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It's surprising to me that forums haven't made a comeback. I guess because forums don't scale well and therefore VC has zero interest in funding them. Everythi
by keiferski 3y ago
It's surprising to me that forums haven't made a comeback. I guess because forums don't scale well and therefore VC has zero interest in funding them.
Everything I dislike about modern social media was a solved issue on a well-run forum: less spam and self-promotion, a tighter community, more toleration for off-topic discussion. When I look at Mastodon, it still has the same blaring "listen to me!" format that Twitter, Facebook, Reddit, etc. all have.
On the traditional forum, the idea of making a thread purely to "share your thoughts" on the topic-du-jour was anathema. Threads were topic-based, not individual based, and the designated personal spaces (post signatures) also allowed for much more creativity – while still not being the primary focus.
Or maybe I'm just being nostalgic.
- downWidOutaFite 3y agoReddit owns the space that forums used to occupy. All forums in one place is more convenient for users. Unfortunately users will pick convenience over the vague centralization risks Every. Single. Time.
- pasc1878 3y agoThat a what usenet was
- TechSquidTV 3y agoToo disconnected. You are expected to remember to visit multiple forums every day. Think of every forum you are no longer a part of, one day you just forgot about it. What Discord ACTUALLY gives you, is notifications. If forums were as low-friction to join an interact with as Discord, there would be more incentive. Unfortunately centralization usually means centralizing body. Lemmy is a federated reddit alternative that in some ways is like a modern forum.
- keiferski 3y agoThat was definitely a factor in the demise of forums, but today it’s possible to get notifications from forums. I agree though that forums require a bit more from their users, which is perhaps why they aren’t as popular today.
- hot_gril 3y agoThe original problem with social media is how content is algo-recommended to people from others they don't directly know, creating a popularity contest often won by dumb things like ragebait, bots, etc. Mastodon doesn't fix the problem, and small forums only avoid it until they become big.
- hot_gril 3y agoBtw, the old Facebook was pretty benign before pages and various kinds of global recommendations got added. It's still less toxic than Twitter or many others.