For me the problem with invite only is that we would only meet all the same people - rather then getting to know new people. Which is what phpc is all about - meeting and getting to know people.

I just hope we never lose our small town feel - that to me would be the worst thing for the group. As for your questions:

1) yes to a certain extent. to me - most there are friends and I talk to them as such. I do still use PM for truly private conversations that are not for general consumption.
2) this one is harder. do I wish we could be more exclusive - yes. I personally prefer quality over quantity. doesn’t mean you have to be an expert - just that you be an active member. even if it is only to say to Hi to a couple of members that are your friends. I don’t mind lurkers - a lot can be learned just by reading some of the discussions. I personally would just like to see interaction.
3) no real preference here.

and yes - i am one of the group that was there when it was only 5 - 10 of us. awormus - miss ya darlin. we never seem to be on the same time lately.

Talk the talks that they gave as an example - these were special events held for people to attend and have a deeper discussion about that kind of technology. There’s nothing saying we cant have a “scheduled talks” kind of thing again where (maybe even in another channel so as not to disturb) the talks happen and interested parties attend.

Personally, I’m all for the idea of openness. I’d rather see anyone who wants to come in join up and enjoy being a part of the #phpc community and get out of the constant questions and stuff of #php. Invite only on he channel would only deter people. They’d be turned off and, imho, any growth in the membership of the channel would drop to almost nothing.

1. Let us know who/what you were offended by, and we will take the appropriate action. I haven’t been active in the last month or three, but there is no need for people to get scared off by trolls.

2. It’s my personal feeling, that within a community a certain amount of abrasiveness / flaming is acceptable within the community members. If someone has a bad day and decides to bite a n00b’s head off for asking a stupid question, as long as it’s not a constant thing, it’s understood. This is different from trolling, where someone just comes in to make trouble.

And now i don’t want to stay myself in that channel, because of those bullies. Ban them all and restart?

Well i perfectly understand your need for certain privacy when it comes to serious discussions. You should open a new channel that it invite only - but ….

It seems that all the effort and the help of the initial group was able to form a pretty popular community on phpc.

I would recommend to turn this development into something that supports both the core-group and the lurkers. Build a website that holds the discussions and solutions that are posted on the public channel - maybe add a forum an strengthen the community. The go ahead and start marketing your community. Sell ad-space and get some $ in return!

Building a community aint that easy - dont waste your luck !

Comment: People even contribute by reading. Channel Bots answering questions or posting Links can help too.

Maybe making a #phpci which could be a invite-only channel, but that would essentially be abandoning #phpc, which isn’t something I would want to do.

As one of the newcomers to #phpc I think that the problem you are facing is actually fairly easy to solve. Make the channel invite-only (+i).

To be honest, that’s how I arrived at #phpc anyway. Ben Ramsey told me about it as a cool place to just hang out with people in the PHP industry. I have been on freenode for over 5 years now (nick silicate) and to be honest, ##php gets annoying with all of the n00b questions. It’s nice to have a place that people talk about PHP without talking about an issue they are having. Most of the people in there know how to use Google

There have been several discussions in the channel that I was very glad to be part of, such as a recent discussion about Conferences and the benefits or Contributing. Who better to hear this from than the people that are actually presenting at the Conferences. Cal Evans, Sebastian Bergmann and others offered great advice about what you should know. Being on IRC, it was much more fluid than a blog post and comments.

Hope that helps,

Matthew Purdon.