The decline of forums

[Don Pedro Dinero]

I would like to bring to discussion here something that I have sometimes mentioned on the meta section.

I’ve been a member in some forums before I joined this one and I still participate on them nowadays but not so much as on this one.

A common pattern I have seen is: when the forum is born, there are few discussions, technical ones, but as forum traffic increases, spam increases as well. The more it increases, the more spam there is, so there seems to be a relation between increase in traffic and decline in quality.

So, nowadays, you see the senior members complaining and missing the old times when there were meaningful discussions and hardly any spam.

On this forum, spam is blamed on signature campaigns but on the other forums people don’t get paid to post and there is a lot of spam as well. The kind of spam is different, however, as here you get many people writing short answers, with poor English, and without reading what has been written before. On the others, it’s more like people writing banal threads and banal replies

My comparison can be a bit biased, though, as I am comparing forums written in my language to this one. But we have seen that happening here on this board, as it has been commented on here:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=3408640.0

This is why I am opening this thread to ask if any of you have been forum members in other forums that have become very popular over the time and can share your views on this so we can compare.

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[suchmoon]

I think there is an overall decline in this form of communication as opposed to "instant" messaging - telegram et al. People just don't seem to be engaged or concerned enough to be able to produce coherent, valuable, helpful "long form" content, and that's not specific to this forum. Nearly every mailing list or forum I've been on in the last couple of decades is either dead or dying or has moved into some sort of chatroom (and dying there).

This particular forum has its own specific problems too - sig campaigns is one no doubt, but also the general expansion of crypto currency development away from Bitcoin. Bitcointalk's altcoin boards are total shit, so if someone is looking for exciting technology beyond Bitcoin they'll be hanging out elsewhere.

[hubballi]

This is not new for any Forum, what you said is always happening to all forums. Because without this the forum wont get famous and how much famous they get that much more users will join and in that you will always get 40 to 50% of the spamming users. This cannot be avoided as every forum to get more attention and famous they surely needed this type of spammers.

[QuestionAuthority]

I don’t see forums in general being as popular as they were. I started communicating with the larger world many decades ago on bbs sites and webrings. Then those faded from popularity and I moved to Usenet newsgroups. From there I moved to IRC which was way cool because it was fast communication. That lead me to Internet forums and I’m just about done with those. Instagram, Twitter, Facebook and others are eliminating the need for forums. Tomorrow maybe we’ll all be linked together with some perverted version of google glass that allows us to blink and link minds, who knows.

Spam may be the cause of forum decline but it’s very likely that the forums life has just run its course. There may simply be nothing new to add to a discussion. It’s all been said, done and tried before.

[iluvbitcoins]

Although, it's true that signature campaigns contribute to spamming, I'd argue they're presented 10x worse than they are in reality on these forums..

[The Sceptical Chymist]

I don’t see forums in general being as popular as they were.

I'm a member of a couple of other forums, and I've seen somewhat of a decline but not too much.  Those forums aren't about bitcoin and are actually about two hobbies that are dying out, so that shouldn't be surprising.  And on one of them, there's still some vibrant discussion going on from people from all around the world.  There's nowhere near the amount of spam there as there is here, and I'm pretty sure that's because of the existence of sig campaigns on bitcointalk.

On the other hand, there's a comic book forum that I'm not a member of, but that I visit every now and then, and even though there's no campaigns there, I still see idiotic space-wasting posts such as "+1", "nice!", and the like.  They often quote huge blocks of text before writing them, too.  It's really annoying.

As I've stated innumerable times, I'm not against the concept of being able to rent out your signature space for money.  I've obviously rented mine out and have done so for about 2.5 years now.  The problem is the people who can't speak the language, have nothing to say, and who create multiple accounts through which they post the same repetitive, moronically shitty nonsense.  It's not going to change, and to some extent I've come to accept it.  But boy do I love tagging shitposters when they get snagged cheating campaigns or a similar offense.

[gentlemand]

I'm on a few other forums, some that have always been big, others that have grown.

I've seen on those places nowhere near the level of brain death that's developed on here. It's ludicrous to think it's anything other than the prospect of free money that draws hundreds of thousands of google translate zombies here.

