No.14[Last 50 Posts]
I just wanted to post some stuff I've been thinking about chans. There's no special point I'm arguing.
As far as I am concerned 8ch has been taken over and destroyed. I was just looking at some screenshots of some older 8ch stuff today: that whole story about the bank robber, people having fun with copypaste before racequeen, all the fan art about nomads travelling from 4chan and rebuilding. It was nice to remember back and think about what a good run we had. I feel like none of the new alt-alt chans have any hope of being close to what 8ch was and that's a shame.
More than that thought I'm starting to feel like the imageboard medium is a dead end. I asked myself what do you even get, today, out of an imageboard that you don't on reddit or something else. They're heavily censored these days, I find that the mods on these create-your-own-board sites really abuse their positions and remove far more than they should.
Maybe it's wrong to focus so much on the free speech aspect, the main purpose of chans is to free people by removing the assocation of their post from their identity. That is the key. What do we gain from that? Frustratingly a great deal of noise and incessant meme posts is one of the results. It's too easy to drag down the level of discussion.
The cultures are often based on paranoia and distrust to the point that spending too much time on a chan can leave you unable to interact and integrate with non-chan people. Not to ignore the enojable side of it: all kinds of chaos, fun. a place to learn about extremes thaht you would never normally see (gore, fetishes, horror stories, …). but I see the creation of OC drying up. Memes used to churn around pretty regularly, but now how long as pepe the frog been going? Also the weird meta-awareness and understanding of memes and propogation has created a weird new irony to everything. The innocent playfulness has been lost.
What would you like to see in the future? How can be change the medium itself to enable better more creative communities to form?
Some interesting articles on chan culture (got any more to share?)
-
http://kazerad.tumblr.com/post/96020280368/faceless-together-
http://thebaffler.com/salvos/new-man-4chan-nagle No.15
>>14>but I see the creation of OC drying upIndeed, the OC well is drying up. When one well dries up you find a new one or a new way to get what is in the well.
All of this that you described in your post is part of the refinement process. It happens with everything not just chans.
A simple solution to this problem is to go away from where the herd is going but not too far. At one point the answer was 8ch (migrating from 4chan). Now the answer looks to be the smaller fragmented chans that are popping up. There are some tor chans but they are much too slow last I checked so that may be too far.
The imageboard medium is fine as it is, just watch out for the politics and find yourself a nice comfy chan somewhere.
No.16
I agree with
>>15 -san. I stay away from large places and dont notice these problems too much. As well, the irony problem is a thing, but its a problem with net culture in general, not just -chan sites, from what I've seen. Pushing the boundaries of irony and the line between parody and sincerity was fun up to a point but it went too far eventually.
No.17
>>14Well I think we have a great potential here.
I'll give it to you all straight: No chan will ever be as great as 4chan or even 8chan at its peak.
Young people today are different. They see the separation of speech from identity as bad because, sadly, most of them use their communications to boost their already massive egos. They don't want to be anonymous.
Also, again in honesty, look at the polish of a chan and compare it to the shiny, smooth layout of tumblr, or the ego (karma) cartel that is reddit. It isn't about expanding thought horizons for the new generation, it's for strengthening their world view and reinforcing the orthodoxy.
Things like /r9k/, /n/, /pol/, /leftypol/, /b/, I think most of us have been numbed so much that we forget how radical, dangerous and outlandish the things they contain are.
\
No.18
>>17[Cont]
Also we must look at the geography of the internet. It is now so central in the life of the average person that many commercial elements are vying to parcel it up for profit. These corporate interest, with their resources, are able to field professionals to create, maintain and perfect mediums which will capture the largest audience possible.They appeal to the general mass.
We on the other hand, are not the general mass. We are the refuse, or at the very most undesirable or incompatible portion of population.
In older days, the internet was a patchwork of smaller communities. Not anymore. Now it is a number of large entitites trying to expand their userbase.
Being in the minority, the internet will instead try to influence US instead of the other way around. Remember the meme where 4chan is a men pooping then imgur eats his poo then memebase then so on until facebook? THAT IS BEING REVERSED
No.19
>>18So aside from declining appeal, the minority position and resource constraints, comes our greatest demon: We keep splitting up.
It's not hard to tell that chan users are fiercely independent and distrustful of authority. For many times it has been for legitimate reasons, but our own infighting is at new heights.
We have reached such a point of paranoia where any wrongthink, any different opinion is seen as external influence that we are degrading into the very thing we loathe: safe-space hugboxes. Mix this with rising external pressures and we have a peak point of disintegration.
No.20
>>19[Cont]
I'd like to cite the case of 8/pol/:
In the final third of 2014 8chan was abuzz: gamergate brought in a lot of new blood from 4chan. /pol/ attracted many of these anons since moot nuked /pol/.
At first the culture of 8/pol/ and 8chan itself was a strong mirror of 4chan, same lingo, same memes, same culture. But as time went on, this influx became hated as 8chan developed its own custom, a bastardization of 4chan. External influences were seen as dangerous, people who moved late to 8chan were told to 'go back to cuckchan' DESPITE THE POPULATION OF 8chan MAINLY BEING 4CHAN REFUGEES THEMSELVES AT THAT TIME.
