A serious question for AncgulCon...

If we did that where would you and Volpone go to have your fun?

Somebody with a lot of ideas about how to practice pedaphilia.

For fuck's sake. You and Fleshlight have been banging the WF is dead drum for as long as I've been a member on this board, and you want to call other people a joke?

Seriously! All he talks about is getting into little boys' pants, anal sex, and looking for pedophiles on the internet. It's some kind of sick fixation with him.

I'm still not entirely sure what the big objection to Anc is meant to be. There haven't been any substantial rules changes or restrictions on what people can post and he doesn't abuse his power.

Is it just because he likes trains and therefore fits into the "evil lefty" category?

Message boards on a whole are less popular than they used to be. For specific niches they still do well, but among lots of communities I've known or been part of they have generally dropped away over the last few years. Facebook, Twitter and the like have absorbed a lot of that general socialising traffic.

Well clearly since membership and board activity has been steadily and significantly increasing for all this time, my observation is unfounded.

That's exactly it. I hate this place because Anc likes trains.

So Bailey's question remains legitimate: What exactly do you think they did?

Political views change once people start collecting government checks. There's no going back once that happens. Just sayin..

What board policies don't you like? If you do think there are things that could be done better why did you refuse to be part of doing that?

I don't like the "Bailey used to be my flunky and now he's a cruel and tyranical overseer" policy.

Yeah, we've definitely given Bailey too much free reign. And then there's that whole unbanning Packard bullshit. Nobody else ever unbanned him.

Now we're getting somewhere!

Warned for because I feel like it.

What did happen to all those big ideas that these guys were gonna bring and turn WF around and make it a lively, growing place again? I mean I remember the rotten remarks and accusations we got quite a bit for not accomplishing what would be so easily done if we just got off our asses.

The problem isn't so much the people who own the place now. It's the people who were emboldened to take over being front and center and doing it badly. It's mostly Obama threads and bitchfights with occasional other topics which eventually devolve into bitchfights or Obama threads. It's boring, repetitive and isn't much of a lure to keep one here for long periods of time. The left is as rude and insulting as the right ever was and would be no different if rep was back aside from the recipients. Between all that and personal challenges lately I've been here very little.

So much for some people's notions that WF would be a utopia if only I was off the staff.

As Bailey said upthread, message boards are dying off. Even Facebook, as colossal as it is, is being used more by our parents, and ourselves, while those younger than we are, are choosing to use smaller social apps to do their chatting. Most of us have a lot to say, and are glad to type it all out and discuss it ad nauseam. We're able to keep our attention focused for whole posts at a time, rather than 255 character snippets, and six second videos. This trend will likely continue.

Wordforge is still very lively. Travel to thousands of message boards that aren't affixed to well known specialty sites, and you'll find languishing populations, and threads 3 years out of date. Wordforge has always been general discussion, with a flavor of science and writing. We're nerds, but we're not the popular shiny nerds you find on TV. We like to actually discuss things, and then get into arguments over politics we only half-heartedly support. We're politicos, and policy wonks. We're ideologues with a lot on our minds. Sometimes we're trolls, with a lot of time on our hands, and nowhere else to go.

Whatever the case, we are what we are, and the likelihood of us expanding into some huge community just isn't there. Wordforge will likely stay moderately sized, but that doesn't mean the discussion can't be meaningful, and engaging. I brought a number of people over when Starscape and Wordforge merged, and they're integrating into the community. It takes time for things to mesh well enough to where growth is not only possible, but inevitable. I do believe Wordforge will grow, just not into some metropolis of new users wanting to infuse the forum with new ideas. That ship sailed many years ago, and the time for message boards to witness exponential growth has passed. She's changed hands several times, but the ship's afloat, she's been retrofitted, but she's the Queen Elizabeth II, and not the Explorer of the Seas that is modern social networking, and there's nothing wrong with that.

Just my two bits.

Also, sorry about the analogy, but I love cruise ships.

How dare they!

But seriously, come back to me when a lefty has a sig counting off the posters he's driven off the board, or threatens another poster's children.

^What @John said.

And while we haven't been able to stop the decrease in posting that has been happening the past 5 years (furthest back records go) the rate of decrease has at least slowed.

Throw in the fact that the board is at least stable (not going offline for days at a time every month) and the new members from Starscape and things are starting to look up.

No, we're not out of the woods yet. I still want more posters and better discussion. I've got some ideas we've still yet to try out, but any other ones are appreciated.

So. Ideas?

I'll get right on that.
Let's see... I drove Jillian off of Lonaf. Does that count?

that's the old WF spirit right there

So, looks like Tamar has decided to publicly turn against the Four Horsemen. "Big ideas" to revitalize WF haven't panned out. The Horsemen who are "front and center" are "doing it badly." WF is nothing but Obama whinging & bitchfights. The "Left" has revealed itself to be assholes just like the Right, and would abuse rep for rep war if it was available to them. Tamar now finds WF "boring, repetitive."

Oh my.

Where O where have you been if you didn't know that was her opinion? She's had that attitude since they started taking over.

Unlike garamet, Diacanu & Gul, I'm not here every second of every day. There's a lot that goes on that passes under my radar. The easy comparison would be to say that WF is like a soap opera where you can tune in once every couple of weeks and find the same folks doing & saying the same things, but unfortunately I can't since most of the cast seems to have been laid off....

So, other human beings are just characters that wander into the TV of your eyeballs.
You've finally confessed to being a psychopath.

You're not the solution, but at least you're not as bad of a problem?

I wouldn't say that's very inspiring.

I think this is criticism is being overplayed. Yes, for a while it seemed like the board was breaking more than usual, but I can remember the board going down under Cass & Elwoods reigns as well.

New members from Starscape? Who? Larry? One thing I noticed going through all 53 pages of registered uses was there are an awful lot of duals and other bizarre usernames I've never seen post.

I have yet to hear any specific strategy from you or the other Horsemen to achieve this goal.

Interesting. And what exactly qualifies as "better discussion" in your mind?

Really? What?

And why should anyone do that? I don't own the board, I don't stand to gain anything financially by increasing traffic to the site. Tell me why I or anyone should help make WF more valuable to you and your partners so that you can make more money off it when it comes time to sell?

So, just like everyone's said, you've got nothing, just here to troll.

Gotcha. Seems that's all @Volpone has got as well. He can't even answer @tafkats and @Bailey's question as to what is actually wrong.

I think it a testament to the leadership of the Four Horsemen that the only board drama is a couple trolls weakly trying to stir shit, but even they can't articulate the problem with leadership.