Future of boards.ie lack of young blood

Oranage2

Young people have better things to be doing then sitting and interneting all day. The ones that's do have much more choice like Facebook, Twitter, reddit etc. And since 90% of internet entertainment is hearing contravsial views boards has killed that with its heavy moderation.

The_Valeyard

Oranage2 wrote: »

Young people have better things to be doing then sitting and interneting all day. The ones that's do have much more choice like Facebook, Twitter, reddit etc. And since 90% of internet entertainment is hearing contravsial views boards has killed that with its heavy moderation.

And the billions of apps and games to choose from.

Boards is for the disgruntleed, perturbed and folk set in their ways.



Rabble, rabble, rabble.

The_Valeyard

suicide_circus wrote: »

100% this.
Boards.ie as a platform does not offer the youff of today what they want - a narcissistic soapbox for them to duckface on.

Turtyturd

Most people on boards don’t care what others have to say either. Just look at the serial thread starters on AH, spew their rubbish in the op and then disappear out of the thread or reply to some post reiterating their original post rather than debating or addressing other people’s points.

Have said before but I think boards is changing it’s purpose. Unsure of which film to watch? There’s a great recommendation thread, involved in a job competition? There’s a thread with information, have a legal issue? There might be an outdated thread with someone having a similar enough issue to point you in the right direction.

Kuva

We went through all this in feedback, many many times in thread after thread, all that was wrong with the site and it was all ignored.

Then the new guy got fed up with the complaints and shut it all down and it's his way or the highway now.

Boards made a profit though so he probably got a clap on the back even though the course he's put the site on will be the end of it.

ytpe2r5bxkn0c1

Turtyturd wrote: »

Most people on boards don’t care what others have to say either. Just look at the serial thread starters on AH, spew their rubbish in the op and then disappear out of the thread or reply to some post reiterating their original post rather than debating or addressing other people’s points.

.

Just don't tar all of Boards with the After Hours brush. There is a myriad of excellent forums, on many topics, that are insightful, informative, entertaining, balanced and constructive.

Don Kiddick

Henry Short Graveyard wrote: »

Just don't tar all of Boards with the After Hours brush. There is a myriad of excellent forums, on many topics, that are insightful, informative, entertaining, balanced and constructive.

But AH is what? 50-60% of the traffic?

Lia_lia

I joined Boards when I was 14/15, in 2004. Didn't post much. Was mainly asking questions about the Junior/Leaving cert. I do remember those forums being very active. Only in the last 6 or 7 years I started posting more.

I'm not a good example though really as there wasn't really any social media when I joined Boards. Young people have their places to go online (Facebook, Reddit, Instagram etc) whereas there wasn't really anywhere except message boards/chat room in 2004..

Anesthetize

The music forums have become a sorry sight in the last few years. When I joined under my original account in 2005 there was probably about 10 times more activity, and far more people who actively seeked out newer music.

Now nearly all the forums apart from Gigs & Events, and perhaps Rock & Metal to an extent, are only sporadically active. But even the Rock & Metal forum itself is in a sorry state, with boring saps who only seem to talk about Metallica, Guns n' Roses and Pearl Jam live shows. No proper music discussion in there any more.

Don Kiddick

Anesthetize wrote: »

The music forums have become a sorry sight in the last few years. When I joined under my original account in 2005 there was probably about 10 times more activity, and far more people who actively seeked out newer music.

Now nearly all the forums apart from Gigs & Events, and perhaps Rock & Metal to an extent, are only sporadically active. But even the Rock & Metal forum itself is in a sorry state, with boring saps who only seem to talk about Metallica, Guns n' Roses and Pearl Jam live shows. No proper music discussion in there any more.

Discussion of Pearl Jam is not boring!!!
The 3 wise men brought the baby Jesus copies of Ten, Vs and a 1996 Irish tour poster...endorsed by God!!

But I take your point....it's not just the music forum, local forums, even some.ot the sports forums are full of the same monotonous rubbish.