What followed was the wave of iconoclast tribalism that stunted 8chan forever: witch hunts against enemies real or imagined (mostly imagined) a frenzy of fear and loathing that's probably unprecedented in chan history.
Shill hunts, arbitrary bans.the populace of /pol/ BEGGING FOR MODS TO HAVE MORE POWER. Giving mods the authority to go beyond simply rule enforcement, but to root out 'wrongthink' 'shilling' 'false-flagging' and so on, plunging /pol/ even deeper into tribalism until you get the atrocities in pic related AND THEY WILL CALL IT NECESSARY AND GOOD.
No.21
>>20[Cont]
The same tribalism was even more exemplified by gamergate. The suspicion,resentment, abuses of power by mods[Which were caused by anons demanding that mods enforce 'rightthink' as well as global rules) led to FIVE gamergate boards (/gamergate/, /gg/, /gamergaterevolt/, /ggrevolt, /gamergatehq/) all killing each other until the movement is the skeleton we see today.
Couple that with the tech problems, alleged IRC good-ol-boy networks, failed infinityNEXt migration and we have the collapsing monument that is 8chan today.
[I'm thinking on making an essay on this matter, should I? would you read it? Is everythinng that I just said utter shit?]
No.22
4chan died because moot kept pushing and pushing with rules. I still get banned every time I visit due to 4chans shitty software that bans VPNs.
8ch was great until around the icup started (I actually own the wiki) and when the hunger games took off, then reddit started pouring in and fucking everything up. Now some asshole owns the site.
lainchan was comfy for a while but the asshole of an owner they have (believe me, he cheated me out of $40 for a phone and never sent it), along with that the community really got stunted.
chans are like cool clubs, its nice when you know everyone and get along but as soon as the owners starts being a dick or undesirables start coming in it really loses any flavor or impact. No one knows where the fuck to even go to anymore, so they just go back to 4chan, hoping something is different, which it never is. Sushichan is nice and everything but sadly went it went down I think it really just killed any little momentum we had.
No.23
>>20The problem with 8/pol/ in large part was the new people coming in,the Decemberfags were the rulefags that began to clamor for heavier moderation. Its not like they opposed rulefaggotry on principle that gave them the impetus to move , when it finally hit them in dece,ber of 2014. Its just that they didn't like modfaggotry against them , rather than modfaggotry in general.
No.24
>>21You have at least one reader for an essay on the subject sushi.
Maybe format it in a pdf and find some way to distribute it for greater effect.
No.25
>>24would it not be more fitting to format it as plaintext that can in principle be copypasta'd?
Well, both would be even better. One pdf with nice formatting, one plaintext.
I'd check it out too, probably.
No.26
>>25both would be best. im more interested in plaintext maybe as a greentext story.
i think the biggest problem with 8ch was that its whole sense of community came from hating 4chan and hating the sjw boogiewomen. 16chan software is nice but i doubt itll create its own culture. I love what lainchan, sushichan, uboachan do in the sense that they are completely their own thing. they dont try to be 4chan in its prime. They know they are different and embrace that causing a comfy community within itself and creating OC because they like their home. Meguca.org is also interesting in its own right.
No.27
>>22I don't have to say anything about Kalyx and what happened to you but Lainchan, its community and atmosphere is sill way ahead of any other boards. For a place where a lot of people related to the punk culture I rarely see someone acting as a dick. Without Lainchan or Sushigirl I'll probably be on Reddit right now. Or Stack Overflow.
No.28
>>21please do! Maybe we could get it published on the bibanon blog
No.29
>>26This is so true, I spent a bit of time on /tech/ board over the months and practically everything that was posted was about how the sjws were destroying our computer hobby.
They were defined in terms of an enemy and made every post part of a struggle, some imagined battle. As others have said this resulted in fear and demand for higher moderation.
It defeats the purpose completely for me: I don't go to a chan because I want to be forced to say specific things and share the groupthink consensus viewpoint. I want exactly the opposite!
I'm really refreshed by
>>15 's way of looking at things. I actually wrote my OP because I was thinking I might quit imageboards totally and was just spending a few days thinking about it all. Now I think I have a more positive way to go forward.
No.31
>>29Small imageboards are maximum fun
>>16I feel like a lot of people use irony as a way to shield themselves from criticism nowadays. When everything is ironic you're never exposing anything real - you can't be attacked, but on the flip side you're crippling yourself by refusing to be a big enough guy to seriously express opinions that go against the grain. Combine that with the tendency towards hugboxing, heavy handed moderation and people overreacting to everything and things just get so much worse.
>>30The main meme I've seen pop up and get (semi)popular recently, like the past year or so, has been gondola. Although that's pretty much just another variation of spurdo/pedobear and hasn't escaped imageboards yet…
>>21I'd read it
No.32
>>27Pls dont ever leave chans
>>30These years dont match m8
>>21It would be nice
I would read it
No.33
>>21>>21I'm never quite sure what to think of IRC, into relation with imageboards.
On one hand it does promote the circlejerk among subgroups , and with the mods that's almost never good.
But at the same time some good has come out of them.
