Turbonines.com: Saab site takes forums to the next level
With TrollhattanSaab's future uncertain, Saabophiles may be looking elsewhere for their daily news and forum fix. The crew that brought you VWVortex, Fourtitude, MWerks and other make-specific sites has finally created a spin-off of Swedespeed to cater directly to Saab enthusiasts on the web.
TurboNines.com launched yesterday, taking the traditional forum template and replacing it with a cleaner, more intuitive design. Readers familiar with MotiveMag will undoubtedly see a resemblance to the online pub's format, with a news and features section, along with galleries, resources and the traditional discussion forum for users to talk smack and wax poetic on their favorite Swedish marque.
If you're already a member of Motive's other sites, you'll be able to login using your existing user name and password, and even if you're not, a quick visit to TurboNines is worthy of a few minutes of your Thursday.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Swede 4:51PM (9/04/2008)
TOO MANY SUBFORUMS! Honestly, have a look at their General forum. It's divided into over nine thousand subcategories.
Nice layout and content integration otherwise though.
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Darren 5:01PM (9/04/2008)
"stands the traditional forum template on its head"
???
I went into the forums and they are setup pretty much like tons of other sites. I was expecting something mindbending but instead I got boring.
Did someone pay to get this DUGG? Seriously. :(
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Damon Lavrinc 5:06PM (9/04/2008)
Hardly. The forum is pretty traditional, but the site layout is one of the cleanest we've seen -- which we like. I've changed the post to reflect that.
Brad Barnett 5:10PM (9/04/2008)
I don't see how this "the traditional forum template on its head". Seems almost identical to every other message board on the internets.
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redaero 5:14PM (9/04/2008)
i'll stick with saablink.net and saabcentral.com, thanks.
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Neil 12:46AM (9/05/2008)
Another shout for saabcentral!
Jeff 4:10PM (9/05/2008)
I know this has already been said but after having my expectations built up I felt I had to add my 2 cents.
The site is nice but I really don't see anything special about the forum.
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Hugh G 5:29PM (9/04/2008)
If they would have named it BornFromJets.com I would have officially quit the internet for good.
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Dave T. 5:37PM (9/04/2008)
I'm really looking for the next thing in forums. I have not found a web 2.0 forum yet. Tangler.com is the closest. anyone have suggestions?
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Jensen 6:25PM (9/04/2008)
So...how much did they pay for this review? Its a nice site, but there's a 100 more just like it that I don't see getting any digital ink.
I love Autoblog, but I just got a little jaded after seeing this "article".
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Damon Lavrinc 6:31PM (9/04/2008)
No reason to be jaded and we certainly don't accept contributions for mentioning a site. We just like to give a shout-out to sites that have potential, and with TrollhattanSaab being on the skids (and the amount of people that seemed to really appreciate Swade's content), we thought this would be of interest to our readers -- Saab devotees or not.
Saabhistory.com 7:11PM (9/04/2008)
This site is a nice attempt, but it's run by a large corporation, so it can't be too hard to make a site look nice with deep pockets, is it?
It would be amazing if Saabhistory.com had a budget like Turbonines does, but it doesn't, and it has quite a significant amount of traffic, content these days.
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Saabhistory.com 7:16PM (9/04/2008)
Swade's site is not the only individually run Saab Enthusiast site on the internet, Saabhistory has been running for two-years strong by a Saab Enthusiast in New England.
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SG 7:14PM (9/04/2008)
This site is a nice attempt, but it's run by a large corporation, so it can't be too hard to make a site look nice with deep pockets, is it?
It would be amazing if Saabhistory.com had a budget like Turbonines does, but it doesn't, and it has quite a significant amount of traffic, content these days.
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SG 7:15PM (9/04/2008)
Swade's site is not the only individually run Saab Enthusiast site on the internet, Saabhistory has been running for two-years strong by a Saab Enthusiast in New England.
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BlueDog 7:19PM (9/04/2008)
This is the same standard forum software that millions of sites use. Yes, the homepage is a nice fresh look, but for community active sites, that's the least viewed page. I've used tons of forums and none have still been able to hold a candle to the software used on AudiWorld.com. A first it looks like an old setup, but once you start using it you'll hate all the rest of the forum sites. You don't have the endless [quote] that everyone forgets to remove especially when replying to a picture, and never any "Bump" posts.
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George@VortexMediaGroup.com 9:32PM (9/04/2008)
Thanks for the mention Damon. Since I'm one of the creators of the site, I figured I'd post.
ZeroForum isn't all-new or anything like that, but our network is unique to ZF and relatively unique in the industry. All of our sites save Swedespeed are on this network and link in to our community forums and The Car Lounge forum.
BTW, we're also not a 'large corporation'. There are three owners - creators of all of our sites, and no outside investors. We invest what we earn through advertising alone.
Sorry for the commercial on us in this post, but I wanted to clear two questions up. Thanks again.
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Liam S. 12:53AM (9/05/2008)
The only Saab site worth a mention is The saab Network www.saabnet.com. The forums area is by far the most informative on anything related to Saab.
It has been around a very very very long time.
It is the site to go to if you own a Saab.
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nighttime 3:42AM (9/05/2008)
I think it would be nice if AB had a forum.
beats this crappy commenting system.
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