CelticRambler

KKkitty wrote: »

AvB wouldn't lower himself to merely hook up and have a clatter of chiselers. He'd find a woman he has an admiration for and take her on the first flight away from where they met and whisper sweet nothings in her ear. He'd regale stories of his many voyages around the world. He'd buy her an expensive evening gown and bring her to the nearest operatic performance in town whilst wearing his finest garments handmade by the most exclusive tailors he knows. They'd dine in the the most exquisite restaurant with champagne and oysters to make sure her senses were heightened. They'd retire to his boudoir and make love in the most beautiful, sensuous way

I'm no AvB, but I can't get any woman to agree even half of that. Instead of being whisked away, all they want to do is kill themselves working to pay the bills that come with a live of capitalistic slavery. :mad:

Then they come on boards.ie and share their misery!

King George VI

Don Kiddick wrote: »

Discussion of Pearl Jam is not boring!!!
The 3 wise men brought the baby Jesus copies of Ten, Vs and a 1996 Irish tour poster...endorsed by God!!

But I take your point....it's not just the music forum, local forums, even some.ot the sports forums are full of the same monotonous rubbish.

That's why I don't post in them any more. Also back in the day when I did post in them, there wasn't any other places that did the same job for me. Nowadays there are far more and less moderated places I can go for what I want. Reddit/Imgur for memes instead of getting around ten funny pics per day from YLYL threads years ago, Reddit for music discussion with parts of the site dedicated to specific bands - instead of one thread per band that gets derailed easily, Spotify for new music suggestions, Reddit again for general conversations..etc

I'm only using boards right now because it isn't blocked in work.

Grayson

King George VI wrote: »

My theory is that young most people aren't interested in hearing/reading what others have to say, which is what an internet forum is by definition. They're only concerned with other people hearing what they have to say and other people seeing their pics. Which is why they stick to Twitter and Instagram and Snapchat these days because there isn't really much of a back and forth thing. Instead of "here's my idea, what do you think?". it's just "Here's my post, like it"... Which kinda makes me a bit sad when I think about it.

You do realise twitter etc have posts on them that aren't your own? And boards has a like button?

10000maniacs

Used to be a great forum but then a lack of suitable mods especially in the Politics forums ruined it. Mods with too much left and lliberal bias and such. Also the transport forums are full of CIE fanboys ready to shoot down any critisism . ETC

andekwarhola

Anesthetize wrote: »

But even the Rock & Metal forum itself is in a sorry state, with boring saps who only seem to talk about Metallica, Guns n' Roses and Pearl Jam live shows. No proper music discussion in there any more.

Might be the bang of superior neckbeard that's driving the punters away?

weldoninhio

10000maniacs wrote: »

Used to be a great forum but then a lack of suitable mods especially in the Politics forums ruined it. Mods with too much left and lliberal bias and such. Also the transport forums are full of CIE fanboys ready to shoot down any critisism . ETC

100% this. I had my card marked in a certain forum on here for liking some posts in it. Ridiculous.

Apart from everything else, the tech is getting very dated.

I just reported a spammer there, got taken to a page where I have to click report, get taken to another page saying "Please enter a reason for reporting this post.", then back again, type in a word, and finally done.

I'm not even a professional web-developer and I'd have that done with an Ajax-loaded form that gives a little optional text box and the user would never leave the page.

On mobile, I still use the green theme I've used for a decade on Desktop mode.


It's really quiet amazing that it wasn't kept upto date. If you have software like Discord / FB etc. out there, people get used to the ease of use.

ToddyDoody

I think after hours gave out about people on the dole too much. Remember that it was the under 30s who made up the lions share of this cohort.

Arghus

Anesthetize wrote: »

The music forums have become a sorry sight in the last few years. When I joined under my original account in 2005 there was probably about 10 times more activity, and far more people who actively seeked out newer music.

Now nearly all the forums apart from Gigs & Events, and perhaps Rock & Metal to an extent, are only sporadically active. But even the Rock & Metal forum itself is in a sorry state, with boring saps who only seem to talk about Metallica, Guns n' Roses and Pearl Jam live shows. No proper music discussion in there any more.