No.35
>>15>A simple solution to this problem is to go away from where the herd is going but not too far.This. I assume I'm among people who have been around the block in some capacity in terms of *chan history, so I will say that as much as I've loved the draw of being able to post as I please, I'm really tired of people acting obnoxious because "LE [imageboard of choice] IZ 4 SHITPOSTINGS ONLY x-DDDDDD" and whipping out the "NOT YOUR SAFE SPACE/CUCK RULEFAG" card when people told them to shove it because they wanted to actually have a discussion about something different. Early /v/ exodus 8ch was probably the only recent time where people could balance being a productive poster and being OC generators/memesters. The whole Blemmys craze was honestly great and the first time I've seen OC come up and transition into a meme without being obnoxious, but it dropped off the instant 8ch really started to get a population.
I don't get why people associate having a standard of reasonable discourse among peers as rulefaggotry. Moderation only REALLY sucks in communities that can't behave like normal/intelligent people, best examples being Reddit subs and the /pol/ descent described in this thread that turn into actual groupthinks where people aren't allowed to go even ever so slightly against the grain. moot may have ended up being an actual cuck but he was 100% right when he said that responsibility for a community ALSO lies in the hands of the poster.
8ch /a/ probably has some of the best moderation policies I've seen on any imageboard, period. The rules are clear and say what you can't do (summary of rules being don't treat the board like shit) and the mod squad utilizes their power only when necessary; plenty of threads and posts that would instantly be nuked on 4ch /a/ by some modbabby last on 8ch/a/.
>>33It's all about the people your community is made up of. Example; /v/olafile on 8ch used to have some really nice and interesting people with a shitter or two. Then /scurv/ happened and the floodgates opened.
No.36
>>35>>35>8ch /a/ probably has some of the best moderation policies I've seen on any imageboardThe problem with 8/a/ as you mentioned, is that have been a few times where the mods have been arbitrary. Like this once instance last year where they changed the rule about /jp/ just because a couple guys posted a few /jp/ style threads.
>standard of reasonable discourse among peers as rulefaggotryThe extent of moderation should only be getting rid of illegal shit, spam , and not much more than that.
As you said ts the people that make up the community that matters , most moderation has never really made a board better and
at best it just makes board(s) sterile and bereft of vitality.
No.37
>>34dat boi feels like a first to me in that I've never seen a meme become so popular with absolutely no context or original 'joke'. I mean you could argue the same for shit like "ayy lmao" but at least that conveys something, even if it's hard to describe exactly what. in this case it seems like an Emperor's New Clothes thing where everyone just assumes there's a reason it's funny because of irony or whatever.
No.38
>>14Thanks for the articles. I must say that it is interesting to read about 4chan when it is written by someone with such a different perspective.
It is nice that the author of the first article actually visited 4chan. It seems that they made a genuine effort to examine chan culture. It is interesting to see someone write not from the perspective that anonymity is what is normal but that everyone has some "persona" that they use to represent themselves on the web.
I am a bit conflicted about the second article. The first half seems to be desperately trying to link mass-murderers to 4chan, as if the writer has some "not all anons are misogynists, but all misogynists are anons" mentality. Then suddenly the second half talks about nerds and jocks and how the beta-male mentality is badly interpreted. I don't really get what point she is trying to make. Is 4chan a bastion of bigotry that needs to be eradicated? Or do its users just need guidance to "see the light"? In my opinion it doesn't really support her point (whatever that is) that she seemingly has never visited 4chan, and yet she writes a long article about it. It seems that she doesn't even know that everyone is anonymous on 4chan by default. Furthermore, I may be severely mistaken, but I always got the impression that the "beta uprising" thing was a joke, yet the author treats it very seriously.
No.39
>>36>Like this once instance last year where they changed the rule about /jp/ just because a couple guys posted a few /jp/ style threads.That's some serious nitpicking you're tossing under the title of "arbitrary moderation", considering that the 8/a/ mod squad is very open with their decisions and processes. Most large issues that have sprung up have usually gotten a discussion sticky. Good moderation goes hand in hand with a good community that can balance them out; one without the other simply leads to problems, be it shitty mod circlejerks or low quality users and in turn, content.
>The extent of moderation should only be getting rid of illegal shit, spam , and not much more than that.This just sounds like someone who's ok with every board being /b/ with $hobby flavor.
>>38>In my opinion it doesn't really support her point (whatever that is) that she seemingly has never visited 4chan, and yet she writes a long article about it.That's about it, yeah. The author isn't a good writer and mostly rambled about different facets of the community surrounding the incident as they appear to the uninitiated. Her conclusion is simply finger-pointing and generally sucks dick.
No.40
Essay anon over here, here's a sample:
Not a democracy
One of the most paradoxical things about chans is the distribution of power; anons are free to post anything they want without implication to their identity, within the board rules. Thus this 'democracy' is actually limited by a select few individuals, mods, and chan-wide, global volunteers. It could then be concluded that chans are not a 'democratic forum'.
The absolute and definite power rests with the chan owner, who then delegates global moderation responsibilities to others, where these global volunteers (vols in short) enforce global rules (rules which apply in all boards) which are created by the chan owner.
