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Old man rant: how Fan Discussion changed
4 months ago
I've been thinking about how the internet and fan discussion have changed over the years. The appeal of the internet, to me, has always been the ability to discuss your weird obsessions with other people who enjoy them and actually know what you're talking about. Lately, I feel like it's becoming the opposite of that, with people aggressively trying to push their interests onto others.
In the beginning, there were fan forums. You would find a fan site and attached to it would be a discussion forum. These are still around, but they don't seem as active.
Early on, it would just be *one* forum. I remember once I wanted to ask the people on my Stephen Sondheim forum what they thought about the non-Sondheim-composed "Titanic: The Musical." I was told no, you have to go to a general Broadway forum to ask that. But I wanted to know what Sondheim fans, specifically, thought of this show. Later, this type of issue would be addressed by having multiple sub-forums for off-topic discussion.
And from the beginning, there were arguments -- OH, WERE THERE ARGUMENTS! But they were usually arguments about the specific topic. (And you had to deliberately click on the title of a thread before you saw it.) If the conversation veered too far off into something else -- like politics -- the admins might lock the thread or send it to an appropriate sub-forum. One of my Disneyland forums had a sub-forum called "The Litter Box" ("Where we send the...um...") for especially controversial threads.
Today, however, social media is dominated by sites like Facebook, Twitter/X, BlueSky and whatever the kids are using these days. Or perhaps I just tend to stick to these sites rather than seeking out forums. One of the appeals is that they offer "one-stop shopping" for all your interests -- the Walmart of social media. (I think Walmart actually altered their logo to look more like Facebook's.) This keeps me hooked. These sites are also bottomless (unlike forums, which are divided into pages) and randomized. Scrolling through to see what will pop up next becomes almost hypnotic.
You no longer have to seek out a fan site. Facebook suggests groups to you and posts from groups you don't belong to just pop up in your feed, no click required. I think this where fan groups started attracting people who just want to push their ideologies anywhere they can. And there's no off-topic sub-forum to absorb this kind of discussion. It's just all mixed right in.
On top of that, a significant chunk of my feed is taken up by groups I don't belong to, devoted to topics I have no interest in. Especially on Facebook. I assume they must pay to have their messaging pushed so aggressively. Or else the algorithm somehow thinks I'm interested -- despite my flagging these posts "Not Interested" and blocking their posters multiple times a day.
To be fair to modern social media, I recall times that people on forums used politics as an excuse try to control the conversation and squelch opinions they disagreed with. Perhaps this shift is also partly the result of more and more of society being online. It becomes more like what we used to escape from by going online.
I appreciate that FurAffinity still uses a gallery format, which has also been around since the olden days.
In the beginning, there were fan forums. You would find a fan site and attached to it would be a discussion forum. These are still around, but they don't seem as active.
Early on, it would just be *one* forum. I remember once I wanted to ask the people on my Stephen Sondheim forum what they thought about the non-Sondheim-composed "Titanic: The Musical." I was told no, you have to go to a general Broadway forum to ask that. But I wanted to know what Sondheim fans, specifically, thought of this show. Later, this type of issue would be addressed by having multiple sub-forums for off-topic discussion.
And from the beginning, there were arguments -- OH, WERE THERE ARGUMENTS! But they were usually arguments about the specific topic. (And you had to deliberately click on the title of a thread before you saw it.) If the conversation veered too far off into something else -- like politics -- the admins might lock the thread or send it to an appropriate sub-forum. One of my Disneyland forums had a sub-forum called "The Litter Box" ("Where we send the...um...") for especially controversial threads.
Today, however, social media is dominated by sites like Facebook, Twitter/X, BlueSky and whatever the kids are using these days. Or perhaps I just tend to stick to these sites rather than seeking out forums. One of the appeals is that they offer "one-stop shopping" for all your interests -- the Walmart of social media. (I think Walmart actually altered their logo to look more like Facebook's.) This keeps me hooked. These sites are also bottomless (unlike forums, which are divided into pages) and randomized. Scrolling through to see what will pop up next becomes almost hypnotic.
You no longer have to seek out a fan site. Facebook suggests groups to you and posts from groups you don't belong to just pop up in your feed, no click required. I think this where fan groups started attracting people who just want to push their ideologies anywhere they can. And there's no off-topic sub-forum to absorb this kind of discussion. It's just all mixed right in.
On top of that, a significant chunk of my feed is taken up by groups I don't belong to, devoted to topics I have no interest in. Especially on Facebook. I assume they must pay to have their messaging pushed so aggressively. Or else the algorithm somehow thinks I'm interested -- despite my flagging these posts "Not Interested" and blocking their posters multiple times a day.
To be fair to modern social media, I recall times that people on forums used politics as an excuse try to control the conversation and squelch opinions they disagreed with. Perhaps this shift is also partly the result of more and more of society being online. It becomes more like what we used to escape from by going online.
I appreciate that FurAffinity still uses a gallery format, which has also been around since the olden days.
Ironically social media proves Socrates was right when he said that a public voice is too powerful for just everyone to use, by default without being educated about how powerful public discourse is.
"Harder than Diminisher's abs." I love that.
I like that anyone can post their opinion on the internet about something like movies, as long as it's kept in perspective. For example, I didn't do any research on this rant. It was all just off the top of my head :D. I feel like it used to be more about individual expression -- not to say there weren't trends, like hating Jar Jar Binks -- but it seems like things have gotten more...Hive-Mindey. And Hollywood is pandering to that. Again, just off the top of my head! :D