Have to agree with you wholeheartedly about the music forums: they're in the sorriest state of all of the once busy corners of Boards.The amount of traffic and activity, outside of Gigs and Events, is pathetic.

It's long past time for a cull of several of the forums down there. If it was up to me I'd lump everything together into one forum, seriously, and let the chips fall where they may. Right now the entire music section is on life support and approaching death fast.

Part of the fun of music fandom, particularly on the internet, is having people with different tastes and listening habits all together in one place: breathes a bit of life into things,. Right now down there, everything is extremely neat and organised - and slowly dying away in their own little sub-forums of indifference.

Muahahaha

Wibbs wrote: »

Moderation is a bit of a red herring, but the perception of Boards moderation has not been helped by it. I would say thread closures happen too damned often. Board's, now you're talking locked.

Threads being locked and discussion being shut down is my single biggest pet hate on Boards. I am loathe to criticise the Mods because they generally do a good job but there are some Mods who seem to lock threads for no other valid reason other than that they can. Unless a thread is in danger of bringing Boards into legal trouble then it should remain open IMO. A good example of this recently was the Trevor Deely thread which was one of the most viewed and active threads of all year. It got locked for no apparent sensible reason. I only realised it had been locked when I searched for it a couple of weeks ago. Reason I was looking for it was that there was new CCTV footage shown on RTE and I felt it merited discussion. But low and behold the thread had been locked. Am I going to open a new one? No, because all the thousands of posts were in that one and thats where it should continue. Am I going to PM a Mod to ask for it to be re-opened? No chance, a Mod made the decision to shut discussion down so I am certainly not going to engage them practically begging for it to be re-opened.

Another grief has to how the Politics Cafe was butchered. It was one of the busiest forums on here and the debate was lively. I get that it was taking up time of the Mods but the solution to that is to recruit more Mods. The death of the Politics Cafe was not due to the Mods in any case, it was Admins further up the chain who made the disastrous decision to force people into having to ask for permission to post there. One week you had stacks of posters and the next week everyone just cleared out and went elsewhere. From what I can see they didnt end up in the main Politics forum so I can only presume they went to Reddit. It was a shambles of a decision and the fact that no-one has yet to do anything to tackle it makes it even worse, it is like the Admins behind the move do not want to admit that a mistake was made.

Discodog

Arghus wrote: »

Have to agree with you wholeheartedly about the music forums: they're in the sorriest state of all of the once busy corners of Boards.The amount of traffic and activity, outside of Gigs and Events, is pathetic.

It's long past time for a cull of several of the forums down there. If it was up to me I'd lump everything together into one forum, seriously, and let the chips fall where they may. Right now the entire music section is on life support and approaching death fast.

Part of the fun of music fandom, particularly on the internet, is having people with different tastes and listening habits all together in one place: breathes a bit of life into things,. Right now down there, everything is extremely neat and organised - and slowly dying away in their own little sub-forums of indifference.

This applies to a lot of forums. Galway City & Galway County spring to mind. Why not just Galway ?

Fr_Dougal

All these chat threads in forums are killing the forums too. What are you eating, where are you, annoying things etc. Turning forums into half a dozen cliquey chatty threads.

NollagShona

As opposed to: Evil Forgnier Mooslims tuk r jabs
Evil Mooslims raping Sweden
Evil refugees etc

Fr_Dougal

Fr_Dougal wrote: »

All these chat threads in forums are killing the forums too. What are you eating, where are you, annoying things etc. Turning forums into half a dozen cliquey chatty threads.

I disagree. They provide a warmth and sense of community away from the usual anger laden discussions around abortion and social welfare recipients.

tomwaterford

Fr_Dougal wrote: »

All these chat threads in forums are killing the forums too. What are you eating, where are you, annoying things etc. Turning forums into half a dozen cliquey chatty threads.

