State of the Boards

[LGM]

Well.. m0ds brought up a good point yesterday in IRC. If you were there, you'll know exactly what this is about.

It explains itself, so just go and read it! :p

http://www.fbc-bettendorf.com/lgm/docs/state_of_boards.htm

[DGMacphee]

I'm going to stay out of giving my opinion on this one because I would like to hear what everyone, both old and new, have to say.

[LGM]

I didn't do this to cause argument or anything.. I was just interested on how they felt about the boards and what was going on.

[DGMacphee]

Nono, I don't mean I think there's going to be an arguement.

I mean, I want to listen and find out what people think are the problems and what they think are the solutions.

[PeaceMan]

There are a lot of people signed up here, but if you look at the members list you can see that only a few of them use the boards. There are a lot of people with no posts and people who havent posted in a long time.

[LGM]

Exactly my point!

[Barcik]

Well, I am now not exactly a 'newbie', not quite an 'oldbie'. I joined the forum in October, when there were around 500-600 registered members. And I do feel the change. It saddens me not to see people like Butcher and Helm more frequently, and I agree, that things are heading the wrong way. Unfortunately, this is a side-effect of popularity, and I believe that the priority is first and foremost to the widespread of AGS, not to the quality of the threads on the forums.

So, what can be done? I think that the people who have been with AGS long, such as DGMacphee and Evenwolf, and know the community need to act. How? Posting 'interesting topics', to quote LGM, posting on a high-level. In other words, to bring the quality up.

[Pumaman]

There are two points I think are important in relation to your essay:

1) "Hi, I'm new here" threads are a Good Thing, in my opinion. It's great when a newbie politely introduces themselves to the community.

2) From the responses of the 'oldbies', overall it just seems to be a natural moving on from AGS to other things. I didn't see any "I'm giving up this forum because it's crap" reasons, but people will gain and lose interest over time. Nobody sticks at anything forever.

I don't think there's any particular problem at the moment that needs to be addressed, personally.

[LGM]

I'm not saying the "I'm New" Threads are bad..

But when it's the only thing to read..  It's just kinda uninteresting..

I dunno.

[Barcik]

1) "Hi, I'm new here" threads are a Good Thing, in my opinion. It's great when a newbie politely introduces themselves to the community.

Slightly off-topic, but....

Chris, many forums have a separate boards for these "Hi, I'm new threads". With the recent amount of them, don't you think it would be wise to create one here?

[DGMacphee]

Actually, I had an interesting thought relating to what Chris said.

He posted this graph in another thread:

http://www.agsforums.com/forumages.jpg

Notice that the number of users declines with the increase of age after 21-23.

We hit a peak in our early 20s, then it slides down.

People are just moving on.

And it's sad, but it's true.

Things are never the same.

Which is why I think we need to call this the death of AGS - Generation 1 and the birth of AGS - Generation 2 -- it's something to be sad and happy about.

But just think of the newbies as a bunch of upcoming talent -- and the oldies as their mentors.

Like I said, it's just an idea.

Now, I'll shut up.

[m0ds]

Nice article LGM but CJ is kinda right, they didn't really say what I know you wanted to hear :p

However, my views remain the same. Boycott the Gen Gen board and make a game.

Boyd advised locking the Gen Gen forum. Do it! LOL

m0ds

[Nacho]

Well... The AGS users are growing incredibily high... but the community not.

Only one of each 20 or 30 newbies become a regular "poster" or will make a game. Where is the problem? We´re still a close community.

I mean... my working group is made by 4 guys and me. My friends are 10 or 12. No matter for me if the program that makes me being together to my friends is used by other 1,000 people or 10,000...

About the decission of making a new board for "Hello, i´m new here!"... Answer sincerelly... would you go to that board somedays? I won´t, and it would be a pitty not having the chance to know at least the names of that guys.

[Trapezoid]

I don't have any problems with this beautiful, beautiful community. What few trolls we get never last very long at all. Every time an oldbie fades away, a future oldbie fades in. This is really the most Utopian message board I've ever known.

[Pumaman]

Chris, many forums have a separate boards for these "Hi, I'm new threads". With the recent amount of them, don't you think it would be wise to create one here?

While I can see the benefit of seperating them off, I don't think a new forum would work. "I'm new" threads tend to have very little substance to them, and as Farlander says, regulars would probably never visit such a forum.

Perhaps we could do with a "Introduce yourself here" sticky thread though.

[Barcik]

That will do quite well too.

[Jimi]

i think that if you implemented that forum, people would post on it, but no "oldbies" would read it.

[rodekill]

This is the example I gave Mods when we discussed it yesterday.

Imagine you and three of your closest friends form a club about... let's say, cows.
So you and your friends hang out in your little clubhouse and talk about cows all day. One day one of your friend asks if he can invite someone to join the club. Great! The more the merrier! More people means more insight into cows!
Weeks pass and more people join. Friends of friends invite people and pretty soon your little clubhouse is packet full of people you don't really know that well.
And then people slowly stop talking about cows. They start talking about forks and bumblebees and all kinds of non-cow things.

I don't think that this means the ultimate downfall of AGS or anything. Things are just different.
I still talk to a lot of the 'olbies' on IM and IRC. Nothing's really been lost.
I just doubt that a forum with this much activity is really going to foster the kind of close relationships I have with some of the people I met here a few years ago.

GO AND MAKE GAMES, DAMMIT!

[Mikko]

What I think that was great attempt to make people closer few months ago, was the Team Challenge. Yeah, it turned out that no one managed to do the game in time that was set, but at least as a newbie like me, it was good to team-work a bit and get more inside with the older members.

I don't quite see the reason why many of the oldbies are against the General forum. As the thing is (liked stated also in this topic few times) that it's a simple fact that whatever you do or whatever you like, you get bored (maybe too big word to use, but) in it as time goes by. And thinking of that, I think it's only good that people have change to "take off" from AGS inside the AGS-community with General forum.

Also what can we do if someone finds his/her interest all gone? Wish him/her good luck in the future. It might be hard to do, but it's part of life some times. Part of "e-life" too, sadly.

I should write my posts when I'm awake so that some could understand, but... ...just try.

Having 1000+ people here shouldn't be a problem. Who says you should make friends with everyone? I mean let's suppose your in school or in big business. Do you know all your school- and work mates? Hardly.

People get to learn who they like and who they don't. It might give us a conflict here and there, but as long as you concentrate being friends with the ones you like and not fighting the ones you don't, everything should go just fine.

Well, maybe what I wanted to say is that as the community grows, don't try too hard to read everything about anything. That helps a lot.

Obviousness perhaps, hope I didn't bore anyone of the community.

[m0ds]

You just proved your other theory too Rode, you killed the conversation.

I still love you.


m0ds