BowlingBallVault.com - Closing its doors 12/31

[MegaMav]

Public Service Announcement:

Just to inform you ahead of time, I have decided to discontinue BowlingBallVault.com
If you have any reviews you would like to keep from there, please be sure to gather that information before the last day of the year.

Why am I doing this?
Its become a dumping ground for biased reviews from company staffers.
Copy/paste staff reviews can be found anywhere, and my vision for the website never came to fruition.
Time has come to overhaul the framework on the website, and I've decided its not worth the capital and time to do it.
I also think I am wasting my time and the time of other's keeping the website and ball catalog up to date if the ratings are skewed and the reviews completely over the top with overly positive feedback for each release.
A critical rating has become 4.8/5.0
I would rather use the server resources to keep the BowlingChat flame burning as long as possible.

Best wishes to you and your family during this holiday season.

Your friendly neighborhood administrator,
-Eric

[scotts33]

I totally agree Eric! BR.com though they say....."There are over 1,080 bowling balls and over 17,000 reviews available." ONLY 95% or less are done by actual users and NOT staffers. riggs and Philip Marlowe did good reviews on BR the rest are singing the company line.

The only issue I see is that site has/had a large amount of information for older discontinued equipment. In general when I did Visionary I included 14, 15 and 16 lb. numbers that info. (for VBP) you could not get anywhere else. But so be it that will be lost but not a big deal. I think your heart was in the right place but like bowling in general it's a slow death.

[russelldean]

Happy Thanksgiving Eric. Thanks for all your efforts in keeping this, the most valuable bowling website around alive and well.

[MegaMav]

Thanks for the support guys.
I will keep the website zipped up on my personal development server for safe keeping for a while in 2016.
Im just not interested in supporting a website that has become a marketing tool rather than a helpful source of information for buyers.

[bowl1820]

Suggestion:

I've been to the vault several times to lookup information on balls, but never to read reviews.

Instead of losing a valuable resource, remove the reviews. Then remake the site into a ball database where ball specs can be researched and compared.

[river800]

I totally agree Eric! BR.com though they say....."There are over 1,080 bowling balls and over 17,000 reviews available." ONLY 95% or less are done by actual users and NOT staffers. riggs and Philip Marlowe did good reviews on BR the rest are singing the company line.

The only issue I see is that site has/had a large amount of information for older discontinued equipment. In general when I did Visionary I included 14, 15 and 16 lb. numbers that info. (for VBP) you could not get anywhere else. But so be it that will be lost but not a big deal. I think your heart was in the right place but like bowling in general it's a slow death.

How about a number of us take 1 ball company each and gather the info on the site and then we can figure out how to put it back together only for review with no comments allowed?

Any takers?

[Vendetta]

I concur with "1820" ... I use the 'Vault" often for info/specs on the balls. Sometimes for comparing types of covers, rg, diff, etc. on replacement pieces for bowlers. Other times for older balls that come through the shop for resale or for donated balls for the youth on Sat morns. Its been an valuable tool & one I will personally miss. I "never" look at the reviews; just the tech data.

You did a great job Eric, sorry to see the site go.

[frps]

I agree with the previous posts. You've done a great job with the vault and I use it often too. Scrap the reviews and go with the bowling ball resource idea. I disregard the reviews on most sites anyway, especially when I see someone's signature being a staffer. Eric, again, with all the work you put into the site, I hate to see that go to waste. The info you have is valuable to the community!

Just my .02!! Thanks again to all the work you and your peers have done for us!

[MegaMav]

BowlingBallVault.com is out at the end of the year, that is going to happen.

I will be keeping the framework and information on my private development server.
It may be possible that it will come back as a subdomain here in a different form, but thats a distant thought right now.

Its very time consuming to keep the ball catalog up to date with the flood of balls that seem to come out every month, its just too much for one person that does not work in the bowling industry to handle.
It wasnt like that when the website first started out, ebonite started the ball line of the month trend and other manufacturers followed suit.
I've received a lot of help from others in keeping the catalog up to date, and its very much appreciated, but its more of a burden for everyone to do than a pleasure.

I've asked for help and only a few people have been consistent in helping out on a regular basis.
The rest do a few balls and drop it.

Now with the framework needing an upgrade to be compatible with PHP 5.6+, it didnt make sense to continue. It would cost $130 for the framework and many of my hours of upgrade work to get it converted and working.

Sorry to disappoint some of you, but in the 970 emails I sent out about BBV closing, I only got 1 reply of support from the userbase. Not many seem to care.

[MegaMav]

BTW, always wanted to say this:

I dont want this to sound condescending, but I will not miss getting the weekly emails asking:

"How much for a 13lbs Brunswick Teal Rhino shipped to Henderson Nevada?"

Like there is some vault out there with all these bowling balls in it.

[Maine Man]

It's very sad to see it go away, but I understand your frustration with it Eric. I use the site almost every day in the pro shop to find original OOB surfaces for older equipment that come in to be resurfaced. Also, as you know, I have been in charge of updating the Brunswick database for a while now and I will miss doing that. If there is anything I can do, or if you end up opening up something to research bowling balls in the future, let me know how I can help.

Thank you for your time and energy keeping the Vault going these many years.

[Dustin]

Thank you for your time and energy keeping the Vault going these many years.

Can't say much more that that. Thank you for the wonderful resource.
Almost time for the horizontally challenged lady to sing!

[DrewPeacock]

As an assistant mgr in a pro shop (and avid bowler), I also used BBV for the trove of information. We're fairly secluded, and many bowlers bring in older equipment asking for a resurface or a new ball that rolls similar. 123Bowl.com is similar, but nothing beats BBV. I also agree that the staff reviews skewered ratings, which became an unfortunate circumstance.

P.S. Regarding this quote: "Sorry to disappoint some of you, but in the 970 emails I sent out about BBV closing, I only got 1 reply of support from the userbase. Not many seem to care."

I was the 1 of 970 who responded to the email Completely for the idea of bringing it back, sans reviews. Your hard work was, and is, always appreciated!