.. something less formal than the forum and less fleeting and more accessible than the IRC channel?

Would be nice to have a place to share Qs and As in a more chatty format.

ex. It could have a channel for help customizing, a channel for general help, a channel for sharing/showcasing customizations ... etc.

If Allen prefers not to maintain a standalone 4coder Discord, we're happy to make a #4coder channel on the Handmade Network Discord (we made a recent Projects category). I'm not sure what his thoughts are on anything, though, except the observation he rarely frequents any chat.

I am not up for running a server of my own. I'll think about options though, because I think it could be useful. At the very least I'll probably take Abner up on his offer, but I want to think it through first. Thanks for the thought!

One channel on a server named for something else seems like it wouldn't change much, questions getting buried under unrelated comments or questions about other topics, also seems like it might be confusing for people looking for and only knowing about 4Coder.

I can help you moderate or admin if you want.

PS: "Support Development" still links to Patreon on http://www.4coder.net and I remember you making that change in your code in one of your latest streams.

Yeah I haven't actually updated the site yet, that was just the source text, I still have to upload it.

I take your point about the chat channel.

I offer a counter-example with Odin's project: it has a thriving chat and it stays on topic virtually all of the time. When a project is on the network, it follows people know how to find it on the network's chat as well. More importantly, the server policies, moderation, code of conduct and communication guidelines are inherited for free. A BIG reason I started the network was to alleviate community management and web development for handmade projects with limited bandwidth.

By all means a standalone server can make sense! But 4coder is a well-known project, and people can underestimate the time-consuming-ness and psychological burden of maintaining a healthy community. Just like in real life, once the excitement is gone, behind-the-scenes fighting may surface, with internals struggles and team conflict the likes of which can shock you. The team and I have been doing it for years at this point, and we've come out strong, but it takes a toll.

Sounds like Jim is up for helping Allen, and I don't want to discourage volunteers, but it feels wrong not to provide caution. I'm also biased as HMN admin :) but I tried to be objective in my earlier observations. If Allen does pick a route, and it's a standalone route, I recommend more than one person have mod powers, because of varying timezones. For 4coder you'll want some community guidelines right away as well.