The non monetised forums certainly have their share of thickos and twats but they might make up 5% of posts vs 95% here.

There's nothing to gain by participating and ranking up on most forums. There certainly is here. You can see the effects every minute of every day.

Spam may be the cause of forum decline but it’s very likely that the forums life has just run its course. There may simply be nothing new to add to a discussion. It’s all been said, done and tried before.

There's masses of cool stuff popping up all the time and who knows how epic the developments will be in the years to come? It's an area that will never get old. How it's smothered with stupidity and mindlessness certainly does get old.

I hope the dedicated forum never disappears. Searching twitter or Facebook for the level of discussion you can easily access here with a quick google isn't possible.

[philipma1957]

This forum attracts spam and shit posts  due to the simple fact money is made from cryptocoins.

First suggestion  is rename  to cryptocointalk.org   it may be for sale.


Frankly the alt coin  = every coin but BTC  is  a limiting concept.

[_Miracle]

When I first started online there were smaller (and more informative) groups for communication, then it started getting nonsensical and seedy as shit so I opted out for  almost 20 years.
One of the biggest reasons I got into forums was that I was a real estate agent during the last market upheaval.
There didn't seem to be a place to gather 'real' information regarding what was going on in real estate in late 2006-2007 and at the time Zillow was a fairly new site with an outstandingly open forum (now it's a commercialized spam fest). Patrick.net was also a good source but at the time I was an agent (so I did waaaay more reading than posting).

It's nice to gather in one "spot" and see the views of others who share an interest.
I read more than I post, many sites will have lifetime lurkers.
I will say though that this one has gotten more difficult to sift through.
I'll check out the landing page to see what topics are trending but for the most part I'll read the last posts of longtime users just to cut through the noise.


P.S. WTF happened to my *signature tag line?
Which for years, used to be this: Sometimes there's more truth in forums than anywhere else.  Twitter:  @cryptobitchicks   "I am expressing multiple attitudes simultaneously. To which are you referring?"

See? that's how long it's been since I last visited ;-)

[gentlemand]

P.S. WTF happened to my *signature tag line?
Which for years, used to be this: Sometimes there's more truth in forums than anywhere else.  Twitter:  @cryptobitchicks   "I am expressing multiple attitudes simultaneously. To which are you referring?"

See? that's how long it's been since I last visited ;-)

This is a sig free section to save us from what this thread is griping about.

[_Miracle]

P.S. WTF happened to my *signature tag line?
Which for years, used to be this: Sometimes there's more truth in forums than anywhere else.  Twitter:  @cryptobitchicks   "I am expressing multiple attitudes simultaneously. To which are you referring?"

See? that's how long it's been since I last visited ;-)

This is a sig free section to save us from what this thread is griping about.

HA! Love it. Thank you.
I probably followed one of you "old timers" here.
And now I'm in an "ivory Tower"? Just where every "respectable lady" belongs.

[TheGodson]

I have been a part of many forums. I believe there is more spam here than on most other forums I have been a part of. The only forums I frequent now though are bitcointalk and 2+2. I haven't really noticed forums declining in usage. They seem to be the way they always have been.

[Don Pedro Dinero]

I have been a part of many forums. I believe there is more spam here than on most other forums I have been a part of. The only forums I frequent now though are bitcointalk and 2+2. I haven't really noticed forums declining in usage. They seem to be the way they always have been.

I sometimes read 2+2 but I’m not a member. Hasn’t the traffic declined? Making money with online poker isn’t nearly as easy as it used to be. The decline in traffic on poker-red forum (in Spanish) has been drastic.

[Jet Cash]

I've been active on forums for many years, and I've seen a variety of models and interests. These include porn webmasters, hosting, domain sellers, hippy, general, casino promoters, and a variety of others. I've even created fake forums to generate traffic to sponsors and other sites I own. One such is Net Barons. and today is the first time I've visited that for many months. I've moderated and owned a number of forums, and I try to use my signature for my own purposes. I have never rented the space to a third party. It is unfortunate that the promotion that generated me the most money was in the on-line casino industry, and one signature on a porn webmaster board was earning £2,000-£3,000 per month.