It is kind of disheartening to see those what aren't part of the cliques get flat out ignored on them

(I'm not againest them....but it's schoolyard stuff to just ignore a username yous don't know)

conorhal

Muahahaha wrote: »

Another grief has to how the Politics Cafe was butchered. It was one of the busiest forums on here and the debate was lively. I get that it was taking up time of the Mods but the solution to that is to recruit more Mods. The death of the Politics Cafe was not due to the Mods in any case, it was Admins further up the chain who made the disastrous decision to force people into having to ask for permission to post there. One week you had stacks of posters and the next week everyone just cleared out and went elsewhere. From what I can see they didnt end up in the main Politics forum so I can only presume they went to Reddit. It was a shambles of a decision and the fact that no-one has yet to do anything to tackle it makes it even worse, it is like the Admins behind the move do not want to admit that a mistake was made.

Yeah. There's something chillingly Orwellian about having to 'ask if you can have an opinion' that is approved. By all means, let me live or die on that hill, but having to ask permission to climb it? They should rename the forum to Politburo.

Fr_Dougal

tomwaterford wrote: »

It is kind of disheartening to see those what aren't part of the cliques get flat out ignored on them

(I'm not againest them....but it's schoolyard stuff to just ignore a username yous don't know)

That’s why all those threads had a strict and enforced “no chat” warning originally.

Arghus

Discodog wrote: »

This applies to a lot of forums. Galway City & Galway County spring to mind. Why not just Galway ?

I still post from time to time in the Galway City Forum myself. It's just about alive these days, just about.

I know it's just an example, but I can see why the distinction was made between Galway City and Galway County. All the discussion in the City forum was entirely City focused and there was a real community in there for a good long while: people knew each other, beers were semi regular, there were clubs and societies all orientated around the forum. It really was its own separate thing to the Galway County forum.

But it's just plodding along now, even the yearly entertaining bitchfest threads about Rag Week and The Races struggle to get going. I could see the point of amalgamation of the two forums at this stage, as they don't really have separate identities in many ways anymore.

tomwaterford

tomwaterford wrote: »

It is kind of disheartening to see those what aren't part of the cliques get flat out ignored on them

(I'm not againest them....but it's schoolyard stuff to just ignore a username yous don't know)

I'm not part of any clique but that doesn't stop me from engaging and joining in.

riffmongous

Some shocking evidence of the fall off in young people here on Boards

DCU forum
2009 -8500
2011 -5800
2013 -1500
2015 -1000
2016 -100

NUIM
2009 -11700
2011 -12000
2013 -6800
2015 -1500
2017 -90

UCD
2009 -16500
2011 -13600
2013 -6000
2015 -1500
2017- 496

Fr_Dougal

riffmongous wrote: »

Some shocking evidence of the fall off in young people here on Boards

DCU forum
2009 -8500
2011 -5800
2013 -1500
2015 -1000
2016 -100

NUIM
2009 -11700
2011 -12000
2013 -6800
2015 -1500
2017 -90

UCD
2009 -16500
2011 -13600
2013 -6000
2015 -1500
2017- 496

Wow...fall off a cliff...

riffmongous

Fr_Dougal wrote: »

Wow...fall off a cliff...

Yeah I was wondering if Boards was banned in unis or something , but sure everyone has a phone nowadays, back in the old days we had to go the computer room

beauf

o1s1n wrote: »

Boards.ie was completely ruined when the menu system was changed to the current one.

Previously folks would browse random forums as they were all immediately available in the dropdowns at the top of the page. You'd just hover your mouse and you'd see loads of places to discuss different things.

Now you've got four drop downs only, two of which arent even dedicated to discussion forums. There are way too many clicks to get to anything of substance.

Not only has this killed random sifting through forums (and as a result, traffic in a lot of them is at zero), I even find it difficult sometimes to find the forums I'm looking for.

This was the point I was making earlier. For me there was a night and difference in activity on may of the forums I used after this.

Even now when I search for information on something the results are mainly from before the re-design.

Buford T. Justice XIX

beauf wrote: »

This was the point I was making earlier. For me there was a night and difference in activity on may of the forums I used after this.

Even now when I search for information on something the results are mainly from before the re-design.

Do you not follow forums and click on the 'My forums' tab at the top right of the screen?

