Future of the footy forum

[mateinone]

I have mentioned this before, but will again.

I think the site should modernize. I think the reality long term is a 'grumpy old men' situation where it is the same group chatting around a fire. Not that it is a terrible thing, it is of course okay, but if the forum was to grow I think it should be including 'hooks' into social media as an example

Just an ability to build followers there and have regular topics posted to these sites to raise questions etc.
You see the thing about these sites is is that once they are subscribed to, people are alerted to the topics.
Let's say Sheik's Cracked post. When it is posted it alerts members and 'reminds' then to come over and have a discussion.

I think forums have a place, but they have a limited places among the youth.
Today's youth have grown accustomed to 'liking' or 'retweeting' a lot more than conversing, so already there is that little bit of the battle in any case.

On the anonymous side.. I don't think it is necessary in today's internet. People do so much online where their ids are known that being hidden on a football site seems a bit irrelevant. In saying that, it is easy enough to have people link their social media accounts as option (ie sign up through Facebook/Twitter or email) and then the choice to link their own avatar or the profile pic as well as using a 'handle'.

I have a love/hate relationship with the site, I have been a member here since about maybe 2001 or 2002 I think it was, I want it to thrive, but the slide that Lods has discussed is exactly what I thought would happen to the site over time if there was not a freshening up of the place.

Anyway I will probably still be back around the place until it blows it's last breath, but I do hope it moves itself forward from where it is in the future.

Oh regardless of what I have said above, I will agree that NO football social media group I have seen goes close to the depth of opinion (right and wrong) as a forum such as this.
It is a lot of people responding in 10 words or less, in fact the comments are basically uninteresting compared to the original 'post'. In that there is no ongoing relevant discussion on those sites.

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Edit.

What you mentioned about the training reports Lods is spot on as well as anything VFL. These are some of my favorite posts on the site for exactly the reason you stated. I can get a view from a supporter rather than from the club. I know what the clubs update will be before the training session has taken place for example.

Again though, I think getting an alert telling me a new training report was posted would get me to the site to read it.
A good example is that I get an alert as soon as the teams are posted from the AFL site and one of the 1st things I do if near a computer is come and see the discussion it generates.

[deags]

I enjoy coming here.
I like to come for both news, and analysis.

I think this type of place will always have a relevance. It may wax and wain in it's popularity, but peoples interest in footy overall will do that due to various things both personal and club related. When we start winning, this lace will once again be a hive of frantic activity.

I left for a while due to the postings of a certain member who is no longer around. I was looking at TC while I was gone and I must admit, I didn't really like the site either in terms of the actual visual look of the site or the "feel" of the site. Maybe just because I was used to this place, not sure.
There are members of the forum who have dominating personalities. That's fine. Most, not all of them, generally have something interesting or useful to say so I imagine most people are willing to put up with the rest of their crap. Some are just horrible, and I wish at times there was an ignore option to filter users posts. I do support banning of people, but I guess probably after a couple of warnings, and maybe a suspension to see if that changes behaviour. We have lost a lot of really great members who posted interesting and useful information due to poor behaviour of certain members... And a lot of the time it may not be terrible behaviour on it's own or as a one off, but when it is repeated over and over it becomes really negative and I can see why people would leave.

[Rational_Expectations]

I've been reading posts on this site for around 10 years now, but regrettably a busy work life means I don't post much. It's a wonderful resource that I value highly.

[laj]

Everything is cyclic and can go up and go up and down. There's a bit more competition these days from the likes of Facebook but there can be alot of twats, know nothings and generally F wits, mixed across a number of good posters too. Sometimes smaller groups are good. Although I occasionally butt heads with some posters, which is part of the forum caper occasionally and it's nothing personal, here all posters here are very knowledgeable and all make good contributions despite what I say occasionally. All on here I would happily have a beer with and discuss all things Carlton, something you feel more in smaller groups.

[Jean-Claude]

I am probably one of the youngest on here but I still love reading the stuff on here much more than the mostly garbage that gets posted on social media or bigfooty from attention seekers. Thoughtful opinions and generally better informed.

[crashlander]

This is an interesting question you have raised. The numbers you have brought up are pretty damning in themselves. But I think they are not as gloomy as they appear.

