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The advantage to forums over Social networking
- Thread starter jwolf6589
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I think forums are easier to reply to and follow, not to mention administer. I also think that (often times) the quality of posts is much better on an established forum, versus the 'free for all' type atmosphere, that is often plagued by immature, impudent teens.
I had a FB account for several years and barely used it. I didn't like it and deleted my account. I have a Twitter account that I use, just so I can follow a few developers etc.
I had a FB account for several years and barely used it. I didn't like it and deleted my account. I have a Twitter account that I use, just so I can follow a few developers etc.
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You get more like minded people on a forum. On FB and Twitter you get people you would probably give a wide berth in real life.
That being said I've never been on either!
Excellent point. In the theology field I notice that FB is plagued by a lack of depth while one gets far more depth on forums. Also FB is plagued by people typing out replies on their phones/tablets and most of the time they do not even read an entire post as their replies are short.
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Yeah I am not too popular on FB/Twitter. I post things and receive few replies. On forums it is easier to find more like minded folks.
I don't think it's foolish. If very few people are getting directed to your site via search, people aren't posting, and you're getting swarm after swarm of bot registrations and spam, then what's the point in maintaining a forum that takes both time and money that could be spent elsewhere? You're not going to pay to keep 1TB+ of file attachments and whatever else around forever. Bothering with the whole process of moving them into Amazon's services to make it more cost effective isn't worth it to some people running these places either. You can archive/prune discussions too, but you're still storing the data.
I personally like forums because everyone has a common interest whether it's Apple Inc., tech in general, books, specific music, whatever. It makes talking about other things easier in most cases too, and even though you can a lot of times end up talking about the same thing across all these various outlets, they all have very different point of views that are not just from the tech savvy/bookworms/audiophiles/etc. Like here on MacRumors, there's obviously a lot of people who don't care for Android, but it's good to be able to talk to people who use a Mac like you and are interested in using a Samsung, HTC, etc, and have also come from an iPhone.
With social media, you can have your one account that people talk to, you retweet, you make hashtags to make it easier to follow in search/clients, and discussions happen in a frame of a hour or whatever. Plus when people want support for something, it comes from the person/team who can answer 100% correctly (not as problematic around here and probably the tech space in general, but I've been on places where about 20 people all answer incorrectly because they clearly didn't understand what they had read).
I don't like it as much either, but I know why it's a "better" alternative.
I personally like forums because everyone has a common interest whether it's Apple Inc., tech in general, books, specific music, whatever. It makes talking about other things easier in most cases too, and even though you can a lot of times end up talking about the same thing across all these various outlets, they all have very different point of views that are not just from the tech savvy/bookworms/audiophiles/etc. Like here on MacRumors, there's obviously a lot of people who don't care for Android, but it's good to be able to talk to people who use a Mac like you and are interested in using a Samsung, HTC, etc, and have also come from an iPhone.
With social media, you can have your one account that people talk to, you retweet, you make hashtags to make it easier to follow in search/clients, and discussions happen in a frame of a hour or whatever. Plus when people want support for something, it comes from the person/team who can answer 100% correctly (not as problematic around here and probably the tech space in general, but I've been on places where about 20 people all answer incorrectly because they clearly didn't understand what they had read).
I don't like it as much either, but I know why it's a "better" alternative.
Forums don't force you to condense your thoughts into an arbitrary 140 character limit.
FB is longer but keep in mind many that read your posts are using phones/tablets which makes it difficult to get a lengthly reply.
Twitter and Facebook are hard to search and archive, and nested comments often get missed. Forums like this one are now cluttered with so much off-topic discussion and are so poorly moderated that they're not really worth visiting.
I miss the usenet newsgroups. They were well organized and really rich in information. The small population of users really made it manageable. Oh, those were the good days!
You can still access newsgroups. I access Mozilla's Usenet servers to post my questions about their applications.
Yeah, I prefer forums so I can waffle on a bit and it's interesting to see a variety of opinions in depth too. It feels more like you're communicating with someone. Although Twitter has been absolutely fabulous in rekindling an ancient friendship, I finally capitulated to Twitter because I have to promote my writing (although right now I'm just largely playing genre film goofball.) Still it's nice to keep up with a few people / companies of interest. It's been a huge time eater though so I have to be careful.
I hate FB though. Was on it for about 2 weeks in 2007 and couldn't stand it. Until I master taking photos of all my baubbles and things I'll probably stay off instagram.
I hate FB though. Was on it for about 2 weeks in 2007 and couldn't stand it. Until I master taking photos of all my baubbles and things I'll probably stay off instagram.
I find that forums provide a meeting place (albeit virtual) for similar minded folks, i.e., MR members talk about Macs/iPhones etc. I don't get that in facebook.
The interweb is an evolving entity, who knows what things will look like in 5 to 10 years, but for now, I think forums provide a nice sanctuary to talk with people who share my affinity towards apple products.
The interweb is an evolving entity, who knows what things will look like in 5 to 10 years, but for now, I think forums provide a nice sanctuary to talk with people who share my affinity towards apple products.
I strictly use FB and Twitter for information or specific communication. MacRumors is the only forum I'm active on and I find it to be much more of a socializing and relationship building experience. Sure, I get information here, but it's social in nature.
EVERY forum that required a Facebook account to post to is inundated with spam.
"I made 10K a week working at home. blah blah blah." Or "I'm making $13k a month working part time. blah blah blah."
I prefer forums but saying that I'm only a member of Macrumors.
I'm not on facebook, Linkedin or whatsapp but I do have Twitter but I'm thinking about deleting it.
I like the fact that forums draw people together who like (and dislike) a particular interest, plus if there is slow news day in your interest the forum memebers usually make up for it with good threads, so often; you can find something to engage in.
Twitter is alright but I'm getting fedup of seeing stupid trends plus not enough is done to keep hash tags consistent one topic can have multiple tags which can make it hard to track chatter on say a F1 race.
I'm not on facebook, Linkedin or whatsapp but I do have Twitter but I'm thinking about deleting it.
I like the fact that forums draw people together who like (and dislike) a particular interest, plus if there is slow news day in your interest the forum memebers usually make up for it with good threads, so often; you can find something to engage in.
Twitter is alright but I'm getting fedup of seeing stupid trends plus not enough is done to keep hash tags consistent one topic can have multiple tags which can make it hard to track chatter on say a F1 race.
whatsapp? Another chat/VOIP app? How many of these are there out there? For me I prefer iMessage/facetime.
Too many! it's ridiculous. However I'm successfully managing to dodge them; when I tell people I'm not on Linkedin, Facebook or Whatsapp I get the 'how do you survive' look
Too many! it's ridiculous. However I'm successfully managing to dodge them; when I tell people I'm not on Linkedin, Facebook or Whatsapp I get the 'how do you survive' look
I have got that 'survive' look also.
I have the same issue.
It's like when you don't give out your mobile number people think you are weird.
But I never get spam calls and most of that is because I only give my number to people who I want to talk to.
Forums are candy for intelligent people who know a great deal about a (or a few) specific thing(s), social media just attracts idiots with opinions.
Interesting generalizations...which often enough don't really hold true (in either direction).