Then there is the more localized distribution of power throughout boards, where board owners (BO for short) are charged with the administration of a board. These BO's could either be appointed (as in 4chan) or in 8chan be the creator of the board or be appointed to govern a board whose past BO has resigned. These BO's will in turn appoint board volunteers whose task is to enforce global rules as well as local 'board rules' which are created by the BO's.
The whole system draws surprising parallels to feudalism, where the King (chan owner) bestows grants of land (boards) to Lords (Board owners), with global volunteers being knights who owe allegiance directly to the King, and the board volunteers being knights in service to the Lords. All this distribution of power of course depends on the trust and loyalty between subordinate and overlord. But unlike in feudalism, the 'Lords' of chans cannot topple the King in any way.
Indeed, the chan owner, like Holy Roman Emperor Frederick I Barbarossa, answers to no one but God and Justice, both of which could be very liberally interpreted. This lack of accountability and feudalistic structure is surprising considering that chans espouse egalitarian principles of anonymity, but it is still less tyrannical than corporate-owned platforms like Reddit or tumblr. In some chans you at least get the ability to appeal your ban.
Nevertheless, abuses of power have been the catalyst of calamity and chaos for times beyond counting in chans. The fact that most administrative functions take place in IRC channels and other back-door mediums that are unaccountable is disturbing to say the least and at most it has been a major factor in causing outright migrations between chans.
No.41
The best way to save an imageboard is to continue contributing quality posts. So even as 8chan (or any other imageboard) darkens I will continue to go there and attempt to light it as best I can with quality discussion.
People shouldn't just turn away and give up when things get bad, doing that will only accelerate the decline.
You need to be the change you want to see in the world. I'll fight to the bitter end til nothing of value remains.
No.42
8ch was fun and all in the beginning with shit like "we're all newfags", but once the paranoia started it all went downhill. Nowadays you can't make a thread about a new video-game on /v/ and get 5 posts before a "shill" or roll derailer.
/a/ is still good (the only problem being that the mods delete discussions that are completely unrelated to the board and thread, which, while it ruins potential fun discussion, is understandable) and so are some smaller boards, but I do agree that most are complete shit and unsuited for any kind of talk that isn't complete circlejerking.
Like the others said, the problem isn't with imageboards, but with the paranoid mentality.
No.43
>>21Do it mate.I could use a good morning read in the near future.
No.44
>>27You can just look at the thread about the removal of /popular/ and you'd get a general idea of his thought process if you weren't there during the staff shenanigan periods.
I wish there was an image board centered around crypto and privacy with a similar lainchan feel.
No.45
>>42>Nowadays you can't make a thread about a new video-game on /v/ and get 5 posts before a "shill"I remember when I went on 4/v/ any thread that was about video games would get called 'VIRAL'
Only not vidya was safe.
No.46
>>40Really good stuff! Keep working on it because I'd love to read the final version. One point of criticism would be that you may want to explain some things in a little more detail for those not as familiar with chan culture. For example, explain what an "anon" and why they are referred as such.
No.47
>>45It's macabre but interesting that viral threads, for everyone's panic that they would overwhelm multiple pages of /v/ and stifle discussion, indeed ended up stifling video game discussion because people were so worried about anything being a "viral" post they refused to talk about video games.
No.48
>>42I can't go anywhere without being told to leave and getting shat at for my opinion. I mean if people were to disagree with me then give a reasonable, respectful, cohesive counterargument.
I remember that /pol/ used to have a picture with a list of logical falacies stickied to the top. Now you could act like an edgy 15 year old all you want in ANY board because everyone assumes that a different opinion is a shill/outsider from whatever boogeyman that group believes in (jews, muslims, big game devs, microsoft, christians, non-virgins, hotheads etc.)
Everyone has this absurd caricature of what their enemy looks like but end up being oblivious to anything else.
No.49
>>26>sjw boogiewomenEven Sushichan has SJW shills now. Great. It's nice that I can't go anywhere on the Internet now without running into you cretins.
No.50
>>49Lots of people are in denial about SJW being an actual problem. Some because they dont want to go against the grain, others because they're so used to communities that are pretty against it it it seems like it barely even exists compared to the opposition to it.
That, and the alt right and folks leaning towards them like to call anything and everything that doesnt match their conservative, traditionalist ideology 'SJW.'
No.51
>>49>>50Political discussion is strictly against the rules. Any further political discussion will be removed.
No.52
>>45>>48I find it ironic how they're censoring in the name of discussion and "free speech", thus turning it into a hugbox.
The site was better when the cripple was still interested and made it a front for free speech, then shit went downhill and most boards are either circlejerks, ousting the ones who disagrees as a shill, JIDF, pedo or whatever, or shitposting central, where there aren't even attempts at discussions.
/pol/ has turned into a bizarro SJW.
>>49Except he's right. There were SJWs on 8ch, and there was no problem with being wary of it, but once they paranoia grew, the site went downhill.
No.53
>>51fuck your rule lawyer, we're having a perfect good thread.
leave
No.54
FREE SPEECH
FREE SPEECH
FREE SPEECH
FREE SPEECH
No.55
If you don't like the thread go post in a different one.
do NOT censor the discussion.