New topics have more than halved (942-416)
New posts have dropped by 20000 (53611-35378)
New members down from 133 to 30
Most online at one time has halved (330-179)
Page views down by nearly a million (4172638-3498045)
There is still a couple of months to go but these figures won’t get close to that 2014 level.

It appears to me that most forums that I know of are trending down. As the information age gathers pace again, there are people who do not like their expression monitored. They don't like the rules most civilized forums have. They just want to get their 2 cents in and do it first.
OK, I can see that in some people, but it is definitely NOT the way I work.
I would much prefer to get things right. I like when I am not abused for having an opinion. I like to share what I know. I don't want ads or trolls or morons or bullies to appear.

1) Is there still a place for the anonymous forum like ours or are we a dying breed?
I hope we are not a dying breed. I feel comfortable here and appreciate the respect I get. Most of the facebook sites do not have in depth discussion, tables of data, posts that contain lots of words. Most facebook posts are 1 or 2 sentences (except mind sometimes.... I wonder why that is?) Even with most of these pages now having rules stated on them, many posters still publish material that we would not tolerate here. I gather it irritates the people who run the pages, but we have lived with that over a long period. Our rules are not there just because someone likes impressing their power and authority over others. Nor do we ban people just because we can.
I would say that as long as people come to these sites and want to participate, then there is a place for us.

2) Do we need to change to remain viable in the current climate?
If we do not change, then we stagnate and die.
However, changing just for the sake of it is also a very poor strategy for long term survival.
I don't mind at all the idea of looking at other forums to see what they do differently and determine what, if anything, we can add to ours.

[/color=limegreen]3) What changes would people like to see?
I have no idea. I come back to this another time.

[b]4) What other Carlton sites do you visit/ are a member of?
I am a member of a couple of the facebook pages. However, I don't spend much time there - things are pretty superficial there.
I am a member of TC and BF, but I spend over 75% of my time here. BF has some very good things, but sorting through the rubbish is time consuming. TC isn't that bad, but it has taken them a LONG time to get their act together and start enforcing their rules.

5) Is there anything in particular you don’t like about the site in its current form.
6)    What do you like that keeps you posting/ viewing here
I feel comfortable here. There is a good community of posters here. I like that.

[chalkybill]

I thoroughly enjoy this site!  I rarely contribute but I really like the variation of opinions and the different aspects that each of these bring to the discussions,  As already mentioned, the training reports are a great highlight for me. 
No longer living just a dropkick and 2 pints from the ground as I did a few decades ago they give a far more interesting picture than the club reports.  (I miss Bluesgirl who gave incredible reports.)

My thanks to all of you for a great site, one that I would miss terribly if it was shut down

[madbluboy]

If we don't move with the times I can't see this forum still going in 10 years time.

Get some young blood on the admin team to help out with getting CSC on twitter or facebook or whatever the latest craze is.

[PaulP]

If we don't move with the times I can't see this forum still going in 10 years time.

Get some young blood on the admin team to help out with getting CSC on twitter or facebook or whatever the latest craze is.

My guess is that sites like twitter or fb would act like news feeds for the main csc site - e.g "check out the latest discussion on Daisy Thomas on csc : www.carltonsc.com/....................

One or more of the csc mods could act as admin for the instamedia sites, creating links and maintaining some sort of sensible flow between the two. It sounds like a big job.

To be honest, I rather like the site as it is now. As a structural engineering consultant told me back in the day, "small fish are sweet."

[cookie2]

If we don't move with the times I can't see this forum still going in 10 years time.

Get some young blood on the admin team to help out with getting CSC on twitter or facebook or whatever the latest craze is.

Be interesting to know the age profile of CSC membership - I suspect it's currently well skewed toward the older end of the spectrum. Trying to appeal more to a much younger age profile as well sounds good but it may well hasten the demise of our forum if done in an uninformed way.  For example, how do we know what younger contributors would want, if they want a forum such as this at all? Secondly, if we did change things to chase a younger demographic, would we still appeal to the older posters and would they continue to hang around? Tread very carefully IMHO - we could possibly build something new that nobody wants.