REPLY: 2:221/6.21 76e733bb   
   MSGID: 2:333/808.7 5fa5ee55   
   CHRS: CP850 2   
   TZUTC: 0100   
   Hi Charles!   
      
   06 Nov 20 09:19, you wrote to All:   
      
    CP> I was reading an article the other day titled "What Makes a Great   
    CP> Online Community"...   
      
   [snip]   
      
    CP> While I'm reading that, I find myself thinking that this is exactly   
    CP> what I found more than 20 years prior to that in the BBS community and   
    CP> eventually Fidonet.   
      
   That is what I found the various message boards and echomail to be.   
      
      
    CP> So why is it the online forums and things like Facebook and Twitter   
    CP> are such huge presences in the world, but Fidonet, and the BBS   
    CP> community in general, aren't?   
      
   That has been debated before. Opinions varied from "the eenernet is sexier",   
   less dialup wait times or faster connections of internet, lots of purty   
   pictures and graphics.   
      
   I wouldn't know if newsgroup use has waned over time since then (more spam and   
   trolls), but even participation in a newsgroup had a faster and more broad   
   response than an isolated BBS or a hobbiest echomail network.   
      
   Myself, my community for fast answers and interesting conversions included   
   Compuserve for at least 3 or 4 years.   
      
   Web forums also evolved out of a need to build communities with special   
   interests. I joined a few when I needed info on Thinkpads and Macs.  I still   
   have the Thinkpad one in my back pocket.   
      
   Meanwhile, FTN echomail has found a way to participate in similar web forum   
   style too (eg Synchronet's eWeb thing?)   
      
   Along the way, people have probably grown accustomed to using the browser that   
   often would come included with their computer purchase and not learn about the   
   FTN/BBS options out there.  BBSing is probably still strongly associated with   
   dialup.   
      
   As for Facebook and Twitter, they address the short term memories and fickle   
   approach of communication (memes, pics, one-liners, forwards of other people's   
   pics/memes/jokes) to the vast majority of computer users, I guess.   
      
   I think Facebook made it easy for an individual (and now companies and groups)   
   to establish a presence and have pretty good control of content and promotion.   
   No fancy web-page coding required. People on Facebook are not interested in   
   conversations as much as they are interested in telling the world about   
   themselves. It really upped the anted on blogging, I think.   
      
   Twitter, I won't comment on, except to say that I don't like the hashtag mess   
   that the tweets become.   
      
   And now over time, people are migrating to using different devices to access   
   their Facebooks and Twitters via "apps".   
      
   Where does all this leave the Fidonet and BBS community? ..probably in the   
   dust. Perhaps if there was a consistent approach to reacquaint the ex-BBS user   
   and the new generation of conversationalist to the Fidonet and BBS communities   
   then maybe we'd notice some increased presence by their participation.   
      
      
   --- GoldED+/W32-MINGW 1.1.5-b20180707   
    * Origin:  ----> Point Of VeleNo BBs (http://www.velenobbs.net)  (2:333/808.7)   
   SEEN-BY: 105/81 129/305 153/757 221/0 6 360 229/426 664 700 240/1120   
   SEEN-BY: 282/1038 301/1 322/757 331/313 333/0 808 335/364 370 460/58   
   SEEN-BY: 4500/1   
   PATH: 333/808 335/364 221/6 153/757 229/664 426