Many say that forums are dying, but in some respects I still maintain a little optimism. The reason why? I think that a lot of people don't actually enjoy using social media. Rather I propose that they are dependent on it, they boot it up unconsciously like a heroin addict getting their latest fix. How much can you actually remember from your time on these platforms? The answer is probably "not much". I can effortlessly remember my DBZ roleplays on a forum back in 2010, yet I struggle to recall any memories from the many Discord servers I've been in save for one or two exceptions.
Do you know why that is? Because you get to know people on forums. You make friends, you forge bonds, you're apart of something greater and much more tangible. Much of this is caused by the medium itself facilitating longer form and most of all human discourse, as opposed to the addiction and dependency that characterise algorithimic social media platforms. It's for this reason that I think one day we'll perhaps start seeing something of an exodus.
When will this exodus come? Who knows, but all I can hope is that my site is still around when it does. Because as of now, it is very difficult to start running a forum. Used to be you'd set up a script, pick up a topic and users would come streaming in. When I tried doing the same, I learned the hard way that this is no longer the reality of it all in 「PRESENT TIME」. Even if I could get someone to join the site, at best they'd browse it for a day or two, leave a few posts and then stop coming back because nobody else was there except me.
I remember being giddy just to see 3 users (including myself) online at once. I've seen the countless forum script installations that are total wastelands. It was all very discouraging, and I had all but given up on growing this site by the time 2026 rolled around. Getting a forum off the ground in any shape or form in the current year is brutal, and were it not for all of you it never would have happened. So excuse me if this post seems melodramatic or overly grandiose, but seeing the total post count reach into the 4 digits made me very happy. Even if this place was beamed out of existence tomorrow by the Organisation I would never forget that time I ran a forum that broke 1000 posts that were not all just me schizoposting. It truly means a lot to me.
I would also like to thank @capstasher , @Blond , @nyan , @cidoku , @alix , @deha28 , @Duk3 , @DrSchnautz , @Kallisto, @John Titor, @StylusNine, @mihai.the.golan, @Dweeeb and @glass, Deluoode certainly would not be the same without the high quality contributions from all of you. And know that even if I did not mention you by name, I read and appreciate every post. In honour of the milestone, I've also decided to repurpose the previously-locked "Help Desk" subforum into a meta board for people to talk about the site itself.
With that, I suppose this tangent has gone on for long enough. Administrator signing off.
El Psy Kongroo.
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