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Cazneau · Post by **Cazneau** » December 13th, 2008, 12:45 pm

It strikes me that this forum is divided into far too many subsections for the number of users. Splitting it up into 3-5 subsections would help make it a more viable community, don't you think?

Citroen · Post by **Citroen** » December 13th, 2008, 12:49 pm

It works the way it is. If it ain't broke, don't fix it.

The other forum http://concept2.co.uk/forum is a more active place. You may want to sign up over there. (It has been suggested that the two forums should merge - that may or may not be a Good Thing™.)

Ducatista · Post by **Ducatista** » December 13th, 2008, 2:27 pm

Huh. I've haven't noticed that, because I never go to the Forum index. I either log in and view posts since my last visit, or, when I'm visiting more frequently, I go to http://www.c2forum.com/getdaily.php, which shows all posts made within the past 24 hours. That's where my C2 Forum bookmark takes me, in fact. I wish C2 would make that a shortcut link, along with the existing View posts since last visit, View your posts, and View unanswered posts.

I've been away from the board for 8 or 9 months, and it seems far slower than I remember. Lots of crickets. What happened? Was there a big dustup or something? Or am I just remembering the board as livelier than it was?

Citroen · Post by **Citroen** » December 13th, 2008, 3:52 pm

Ducatista wrote:I go to http://www.c2forum.com/getdaily.php,

I use http://c2forum.com/getdaily.php?hours=48 to avoid missing things.

zen cohen · Post by **zen cohen** » December 13th, 2008, 8:42 pm

Citroen wrote:....The other forum http://concept2.co.uk/forum is a more active place. You may want to sign up over there. (It has been suggested that the two forums should merge - that may or may not be a Good Thing™.)

If anyobdy's listening, I think it would be a good thing if the forums (fora?) merged. I check both and I think the two combined would create more than the sum of the two parts. I also like the idea of a single, more "international" forum, maybe with subtopics for country/continent-related stuff. I'd also rather be the slowest guy on just one rowing forum rather than two.

Cazneau · Post by **Cazneau** » December 13th, 2008, 10:28 pm

Just not as tech savvy as you guys. I visit a kayakers website (paddling.net) and find that a post there gets many, many more reads per day. Of course there are lots of more kayakers out there than ergers, but their forum is divided into just six sections, with most of the activity taking place on just three of them.

Oh, and Zen Cohen, I'm slower than you. I haven't been rowing long, but rowed a 21:29 5k yesterday, and was pleased as punch at that PR.

zen cohen · Post by **zen cohen** » December 13th, 2008, 10:46 pm

Cazneau wrote:Oh, and Zen Cohen, I'm slower than you. I haven't been rowing long, but rowed a 21:29 5k yesterday, and was pleased as punch at that PR.

Thanks for sharing that. I suspect that even our times are not all that bad. As poorly as I compare to other times here, I consider myself pretty fit, at least for my age. Maybe there's something of a selection bias on the C2 forums in that most of the rowers who care to post are the really good ones.

The ergers at my gym are pathetic but for the first time since I've been erging I saw a guy using pretty good form and noticed his splits were under 2min/500. I really wanted to talk to a live person about rowing but he looked so into it I didn't want to bug him.

michaelb · Post by **michaelb** » December 13th, 2008, 10:47 pm

Although I use the get new posts feature too, I agree this forum has too many forums and that that split up the forum into too many parts. For years, the US forum here was one forum, and that was much more diverse and interesting back then. Splitting it wasn't the cause of this forum falling apart, but it certainly made it worst or has prevented any significant recovery.

Yankeerunner · Post by **Yankeerunner** » December 14th, 2008, 11:58 am

I wouldn't like to see the two forums united. Although the way things are going it's questionable whether either will ever be as good as they used to be.

Unfortunately a few trolls and other hot-heads seem to have sucked the life out of this one and are working on the other. It seems to me that a lot of people were driven away in disgust while a greater number simply gave up from the fatigue of trying and failing to keep things civil.

One topic that comes up whenever nastiness rears its ugly head is that of Freedom of Speech. One thing that did not sink this forum was infringement of Freedom of Speech. Often Bill Patton (an absolute saint to indoor rowing) would plead for sanity and self-control because he was dead set against censorship, but rarely did anything but beg for peace. If I recall correctly he twice deleted the worst threads that had descended into foul language and name calling, and again begged for self-control after doing so, but he never banned anyone and didn't delete anything else. The result, unlike what Freedom of Speech is supposed to accomplish, was not a more vibrant and lively forum but a forum that drove good people away in droves until there are now very few of the original posters left.

