Tumbleweeds

 

Isn’t it sad when a once vibrant forum has just (naturally) withered away? I was a HUGE fan of a forum at YOUR TAX DOLLARS AT WORK. This was mainly a CSI forum and during my CSI phase, was where I’d catch up with all the CSI news and gossip. Getting some episodes before they aired and discussing them (and WITHOUT A TRACE) with fellow fans. The forum was lively, full of debate and creative talents. The members of the forum would create videos, photo-shop graphics (desktop wall-papers etc) and were all (as far as I could tell) good people.

I popped back in today, and the fire message to great me was:

Ok, so I’ve not been here for 3 years +, no problem.

But then I started seeing threads that hadn’t been updated since 2012 and a fair few “Where is everyone” type posts…

I suppose it happens, and I know it’s happened to a fair few forums I’ve frequented over the years. After all, I’ve been using the internet (on and off) since 1995 so many sites have come and gone in that time.

I used to be a BIG reader of Newsgroups (anyone remember those?) uk.media.tv.buffy-v-slayer was one (I think), along with many computing ones where I offered my (megre) knowledge to help fix people’s computing problems.

I remember using the DEJANEWS service to log-in to newsgroups from Uni as I couldn’t get on the NNTP servers from Uni. This was before Googel gobbled it up. Again, as time moves forward, many of these discussion places are vacant, filled only with SPAM posts trying to extort money out of you after a fashion. Now all anybody things when NEWSNET is mentioned is piracy. Which is sad as it was an awesome place to meet and chat.

Now, a large number of groups have sprang up on Facebook but I honestly don’t think that Facebook is the perfect home for this. It’s difficult to find posts, conversations get lost quickly (unlike on a message-board) and a lot of the pages are taken up with pictures rather than text-posts.

I know message-boards are still around, but I feel (though please correct me) that their usage has declined. If that is a good thing or a bad thing I’m unable to decide right now.

At the end of the day, the internet is a tool to allow us to communicate with each other. TV message-boards were just one of the places where I found a home and like-minded people to communicate with. Good times.