Lists all your forums and shows which have new posts, easy peasy.

_Kaiser_

For me, there's several "milestone" events that stand out as decisions that were completely wrong if the powers that be actually want to have a Boards.ie in the future

- Killing off the last incarnation of the Politics Cafe and replacing it with the castrated sanitised version that is now supposedly filling the gap rather than just dealing with the handful of truly problem posters and ignoring the complaints from the "grown up" Politics regulars who weren't happy with the traffic the Cafe was getting

- Similarly neutering Feedback. Again rather than deal with the issues and take on-board the huge numbers of genuinely constructive posts made by people, let's just ignore it by denying the platform in the first place

- In general I don't have many issues with Moderation, but there are a few forums where some individual Mods just can't be objective and really take "their" kingdoms far too seriously
A far bigger issue is the shutting down of high-traffic/current-event threads because posts don't fit with the "agreed" narrative (eg: any thread on the migration issue)

I've been here a long time, and most likely I'll still come here until the site goes offline, but less and less frequently. As it is I am spending more time on Reddit of late (something I previously just couldn't "get" and couldn't be arsed to.. but events like the above gave me the incentive to do something about it)

To be honest I'm genuinely surprised this thread is still going as they're normally locked long before they get this far

Kuva

beauf wrote: »

This was the point I was making earlier. For me there was a night and difference in activity on may of the forums I used after this.

Even now when I search for information on something the results are mainly from before the re-design.

Ah thats only temporary.

_Kaiser_

Buford T. Justice V wrote: »

Do you not follow forums and click on the 'My forums' tab at the top right of the screen?

Lists all your forums and shows which have new posts, easy peasy.

Yes (and I do it myself ) but that's not the point... with everything needlessly hidden away in the "temporary" (as I recall) menu, there are dozens of forums that most people probably don't even realise are there.

beauf

Buford T. Justice V wrote: »

Do you not follow forums and click on the 'My forums' tab at the top right of the screen?

Lists all your forums and shows which have new posts, easy peasy.

...What new posts?....:D

_Kaiser_

Fr_Dougal wrote: »

All these chat threads in forums are killing the forums too. What are you eating, where are you, annoying things etc. Turning forums into half a dozen cliquey chatty threads.

That's a big issue on one of the other popular forums here with new posters being made completely unwelcome by the "regulars". I've pointed it out a few times and to be fair one of the Mods PM'd me back only recently saying that they were trying to address it, but it's an uphill struggle.

Ironically it's probably tolerated to encourage traffic, but ends up doing the complete opposite. Boards is just not Twitter/Facebook/Reddit and the reasons people come here are not the same as those they go to those other sites for.

jeonahr

Buford T. Justice V wrote: »

Do you not follow forums and click on the 'My forums' tab at the top right of the screen?

Lists all your forums and shows which have new posts, easy peasy.

What if they're looking for information? I've encountered this myself when trying to find a forum on something and the latest forum I'd find would be from 5/6 years ago. The search engine isn't very good in my opinion.

tomwaterford

_Kaiser_ wrote: »

That's a big issue on one of the other popular forums here with new posters being made completely unwelcome by the "regulars". I've pointed it out a few times and to be fair one of the Mods PM'd me back only recently saying that they were trying to address it, but it's an uphill struggle.

Ironically it's probably tolerated to encourage traffic, but ends up doing the complete opposite. Boards is just not Twitter/Facebook/Reddit and the reasons people come here are not the same as those they go to those other sites for.

This is true most definitely....like never went to effort of pm anyone to complain (like it's not worth getting bothered over)



But did have at least one good friend (only found out I knew irl via PM) who used post very exact and good technical and helpful info and any questions/opinion he voiced/asked were just flat out ignored after a few weeks he just didn't bother anymore


(For clarity a regular could come in and ask similar question/voice similar opioions and they'd get feedback/discussion).....I think it's same forum were talking about

_Kaiser_

jeonahr wrote: »

What if they're looking for information? I've encountered this myself when trying to find a forum on something and the latest forum I'd find would be from 5/6 years ago. The search engine isn't very good in my opinion.

