definitely think we were sold a bill of goods that was not delivered as advertised.

With that said, I'm going to put it behind me as the growing pains of a young organization, as opposed to outright maliciousness. If you like the coverage (perfect or not) then subscribe, if not... don't. It's pretty simple really.

[maynard]

Jason if you have been playing disc golf for as long as I have and had to wait until it was your turn to borrow or get a copy of someones grainy vhs tape from some tourney years ago or months ago, I think this is pretty ground breaking. Thats just my perspective. I have been listening to the "emerging sport" talk for over 25 years already. In NO WAY am I suggesting or downgrading anyones support by ONLY buying a lifetime membership, like I said in the start I was taken back at first as well with the additional cost for the worlds. I just choose not to be bitter and move on to live another day without resentment surrounding this whole thing. You have every right to voice your own opinion and I applaud you for asking the questions and putting it out there so to speak.

QUOTE=Jason Philips;124353]What is ground breaking about dedicated coverage to an emmerging sport?

And are you saying that people who pay a lifetime membership are not supporting Discgolf Planet enough?

I have a legitimate question, did non-members have to pay the pay per view price and the lifetime membership price?[/QUOTE]

[Jason Philips]

I thought the two girls one cup phenomenom was groundbreaking but that is only because it was so widespread. I think even my grandmother knew about it.

Currently you can find all kinds of live broadcasts on the web. I don't even have to attend Burning Man anymore. I can watch it from the web. The broadcast capability is probably groundbreaking but not the actual broadcast of disc golf. I'd call groundbreaking showing the championship on ESPN. That would be groundbreaking. I wonder if we spend time fostering just another web show (How it is likely viewed by many) will we ever devote time to getting coverage by major networks. Is there a marketing team at the PDGA that focuses on just such a thing? (I honestly don't know).