Question The Future of Fan Forums

November

November

Yes Sir, Captain Tightpants
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Sineya
I have been exploring other fandom forums lately, and I hadn't really thought about the future of forums until now. I always assumed forums would outlive me, but tonight I wondered, what happens to them when those who own them retire or pass away?

These are very essential and established communities for members. I am utterly surprised that I have encountered fans that are even more addicted and reliant on forums than I have ever been. I worry about them if these places ever close. They could lose their entire community, overnight.

Is this where Reddit has the long term advantage? If one sub dies, another can open? Now most search engines seem to source fandom related questions from there anyway.

Are high quality forums going to switch to paid membership only? (Two of the forums I have joined lately have paid tiers, monthly/yearly subscriptions) One has very poor moderation, so I wouldn't even consider it, while the other is much like BB in set up and well moderated, if they asked for paid entry, I would consider it now - especially when the next best option is reddit. How long would this be sustainable? Does this fragment fandoms or does it unite them in a tighter bond?

Do we expect to see all social media require subscription soon? X seems to be headed in that direction. What is the future for fandom when people have fewer options? Or too many low quality options?
 
Reason: Pls fix spelling!
I think forums are going to become increasingly important as all the major social networks and similar become increasingly money-grubbing and enshittified but yes, there's a problem in keeping them going. When it comes to fanfiction, AO3* collects it from shut down or shutting down sites in order to keep it safe. Perhaps something similar is needed for forums.

*Yes, I know that might seem a poor example at the moment given they're down for 2-4 weeks due to issues.
 
I wouldn't touch social media with a bargepole, so forums will remain important for me, and I'm guessing there's a significant minority of people who feel the same way. I do post on a very active Star Wars forum, and I'm aware of a Star Trek and a Stargate forum that are pretty busy.
 
This is currently my only fan forum.

I was on Rockstar INXS and Rockstar Supernova when they came out but they were collapsed after a while by their founder. Some of the Rockstar Supernova fandom was so vile that an additional site, After Rockstar, was started independently and membership was by invitation only of people who valued civility (and yes, I was invited). On Rockstar Supernova, toward the end, it was nothing unusual to check up on the website in the morning and find a 5-page thread had been chopped down to two pages by the mods. A case in point: one person who lived about six miles west of me in Mississauga was accused of having an affair with a single mother named "Whore of Babylon", but she lived in Auckland NZ. How was this supposed to happen? When it got to the point where the mods had to slash and burn a lot of the posts, the forum was closed.
 
I’m not sure who here is familiar with the video game Dead By Daylight but I was a member on their forums for years and they sadly announced that it will be closing down at the end of today and Discord and Reddit will be the ‘new’ place to go for discussions. They just don’t have the same vibe or appeal of a forum so I won’t have any place now to discuss that video game which is sad.

I was pleasantly surprised to find this forum existed a few days ago and still seemed to have a vibrant community.
 
wolfheart
wolfheart
I was also suprised its a realy nice forum with intersting people and comments
Chaos Bleeds said:
I’m not sure who here is familiar with the video game Dead By Daylight but I was a member on their forums for years and they sadly announced that it will be closing down at the end of today and Discord and Reddit will be the ‘new’ place to go for discussions. They just don’t have the same vibe or appeal of a forum so I won’t have any place now to discuss that video game which is sad.
Click to expand...

It's perhaps noteworthy that Discord started rolling out features that duplicate forums. But the problem with all these alternatives is that you're at the mercy of a company whose owners' goal is often to sell out to someone bigger, than that bigger company enshittifies it (or the existing owners do so in an attempt to please investors).

I think forums have a place, but the problem is keeping them up and running.
 
I'm more worried about it today than and I used to be. I hope it will be some kind of demand though.
But I do believe it is getting harder and harder to start new ones that can get enough traction to survive.
It's not easy being seen when only the big ones will pop up on google and other search engine.

So when the owners of the current sites gets fed up with it, or can't afford it any more, I'm afraid that it won't be any replacements.

Another issue, at least here in the EU, is the never ending rules and laws that you supposedly should follow.
Some of them are not necessary bad rules. But they are often designed for the big sites. Others are just bad...
Either way. They have a tendency to make it more and more impossible to run a small site with some kind of community where people can post own content.

/SK
 
NotASlayer
NotASlayer
True, the rules intended to stop the likes of Google and Facebook being complete jerks are rather harder for a small site to deal with.
I don't know. As social media has increased in popularity, I've definitely seen a dip in activity on fan forums. This is the only fan forum I am still a member of (although I'm also very active on Reddit), and I just came back a few months ago after years of being gone.

BB has been here for more than 20 years now. I think that's a huge testament to the site and the community here, and @Buffy Summers should be so proud of that. I'm sure she has some kind of backup plan should anything happen to her (God forbid!!!) but I don't know for sure. I like to think Buffy Boards will be around forever... If it's been 30 years and people are still talking about this show and discovering it for the first time, then I hope the fan forums will keep going too.
 
