Why are these forums so dead?

[spudmunkey]

Also, going hand-in-hand with an increasingly-heavily-handed moderation (or maybe even being a major reason for it), you have more and more people and entities (both government and non-government) wanting to hold content hosts (from 1-person website owners to multi-national, many-billion-dollar corporations) to be held responsible for the things their users post there.

[Nombrecomun]

I'd wager that most under 40 rarely use a dedicated computer/laptop for social media, and forums like this are not designed for a smart phone, touch interface.

Yep.

[Koshchei]

Also, going hand-in-hand with an increasingly-heavily-handed moderation (or maybe even being a major reason for it), you have more and more people and entities (both government and non-government) wanting to hold content hosts (from 1-person website owners to multi-national, many-billion-dollar corporations) to be held responsible for the things their users post there.

Not sure this holds water. In terms of moderation, the opposite holds true for me -- a huge turn-off was the amount of nonsense posted by a small number of vocal critics who proclaimed doom every chance they got because they didn't like Jeff's bombastic personality, that Kiesel was making headless guitars, that Kiesel wasn't sufficiently Carvin for them, etc. A few of them didn't even own any Kiesel guitars. I wish that the mods here had acted sooner with a bunch of them.

[spudmunkey]

Also, going hand-in-hand with an increasingly-heavily-handed moderation (or maybe even being a major reason for it), you have more and more people and entities (both government and non-government) wanting to hold content hosts (from 1-person website owners to multi-national, many-billion-dollar corporations) to be held responsible for the things their users post there.

Not sure this holds water. In terms of moderation, the opposite holds true for me -- a huge turn-off was the amount of nonsense posted by a small number of vocal critics who proclaimed doom every chance they got because they didn't like Jeff's bombastic personality, that Kiesel was making headless guitars, that Kiesel wasn't sufficiently Carvin for them, etc. A few of them didn't even own any Kiesel guitars. I wish that the mods here had acted sooner with a bunch of them.

I guess I was thinking about it more in the "off topic" direction. Conversations can easily turn to sensitive topics (quite often by chest-pokers looking to stir up a reaction anyway). This forum had no "backstage lounge" for years, after a crack down on the old off-topic conversations. Almost every forum I've been a part of, no matter how narrow the focus, always ended up with all sorts threads about photography, religion, guns, computers, sports, politics, etc....and quite often those threads would bet shut down, people banned, etc. I think hand-in-hand with many places LIMITING those kinds of conversations was the growing availability of all-purpose forums like Facebook, Reddit, etc where it's one-stop shopping for all of your e-conversations.

In regards to cracking down more on Kiesel-dissenters, that's a double-edged sword. As it is, you see comments all the time on the facebook group accusing Kiesel of deleting complaint threads...but honestly that's more to blame on Facebook being absolute dog stuff in terms of archiving and searchability, and people deleting their own threads than Kiesel deleting it themselves unless it got WAY out of hand and often off-topic, with accusations being throwing from all directions...

[Koshchei]

Yeah, I totally agree with you on all points here.

[spudmunkey]

TIL, this forum auto-corrects the british/irish version of the s-word (with the e at the end) to "stuff". It also changes one of the d-words to "dang", but amusingly doesn't touch the c-word.

[HarlowTheFish]

TIL, this forum auto-corrects the british/irish version of the s-word (with the e at the end) to "stuff". It also changes one of the d-words to "dang", but amusingly doesn't touch the c-word.

I don't think it used to because I have plenty of posts cursing out stuff from a year or two ago, but it definitely covers up my more colorful expletive-laden descriptions of stuff nowadays.

[ElfDude]

TIL, this forum auto-corrects the british/irish version of the s-word (with the e at the end) to "stuff". It also changes one of the d-words to "dang", but amusingly doesn't touch the c-word.

It ignores the MF word. I only know that because one was recently reported and I had to edit it myself.

One other theory as to why the forum is so dead...that ElfDude guy is just so obnoxious that no one wants to be here with him.

[helldorado]

One other theory as to why the forum is so dead...that ElfDude guy is just so obnoxious that no one wants to be here with him.

You always got me!

[UnexplodedCow]

I kind wish that I could've seen the forums at their peak, or attended one of the fabled meets. It's that loss of comradery that seems to permeate the forums, except for a few of us lurkers and hangabouts.

[canon_mutant]

. . . and a few designated dyslexic old frats