I and some others are working on starting a new company and would like to have a web presence. Actually I would like to have something like 914world.com (at least a moderated user forum) as part of a website. We don't have much money at this point (I could help out with your 914 stuff) but hope to in the future. Can anyone help out?
Steve

Hmmmm....

The html behind a forum is pretty heavyhanded. You would have to buy most of it from IPS.

And the HTML for a store would be easy.

And I like 914 parts...

Hey fellow Campbelltonian!!!! Nice to hear from someone in the hood. So what the company gonna do? I'm a hardware guy that is struggling to learn HTML right now. What an awful awful language.

Interested!

There are plenty of free open source apps you can download and customize.

YABB is a good one and it's not too hard to setup.

http://www.yabbforum.com/

I would probably recommend a Content Management System (CMS). Make sure that you get one with a BBS and e-commerce capability (or plug-in) if you need it.

Check out this site for options:
http://www.cmsmatrix.org/

The setup on most of these is not trivial. However, you'll do better with a supported platform (commercial or open-source) than paying someone to build from scratch.

There are a variety of free forums. First you need to buy a domain name and find a host to determine what languages/database they support. Then pick a forum to use and change the look to blend in with your site.

I have an ASP based forum I got free, set's up in minutes for a windows environment. This one is PHP, so I'm guessing its running on Linux?

Your ISP typically provides you some web space, should be an inexpensive way to get started.

I do web development consulting for a living, might can spare a little time.

as others have said, forums are fairly easy and cheap to set up since the code has all been written. no sense reinventing the wheel there.

for your site look and feel, sounds like you're looking for design/user interface person. for what it's worth, i have a fine arts degree in design and have been doing graphic design/web design for a decade or so now. if you're interested, send me a pm and i'll link ya.

~a