Does anyone wish the forums were used differently?

[JamesonA]

I feel a bit as if we're wasting some great opportunities with this forum. There's potential for it to be like a continuous magic convention, with people jamming effects together and giving feedback and advice to each other. The Magic Café does a better job of this (which is saying something), but honestly, most of us are here to avoid the Café's drama. I understand if y'all are content with the way this forum is, asking a question a week and getting a response a month later (or not at all), and the primary usage of the forum being hosting the Saturday Night Contests, but I was curious if anyone agreed with me. Maybe it's just me, since I'm a teenager in a city that has no magicians, but I wish there was more of an online community here. I'd love to hear y'all's thoughts! (There are a few exceptions to this post, namely @RealityOne and @Justin.Morris, so thank you both for being so helpful and encouraging!)

 

[Signature-]

I have to say I’m in the same boat as Jameson. I think most people are just here for the SNCs, which is fair, but I do wish things were different.

 

[Theorist19]

I feel a bit as if we're wasting some great opportunities with this forum. There's potential for it to be like a continuous magic convention, with people jamming effects together and giving feedback and advice to each other. The Magic Café does a better job of this (which is saying something), but honestly, most of us are here to avoid the Café's drama. I understand if y'all are content with the way this forum is, asking a question a week and getting a response a month later (or not at all), and the primary usage of the forum being hosting the Saturday Night Contests, but I was curious if anyone agreed with me. Maybe it's just me, since I'm a teenager in a city that has no magicians, but I wish there was more of an online community here. I'd love to hear y'all's thoughts! (There are a few exceptions to this post, namely @RealityOne and @Justin.Morris, so thank you both for being so helpful and encouraging!)

I must say, I feel like the forums have been getting less active over time. I am among those that left and now just lurk every once in a while, so I’m also partially guilty of this, perhaps, but I feel like this was a reaction to a mixture of four things, some of which could also reflect other users’ experience:
- Having progressed from merely being a beginner, less and less posts kept contributing to my knowledge
- Other, more knowledgeable members not being as active as they used to
- TXI shifting as a company, releasing less magic products yearly and focusing instead on luxury collaboration playing cards.
- Life events

All this, despite being just as passionate about magic as I used to be and also living in a city without magicians.

 

[DavidL11229]

Well yes, but back in the day much of the activity was from beginners looking for information. I'm not sure why this has slowed, but almost everything can be found by searching the forums and all reasonable questions do still get answered, though yes, it may take a week. It was quite a bit of 'what's a good beginner book for (cards or mentalism)' or technique questions that were answered by 'check your finger positions'. Frankly, the more knowledgeable members don't have much to discuss with each other beyond 'what did you think of this new book'. Part of the problem is the prohibition on exposure which limits discussion. Fortunately technique discussions have de facto been given immunity in this area. I'd kind of like to post some of my practice routines for discussion but that would lean too far into exposure. Perhaps the definition of exposure here should be limited to the exposure of commercially available tricks or effects found in books.

What kind of discussions would you like to see?

 

[WitchDocIsIn]

In my experience, and I've got quite a bit of it, this is how forums go in general. Interest peaks, they are active, then interest wanes, a few key players exit for whatever reason, and they die down.

This has happened in every forum I've ever used.

Even the Cafe is seeing much less activity than around 4 years ago.

I think for magic forums specifically this also ties into the global level of interest in magic. Right now it's not super popular. There's no household names to pique interest for newbies, and most forums (and magic businesses) live and die on new people getting interested in magic. The industry kind of burnt itself out a few years ago, I believe. Now it's time for a shift.