[Stronico]

I run a discussion group that meets once a month - our tech stack is 1. A blog running WordPress that I use to announce meetings 2. A meetup.com account (free tier) that has the same information as the blog 3. A MailChimp account (free tier) where I send notices about the meetups 4. A very active Slack group (free tier) where I announce meetups and we have entended discussions. Discord would probably work just as well.

I've never used Facebook for anything, but the above four tools work very well for us.

[robertlagrant]

This is why Facebook ended up being the tool of choice. Stay in one app instead of logging into 2 and checking your email and a website. I'm only surprised that 1-3 can't all be done via Meetup.

[latexr]

> Stay in one app instead of logging into 2 and checking your email and a website.

The point seems to be that you can pick whatever service you want and will still get the information because it’s repeated across channels. The manager needs to post to all four, but everyone else picks one.

[jaimie]

They all can be done through Meetup - I think the point here is that multiple channels avoids vendor lock-in and increases the likelihood that a user will overlap with one of the 4 communication strategies.

[Stronico]

All of those can be done on meetup - but then we would lose a lot of people who are not, and will not be on Meetup.

The email list is probably the single most important part of the tech stack actually.

[johnneville]

Discord has replaced facebook and reddit for some of my communities and it works really well in general. Unfortunately we are seeing them turn toward incorporating ads which is somewhat offputting. I'm already looking into a self hosted discourse forum as an alternative but it lacks the immediacy of live chat for better or worse

[scarface_74]

You don’t see how much more work that is?

[Stronico]

I've got it down to 45 minutes a month, including a phone call to the venue.

[scarface_74]

And what happens when he gets tired of managing all of that? With Facebook he can just give someone else admin access.

[solid_fuel]

Organizing people takes work, and passing off a single set of credentials to someone else doesn't mean that work will still get done - whether its all in one place or not. Look at all the subreddits which are lost because of no moderation, even when they used to have a team.

When they eventually get tired of managing all this, they will eventually need to hand the reigns off to someone else. Hopefully someone will step up, because if someone doesn't it won't matter if the group is in 4 places or one.

[scarface_74]

Which is easier - finding someone that can manage a Facebook group or finding someone that can manage his Rube Goldberg setup?

[Stronico]

I can just give the logins to someone else. My current setup is a workable, optimal, but not clean solution to the problem.