General Do you still think forums are dead?

[Arantor]

What do shells have to do with it?

 

[Empire]

What do shells have to do with it?

FIrewalls

 

[Tracy]

Only those that think it's dead shell make it dead

No, lack of enthusiastic users is what will end up killing forums. They simply are going to end up going the same route that the BBS did (and yes, I was an active participant in the BBS/Fido days, ending up as NEC for the Dallas Texas region). It's sad, but that's simply the way society and technology progresses. Luckily, I'm blessed with a a good income and a dedicated "hobby" fund and don't run my site for numbers/income, but personal enjoyment so I'm not as worried as those that depend upon visits/ads/subscriptions to keep their site up.

 

[Ambient Vibe]

Just look at places like JCINK - they're still thriving and have been for as long as I can remember. I still see many lively discussion forums on the web, be it paid or free software. We are using forums and not discord, for instance - because the staff prefers having full control over content. As in, we don't want some third party to own it, and make it difficult for us to obtain copies of whatever we want. As a fan fiction and roleplaying forum community, I cannot imagine posting anywhere, but a forum hosted on a reputable platform. I am sure that is the case for many other types of communities at large. Excuse any typos btw - I am partially blind, so that may create verbal eyesores, from time to time. 😊

 

[Arantor]

I'm always intrigued by the claims of 'thriving' and 'Jcink' when as far as I can tell every single site is served from a single server because *literally* everything has the same IP address and the routing for it doesn't look like it's a front load balancer.

I don't have good stats on how busy Jcink really is but I'm not sure it's as big as some feel it is. I've only been able to source a couple of thousand subdomains in total from trying to build a network map of roleplay sites, and those range in time from 2010 to now, and there's a *lot* of expired premium in there, I was shocked how many.

 

[Cory]

I don't think Jcink is necessarily thriving, otherwise, you'd probably see 100+ usernames on the online today list on the official board due to being the #1 board for people to go to for Jcink-related support. But, it's usually around 15-25 people on the online today list. My board usually only has 10-20 log-ins per day and has various resources for Jcink administrators to use.

Some boards on the Jcink platform may be thriving due to how much daily activity they receive, but I would say the general activity of the platform overall is pretty slow. Most people use paid software or free self-hosted software these days, it's not like the days of InvisionFree/ZetaBoards where a lot of people primarily turned to these types of software to operate a forum at little to no cost. But, a lot of these people were probably teenagers that had little to no money. Nowadays, the younger generation is mostly on social media.

Jcink is not necessarily dead, but I think it's far from thriving though.

 

[Cedric]

I think it's also the fact that we were used to more popularity. I mean, we used to see 50-100 members online at once, or even more. Now it's more around 15-20 unless you have a really successful forum where there are hundreds online at once. I've seen a few, but they're very rare.

So, Jcink is probably still thriving for today's standards but not so much as compared to 10 years ago. So yes, there is a decline, although most likely stable now compared to 10 years ago.

 

[Empire]

Going to be some 2024 new things maybe to bring the dead into the light

 

[NeoMetallix]

I think some versions of social media are dying. Twitter and Facebook have always been trash but I know so many people who have Facebook but never use it. It's only to message long distance family members.

 

[Ravenfreak]

I think some versions of social media are dying. Twitter and Facebook have always been trash but I know so many people who have Facebook but never use it. It's only to message long distance family members.

I know Twitter has definitely declined, most people who use Facebook are older people to keep in touch with family. Heck my parents finally just joined Facebook just a few months ago. I feel like mainly younger people are using Instagram as well as Tiktok more than anything. I've seen a few people make the switch from Twitter to Bluesky and Mastodon. I just don't see social media dying anytime soon, there's also Reddit which I consider social media more than a message board that many people have been using more too plus you can remain anonymous on Reddit like a forum.

 

[NeoMetallix]

I know Twitter has definitely declined, most people who use Facebook are older people to keep in touch with family. Heck my parents finally just joined Facebook just a few months ago. I feel like mainly younger people are using Instagram as well as Tiktok more than anything. I've seen a few people make the switch from Twitter to Bluesky and Mastodon. I just don't see social media dying anytime soon, there's also Reddit which I consider social media more than a message board that many people have been using more too plus you can remain anonymous on Reddit like a forum.

I just mean certain ones are in decline, not all. Facebook and Twitter are from my observations but maybe that's just my age group and not overall.

In 20 years I think most will be MySpaced and new ones will have taken their place.

 

[ZandraJoi]

When you are on Social Media & hear the term "Forum" you may scratch your head not knowing if they still exist or not. & if they do, it's just a literal handful. However, us on Team Forum who are in the forum community know that we are thriving & will continue to do so because we believe forums are a gateway to making lasting friendships.

 

[Jay™]

It's funny, I've been doing forums for many years, a few years back my wife decided to ask me what I do on here all the time and I gave her a tour of online forums, I then decided to build a new family website with IPS and kept it private which she now enjoys with other family members.

Strange how some people after all this time still discover forums for the first time and enjoy the conversations, so for me are forums dead? depends on how you look at them and what communities you like to be involved in.

 

[Cedric]

Well we saw new forums being created every day. That's the biggest thing I miss about forums. It's the constant flow of new forums.

 

[Arantor]

Thing is, the constant flow of new forums wasn't healthy because it just meant people would close faster, not throw in for some longevity.

 

[Cedric]

Thing is, the constant flow of new forums wasn't healthy because it just meant people would close faster, not throw in for some longevity.

That I also agree with. It surely was so for me. Opening and closing forums became a usual thing for me. Losing interest, moving on.

 

[Kale]

No, lack of enthusiastic users is what will end up killing forums. They simply are going to end up going the same route that the BBS did (and yes, I was an active participant in the BBS/Fido days, ending up as NEC for the Dallas Texas region). It's sad, but that's simply the way society and technology progresses. Luckily, I'm blessed with a a good income and a dedicated "hobby" fund and don't run my site for numbers/income, but personal enjoyment so I'm not as worried as those that depend upon visits/ads/subscriptions to keep their site up.

I remember a friend showed me a BBS. The owner of the BBS rightfully got pissed at my friend at the time using the call button or whatever to call for them. Had no reason to even need to talk to the BBS sysop, and glad they banned him lmfao. Making the OWNER of one pissed off, let alone a BBS mod seemed like a bad time. This was back when I and some other people thought it was funny to be 'trolls' and punk kids.

I think some versions of social media are dying. Twitter and Facebook have always been trash but I know so many people who have Facebook but never use it. It's only to message long distance family members.

I feel this. Twitter/X is just slowing dying, Facebook for me has always been for following and staying in contact with friends and family. I also use it to join local groups or groups related to something like say sleep apnea support, diabetes support, CKD, etc...

 

[Jay™]

Well we saw new forums being created every day. That's the biggest thing I miss about forums. It's the constant flow of new forums.

I still see many new ones pop up; however, they don't last long, and it's too bad as some of them were really nice; it goes back to the site owner; speaking for myself, I've put it down many times over the years, but still find myself doing it again and again, as for places like Twitter and FB I do not have much use for them.

 

[Cam]

Thing is, the constant flow of new forums wasn't healthy because it just meant people would close faster, not throw in for some longevity.

I think the money flowing in from those new forums is a big part of what has kept the developers/designers in business though. It’s annoying to see these sites coming and going, but I think it was probably better for the marketplace as a whole.

 

[Jason]

I think the money flowing in from those new forums is a big part of what has kept the developers/designers in business though. It’s annoying to see these sites coming and going, but I think it was probably better for the marketplace as a whole.

I was especially upset by the closing of Promotion Future.