Herdanos wrote:Sorry jiggles but I disagree with you on both points (that running Discord and WhatsApp simultaneously is redundant; or that everyone moving to Discord and the forum here dying would be OK). The forum has a permanence that neither WhatsApp nor Discord can replace; and, we wouldn't want them to.
For one thing, the forum is public. That's great - its visibility allows us to attract new members. Sure, we do that more slowly than we used to, but we still do it.
The forum allows splintered discussion that is preserved in perpetuity. That's great too! Ideal for a public forum.
But that public nature definitely leads to some people sharing less personal info than they might otherwise. WhatsApp gets round that. And, hey - if your purpose is to participate in a forum, there's no obligation (no need, even!) to share personal info. But the purpose of this endeavour has been quite overt from the outset: to potentially transform those forum relationships into something more akin to IRL friendships. (Discord is public too, though to less of an extent.
Through WhatsApp I've learnt more about some people in a few days than I have in over a decade through the forum - real names, faces, places, jobs, families. I've spoken 1 on 1 with some people more than ever, and more quickly and easily than PMs allow. That's helpful for... making friends! Discord can't do that; and the reality is, the forum doesn't promote that.
But the forum is host to discussions, conversations games, etc etc, dating back decades, from over a thousand genuine registered members, and hundreds of meaningful contributory participants. WhatsApp or Discord can't replace that sense of community.
But WhatsApp can (maybe) help individuals within that community become friends. Some people have already discovered that they live closer than they think!
Again, though, I didn't expect this to be as big as it is. I think that speaks volumes as to how difficult it can be, as adults, to form meaningful friendships in a modern, post Covid, increasingly online world, where people "our age" (a broad spectrum) move around the country a lot. I do think it'll get quieter as the days pass; someone's already left, others have muted the chat. But I'd like to think it'll serve a meaningful purpose, and one that isn't to the detriment of the forum as a whole. If anything, by making stronger connections, we'll feel more determined to keep this place running!
I think the bolded bit is what's important here. The idea - at least as far as I can tell - was never to have a massive, overarching network of people in a monumental Whatsapp chat. It was to connect a group of people who are interested in making new friends, chatting a little bit and seeing what comes out of it.
For me in particular, it's nice to have a football chat that's geared towards English football(particularly the Championship!), for example, because I don't really have anyone to talk to about that where I am. Especially knowing that I'm chatting with like-minded folks, who I've had some form of communication with for a long time. To that end, Whatsapp is an easy choice of messaging service because just about everybody has it, chats can be set up pretty easily and without much commitment from anyone.
The issue we've had is that the idea has been much more popular than intended, so we're now trying to balance the original concept with the numbers Dan has managed to sign up. It's a nice problem to have, and I think it shows the togetherness we've kind of curated over 15-20 years. I think decamping to a popular Discord server *would* begin to undermine the forum over time, as different threads and topics would begin to override their forum equivalents, but a catch-all Whatsapp group, or a couple of groups, doesn't necessarily have that danger.
And as Dan has kind of said, these things are always extremely frantic for the first week or so. A few people will decide it's not for them and drop out over time, as someone did earlier on. We are inclusive, but it's not a format that everyone will enjoy, and we won't all get on with each other in the Whatsapp format either - it's not an indictment of anyone, just the nature of the beast. When it settles down a bit, I think it'll run a lot more smoothly.
And it would be nice to springboard off this to have some kind of summer meet up, too. If everyone gets on well enough, a thread can be set up here and we can go from there!
Final Discordnation? Sorry if that’s slightly out of order 