• Square Elite
  1. If you are having trouble logging in, check the box, "stay logged in" to fix the issue. Thanks! —KHP Staff
  2. Hi Guest, you may have noticed that we aren't khplanet.com anymore. For more information on why these changes are happening, check out our thread, Site Re-Brand Updates

Message boards are dying. :/

Discussion in 'General' started by Rogue, Mar 28, 2018.

  1. Rogue

    Rogue Member

    With the powerful, fast, and efficient facebook pages, Discord, communities built into consoles, and Twitter, message boards dedicated toward video games appear to be phasing out. This is sad, as I have been posting on gaming forums since at least 2003.
    I gain a lot of traction on my website, however, I'm even considering abandoning my forums side for a built in facebook page comment-feed, or using the popular Disqus platform for article comments. No one seems to want to sign up for dedicated forums. Does anyone agree?
     
  2. Derek

    Derek Well-Known Member

    Tbh It's impossible not to agree I think. I always had limited internet and so forums is all I could really use and not fry data. For years I've seen many die and many more near death.

    I do find it a great shame however.
     
  3. Become

    Become Resident Tashian Staff Member Moderator Content Writer

    It's quite interesting that you bring this topic up, @Rogue.

    Over the past few months, I've been in discussions with a group of roleplayers that have touched on this very subject. While the discussions as a whole have examined the situation in the context of forum-based roleplaying, it really transfers across all manners of message board activity. After all, a Roleplaying forum is just a microcosm of larger forum communities; the same traits that apply to the part apply to the whole on a much larger level.

    While mediums such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Discord, etc. Have indeed taken their share of activity away from boards, I've come to believe that another factor that has contributed significantly the slow decline in places such as this, lies within the culture of forum communities. The adjective that comes up often in the discussions I've participated in is "insular." Many forum communities, especially those that have been around for a decade or more, spent years developing and growing into their own identities. As in the case most communities, cultures, and sub-cultures within, spawned over time; forum sites have firmly established "norms," by which the majority of their populations abide.

    The issue is that these cultural norms have created a sort of wall, which has, by and large, caused many new faces that may have challenged the cultural norms, to be shunned, or hazed to the point of not even wanting to stay. The result: because the culture established by (now mostly retired veteran forum members) has perpetuated into a much smaller "new generation," the ability of forums to retain new membership to offset the departures of the old.

    Simply put, forums, in general, have, by and large, become cliques conditioned to respond negatively to those they view as outsiders. In all honesty, I feel that this is a factor more prevalent in the decline of forums than the rise of other social media options.
     

Share This Page