That's the other issue.. several key parts of the core functionality (like Search and a wholly committed to Touch version) is unfinished or was never fixed (like the aforementioned "temporary" menu on the Legacy site) which doesn't help navigation or use, and ultimately only puts people off even more.

_Kaiser_

tomwaterford wrote: »

This is true most definitely....like never went to effort of pm anyone to complain (like it's not worth getting bothered over)



But did have at least one good friend (only found out I knew irl via PM) who used post very exact and good technical and helpful info and any questions/opinion he voiced/asked were just flat out ignored after a few weeks he just didn't bother anymore

What I find in the forum I referred to is a new poster will ask a genuine question and is jumped on by the regulars for their ignorance or belittled with post after post of "witty" banter between themselves.

It's incredibly off-putting.. even for someone here years!

tomwaterford

_Kaiser_ wrote: »

What I find in the forum I referred to is a new poster will ask a genuine question and is jumped on by the regulars for their ignorance or belittled with post after post of "witty" banter between themselves.

It's incredibly off-putting.. even for someone here years!

90% sure we're talking about same forum now

Buford T. Justice XIX

tomwaterford wrote: »

This is true most definitely....like never went to effort of pm anyone to complain (like it's not worth getting bothered over)



But did have at least one good friend (only found out I knew irl via PM) who used post very exact and good technical and helpful info and any questions/opinion he voiced/asked were just flat out ignored after a few weeks he just didn't bother anymore


(For clarity a regular could come in and ask similar question/voice similar opioions and they'd get feedback/discussion).....I think it's same forum were talking about

That's a big problem across the site and across all sites, I think. I joined a forum in the last few months and posted regularly and it's only now that I'm accepted as being there for the long term and getting replies. I see something similar in F&F and try to answer new posters threads where possible as new posters tend to be ignored by most, I think.

It's not a Boards problem, it's a widespread problem across all sites, I think.

_Kaiser_

Buford T. Justice V wrote: »

That's a big problem across the site and across all sites, I think. I joined a forum in the last few months and posted regularly and it's only now that I'm accepted as being there for the long term and getting replies. I see something similar in F&F and try to answer new posters threads where possible as new posters tend to be ignored by most, I think.

It's not a Boards problem, it's a widespread problem across all sites, I think.

I don't know.. the forum I'm talking about naturally attracts a lot of people who haven't a clue about the topic but are looking for help from the most obvious source.

(I can name it if you like but I'm trying to be fair to the Mods)

Anyway, almost without fail will some smart-ass regular jump in with a completely unhelpful and insulting post, followed shortly thereafter by more from their "friends" and it deteriorates from there.

It's going on for years now and it's largely in part to the numerous chat threads on the forum in question coupled with some very hands-off/odd moderation from several of the Mods.

beauf

There is a post count snobbery on forums. People often will ignore a low count poster.

Thats true in real life though the new guy syndrome.

keith_sixteen

Not sure what's happening with boards but it's definitely not the enjoyable, make you laugh out loud, learn something new experience it used to be.

The Rugby forum in particular has gone to the dogs. The main Ireland team talk thread was closed for review for almost the whole month of December. There were a couple of challenging posters, but nothing that could not be sorted out with a bit of common sense moderation.

Instead, one of the regulars in there opened up a couple of threads mocking the posters. Absolute cringe. No explanation when the Ireland thread was suddenly re-opened.

Tom Mann Centuria

It's not hard for a mod to remember all his regular posters**, all mods should learn their regulars names to create a friendly atmosphere *




*If you're on mobile I mod Rugby League


**and have about 4 (albeit excellent) regular posters :pac: Early happy New Year!

Don Kiddick

Tom Mann Centuria wrote: »

It's not hard for a mod to remember all his regular posters**, all mods should learn their regulars names to create a friendly atmosphere *




*If you're on mobile I mod Rugby League


**and have about 4 (albeit excellent) regular posters :pac: Early happy New Year!

"*** Not real rugby ***