wri t es Simon says
by Simon Hastelow
The power of the written word I’m not sure if they appealed to us because we didn’t have anything else, or whether they really were better back in the day, but I really miss Forums. I remember spending literally hours every day on the Difflock Forum. I used to excuse it by saying it was my job, but I think I would have spent just as much time on there regardless, just as a lot of other people did. There are still a few oldstyle forums around, but almost all of the good ones have died a death and switched to social media groups instead. But Facebook Groups just don’t work the same do they? They are a great place to congregate, share memes and ask questions, but I just don’t see the long, in-depth discussions going on, the way they used to on forums, and if you’ve ever tried to use a search function on a group chat you’ll just become deeply frustrated. Which leads to another issue: The Newbies. This is not a new phenomena, Noobs have been around since the first forum went online. Someone, new to whatever ‘scene’ or subject the forum caters to, asks the same questions that have been asked, and answered, numerous times. We shouldn’t criticise, it is partly that lack of usable archive and search of previous posts which causes the issue. 88
THE MUD LIFE MAGAZINE
However my other main gripe is that the attitude and temperament of the average social media user nowadays can be characterised as constantly short-tempered, quick to criticise and just lazy. Some wouldn’t use a search function if their life depended on it, going by the ridiculous regularity of people asking “What time does Morrison’s close?” on my local area Facebook Group. You’d think people had never heard of Google nor had any knowledge of how to research such basic information for themselves, so when Noobs do rock up and ask daft or previously asked questions, the regulars can be prone to sarcasm and shorttempered responses which ultimately drives the new-blood away. Then the same ‘regulars’ can be seen moaning that their particular ‘scene’ is dying Catch 22. People see the content from their Facebook groups in the same timeline as photos of their aunty Beryl’s Sunday Roast, a mate going off on Boris, even though he previously said he never votes, a daft advert for funeral planning and unfunny memes. They scroll and scroll and scroll through endless crap before they get to a sensible question that they could easily and helpfully answer, but by then they’re just not in the mood for it anymore.