No.56
<undoall> SushiChan should've died when itamae disappeared
* undoall (~undoall@2602:306:39d6:40b0:d93:484:dd4f:3f0) has left ("Leaving")
this guy should not be admin, he doesn't care about the site just wants to delete peoples posts. Unfair.
No.57
>>51The eternal hotpocket strikes again.
No.58
Take the moderation dispute to /yakuza/ please since it's derailing this thread.
Undoall, please contact me before deleting posts.
No.59
>>58I think it was actually the person threatening to delete posts of people continuing to engage in discussion that 'derailed' it
No.60
>>51>>59This is exactly one of the main problems killing chans.
There was no fighting or toxicity in this thread at all. It's really poor taste and an intimidation tactic to put warnings like this into threads that were going fine.
It's important cultural discussion, things we are all dealing with. You shouldn't just label things to try and get rid of it; whether it be "political", "trolling", "sjw", or whatever else people come up with. It's not just with mods, it's with everyone. Jump to these labels to shut people out or ignore them has spread like a virus and become more common than real discussion.
Marginalizing people is the most un-comfy thing you can do in an online community, and moderation is the most extreme form. Until people learn to avoid this behavior things are going keep deteriorating.
No.61
>>59They resigned from the backlash so it doesn't matter. It's just me now. Let's stop talking about it here.
>>136Yeah I agree and I wish they talked to me first.
No.63
>>60I completely agree with you. Now, having read everything previously stated in this thread, as well as just experiencing things myself for as many years as I have. I must admit, it's just getting exhausting and confusing to the point where I almost don't want to think about it anymore.
There was a time I believe, where chans felt comfy and fun and shit flourished. Now I feel like every big chan is a complete piece of shit in every way and is depressingly shitty, while all of the small chans feel like they're missing something really important and I can't put my finger on it.
No.64
>>56this
NEW SITE NEW ADMINISTRATION
GO AWAY FAG MODS
No.65
>>51But SJWs shilling on the site isn't against the rules? That's not political? Fuck off.
>>52>paranoia"Bogeyman" (or a variant) is an absolute dead giveaway. SJW shills always use that word and always insist that SJWs don't really exist, which by now is as believable as claiming Trump doesn't exist.
Anyway I can see that this site is a lost cause so I will not be coming back. Have fun with your SJW circle jerk.
No.66
>>65I refer you again to my reply, earlier.
>>50Not everyone who pretends theres no problem with SJW is one of them. Loads, in fact, are not really, unless you're a /pol/ack afraid of any outsiders who'd call anyone who associates with or aligns themselves with people who are one themselves regardless of what they're actually willing to do, say, and believe, or anyone who just is a leftist of any kind ever.
Plenty of SJWs will, of course, also pretend there is no problem, because pretending there isn't a problem when it undermines their narrative is one of their specialties. See pretending there are no problems with backwards Islamic orthodoxy or popular Islamic extremism.
Pretending there is no problem where there is one is bad, but its done for differing reasons by different people. Some people just dont want to have to feel like they're orienting themselves in opposition to what they've been taught is the "good guys." People averse to conflict in this manner are incapable of actually being SJWs, because that would involve being very proactive about being a loud, aggressive, imposing asshole.
I'm probably just some shill from tumblr, or one of anitas COINTEL agents or something though. With us or against us, with us or with them and so against us.
No.67
thanks for ruining my thread
we were having a good discussion before mods fucked it up.
No.68
>>67I agree with this. Three different mods came in for no good reason and stirred shit up that didn't need to be stirred.
No.69
>>68Three? There were only ever two, though now there's only one.
No.70
>>69Well, I wasn't entirely sure if it was two or three. But I saw three different posts. Two with names that were different. .-.
No.74
>>63>while all of the small chans feel like they're missing something really important and I can't put my finger on itSite traffic?
No.76
>>74Kek. I mean, that's one part of it. But not really what I meant.
No.78
>>21I'd like to read more of it
No.79
>>76The main problem with small chans is in a way site traffic. In a way the communities are almost too personal. If you go on a big chan like 4chan your posts are a drop in the ocean, 8chan a drop in a sea, sushichan a drop in a lake. It places more responsibility on the individual poster which I think is daunting for some people. In addition, less site activity means the site doesn't have that buzz of activity of a bigger chan where refreshing the front page will bring a whole bunch of new threads that you want to reply to. Smaller chans like this are better suited for longer and more detailed discussions. The lack of activity also means the percentage of lurkers is dramatically lower than it is on bigger chans. I imagine that a majority of the visitors to this site are active posters as opposed to lurkers. On a bigger chan, the opposite is true.
No.81
>drop in a lake
more like a puddle.
No.82
>>79I guess that's why I participate in several chans. At some point I decided that 4chan was kill and stopped using it. It worked becuase I wasn't full NEET. But here I am again, living the NEET dream, and of all the internet, I only feel at home in chans, so I go back to 4ch for my daily dosage of shitposting and for all the buzzing activity (which is, in a way, counterproductive because I end up wasting my time there), while I keep these small chans my 'safe spaces' because here I can see some interesting discussion that isn't littered by the words cuck and shill (recent sushichan drama notwithstanding).
