In defence of the forum

[Ivan Sorensen]

Now this might be preaching to the choir, but I got to think after conversations I had with Mike from here as well as with one of my friends.

I’m not huge on social media but it is undeniable that it can be useful in helping create a community around something. THe Five Parsecs group on Facebook is huge (and I had nothing to do with getting that running), Discord servers allow real time interaction, back on Google+ (RIP) the RPG circles were really creative and inspiring.

But what all of these lack (or only do poorly) is permanency to information. Forums remain the optimal choice for actually finding stuff. How often have you had to solve a computer problem or find a rules question for a board game and its an old forum post that springs to the rescue?

That is not to say forums don’t have other advantages too. I think the slower pace can be helpful and I see much longer replies and posts on forums than I do elsewhere, but I think that is a really underrated feature, particularly for history and crafting adjacent nerds.

[Mike]

/presses like button rather than engages/

[Not Connard Sage]

FaceBook is useless for forum type stuff, unless you want to wade through lotsandlotsandlotsandlots of old toss.

I do wonder why Sam Mustafa gave up on BB forum software and moved to FB. I suspect hacking was a big part of it.

Obvious contrarian and passive aggressive old prat, who is taken far too seriously by some and not seriously enough by others.

[willz]

It’s all about doing research, finding information from different sources and understanding the information that is available and using the information for your hobby.  Sadly a lot of fellow hobbyists are slightly lazy and want information at their fingertips instantly.

[Mike]

FB also hides a lot of information from google searches, forcing you to search FB, and that is assuming the stuff is in a public FB group or page.
If the stuff is in a private FB group…

[Not Connard Sage]

I don’t see what instant gratification has to do with anything that Ivan wrote.

Obvious contrarian and passive aggressive old prat, who is taken far too seriously by some and not seriously enough by others.

[Mike]

FB and other social media had the advantage of allowing direct media uploads, though ofc forums allow that now too.

[Mike]

Not Connard Sage wrote:

I don’t see what instant gratification has to do with anything that Ivan wrote.

This?

Ivan Sorensen wrote:

I think the slower pace can be helpful and I see much longer replies and posts on forums than I do elsewhere, but I think that is a really underrated feature, particularly for history and crafting adjacent nerds.

[Not Connard Sage]

Mike wrote:

Not Connard Sage wrote:

I don’t see what instant gratification has to do with anything that Ivan wrote.

This?

Ivan Sorensen wrote:

I think the slower pace can be helpful and I see much longer replies and posts on forums than I do elsewhere, but I think that is a really underrated feature, particularly for history and crafting adjacent nerds.

Well, you might get instant replies on FB, but if you want to refer back to them for any reason, it’s a bum ache finding them again.

Obvious contrarian and passive aggressive old prat, who is taken far too seriously by some and not seriously enough by others.

[Mike]

Ivan Sorensen wrote:

How often have you had to solve a computer problem or find a rules question for a board game and its an old forum post that springs to the rescue?

Or blogs. I like blogs.

[Patrice]

I agree with what has been said …I suppose that many people use more their phone than their computer now, which can be a reason for some of them to be less active (or not at all) on forums and blogs, less practical on a small screen.

http://www.argad-bzh.fr/argad/en.html
https://www.anargader.net/

[Paint it Pink]

Mike wrote:

Ivan Sorensen wrote:

How often have you had to solve a computer problem or find a rules question for a board game and its an old forum post that springs to the rescue?

Or blogs. I like blogs.

Have an upvote, or a like. Oh well, here’s the comment instead.

So meta…

One is good, more is better
http://panther6actual.blogspot.co.uk/
http://ashleyrpollard.blogspot.co.uk/

[Thuseld]

I am a member of all the usual suspect groups on FB, and some specific groups pertaining to rulesets. They provide me with photos of gorgeous looking tables, and some cool ideas. I get a lot of inspiration there. If I ask a question it gets answered pretty quickly and I can access it easily on my phone in real-ish time.

However, I much prefer using an internet forum. Everything is in date order so easier to find. Some images don’t load, fair enough, but for the most part things posted 10 years ago aren’t that hard to find. I like the interaction, but then if I think about it, I am not going to surf through an internet forum in the evening because I don’t really want to sit in front of a computer in my free time.

Experiments here: http://inexperiencedmodelmaker.blogspot.co.uk/

Tranquil Stars updates: https://tranquilstars.wordpress.com

[Mike]

Thuseld wrote:

but then if I think about it, I am not going to surf through an internet forum in the evening because I don’t really want to sit in front of a computer in my free time.

Same, but I also don’t want to use my phone in an evening either, I would rather paint or watch a film, or read,  or do anything other than doomscrolling.
Though this is easier said than done, as a weaning off method, when I can’t be bothered to paint of an evening (which is a fair bit at the moment due to reduced energy levels, weight loss diet) I try to look at blogs or dare I say it, other forums rather than just endless scrolling..

Maybe we should all be in a giant whatsapp group and when some messages it, we tell them to naff off and go and paint/read/play/use a forum instead!

During ‘working hours’ I use my laptop for here. During the evening I use my phone.

[Thuseld]

Mike wrote:

Same, but I also don’t want to use my phone in an evening either, I would rather paint or watch a film, or read, or do anything other than doomscrolling.

I have been actively trying to turn away from doomscrolling over the past couple of months. I have been reading a book and spending more time on my hobbies. When I paint I will have a laptop in front of me with something playing – I then find I will go on forums. But I won’t sit just looking at fora and blogs of an evening.

Experiments here: http://inexperiencedmodelmaker.blogspot.co.uk/

Tranquil Stars updates: https://tranquilstars.wordpress.com

[Thomaston]

Forums for the win.

I’ve been following a long ass multi-year discussion on the NH90 helicopter and its failure. The chronology of information, specilation, validation and disproven as they become public can’t be matched by other formats. Blogs and articles can only be so long and they’re very limited by information at the time.

[Ivan Sorensen]

Maybe we should all be in a giant whatsapp group and when some messages it, we tell them to naff off and go and paint/read/play/use a forum instead!

“If you got time to post, you got time to paint!”

[MartinR]

Forums are great, but you can just tell by the every dwindling numbers of people on them, that isn’t how much of the rest of the gaming population feels. I hardly even bother looking at groups.io since yahoo groups closed.

WhatsApp is also great,  but only if restricted to a few select people you know. I’m on quite a few FB gaming groups and they are largely a waste of space, and there so many…

My favourite medium is blogs, you can actually find interesting stuff on those.

"Mistakes in the initial deployment cannot be rectified" - Helmuth von Moltke

[Ivan Sorensen]

For facebook it depends a LOT on the group in question.
I don’t tend to stick around for long, since a lot of them are just an endless series of pictures with 1 or 2 comments in reply.

[Mike]

That is often the case, in the one I run/moderate I try to encourage conversation about the models shown, but sometimes it is not easy.
People just seem to want likes….

[Andrew Beasley]

Mike wrote:

…People just seem to want likes….

Hunting for recognition and 15 mins of fame?

For me:
Social Media = Transitory Trends
Forums = Information

It’s worth remembering Facebook was the follow up to MZs rapidly closed site designed to get its users to rate one another’s photos (it let users compare two student photos side-by-side and determine who was “hot” and who was “not”) – it was never designed for permanence – just the latest trends. Twitter looked to replace SMS and give your status to your friends – and no history was designed in or planned.

[Shaun Travers]

I like forums.  Like Martin my favourite medium for consuming gaming content is blogs.  You get  lot of depth out of blog posts.  So in order: blogs, forums, and then trailing those two is social media.

[Author]

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