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Providing topical community services can be extremely rewarding but at the same time extremely tiring. I run a website dedicated to something technical from the

by anc84 10y ago

Providing topical community services can be extremely rewarding but at the same time extremely tiring. I run a website dedicated to something technical from the nineties. There is a bunch of attention-whoring weirdos but the 2-3 people per year telling you how much the community and your interaction matters to them makes all up for it. To me forums are still the best thing about the internet. Forums with simple threads, post count based user titles, avatars, nicknames and strict topics. You can be yourself in many different ways, one "persona" per topical forum. No one would know who you are or care about your sex, race or political orientation. anc84 is me here for example, nothing matters but the content of my posts.

usmannk 10y ago
What is the topic of the website, if you don't mind?
- anc84 10y ago
  For the purpose of keeping my online personas separatly, nope ;) It's just a forum with some bells.
PuffinBlue 10y ago
I host one for an open source tool (although most replies come from the maintainer). It's mostly technical/support in nature and I really locked down the board (no signatures, no PM etc etc) because we're not really trying to build a community - but the tool really does make a big difference to some peoples lives. It made enough of a difference to mine to want to give back and start the forum in the first place, such is the power of these things! Little stories come up now and then through the questions people ask and it's possible to see how they're using the tool. It's like forums just bring life to the surface even if you fight to stop it, it's a genuinely compelling form of social interaction. Aside from the spam. The thanks that comes along is infrequent but very nice to receive.
iamatworknow 10y ago
>nothing matters but the content of my posts But the permanence of those posts can bite you in the ass. Over time your post history will grow and if it's accessible to others (and they care enough to dig through it) they can potentially use what you said 6 months, a year, ten years ago against you. If you happen to let slip your real identity, all of that history is now linked to the "real life you" and if you said anything under the false expectation of anonymity you're screwed. This is one of the reasons I don't think I could ever go into politics. A savvy opponent would only need to do a few google searches, research my online history, find some stupid shit I said when I was 17 years old on LiveJournal or whatever, and there goes my campaign.
- jablan 10y ago
  I don't get why you would have to worry, unless you are some kind of psychopath or sociopath and it can be seen from these posts? We all say/write stupid things when we are 17, why would it affect your career in any way? Look it other way, would you really judge a politician based on what they said on some website when they were 17?
  - iamatworknow 10y ago
    I was a teenager in the early to mid-2000's, so of course I was playing video games and throwing around slurs and insults and what have you -- words I've grown out of saying "for the lulz", of course, because I know they can hurt people and I honestly don't get anything out of saying them. But if you look hard enough there's a record of that online, linked to my real life identity, and in the court of public opinion that record would overrule any actual beliefs or policy positions I have as an adult. "This guy says he stands for gay rights, but look at how much he casually used the f-word as an insult on this Counter Strike forum." This isn't something previous generations have had to experience in politics or in the workforce and it'll only get more ugly with time. The kids today who are in their teens are churning out exponentially more troubling data than I ever did. Just imagine what kind of political mudslinging fodder that will provide in 20 years.
    - 10y ago

by anc84 10y ago

usmannk 10y ago

What is the topic of the website, if you don't mind?

anc84 10y ago
For the purpose of keeping my online personas separatly, nope ;) It's just a forum with some bells.

PuffinBlue 10y ago

I host one for an open source tool (although most replies come from the maintainer). It's mostly technical/support in nature and I really locked down the board (no signatures, no PM etc etc) because we're not really trying to build a community - but the tool really does make a big difference to some peoples lives. It made enough of a difference to mine to want to give back and start the forum in the first place, such is the power of these things! Little stories come up now and then through the questions people ask and it's possible to see how they're using the tool. It's like forums just bring life to the surface even if you fight to stop it, it's a genuinely compelling form of social interaction. Aside from the spam. The thanks that comes along is infrequent but very nice to receive.

iamatworknow 10y ago

>nothing matters but the content of my posts But the permanence of those posts can bite you in the ass. Over time your post history will grow and if it's accessible to others (and they care enough to dig through it) they can potentially use what you said 6 months, a year, ten years ago against you. If you happen to let slip your real identity, all of that history is now linked to the "real life you" and if you said anything under the false expectation of anonymity you're screwed. This is one of the reasons I don't think I could ever go into politics. A savvy opponent would only need to do a few google searches, research my online history, find some stupid shit I said when I was 17 years old on LiveJournal or whatever, and there goes my campaign.

jablan 10y ago
I don't get why you would have to worry, unless you are some kind of psychopath or sociopath and it can be seen from these posts? We all say/write stupid things when we are 17, why would it affect your career in any way? Look it other way, would you really judge a politician based on what they said on some website when they were 17?
- iamatworknow 10y ago
  I was a teenager in the early to mid-2000's, so of course I was playing video games and throwing around slurs and insults and what have you -- words I've grown out of saying "for the lulz", of course, because I know they can hurt people and I honestly don't get anything out of saying them. But if you look hard enough there's a record of that online, linked to my real life identity, and in the court of public opinion that record would overrule any actual beliefs or policy positions I have as an adult. "This guy says he stands for gay rights, but look at how much he casually used the f-word as an insult on this Counter Strike forum." This isn't something previous generations have had to experience in politics or in the workforce and it'll only get more ugly with time. The kids today who are in their teens are churning out exponentially more troubling data than I ever did. Just imagine what kind of political mudslinging fodder that will provide in 20 years.
  - 10y ago