The problems that I have seen have been many, and the worst for me was the attempted signups by ref link spammers for the pharma and porn industries. It is hard to control a flow of 500 or so signups every day, and one just ends up closing registration.

Another problem comes from cliques of long term members who try to dominate new members. This can drive away potentially useful contributing members. Often they start flame wars, and whilst sometimes these can be entertaing, often they are destructive for the forum.

I was also very active on a paid to post forum, and this can be fast flowing, and generate good revenue for the forum owner, but it does encourage spamming, and it is often difficult to maintain a sensible discussion.

One formula that does seem to work is to have an open section with a number of boards, and a closed section that is private and invitation only. I'm a member of a casino forum that has this structure, but I've rather neglected it of late,

Bitcoin Talk has a fairly difficult problem. It needs to be international, but it needs to have the main boards in English. Keeping the English boards clean can only be managed by active moderation in my opinion. It would also appear that it needs the traffic generated by the bounty hunters, and they seem to be very low level members in the main, and I believe that they should be contained in their own sub-section of boards.

This post seems to be going on a bit, so I'd better close it now.

[paxmao]

This is why I am opening this thread to ask if any of you have been forum members in other forums that have become very popular over the time and can share your views on this so we can compare.

I have taken part for years on a popular forum dedicated to mountaineering, climbing and trekking. On that forum I wanted to share routes, experiences, comments on tools and materials but inevitably, some of the answers came from brand promoters, etc... A norm was set so that those comments would be accepted as long as the people having interests in brands or shops identified themselves as such.

My experience is that anything that engages and excites people creates commercial opportunities and marketers of all levels, including the spammers, will jump in the scene at any occasion possible. On Bitcointalk this is even more acute because Bitcoin and Alts involve a young market with plenty of growth and excitement.

That is the modern internet, the old times were amazingly naive, and it would be extremely difficult to change it. However, you can promote a better forum with things like the merit system, the trust system and the Serious Talk and Ivory Tower sections. Some of the keys:

a) You need really good and active forum moderation. You may need more section admins.
b) There has to be a systematic application of rules. You can´t leave to campaign managers admin duties, they have no incentive.

But anyway, it is an arduous task and there has to be a balance between commercial and non-commercial content, because it is good that new funds come to the arena and it is good that this forum can channel them.

[paxmao]

It is unfortunate that the promotion that generated me the most money was in the on-line casino industry, and one signature on a porn webmaster board was earning £2,000-£3,000 per month.

That must have been a site worth seeing 

One formula that does seem to work is to have an open section with a number of boards, and a closed section that is private and invitation only.

I kind of agree, there could be sections with requisites to entry, Ivory Tower and Serious Discussion are kind of that.

Bitcoin Talk has a fairly difficult problem. It needs to be international, but it needs to have the main boards in English. Keeping the English boards clean can only be managed by active moderation in my opinion. It would also appear that it needs the traffic generated by the bounty hunters, and they seem to be very low level members in the main, and I believe that they should be contained in their own sub-section of boards.

I have been living and working in English speaking and non-speaking countries. Believe me, you actually need to promote more the local forums. There are billions of people that don´t read nor write English, nor are interested on learning it. If you don´t cater to their needs and legitimate desire for knowledge you are really missing more than half of the world that could be actively supporting Bitcoin and Alts.

[paxmao]

This forum attracts spam and shit posts  due to the simple fact money is made from cryptocoins.

First suggestion  is rename  to cryptocointalk.org   it may be for sale.


Frankly the alt coin  = every coin but BTC  is  a limiting concept.

That is an historical thing on this forum, but I guess it does not matter that much. Many early bitcoiners are a morally hurt by the alts because they think that, for some reason I fail to understand, bitcoin is the only "true coin" and Alts hurt its value.  I think it is exactly the opposite.

Just think of it in terms of another category such as coins or airplanes: The only coin is USD and the rest are "Alt Cash" or the only true plane is the Wright Brothers plane and the "F16" is an Alt-Plane.

