I say get the word out there. Back in the day, '99 or so, I decided to get into mountain biking. Never was really able to get in a click of other riders, so just rode solo all around the south bay. Did a couple of Sunday rides but never really was verbally invited back by other riders, so I just kept riding, on and off unfortunately. Fast forward 10 years and I luckily come across a group of Mountain Bikers by luck through a friend. Finally I had some guys that enjoyed riding as much, if not more, than me. Showed me new trails, new skills, the world of Mountain Biking opened up to me beyond words. Fontruckit, say wha? So just think of those out there that ride, but do just that, ride. There is so much more out there that we as a community can share. Of course there will always be that 10% of assholes that muck things up, but if we can add 10 cool people and deal with 1 more asshole, lets do it. Spread the word of San Diego Mountain Biking, we will all be better for it. Just think of the possibilities, if we time it right, we can guarantee good beer at Newb rides for the next 6 months. Win Win!

K.I.S.S.

Well, when Dooder started Dirt Treaders, there wasnt an intention of keeping it a San Diego specific site. There has been several times he's mentioned it since its inception. I know I have as well.
I have mixed feelings about site promotion. Back in 2008 when Ldood created this and invited a couple of handfulls of people, I went on a mission, a mission to get DirtTreaders.com known locally. We tried it a couple different ways. The first was by placing some business cards at the kiosks at Calavera and giving one to each rider we encountered there. Then I stepped it up, I asked Dirty Boo to make a few hundred business cards for me to pass out and I rode the North County hotspot of the time...La Costa trails. That grew the membership base by leaps and bounds. I was aso handing the cards out everywhere else I rode, bt La Costa was the big spark, ya'll can do the same, at different spots, I know for a fact you have..thanks! I really enjoy promoting Dirttreaders.com on a personal basis and doing so I have made some great friends and met some really cool people. Did I hand select...nope, I was just riding around with my Squeeky Panda Horn on my handlebars like a dork inviting people to an unknown mt bike website.... And...its just plainly that simple. Now that those of you I have invited and your hooked, did it work?
Like Jimmy "The Supa Fly" Snooka say's..K.I.S.S. Keep It Simple....Stupid.
Now, only if there were a way for me to do this across the country, in person, on the cheap. I think some of you guys have spread the word while on your excursions..I see that people have signed on fom different areas of the country. Usually right after ya'll come back from your trips...cool, thanks!
There are members moving out of state, out of the area, if they spread the word that would work. Its easy to add different forums, so to make subforums that are region specific can be done if our out of town members got the word out.
Is that slower than doing it all electronically? Yep. But I look at it this way, good BBQ is a slow and low process, mix in the right seasonings and herbs, add a little personalization to your dish and you have the best BBQ, the kind people are going to want to come back and have again and again.
This is not to say that cross-site promotion wont work, it will, I'm cool with that as well.
There are several San Diego based mt bike groups, some are a meet-up group type thing, some are religious, some are team oriented..think Trek and Luna, some are obscure.
Im actually happy the way Dirt treaders has grown and look forward to more growth...on a national and maybe even an international level.
We start local and grow global...we will someday be "Glocal".
Spread the word.

we have a Belgium guy. We are international already!

I wouldn't mind heading a Houston based link starting in august. Unfortunately I will be leaving the San Diego area and all the great riding, but I will be retired from the Navy after 21 years and it is time to move on and start a new chapter. I will miss San Diego, but I have been wondering what there is in the Houston area. I know there is nothing like this website there and I would like to always offer up what I have learned of the area to anyone from here that passes through and wants to ride. So maybe in august or so I can help branch this site into a new area, granted not a MTB mecca, but lots of single speed areas.

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Dirt is your friend!

We already do have some international folks on here, don't we? At least we'll have a place to crash should we travel overseas to ride.

I like the grassroots feel too. You know about the site because you were actually out RIDING, you met other cool riders, and that's how you were invited. You don't just do a search online and lurk. You don't have a site where most people have no idea who is posting and you never see their face. This site feels more like a community, rather than an online forum, which I think is super cool.

But then again... I do like the idea of guaranteed good beer at every ride for the next 6 months if we have an influx of newbies.

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~I don't know the key to success, but the key to failure is trying to please everybody.
~Nothing from nothing is nothing.
~I'm allowed to be a pussy because I have one!

I'm just happy the snowflakes are gone...

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"New York City is a mismanaged carnival of stupidity that is desperate for revenue and anxious to criminalize behavior once thought benign."
--Alex Baldwin, unknowingly describing his socialist utopia.

Ha, didn't even notice until you mentioned it. Guess I was blocking them out

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Dirt is your friend!

I dont even remember how I stumbled upod DT. I know it wasnt out on a ride. Im one of those unlucky ones that actually found it online and not by word of mouth. I think I was in MTBR and for some reason found a link for SDMBA then I found the link for DT havent log in to mtbr since. I like the feel of this forum. Its a solid community of riders. All skill level welcome on group rides for the most part. Now if only i could up my skills so I dont have to worry about that.

Funny, I stumbled upon DT when I tried to ride with bonita bikers, Of course none showed up that Sunday Morning at Performance bike but A guy named Travis took us around the trails in Bonita. There was also another rider with a Carbon Fiber Schwinn, I don't remember his name though. that was about 3 years ago.

Mike

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My Favorite Trail is unknown to many, everybody here loves it.

A big to Bonita Bikers and sorry if we missed you that day.

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THOSE WHO KNOW, RIDE TURNER

Why does one need to go through a "screening" process??
? What exacttly, did you have to do to pass that screening process and becpm a member of the inner sanctum?? Sound oddly like a two wheeled "skull and bones" club.

Maybe Ozzer wasnt sure if you were responsible enough to provide the necessary refreshments post ride... See New Guy On Ride Rules
But, there is no screening process, I mean, if there was, more than half of us wouldnt make the cut.

Key word.... and if there was any kind of skull and bones club action going on I would have been banned years ago for being an annoying PITA

Well, I know that the O.G. folks didn't have an SD only attitude. You can see the very first DT post in the sticky at the top of this forum "what this is forum is for" (really, that's verbatim). I followed here a little later, because I didn't know for a while that Dooderino, who had vanished from "that other site", had transmogrified into LDood the Creator of DT. But what I liked (still like) best was the friendliness of folks like Ambassador RHS, and the local feel. Even after all the growth it stills feel pretty much that way, without the things that caused people to leave "the other site" (after the Sladnas incident and other BS, I don't like to call it by name, even though I did meet and ride with some good OC folks). Even what seems like exceptions are usually in jest. And I do like that folks from other areas, not only joined, but participate -- I hope to ride with 'em sometime. But I like the idea that someone was personally invited, or had to do a little sleuthing to find it. I've told plenty of folks about it in random encounters, but that's a kind of on-the-spot screening in itself. They probably wouldn't be talking to us if they were d*cks. I think it will grow plenty fast enough by word of mouth. Advertising it might lead to uncontrolled growth (emotional analogy: developers raping mesas and bulldozing our trails! cancer!) and turn it into something like the others. So I agree with "if it ain't broke don't fix it".

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Thus, if we are to understand the world, we should live somewhere between judgement and amazement — Alfredo Lopez Austin