I worry. I am here. At the twiting the hellmouth forum which is slow and small, but still active and I have been there decades. Also on the (currently absent) Buffy Forums, which said it was coming back but now seems to exist on X which is not for me.

I have joined a few fora. Most are slow, or dead.

One went belly up and took a story that was a forum work so existed fully only there. (NFA, an NCIS site) turns out the owners did not back it up properly and the Go Daddy host lost the server. It existed on discord for a while but most people probably did not know about the discord.

I am on Gateworld, which is pretty slow as a forum though it is a big site with a lot of Stargate related news.

I joined a couple Criminal Minds sites but they are mostly dead. Not sure they were ever more than places to say Matthew Gray Gubler/Shemar Moore are so pwetty... And i am more used to discussion than fangrrrling.

I worry about fan forums (and fic sites) as the owners age. In the last several years TtH (the fic part of the site) has had several autors die. None was old old but none of us are spring chicks.

As mega corps suck the air from the internet, it is harder to start anything fannish unless you are pottermore... The non fandom outlets really dont exist to serve the fandoms even if they allow space...(like discord does).

Forum software operated by dedicated fans, preferably whi are tech savvy enough, allows for different ways of interaction & individualized fora hold reader paticipation.

Competence actually matters. Thank You Buffy Summers! Thank you all mods & admins.
 
November said:
I have been exploring other fandom forums lately, and I hadn't really thought about the future of forums until now. I always assumed forums would outlive me, but tonight I wondered, what happens to them when those who own them retire or pass away?
Click to expand...
This is the only fan forum I use. If it closed, I probably would go over to the forum we don't name, because I already have an account on there, but only if a significant number of members on here did so as well.

I much prefer the forum style for discussion. I wouldn't want to discuss the show on Tumblr, or Reddit for example. The older I get, the less I'm interested in social media, honestly. I'm on Instagram, that's it.
November said:
These are very essential and established communities for members. I am utterly surprised that I have encountered fans that are even more addicted and reliant on forums than I have ever been. I worry about them if these places ever close. They could lose their entire community, overnight.
Click to expand...
That is worrisome. Some folks have no friends in "real life" and definitely rely on their online communities and friends.
November said:
Is this where Reddit has the long term advantage? If one sub dies, another can open? Now most search engines seem to source fandom related questions from there anyway.
Click to expand...
I really dislike Reddit for discussion, but it doesn't seem to bother a lot of people, so I guess my answer is yes? Unless it starts charging.
November said:
Are high quality forums going to switch to paid membership only? (Two of the forums I have joined lately have paid tiers, monthly/yearly subscriptions) One has very poor moderation, so I wouldn't even consider it, while the other is much like BB in set up and well moderated, if they asked for paid entry, I would consider it now - especially when the next best option is reddit. How long would this be sustainable? Does this fragment fandoms or does it unite them in a tighter bond?
Click to expand...
Totally agree. I would gladly pay a membership fee to be on this forum. I don't think it fragments them but it does exclude those who can not pay.
November said:
Do we expect to see all social media require subscription soon? X seems to be headed in that direction. What is the future for fandom when people have fewer options? Or too many low quality options?
Click to expand...
Yeah, that's where we're going, and I have no interest in being involved. This is why I've switched back to using physical media and don't pay for any streaming services anymore, and I would certainly not pay for any social media. Absolutely not.

I don't know what the future of fandom is if this happens. I guess we'd see smaller communities on different platforms? The more "hardcore" fans like us would be in the paid option, and the more "casual" fans would be on the free option? Sort of the way it is now, but more.

Interesting thread idea, by the way!
 
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I don't have extensive fan-forum experience, but in the past I was on a few Yahoo forums. In one case, the owner passed ownership on to another person; in another, the owner just shut down the forum when she lost interest. None of my Yahoo forums were still active when Yahoo corporate shut down the entire community several years ago.

I have gotten the sense from younger people who have joined here that forums are not as much a thing anymore. That is a pity, because I've found them the best place to discuss a fan interest, without having to join the greater website (such as Facebook). I'm so grateful for this forum, which is the only Buffy forum I'm on. It is active and well-run (thanks to all the mods!), and gives me a valued social outlet. ❤️
 
Stake fodder said:
I have gotten the sense from younger people who have joined here that forums are not as much a thing anymore. That is a pity, because I've found them the best place to discuss a fan interest, without having to join the greater website (such as Facebook).
Click to expand...

They aren't, because to a large part they were replaced by social media. However, a lot of, especially younger, people are now abandoning social media, because it's awful and controlled by awful people and companies, and I do wonder if that's going to create a resurgence in popularity.
 
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