I'll give you $50 for naming the best pool forum

[billiardsblogger]

Many people wonder if they are spending their time at the ‘best’ online forums. To help you make an informed decision on what commmunity offers what, I decided to put together a detailed comparison of all of the significant pool and billiards forums on the internet. Minimum requirement for inclusion is a Google Pagerank of 3 or more for every forum. So far, I’ve compliled the following information on all of the major sites (where available):
Date of forum launch
Users
threads
posts
Popular post categories
…and all other relevant site info

So far, I’ve researched the following sites:
AZ Billiards
Inside Pool
Billiards Digest
OnePocket.org
Uk8Ball
Usenetsports
Socal pool talk
Poolfanatic
Seyberts
Poolchat
Easypooltutor
World pool championship
Southern Billiards
Pro9
Nola.com
Xtreme Forum

This research should give everyone an overall sense of the billiards forum landscape. What I need now is some member feedback on what my research can’t tell me - which forum is truly the ‘best’. I’m going to write up a large post recapping this feedback and include the best user comments to help illustrate the intanglibles each offers.

I'm taking feedback over at my blog (the address is in my signature). Feel free to speak about more than one forum - I’ll give a $50 Amazon coupon to the member who makes the most compelling argument for ranking the forums in a certain manner.

Thanks in advance for the help with this - I think it’ll provide some real value to the billiards and pool community.

[nAz]

hey there, i was just checking out your blogging site and notice there wasn't much blogging going on over there. /ccboard/images/graemlins/smile.gif anyways the best billiard forum site bar none is CCB, but then again i am biased /ccboard/images/graemlins/smile.gif

I like to see you include in your list 3 cushion billiard AKA carambola, carombolage, billares and straight-rail billiards.
here is a cople of site i like to visit when im in 3C mode... http://www.3cushion.com/ http://www.caromcafe.com/frameset.html and http://www.umb.org/ (they have a good 3C simulator)

[jjinfla]

Not a very scientific pole. The forum with the most members will always win. Most likely that would be RSB which in my opinion is nothing but trash.

Actually there is no outstanding forum. They all have many drawbacks. It all depends on which clique is in control on any given day and whether the posters have taken their medication prior to posting.

One must sort through all the trash in order to find the few gems.

Jake

[Billy_Bob]

In my opinion, there is no "best" forum. They are all good!

You may get one person who posts one message on one obscure forum somewhere which is worth its weight in gold.

Same thing with playing. You may play one person one day who decides to teach you a shot. These people rarely share anything, but when they do, it is a gem.

Also books/videos. I've found something helpful in all of them.

With that said, RSB has a lot of posts from years ago which discuss various topics in extreme detail. So by searching groups.google.com rec.sport.billiard, there is a lot to learn. Also by searching the other forums for past posts.

If you're interested in clicks, who you like/don't like, etc. Then stick with one forum. If you want to learn and could care less about clicks, etc., read them all.

[Eric.]

I agree. Basically, there are several "good" forums that have plenty of content. My favorites are CCB(here), Inside Pool and AZ Billiards.


Eric

[wolfdancer]

It's late in the day, and my meds effects are fading with the sunset, but ...while the "gems" are few and far between....it's almost worth reading the dominant eye threads to find one....
The latest "GEM" in my opinion, is Colin's break video... can't believe how much it has helped. Now I no longer have to warn people before I break "If you have a weak stomach, you may not want to watch this"
How come nobody starts a thread about the subordinate eye?
That's the one that focus's on all the distractions....and ruins a lot of table runs...

[billiardsblogger]

Sorry everyone- today there was a small problem with the ability for users to login and leave comments on my blog. Fixed now.

I'll consider the responses here in the final report - but feel free to leave comments at BilliardsBlogger.com (http://www.billiardsblogger.com) under the 'best pool forum' post to be included.
Cheers