Lets get the truth out. Many rumours has been around over the last weeks, and we at Happy are sorry to not being able to give straight answers to questions about the future of Happy that many of you have asked, but today it was announced that HappyMTB has been sold to the dutch company Netforums.ne.
This is what Fiets Wieler, C.E.O of Netforums.ne had to say before leaving for Arlanda after negotiating the deal :
– We have been watching HappyMTB since the beginning, and it´s part of our strategy to purchase forums that already have moderate success and a good strong customerbase. We think that HappyMTB have the opportunity to be Europes biggest bikeforum once we change the language to english.
So why not buy a British or Irish forum, then you won´t have to change the language?
– Those forums are already too big, and they have too much local character. German or french persons would not feel at ease there. Swedes write the most easily understood english in the whole europe (apart from the dutch), but your country is so small so when persons from other european countries start using your forum the unneccessary local flavour will quickly go away. Also swedes are adaptable and have a tradition of avoiding conflicts, and for internetforums that is a very good thing. We could never do this in Denmark. We want to provide the whole Europe with a HappyMTB-forum!
Will the users of HappyMTB see any changes?
– No. Not for the first six months. The forum stays the same with colours and layout, but in the autumn of 2006 we will introduce a membership-program. In our other forums this is called ”Gold” and ”silver, but for Happy we will call the categories ”Titanium” and ” Carbon”. But we will not in anyway stop unregistered users for wiewing and posting on the forum, we feel that it is a good way of attracting new customers. The only drawback is that unregistered users will have a 24hour delay when viewing and posting and will have advertisements included in their posts. We already run this programme on others forums like PetCats.com, deutschetriathlon and iceskater.ne and it is quite sucessful.
Membership program? Will it cost?
– Yes, we want to have the same pricestructure in all our forums. ”Gold” costs 80 euro per year, but has many benefits. ”Silver” is based around how many visits each member does and works with cost per click and is charged by the ISP-provider, so many people will only see the charge on their phonebills. Unregistered use will still be free.
OK, it sounds very nice. So last question, are there any good trails around Eindhoven or do i have to get a roadbike?
– Well. we have very good bikepaths along the canals here in Holland, and many people ride bicycles. I like to go out for a ride on sundays with my Batavus 7-speed .
We are very glad for this to happen, for it gives HappyMTB a lot more freedom to do a good job for you and for us staff it means we will get paid for going to Spain to ride new bikes or to party at Interbike in Las Vegas and at the same time post reports to you. Could it be better?
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