So, yeah, there has to be a tradeoff between traffic and coziness I believe.
No.83
I really like this thread and the articles OP posted.
Anyway. Culture on chans more often than not leads to paranoia. There are many problems that lead to killing new chans. Often times it is hard to pinpoint one issue, though usually they are closely related.
If the owner of the chan is not good then the chan will ultimately fail. We see this time and time again with new chans that pop up and never amount to anything.
Wizardchan is a chan that was murdered by IRC cliques and absolutely terrible site management. Even today the wizardchan remnants are in shambles. The Wizardchan offspring show how detrimental cliques on chans can be. Furthermore wizchan shows us how bad paranoia can be (however I do not blame the wizchan community at all)
In my opinion there is a pyramid of what must be done for a chan to be decent. First off the owner has to be great, anything less and things will falter sooner or later. Secondly, there has to be firm rules laid out at the start and they must be stagnant unless absolutely necessary. Third of all, IRC cliques, as well as Trip cliques must be kept to a minimum. Next, I believe the chan must have some sort of "gimmick" or premise. As someone else in this thread mentioned, it is pointless to try to reenact the glory days of 4chan. Last of all I believe the chan has to stay small. "Chan culture" is toxic on many fronts. Many people are of different beliefs on how things should be run. Some want rules to be crushingly strong and others want them to be lax. Some people want to move on from the mindset 8chan had and others want to stay by it. We have seen both sides in this very thread.
8chan was enjoyable, for a while. Even before the many management problems 8chan was clearly showing growing pains.
>>21 sums it up quite perfectly.
Right now chans are at a transition phase. I'm sure many of you know this because you are apart of it.
With 8chan being abandoned some users are heading back to 4chan (though most already went back during events such as InfinityNever and the server bugs) some are heading to places like lainchan (which has been slowly dropping in quality for quite a while) 16chan (along with all the "new 8chan" sites),wizchan. There are obviously also places like 420chan and 7chan that have been alternative chans for many years now.
In the coming months things will continue to settle down. I certainly believe there will be more and more chans that pop up and rise in popularity. 4chan led to 8chan which is not leading to a disbursement of many other chans.
Personally, I am fine with this. I have found many slow chans. I will browse them simultaneously and enjoy each for what they are worth.
With this all said. I believe chans are dying, but that is a topic for another day.
No.177
lainchan used to be good. And it's current state makes me sad.
No.178
>>83If I'm understanding correctly, this paranoia you speak of, is something I notice where it's hard to talk about anything without being accused of something.
If it's wizardchan, you're a normie.
Lainchan, you're the NSA.
8chan, you're a cuck.
Anything that discusses products(like /g/ or /toy/ on 4chan), you're a shill.
Although the latter 2 examples are usually just harmless shit posting that is part of the boards way of communicating.
No.179
It stopped being about fun and comfy and started being about politics and people thinking that being a keyboard warrior with a hashtag or tumblr would make a difference. The whole idea that every chan needs to host complete unfettered free speech leads to these ridiculous moral crusades and stupid noise. People think that banning posters shitposting about [politics] on other boards is the mods suppressing their free speech, when in reality its just keeping the bugs out of the kitchen.
No.184
Besides Sushichan and Uboa, I can't think of a single good chan. The old breed are dead, and in its place come a new breed. I can't stand being on /v/ or /sp/ or really any sub for that matter. /g/ is decent because there is a deep learning curb that weeds out the normies, but it never has topped lainchan at its peak. Chan culture has become mainstream and because of that reason it has really started t become unintelligent and repetitive. 8ch had a minor chance to become good but incompetence burned it to the ground, along with the redditors. every site seems to gets razed to the ground by pedos, under 18 year olds, and normies. 8chan to me was a sanctuary and was great, until the anger and hatred of everyone and everything just got too much to handle. It just really stopped being fun and inviting. Lainchan was a step away from that mindset, into something different, unique. I felt at home there. now its all pretty much gone. Nobody does jack shit anymore on that site. chans were really my only way to have real conversations that weren’t small talk or bullshit. Everyone I talk to IRL really bores me. Thing I liked about 4chan/8chan was that it was all real, raw and relentless. I get really tired of moving board to board, chan to chan, trying to find something I won't roll my eyes at, or be bored with after a few posts. I haven't had a good conversation or laugh anywhere in quite a long time. After spending a good 7 years of my life on chans it really saddens me to see it all change. I keep getting this feeling that there is nothing of substance left on chans. This site very well be my very last one, with the way things really are going. If I had the money I would love to make a chan, or help a chan become great once more, but I don't really talk well online with others ( Either I come across as a california roll or an asshole) and making a whole site is too difficult for me. I try to start working on something like writing or learning something but my mind just keeps wandering.
No.186
I largely agree with most of what the other rolls have said. Trying to recapture the vibe of 2006-10 era 4chan is futile, the nature of the web has changed too much for this to be possible. We're too far gone.
