Leics Villages website BAD NEWS

[diddymiller]

 Just found out whilst searching that the Leics Villages website is to close in August 2016. It is loosing its Leics County Council funding. It has been announced early to give the villages a chance to save /move their info elsewhere.

Frequently Asked Questions – Leicestershire Villages Website Changes
*Is there an opportunity to self-fund by village (similar to how Parish Councils websites work) and keep the website running?   
The infrastructure will not be available for communities to do this, BUT the site could be recreated on a similar platform.
*What happens in August 2016? Will the website go off air and disappear, becoming un-editable?   
The website will cease to exist after August 2016. You won’t be able to see it after that date.
*Will the information from the site be archived anywhere? If so, could it potentially ‘go live’ again in the future?   
There are no plans to archive any of the sites. The reason we’ve extended until August 2016 (an extra year) is to give all site administrators plenty of time to explore the alternatives.
*If the site itself won’t be archived, will there be a facility to archive existing village pages?Existing village pages will not be archived, but we are making arrangements with Cuttlefish to retrieve any data/images for you to use (for example on an another website). Again, the extended period until August 2016 give site administrators plenty of time to do this.
Technology has moved on considerably since Leicestershire Villages was set up – for example, cloud software (for storing images and data) or social media platforms such as Flickr, which also serve as an image store that the public can access.
*Does closing this website really make much of a dent in £120m?   
We have to consider all of the services when we’re considering our overall savings target. Through the savings around community ICT, we’ll save around £70,000 which is a significant figure. Overall, Leicestershire Villages has a very low number of visits (an average of less than 10 visits per day on most villages). When you consider than the most frequently visited pages are those related to local businesses such as pubs and restaurants, which are not priority areas for the council, it is very difficult to justify the money spent.
*Will there be any guidance as to which platforms to move to?    
We’ll add some suggestions to our online self help guide, but we can’t make those decisions for villages – it’s best to explore the options and see what’s right for you. We’re also running two social media focused workshops in April (21st or 27th) 2015 – these may run again if there’s sufficient interest. Contact comms@leics.gov.uk for more details. 
*After support ceases in April 2015, how will be able to add new users, changes messages, customise picture galleries, etc?   
We’re making arrangements to give administrators increased access rights - as required - so administrators  will be able to do these things for themselves.

Diddy 

[TonyV]

It's always sad to see such facilities threatened but in my admittedly limited experience of looking at some of the villages I've not found many of the websites well supplied with historical or genealogical information. Maybe I've missed something?

Tony

[iluleah]

It is bad news, some of the villages have some really great information on them.

Possibly the administrators of any who have put so much work in already could transfer it to one of the free websites such as http://www.webs.com/ which could be a simple solution either as a temporary or permanent fix and keeps the information live.

I am assuming those who are trying to find alternative funding have made applications already to the heritage fund? http://www.heritageportal.eu/Resources/Funding/