Hatchling Cockatrice Alorael at Large Posted July 12, 2011 Share Posted July 12, 2011 Message boards are relics of the past. To some extent, the urge to chatter is quite easily satisfied on Facebook, or in comment threads. But old communities also tend to die and new ones tend to come into existence. Is the total number of active forums smaller or larger? Is the total number of people visiting forums greater or lesser? That's difficult to assess, and that article doesn't really do it. I also think there's a major category that hasn't gone away and isn't likely to: boards like this one. If you want to provide help and discussion of specific problems or specific products, and if new stuff for discussion is provided regularly, forums are probably more wieldy tools than the tag cloud. And where you have forums, you have discussion that creates all the crazy emergent community identities and monuments that will, years later, be chronicled by the Slarties of the world. —Alorael, who really would love to see a graph of forum numbers and forum users. He's not at all sure the former has gone down; big, old sites die just like all sites, and new ones are created all the time. The internet runs on the best and newest! As for number of people, well, he doesn't see a population crash coming anytime soon. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Easygoing Eyebeast Goldengirl Posted July 12, 2011 Share Posted July 12, 2011 We're retro and technologically behind the time? This is such shocking news for the users of Spiderweb Software! Interesting article, though. Social networking has seemed to be growing faster than forums, what with Facebook, Twitter, now Google+, and all the others. It's good to know that, between the unique community we've developed, and the steady stream of games to keep the content on these fora recent, we've got some security. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Easygoing Eyebeast Dintiradan Posted July 12, 2011 Share Posted July 12, 2011 For me, social networks and message boards serve different purposes. I use social networks to discuss a variety of topics with people I already know in meatspace. I use message boards to discuss specific topics with people across the globe. Social networks don't have the same emergent community as message boards do, but then again, the point of social networks are to model existing communities, not create new ones. One trend I am seeing is the use of Google/Facebook/whatever accounts for logging into third-party sites (usually comment threads). I wouldn't be surprised to see message board software five years down the road have more integration with social networks. When that day comes, I guess I'm making a second Facebook account. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hatchling Cockatrice Aoslare Posted July 12, 2011 Share Posted July 12, 2011 That day is already here for me. Google+'s insistence on integrating with my gmail account is extremely frustrating. The problem is that since you use one login for all google servers, it's not practical to have one google account for google+ and one for gmail. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Easygoing Eyebeast Dantius Posted July 12, 2011 Share Posted July 12, 2011 BREAKING NEWS! BREAKING NEWS! MEDIA OUTLETS EXAGGERATE CURRENT TRENDS AND SENSATIONALIZE TO INCREASE READERSHIP! YOU HEARD IT HERE FIRST! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hatchling Cockatrice Randomizer Posted July 12, 2011 Share Posted July 12, 2011 I'm all for other people using social media to communicate if it means they won't come here. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Magnificent Ornk Ephesos Posted July 12, 2011 Share Posted July 12, 2011 Truthfully, I think message boards have been out of date in a mainstream sense for years now, ever since the "shout into the void what was on your sandwich" model of communication apparently won out over the "discuss common ground within a community". Or you can just argue that "common ground" became "inane garbage" and "a community" became "everyone who ever has or will exist". Either way, I still prefer this model, even if I don't come around as much as I used to. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kyshakk Koan Skwish-E Posted July 12, 2011 Share Posted July 12, 2011 I keep looking ofr a good Antisocial Network to join. You know, like "Not Your Space", "Outta My Face Book", "Spitter", or something like that. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ineffable Wingbolt Arch-Mage Solberg Posted July 12, 2011 Share Posted July 12, 2011 Originally Posted By: Skwish-E I keep looking ofr a good Antisocial Network to join. You know, like "Not Your Space", "Outta My Face Book", "Spitter", or something like that. Those are some funny names. How would an Antisocial network work? Post #575 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Understated Ur-Drakon Earth Posted July 12, 2011 Share Posted July 12, 2011 imagine these boards at fb, there would be n+1 answers and chitchat and proper answer would get buried under those. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Magnificent Ornk Student of Trinity Posted July 12, 2011 Share Posted July 12, 2011 It would be a diary. Offline. With a lock. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kyshakk Koan Karoka Posted July 12, 2011 Share Posted July 12, 2011 I'd like to read it some day. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hatchling Cockatrice Alorael at Large Posted July 13, 2011 Author Share Posted July 13, 2011 Originally Posted By: Ephesos Truthfully, I think message boards have been out of date in a mainstream sense for years now, ever since the "shout into the void what was on your sandwich" model of communication apparently won out over the "discuss common ground within a community". Or you can just argue that "common ground" became "inane garbage" and "a community" became "everyone who ever has or will exist". Either way, I still prefer this model, even if I don't come around as much as I used to. Message boards were full of sandwiches and other inane garbage before the next-gen social networks, and plenty of conversations even on these enlightened boards are pretty stupid. I think it's the nature of humans to babble about inanities. It satisfies something deep within us, and I'm sure the psychologists and sociologists and linguists and psycholinguists and psychosociologists and sociolinguists and sociopsycholinguists have already worked on analyzing that fact extensively. —Alorael, who draws a distinction between an asocial network, which really isn't a network, and an antisocial network, which rapidly ceases to be a network in horrifying ways. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Magnificent Ornk Ephesos Posted July 13, 2011 Share Posted July 13, 2011 Originally Posted By: Megalopolis 2011 Message boards were full of sandwiches and other inane garbage before the next-gen social networks, and plenty of conversations even on these enlightened boards are pretty stupid. I think it's the nature of humans to babble about inanities. It satisfies something deep within us, and I'm sure the psychologists and sociologists and linguists and psycholinguists and psychosociologists and sociolinguists and sociopsycholinguists have already worked on analyzing that fact extensively. Ah yes, but my point was that at least here there's a tendency to discuss some of the same types of sandwiches. And over time, a community is more likely to emerge, built upon our common sandwich preferences. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Well-Actually War Trall The Ratt Posted July 13, 2011 Share Posted July 13, 2011 But then there's the people who come in and say they like wraps, just to create controversy. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Magnificent Ornk Student of Trinity Posted July 13, 2011 Share Posted July 13, 2011 Don't feed the trolls. They don't like sandwiches. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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