Given how apathetic the majority of users seem to be about NSA/Five Eyes/windows 10/etc spying it would appear that they no longer care for the sushi rollymity and type of expression provided by an imageboard. The thought process of "nothing to hide, nothing to fear" is too prevalent. it's easier to have fellatio performed on your virtual ego and to go with safe, popular opinion on an aggressively moderated, rule heavy site.
We've also got to contend with the changing landscape of the wired, most users, especially more casual/new ones mill around the same handfull of sites (facebook, twitter, tumblr,reddit) and are fed content from aggregators. rarely venturing outside their closed pools. Web surfing of the late 90's/00's is becoming antiquated.
I'm not entirely unoptimistic about our situation however, as long as there is a demand (or in 4chan's case, revenue) for our kind of website they'll continue to exist. I believe eventually a chan will arise and unite the disseminated users towards a new dawn.
What really worries me are the sushi rolls of the now and the sushi rolls not yet born. children are being raised on a diet of instant outrages, scandals, clickbait and permanent connectivity. I worry that their youths spent in the walled gardens and hugboxes where their views and opinions are never challenged or invalided will permanently warp them.
I'll admit that alot of what im saying is motivated by nostalgia, many of my formative teenage years were spent lurking shitty 4chan threads and i dont think i would of developed into the same person without it.
tl;dr
-4chan is well and truly fucked from an influx of people looking for a secret treehouse club
-8chan is failing from constant witch hunts and poor moderation.
-smaller chans are failing from a lack users/users scattered across many smaller boards
master/wizard/16/7 etc
-modern internet users dont want an sushi rollymous experience, would prefer individuality and a chance to express their personal "flair"
On a somewhat unrelated note, do you rolls ever think about what happened to the super early (06-09) 4chan userbase? i've always wondered what became of them, occasionally i'll stumble on a screencap/greentext from that era and wonder what they would of made of us. who among our progenitors died, got married, fell in love, had children, grew up or got old, what became of them and their stories that we will never know.
No.187
>>184>Lainchan … Nobody does jack shit anymore on that siteYeah… Now that I think of it, you're right.
There was some sorth of enthusiasm there. Now it's all plain. Imstill go because they'remthe only people who seem to know how to keep some intelligent discussion… sometimes.
And the feels board. But great part of it is boring discuasion over the same old things.
No.188
>>17I believe the young people of today that have no qualms with linking their entire identity to their internet personas are the type that never used the internet significantly until social media. These people aren't all the same, and of course plenty go on the chans, but collectively there's a strong anti-corporate tone. Don't we all remember when YouTube tried to force people to link their profiles with a Google Plus account, and the backlash from that? There are certainly people that care, the problem is that they're not being told. This is only becoming more and more difficult as things continue to centralize. As one of the no-doubt younger posters here, I can say that there will always be a demand for small discussion boards like this. The biggest problem now is that the internet's hopelessly fragmented, but perhaps that's a good thing. Only those who really have the interest and are sick of their few mediocre options will bother to look.
>>177What happened?
No.189
>>186>sushi rollymity heh heh
>What really worries me are the sushi rolls of the now and the sushi rolls not yet born. children are being raised on a diet of instant outrages, scandals, clickbait and permanent connectivity. I worry that their youths spent in the walled gardens and hugboxes where their views and opinions are never challenged or invalided will permanently warp them.Yeah I've been a bit worried about all that as well. It's going to be interesting to see how the world turns out in 20-30 years when everyone sperging out online nowadays is running the show.
No.190
>>14>http://thebaffler.com/salvos/new-man-4chan-nagle>After the November 2015 shooting of five Black Lives Matter protesters in Minneapolis, a video emerged of two of the men involved, clad in balaclavas and driving to the BLM protest, saying, “We just wanted to give everyone a heads up on /pol/”—referring to the politics board on 4chan, a group that partially overlaps with the /b/ community. The speaker then points at the camera and says, “Stay white.”Yeah because that's totally what happened.
What a bullshit article.
No.191
>>53>>57>>60>>65>>64>>68Thanks lads. You talk about the problem with chans - it's you. It's painfully obvious that you were never on the old sushichan (forgivable) and/or never understood the purpose of this site (not).
There are a million places you can complain about samurai platters or be political - 4chan, 8chan, most smaller boards that have a /b/ or /pol/. But you had to come to a place that specifically aspires towards comfiness - by definition ruling out the grating argumentation of politics - and complain here.
And then, when challenged, you start spamming and cursing at the mod who's been here practically from the start and helped build this community and get it through tough times, causing him to leave. Thanks for that.
Please stay in /hell/ forever. You've done a great disservice to sushichan.
P.S. I know this post is in itself uncomfy, but it had to be said.
No.192
>>191>the old sushichanHow far back are we talking here, buddy?
No.193
>>192Sushi in any form is better than cloverchan could ever be - I was a part of that 06 crowd and it served largely as a distraction from actual life, at least I feel the things I enjoy everyday are appreciated here…
No.194
>>188>The biggest problem now is that the internet's hopelessly fragmentedThanks to the big players, the internet is getting more and more centralized. Cloudflare runs like half the internet, Google is slowly taking over the entire SASS field, Facebook is buying any social services that get too big. The internet was a lot more fragmented 15 years ago.
