Back in February, I announced that the “Managing Online Forums” book website had launched.

I am very proud to announce that the book is now available and can be purchased online at Amazon.com, Barnes & Noble.com and other retailers. If you are in the United States, it is being stocked nationally at Barnes & Noble locations, as well. You can check stock status at the closest store to you on their website.

“Managing Online Forums” is appropriately titled: it is truly a forums management book, but with principles that can apply to other types of online communities, like blogs, as well. From creating the infrastructure of the community and setting and enforcing policies to dealing with troublemakers and managing staff. This isn’t a programming book or a software book, this is all about managing the actual forums.

Here is a look at the chapters featured in the book:

Chapter 1. Laying the Groundwork
Chapter 2. Developing Your Community
Chapter 3. Developing Guidelines
Chapter 4. Promoting Your Community
Chapter 5. Managing Your Staff
Chapter 6. Banning Users and Dealing with Chaos
Chapter 7. Creating a Good Environment
Chapter 8. Keeping It Interesting
Chapter 9. Making Money

It also features three helpful appendices at the end that include online resources, a glossary and blank, general templates that you can use as a basis for your own user guidelines, staff member guidelines and contact templates (pre-written messages for you and your staff to use when contacting members).

For more information on the book, including a full table of contents, advance praise, interviews and reviews, an excerpt, downloadable document templates, an example forums setup and more, please check out the book website.

If you are interested in reviewing the book, please do not hesitate to contact me.

Thank you for reading and for your interest in the iFroggy Network.

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In honor of April Fools Day 2008, as is tradition, iFroggy Network sites got into the act.

At Bad Boy Blog, we reported that former Bad Boy rapper Mase was joining Suge Knight’s new label venture.

Over at phpBBHacks.com, we announced that we would be ending support for phpBB 3, the latest iteration of the popular community software script.

Finally, at KarateForums.com, we announced a number of odd forum mergers that would soon happen.

I hope everyone had a good, fun day! I appreciate, in advance, everyone who was a good sport. :)

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I know - two blog posts in one day! No way! But, it’s true, as we just launched the Managing Online Forums book website.

Managing Online Forums is a new book from AMACOM, the publishing arm of the American Management Association, slated to be published on April 28, 2008. I am the author of the book.

I wrote a long post about the book and it’s background over at my personal blog. But, to summarize, the book is all about the management of online communities. From creating an organizational structure and enforcing guidelines to dealing with users and managing staff members, with complementary sections on promotion, monetization and more. These are real life, battle tested, in use theories and solutions that are used on the iFroggy Network everyday. I’m very happy with how the book turned out and am very excited and proud to finally be sharing it with everyone.

If it’s a book that you may be interested in, please check out the book site. You can pre-order it now at most large online booksellers, including Amazon.com.

Thank you for reading.

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I have a couple of live podcast appearances coming up. I will be on phpBB Weekly on February 9 at 12:00 PM ET and System Showdown on February 12 at 7:30 PM ET. On both shows, there is some level of listener participation, so if you are around and want to listen, I’d love for you to do so. Thanks.

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ManagingCommunities.com launched today.

I’ve been managing communities since 2000. As part of the iFroggy Network, I run several communities, including SportsForums.net, KarateForums.com, phpBBHacks.com, DeveloperCube, CommunityAdmins.com, PhotoshopForums.com and BadBoyForums.com. It’s something that I’m passionate about and I’ve been wanting to share random thoughts, knowledge and experiences on the subject in a specialized blog for some time. I’m the author of a new book called “Managing Online Forums” (more about that in the next few months) and with that coming out in April, I felt that now was the perfect time to start blogging on the subject.

Beyond just being the administrator, however, I’ve spent substantial amounts of time contributing to communities from all angles, as a member, staff member and owner.

The blog will definitely be random thoughts. It won’t have any kind of set style or format at the start. If I have to ban someone on a given day, I may talk about that. If I had a noteworthy troublemaker or a great experience, I may talk about that. And, hopefully, if anyone contacts me with questions, I can answer those in entries, as well. I’m looking forward to sharing my day to day experiences as a community administrator and I hope that I am able to help some people, in the process.

Thank you for reading.

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Today, KarateForums.com has reached 10,000 members. From my announcement at the site:

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