The UK forum has survived better, and I don't think that it is a coincidence that it is also moderated more actively. It shows signs of heading in the same direction though. Already a lot of people have succumbed to fatigue and drifted away. Many of the women have given up the ghost and others have sought refuge in the diary section. The more vociferous and argumentative forumites have then criticized the diary section as being part of the downfall of the forum, and suggested that it be scrapped.

They want a big audience for their rantings but can't seem to understand that people don't have to stay around and listen to them. Unfortunately they seem to prefer destroying the forum by driving people away to exercising self-control.

The newer people on this forum who are enjoying it should probably hope that the 'liveliest' posters on the other forum stay there and not muck up what you can be building here.

Ducatista · Post by **Ducatista** » December 17th, 2008, 2:51 pm

Yankeerunner wrote:Many of the women have given up the ghost...

What? I don't even know what to make of that.

Anyway, back to this forum. Is that the consensus? That a few trolls and hotheads drove away the "good people"? That's a damned shame. Without having seen it all go down, I'm more inclined to blame the goodies than the hotties, but that's just because I've seen more fora done in by blandness than by vitriol.

Still, I can imagine a situation in which a few diehards could really make life difficult. I can't recall... has there been talk of an "Ignore" feature on the forum? The mouthiest board I frequent, run by an alternative newsweekly, has such a function. People seem to like it.

Citroen, thanks for the tip! I'm switching my bookmark to hours=48

Cheers,
Ann

grams · Post by **grams** » December 17th, 2008, 7:43 pm

I stopped participating when there was simply too much egocentric nonsense being posted. At the time there wasn't much good motivational stuff I could glean from the posts. I found it took too much time wading through the verbal swamp every day to find any good stuff.

I know some ladies switched to private emails and newsletters as a better way of keeping in touch.

There used to be an 'ignore' feature which I did use to good effect. I believe when the forum was updated that feature went away.

Things are better than a year or so ago. Welcome back ducastita.

grams

Bob S. · Post by **Bob S.** » December 17th, 2008, 10:29 pm

Ducatista wrote:
Yankeerunner wrote:Many of the women have given up the ghost...
What? I don't even know what to make of that.

Anyway, back to this forum. Is that the consensus? That a few trolls and hotheads drove away the "good people"? That's a damned shame. Without having seen it all go down, I'm more inclined to blame the goodies than the hotties, but that's just because I've seen more fora done in by blandness than by vitriol.

The old forum had to be closed down because it had been spammed repeatedly. There is a good possibility that the spamming was done by someone who was not a regular forum member. It was shifted to a new venue that would provide some protection against that happening again. The new forum was announced on March 16, 2006 — 33 months ago.

After the switch it was a long time before it got much activity again and it never did get back to anywhere near the level of members and posts that the old forum had.

Blame the anonymous spammer(s), not the members.

Bob S.

Ducatista · Post by **Ducatista** » December 18th, 2008, 10:10 am

Thanks for the welcome, grams!

And thanks for the history, Bob S., but I was only away for 8 months, and I was a member of the old board, so that's old news to me.

My perception: in March I drifted away from a fairly active board. In November I drifted back to a ghost town. Was there really no big precipitating event? No Chad Williams working everyone into a lather?

Nosmo · Post by **Nosmo** » December 18th, 2008, 1:47 pm

Ducatista wrote:Thanks for the welcome, grams!

And thanks for the history, Bob S., but I was only away for 8 months, and I was a member of the old board, so that's old news to me.

My perception: in March I drifted away from a fairly active board. In November I drifted back to a ghost town. Was there really no big precipitating event? No Chad Williams working everyone into a lather?

No, participation fell off in the summer like it always does, and didn't start up again. No reason that I'm aware of.

Ducatista · Post by **Ducatista** » December 30th, 2008, 4:34 pm

Citroen wrote:The other forum http://concept2.co.uk/forum is a more active place.

Whoa — you can have your own blog over there! Sa-weet!

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Thanks for the tips

slower rowers