You see, on the end the "sects" will be losing opportunities in the name of a strange "bitReligion" (ooohh... that´s it, I am launching an alt with that  )

[Trofo]

IMHO decline of forums is partly caused by the time we live in. It has gotten so much faster and people (especially newer generations) have forgotten how to read. It is difficult for new members on this forum to always find the right information and I understand that there must be some amount of duplicate topics due to this. However, I will never understand people who doesn't take care to read even few post above their question and ask for the same thing.

Decline is unfortunately felt most by the people who were there in the beginning. I came here recently and still consider myself as new member, but I have experience from another forum where I was one of the founding members. It is tough to see your favorite place to hang out and exchange information/opinions with close group of members get overrun by horde of new people. And almost every one of the newcomers has some ideas how you can improve the thing you had a hand in creating Never mind those ideas have already been tried out and found lacking.

After saying above I will immediately go against it and offer a solution for signature campaigns which is probably not feasible. Sorry for that.
Signature campaigns are part of the problem but I don't believe situation would be much better without them. There is no easy solution to regulate them. I would try to somehow make campaign managers take more active role moderating posts from their employees. It could maybe be done in a way that campaign manager has to have some sort of special rank which can be lost in case his campaign participants are spamming. All campaigns threads without certified manager can be deleted immediately.

I would gladly get rid of my income due to signatures if I could be a part of the forum like this one was at its beginning. I have a habit of browsing trough some old topics when time allows. Sadly I am still lacking some knowledge to appreciate them completely, especially from cryptography part of technical discussions.

[TheGodson]

I have been a part of many forums. I believe there is more spam here than on most other forums I have been a part of. The only forums I frequent now though are bitcointalk and 2+2. I haven't really noticed forums declining in usage. They seem to be the way they always have been.

I sometimes read 2+2 but I’m not a member. Hasn’t the traffic declined? Making money with online poker isn’t nearly as easy as it used to be. The decline in traffic on poker-red forum (in Spanish) has been drastic.

It is hard to see that from my perspective. I frequent the bitcoin section on 2+2 under business and finance and new stuff is posted nearly every day. I also was never there for the poker boom. So I missed out on the easy money.

I imagine that you are correct though. I joined 2+2 in 2013 so maybe that is a bit late.

[TheGodson]

I've been active on forums for many years, and I've seen a variety of models and interests. These include porn webmasters, hosting, domain sellers, hippy, general, casino promoters, and a variety of others. I've even created fake forums to generate traffic to sponsors and other sites I own. One such is Net Barons. and today is the first time I've visited that for many months. I've moderated and owned a number of forums, and I try to use my signature for my own purposes. I have never rented the space to a third party. It is unfortunate that the promotion that generated me the most money was in the on-line casino industry, and one signature on a porn webmaster board was earning £2,000-£3,000 per month.

The problems that I have seen have been many, and the worst for me was the attempted signups by ref link spammers for the pharma and porn industries. It is hard to control a flow of 500 or so signups every day, and one just ends up closing registration.

Another problem comes from cliques of long term members who try to dominate new members. This can drive away potentially useful contributing members. Often they start flame wars, and whilst sometimes these can be entertaing, often they are destructive for the forum.

I was also very active on a paid to post forum, and this can be fast flowing, and generate good revenue for the forum owner, but it does encourage spamming, and it is often difficult to maintain a sensible discussion.

One formula that does seem to work is to have an open section with a number of boards, and a closed section that is private and invitation only. I'm a member of a casino forum that has this structure, but I've rather neglected it of late,

Bitcoin Talk has a fairly difficult problem. It needs to be international, but it needs to have the main boards in English. Keeping the English boards clean can only be managed by active moderation in my opinion. It would also appear that it needs the traffic generated by the bounty hunters, and they seem to be very low level members in the main, and I believe that they should be contained in their own sub-section of boards.

This post seems to be going on a bit, so I'd better close it now.

I've had very little success with online casinos and sports book. I have managed to get 25 clicks and one sign up. I was so excited to get one sign up, but they didn't even gamble. Was there anything in particular you did that made you successful?

I have even considered opening up a forum of my own, but I fear I will be wasting my time since I am terrible at getting traffic for other stuff I've done.