Is Our Happy Forum Community Wasting Away?

[lwestatbus]

I haven't been all that active lately myself but it seems to me that our little community is wasting away. Many of the stalwarts of a few years ago are nowhere to be seen and I'm not seeing many new names coming in to take their places. As of this writing we have four forums with latest posts over a month old and the Tournament forum had a one-month gap before a recent post.

Mods: How do our usage stats look?

[miaowmiaowchowface]

i tryto help

[Ensano]

looks like it's done

[jeffonline]

I still look evry day.

[Northern Hillbilly]

I try to get here every day New to this forum and then moved to where there is no net in this hillbilly state. So i use my cell as modem 3g speeds suck but it cures my internet addiction daily :D

[Golden Holden]

What would help? Freerolls? A league? I think overall enthusiasm for poker has fallen since the online poker salad days, but that certainly doesn't mean we can't do what we can to keep things interesting.

I'm certainly open to suggestions if anyone has any.

[lwestatbus]

What would help? Freerolls? A league? I think overall enthusiasm for poker has fallen since the online poker salad days, but that certainly doesn't mean we can't do what we can to keep things interesting.

I'm certainly open to suggestions if anyone has any.

One of the first things that might help is to find out why people have drifted away. Do you, as site admin, have easy access to posting statistics and eMails. If I had these I would try to identify high volume posters who haven't posted in several months. I'd then send them a blanket eMail using BCC addressing to their eMail of record and invite them to tell us why they haven't posted in a while. The message can also invite them back but a really big thing we need is to find out why they haven't been here in a while and then try to address that issue if we can.

I had thought of trying to do this on my own but I'd have to pick through my memory for posters and send individual PMs within the Forum and hope that the addressees have the alert feature set.

I've had a big drop off in my own personal posting from my high points. No particular reason that I can identify, either. My usual lunch activity at work was to browse the forum and post as the opportunity arose. I can't really say why I stopped doing that.

I have a lot of 'friends' on the forum and miss some of them.

[Ensano]

awww


I took a year or so break off poker when i realized i hated playing it...

[HalfSugar]

I'd really like to know if Webmaster is still alive. The dude just disappeared never to be heard of again. Same for Fat Tony I guess.

[xDiamond_CutteRx]

I simply don't care that much anymore. Sorry, but it's the honest truth. I have better things to occupy my time now.

[HalfSugar]

Uh oh, someone has started losing.

[lwestatbus]

I simply don't care that much anymore. Sorry, but it's the honest truth. I have better things to occupy my time now.

This is actually a pretty insightful comment and sort of mirrors my own experience, though I wouldn't phrase it quite so strongly. I can't really say why I quit posting at the levels I had been before. I can say that I don't visit the forums as much because there isn't as much to see. And that is a self-reinforcing negative feedback loop. Fewer posts-->Fewer visits-->Fewer posts...

I would challenge both Diamond and myself to figure out why we aren't participating as much personally. Maybe that would give us some insights into the broader community.

There are so many active members I don't see. Tame Deuces, Webby, URAteUp, Pocket Rockets, and Wenchie. How can any of us get by without BeerWench???

I did notice that the decline is roughly correlated with Geno's departure and the appearance of this HalfSugar fellow.

[odlozilik]

Well, I think many of us know the answer somehow... Some of members have left because they were attacked quite badly on some topics (I think nobody would be surprised if I have left too long time ago). Another ones might left because they don't run good as it's getting harder and harder (or they just don't play poker anymore for any reasons), and the rest of members simply don't have much to say what wasn't already said before, or they might just want to keep their secrets.

What would help? Maybe everyone should try to make an effort and post something unique and deep. More posts => more visits => more posts.

[xDiamond_CutteRx]

Uh oh, someone has started losing.

Nah, not really. I had a winning month in December, but I haven't played since the middle of that month. I was up several thousand in 2009. It's just with school and everything else I haven't had a lot of time to play, and with paychecks from the university I haven't had as much financial need, either.

I would challenge both Diamond and myself to figure out why we aren't participating as much personally. Maybe that would give us some insights into the broader community.

Poker isn't as popular as it was a few years ago, and a lot of people who played it a ton, myself included, are just burned out. It's hard to go at something 30+ hours/week when it really doesn't change all that much (I know there are a lot of nuances to the game, but Poker is Poker and the basic setup does not change), and I simply don't like sitting still that long, especially since that's what I have to do for school. Being sedentary on campus means I prefer to do active things in my leisure time, like lasertag, biking, rock-climbing, etc.

I'd kinda like to get back to a habit of maybe playing like 1 day a week or 3 times a month or something like that to keep it fun without burning out.

[crack]

It's pretty simple.

It's natural progression. People lose interest in certain hobbies for whatever reason and their enthusiasm wanes. Which subsequently means they decide to stop posting in their forums on that particular hobby and they move on to pastures new. E.G Diamond Cutter

Users may find somewhere else where they feel their time is better spent and have found they fit in a lot better in another forum.

What usually happens is a regeneration of users, some leave, and new users who have the same enthusiasm as the old ones once did at the start will post and we have the circle of life. This happens on every forum on the internet.

The problem with our acoona matata is we don't get many new users, and the ones that do sign up and post a few times do not stay. If you can find a way of retaining the new members then the circle of life is complete and we can all sing a long to can you feel the love tonight by Elton John.

How you would go about this I am not so sure. First, the whole of poker is saturated. From TV programs to rakeback sites. Maybe freerolls would help. A monthly freeroll where to enter you must have at least 50 posts or something on the forum could help. The problem with that is although it may increase activity, you may just have a few retards posting 50 times trolling or spamming.

If you can keep them checking back here everyday for something then your halfway to solving the problem.