Bring back crappy forums
tedium.co
Bring back crappy forums
1–10 of 376 posts
Re: Bring back crappy forums
#2I have a lot of sympathy with this. I use some topic specific old school web forums and they feel better all round than the discord channels/forums.
I suspect it's an age/attitude thing. The implicit "My forum my rules" autocracy shows its upsides on a well curated space: trolling and spam dealt with rapidly.
Re: Bring back crappy forums
#3I have a lot of sympathy with this. I use some topic specific old school web forums and they feel better all round than the discord channels/forums. I suspect it's an age/attitude thing. The implicit "My forum my rules" autocracy shows its upsides on a well curated space: trolling and spam dealt with rapidly.
It notably lacked up/downvoting which is a cancer foisted upon open discussion.
Discussions ran chronologically as they would in real life.
Imagine having a remote control you could point at people to increase and decrease their speaking volume. That's what voting is.
Re: Bring back crappy forums
#4I have a lot of sympathy with this. I use some topic specific old school web forums and they feel better all round than the discord channels/forums. I suspect it's an age/attitude thing. The implicit "My forum my rules" autocracy shows its upsides on a well curated space: trolling and spam dealt with rapidly.
It notably lacked up/downvoting which is a cancer foisted upon open discussion. Discussions ran chronologically as they would in real life. Imagine having a remote control you could point at people to increase and decrease their speaking volume. That's what voting is.
Remote mute control was contentious in early MBone apps. Lots of good discussion about why they were useful and when.
Cisco webex went out the door with one and it's wonderfully "undemocratic" and equally useful. Just stop. Done.
Volume, hadn't thought about it like that.
Re: Bring back crappy forums
#5I think the nostalgia here is misplaced. No one took the forums from us. They're still around. They're just not fun to use unless you're already invested in the community and its lore. And truth to be told, I don't want to become a part of the furnace enthusiasts community, set up an account, read ten pages of rules, and then get chastised by a moderator for posting in the wrong sub-forum just because I have a furnace maintenance question.
I think there are greater tragedies playing out on the internet than people preferring Reddit to phpBB.
Re: Bring back crappy forums
#6Oh how I miss old school forums. It’s crazy to me how communities are wholesale embracing discord, which just is not the right form factor at all for anything but ephemeral real time chat. I remember engaging in threads on real forums for literally years. It was so great
Re: Bring back crappy forums
#7I'm not sure I understand the difference between "crappy forums" and subreddits. They have all the same features. Tags function as sections. You can sort threads chronologically. Karma.
I suspect there's no actual difference, the author just liked the sort of people who were willing to deal with the traditional "crappy forum" interface for the sake of connecting around some niche hobby, and it provided enough friction to promote adherence to the community's culture.
There are just more people on the internet now. The problem always boils down to some version of Eternal September.
Re: Bring back crappy forums
#8I'm not sure I understand the difference between "crappy forums" and subreddits. They have all the same features. Tags function as sections. You can sort threads chronologically. Karma. I suspect there's no actual difference, the author just liked the sort of people who were willing to deal with the traditional "crappy forum" interface for the sake of connecting around some niche hobby, and it provided enough frictio…
The crappy forums don't have to let anyone register without a vouching process if they don't want to. They also don't accidentally end up on the Reddit Front Page and get swarmed by a mob of overly-enthusiastic or angry strangers who don't know or follow the community's etiquette.
Re: Bring back crappy forums
#9I have a lot of sympathy with this. I use some topic specific old school web forums and they feel better all round than the discord channels/forums. I suspect it's an age/attitude thing. The implicit "My forum my rules" autocracy shows its upsides on a well curated space: trolling and spam dealt with rapidly.
It notably lacked up/downvoting which is a cancer foisted upon open discussion. Discussions ran chronologically as they would in real life. Imagine having a remote control you could point at people to increase and decrease their speaking volume. That's what voting is.
The irony in me pressing the upvote button on this post…
Re: Bring back crappy forums
#10I'm not sure I understand the difference between "crappy forums" and subreddits. They have all the same features. Tags function as sections. You can sort threads chronologically. Karma. I suspect there's no actual difference, the author just liked the sort of people who were willing to deal with the traditional "crappy forum" interface for the sake of connecting around some niche hobby, and it provided enough frictio…
Forums aren’t subject to Reddit’s capital aligned tactics. Forums have a sign up barrier meaning the discussion is not at risk to random people not-interested in the forum topic can’t pile on to and troll your forum without work.
The people who are willing to work with a “crappy forum” ui are more likely interested in the topics being discussed, not the fluidity of the platform.
Very different and distinct intents even though the features might be the same.