author_by_night (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
author_by_night) wrote2008-01-03 08:51 am
author_by_night) wrote2008-01-03 08:51 am
Entry tags:
Livejournal Versus Websites
(This public post mostly refers to Harry Potter fandom, but can apply to others. I just don't know how it works in other fandoms in terms of websites over LJ. But if it's like that in other fandoms, or just the opposite, I'd still love to know.)
When I first came into fandom, messageboards were huge. But now, I've noticed a decline. Messageboards (and websites overall), old and new and revamped, seem to get far less traffic.
My question is - what's the cause? Obviously there are many reasons. Without naming names, some boards over time became so big that it got confusing for the members. Then suddenly, many members left, and it eclined from there. There's also the fact that members who had time to run the sites and messageboards and/or be active in keeping things going there had less time.
But could Livejournal have an impact as well? I wonder if people aren't choosing Livejournal over messageboards and websites, and that's what I'm asking. I know with me, I do certainly find it's sometimes easier to post on Livejournal. For one, LJ doesn't have the "newbie stage" - the newbie stage being the stage wherein new members are more or less ignored on the basis of being new. For another, I myself am a very elaborative person; at a board, half of what I'd want to say would probably be considered "tl;dr" ("too long, don't read"), so I have to shorten it. But when I shorten things, I'm often too vague and make no sense. On many occasions, discussions at messageboards have prompted Livejournal responses, because I'd rather not write a full page reply. ) However, on a website, I do know what I'm going to see and discuss; it's harder to have a firm idea of that with Livejournal, because even LJ communities change.
Thoughts?
When I first came into fandom, messageboards were huge. But now, I've noticed a decline. Messageboards (and websites overall), old and new and revamped, seem to get far less traffic.
My question is - what's the cause? Obviously there are many reasons. Without naming names, some boards over time became so big that it got confusing for the members. Then suddenly, many members left, and it eclined from there. There's also the fact that members who had time to run the sites and messageboards and/or be active in keeping things going there had less time.
But could Livejournal have an impact as well? I wonder if people aren't choosing Livejournal over messageboards and websites, and that's what I'm asking. I know with me, I do certainly find it's sometimes easier to post on Livejournal. For one, LJ doesn't have the "newbie stage" - the newbie stage being the stage wherein new members are more or less ignored on the basis of being new. For another, I myself am a very elaborative person; at a board, half of what I'd want to say would probably be considered "tl;dr" ("too long, don't read"), so I have to shorten it. But when I shorten things, I'm often too vague and make no sense. On many occasions, discussions at messageboards have prompted Livejournal responses, because I'd rather not write a full page reply. ) However, on a website, I do know what I'm going to see and discuss; it's harder to have a firm idea of that with Livejournal, because even LJ communities change.
Thoughts?
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As far as reading fic goes, almost any format is better than message boards; the colors were usually unappealing, you were forced to scroll through feedback to get to the next chapter, and often if a thread went un-updated for too long, it'd disappear and the fic would disappear with it. These things aren't problems on LJ; thanks to the magic of ?style=mine I can read posts in any format I want, and while fic can be taken down, it has to actually be deleted by someone; it doesn't just disappear with the passage of time.
I think there are a lot of discussion forums still around, but the thing with discussion is that you have to have something to discuss :) HP isn't an open canon anymore, at least not officially, and a lot of the things we used to wonder about have been definitively resolved in canon. But I think things might be different in other fandoms that are still open. I do know of several rather active fandom and non-fandom forums, though since I'm not really into that kind of thing right now, I don't know if they're more active or less active than similar boards in the past. You have to remember also that a lot of the bigger blogs essentially function as message boards with extreme restrictions on new threads (well, and no post count, I guess XD), so there's probably a lot of overlap there, at least in non-fandom circles.
To the extent that there is a decline, I think the reason is probably that nowadays more people are comfortable with opening their own websites and setting up their own forums. In Roswell, which was my first fandom and fairly popular back in the day, there was one major discussion forum and two or three fanfic message boards that I knew of; it was easy to keep up. But nowadays, forums are much more common, and so unless your site draws people in another way, you simply can't build membership.
For one example, I read manga that's been translated by people online--we call it scanlations, because the English text is edited into the pages. (Sorry if I'm telling you stuff you already know.) And most of these scanlation site have a forum attached. Now, the groups that do quick scanlations of popular series', or are the only translators of a popular series, will get a lot of traffic, and because of that they're able to build membership. But the forums on less popular or less active sites are usually ghost towns; there are only so many times you can say 'YAY X', after all, and without five or six people interested in hardcore discussion, things peter out rather quickly.
As people have gotten more used to the Internet and now have the ability to open all these different sites/blogs/LJs/message boards/whatevers, you also get a lot more balkanization, IMHO, and that's one place where LJ (and blogs, for many non-fandom areas) is way superior to message boards. If you're not forced to rub elbows with people you disagree with, you're less likely to have a lot of discussion. This isn't a big deal on an LJ community, because as long as people have it friended they'll be able to see any new posts without going to any effort. But on a message board it's the kiss of death, because without new content, people are just going to stop visiting the site.
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Most of the fiction posted is HP fanfiction, but original fiction and other fandoms are encouraged.
On the forum we have quite a lot of active members. Many of us are fanfiction writers and others original fiction or interested readers. What I love about our site is that it is not just one ship or two. We also are comprised of *het* and *slash* members.
On LJ I've found that most folks stay within a ship or two for HP, and het and slash hardly ever meet. On our forum we discuss more about writing in general, and personal things. Occasionally, our previous owner, Morrighan, will run her writing academy.
So while there maybe a decline in forum and message board participation, there are still a few thriving pockets left. LJ, after all, can be a big scary place for newcomers. There's nothing like joining a forum and having ten people welcome you and ask about what you like to read and write. Any questions you have, you know who to ask, and you know you won't get flamed for it.
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If she can't fix it right away, she will add you in manually.
Just mention in the email my name and that you were having the problems registering. She already has a record of the issue.
you can always contact me at romaine2424 @ yahoo.com
Hope to see you soon!
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Anyone else has a similar problem, just email the webmaster at cipher_wotr at yahoo.com.
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And ABN, hope it's okay, but I borrowed some of your original post (linked back to you) to carry this dicussion over to my LJ. Good topic.