~Hakurei Shrine~ > Touhou Addict Recovery Center |
Revitalizing the forums, some motivation |
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williewillus:
TLDR * Forums are important because * The community is self-determined instead of at the mercy of Discord/Reddit/IG/Twitter * Long form discussion boards are a healthy addition to ephemeral communications like Discord * They allow historical archival of what the fandom was like * Revitalizing the forums only takes a few active people. I will be active here and responding to any new posts daily, and I invite you to do the same. This post is not really a direct call to action to improve the forum, but meant to lay out why I believe forums are more crucial than ever to a fandom and community, even in 2023 where we have Facebook, IG, Twitter, Tiktok, Reddit, Discord, etc. I hope to send and circulate it around the community to encourage more activity here on the oldest forums in the west, MoTK. What Are Forums? You're looking at one right now! Common in the 2000's and into the 2010's before the dominance of social media, forums were websites hosted by fans that acted like message boards. There are a variety of subboards for various topics, and members can start new threads of topics. For example, a thread for discussion about the new game Touhou 19 as it comes out, or the Touhou World Cup matches that are happening soon. Other members can then post replies, which bumps that thread up to the top of the list in its subforum. There is no ranking of posts or "algorithm", for better or worse. Why Does It Matter? Self-Determination This website has been run by fans and for fans for nearly two decades. Transfers of ownership have happened, but it's always remained in the hands of fans. This means that we can chart our own path and set our own vision of what our community should be like, instead of what Reddit or Twitter (gross) or (insert next viral social media network) wants it to be like. It's hard work, but the benefit is well worth it. Tangentially, I'm also really grateful we as a community have congregated around a self-determined wiki, TouhouWiki, instead of using a garbage hosted wiki on wikia/fandom.com. The Minecraft wiki hosted on fandom.com has devolved into an unusable mess, at the mere whims of these large companies who care nothing about our specific community, just that you use their service. Being standalone and independent is vital in this regard. Long Form Discussion Forums encourage reading your community's messages and composing thoughtful longer-form responses. It's a slower and more distinct vibe than the fast-paced, more chaotic and ephemeral vibe that a chatroom like IRC or Discord gives you, but one that is necessary. Ever since forums and Facebook groups have declined, there really isn't a space for this anymore in the broader internet. Reddit comes closest, but its algorithmic ranking system usually means whatever art that was posted most recently is at the top, and long-term long-form discussion about e.g. gameplay just gets buried immediately with no comments. I'm not saying we should all quit Discord, just that a short form chatroom like Discord should be paired with a long-form discussion board like forums. Historical Archival The most important point of the three, in my opinion, is that forums allow open historical archival. It is incredible when you have a long-running community forum that stretches back for decades, what sorts of things you can see by going back and looking. For example, on MoTK v2, we have history going all the way back to the launch of UFO. You can go there right now, today, and read how people felt about those games when they came out. This is precious and valuable history about our community and fandom that should be and is preserved. Nowadays, all discussion happens in locked-down, scattered, and fragmented Discord guilds. Not only does that discourage thoughtful discussion as mentioned earlier, it's also impossible to archive -- Google and Wayback Machine have no way of reading a Discord guild's chat logs. If a message is not pinned and is older than 3 days, it may as well not have existed. I see this happening especially in the Touhoufest Discord. There is a "2023 highlights" channel, which is just pictures and videos posted in the channel. What happens if Discord ever dies? Or Touhoufest concludes and the guild is wind down? All of those memories would be lost. History is something that is written down, and if we lose those records, then future fans will have no idea how things were like. This is the most important reason why I long for the revitalization of old-style forums, for communities that I really care about. Great, How Do I Help? These Forums are Dead I admit that currently MoTK is a bit dead outside of occasional news and the Party Games, but revitalizing forums only takes a few active people. MoTK still receives some amount of lurkers every day, and just a few active posters can encourage those lurkers to themselves be active, and a healthy cycle can proceed from there. I'm trying my hardest to post my commentary on recent events in the community on the forums as well as other things that I might have just dumped on Reddit or in a Discord channel. I invite you to join me as well. Right now I try to come on the forums at least once per day and respond to anything, so you might see me a lot on the various threads. Come say hi! I don't bite. I hope you can join me to ensure our community continues to leave a lasting written history for decades to come. |
williewillus:
Note: This is in TARC instead of Resurrection Butterfly because the latter is not open to logged-out users (for some reason). |
CyberAngel:
I remember some wiseguy saying forums are useless now that Discord is a thing. I laugh at that every time I'm looking through some ancient discussion on MotKII archive. |
williewillus:
--- Quote from: CyberAngel on May 06, 2023, 05:54:28 PM ---I remember some wiseguy saying forums are useless now that Discord is a thing. I laugh at that every time I'm looking through some ancient discussion on MotKII archive. --- End quote --- That reminds me, the absolute nerve Discord has to add so-called "forums" to their guilds that are just lists of chat threads. No, that is not a forum lol. If the message box is a single thin line at the bottom and enter sends the message instead of adding a new line, it's not a forum, it's chat. |
Felis-Licht:
I've admittedly been less active here (and overall) due to other priorities, but I agree that I'd like to see the forum have more activity and an archive for people to look up things. I don't like how Discord's so isolated from the web sometimes. |
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