No.197
>>196I kind of gave up posting here since I'm worried about my posts getting deleted. just lurking a bit
No.199
>>197Wait, are people afraid I'm going to delete their posts? Why?
No.201
>>192When itamae was in charge.
No.202
The IRC medium of conversation has worked for a hundred years. What will secure the future of our sushi people is IRC.
Then imageboards should just be IRC but have
>multimedia support
>sushi rollymous posting
>mods that delete illegal shit and spam
>saved posts so people across multiple time zones can speak to each other without both being online at the same time
>web based
No.204
>>202>imageboards should be IRC but actually imageboardsI don't get what you are trying to say. What features from IRC do you want on an image board?
>sushi rollymous postingheh
No.205
>>199 I'm mad about this california roll who said that. Just because of a single incident with a mod who's gone anyway, this california roll says "I'm afraid of oppresion wah wah"
>>196I'm feeling that way too. I just wish this thread died anyway. It's uncozy af and it made undoall resign, which makes me sad too.
And lately I've felt distant from imageboards.
This is the best one I know of, and it's slooow. lainchan lost that special something it had back when I first found it. Can't point it out, but it seems to have dropped in quality, a lot.
4chan is 4chan, I don't need to say much about it. Same goes for 8chan and 16chan.
Wizchan is for wizzies, and it's gettinga shitload of activity, not very good activity either.
I haven't tried uboachan because I don't get it… I've pretty much limited myself to reading /hikki/ occassionally…
I think it's time to leave dem imageboards…
No.206
>>205I get the feeling that as soon as I turn up to a low key imageboard it turns to shit.
I imagine there's ones doing well now that I will find in a year and it will suddenly become shit.
Maybe I just put too much stock in other peoples claims on the past, or I'm searching for a rose tinted place that doesn't exist. I'm not really sure.
Feels bad man.
No.207
>>202Well, there's Livechan. I wouldn't assume it's the exact thing you're looking for, though. And it seems more-or-less abandoned and filled with spammers at this point. But the concept is still there.
No.210
Does anyone remember the url for /Tea/ ?
No.212
>>210[LINK REMOVED BY REQUEST OF SITE OWNER]
No.213
>>205I can feel that sushi roll. I've been less feeling less and less internet recently. I really like sushi rollstyle connection though. Maybe a new kind of internet based connection would be good. I used to like omegle, even though you'd have to go through many "asl -> quit" conversations. But that's neither here nor there.
I quite like the "comfy" concept that sushi extols, and I feel like this thread is kinda hurning that feel in some abstract way. I don't think sushi is really a place for meta discussion. I think this thread would have lived better on lain/cyb, though honestly I haven't been by there for a while. It is on /hell/ but hell still shows up /kaitensushi/. I suppose I should probably stop complaining and just hide threads from /hell/ when I want to be comfy on sushi.
Though all I'm saying may be nonsense to other perspectives. I'd honestly like a little more discussion out of this, despite my view that it's uncomfy.
No.214
>>213Maybe I should just hide /hell/ from /kaitensushi/? I think most people know how to get here anyway.
No.215
>>214you should. comfy should have more visibility than /hell/
No.217
>>214That was a good idea. I keep seeing this depressing thread bubble to the surface.
No.229
>>186as someone who came to 4chan relatively late (2010 ish), i feel kind of weird, because it was a sort of sekrit club thing for me for a while
the elitists attitude was kind of intimidating though, so i mostly just lurked for a long time, but i felt like the difference between ironic and actual toxicity was a lot less ambiguous
i still dont really understand what happened in the lead up to the whole moot scandal and 8chan exodus, but its never felt the same since
sushichan was the first board i posted on regularly, and it was nice, while it lasted, although i do remember arguements about the roll censorship
the mods leaving is kind of depressing, especially since they interacted with the community so much
No.230
>>228He may be talking about the old news board on 4chan, aka proto /pol/.
No.233
>>229>i still dont really understand what happened in the lead up to the whole moot scandal and 8chan exodusGamergate happened.
No.237
This sucks guys.
I don't use the web much anymore, but today I went to some of the imageboards where I used to spend some time. And it's all fucking invaded by /pol/ kiddies mindlessly spouting their stupid memes.
It sucks. For real, fucking 12 year olds. I can't go into the web anymore because I'll be seeing this bullshit and it just diminishes quality by orders of magnitude.
I don't know what is going on, but I can say that /pol/ is certainly cancer. These guys are really brainwashed to shit. What I mean is that if there is a thread about cats, they either say JEWS out of fucking nowhere, or they somehow manage to start a fucking discussion about politiks before saying "yeah, I go to /pol/ and know how the world is fucked up", not realizing it's all fucking propaganda on both sides.
Sorry if I fucking bring this up in sushichan, but it's the only place I feel safe posting anymore. I know it's a highly uncozy topic, but that's kind of why I don't mention it outside anymore, because I know here people are more likely to quaranteen these sort of topics, while in other sites I might just be contributing to the pollution by bringing it up.
Anyway, thanks for keeping this place cozy guys (everybody). You know this is not to start a flame war, I just needed to say this because, well, there's nowhere that isn't infested wit this plague anymore
No.239
Stereotypical chan culture is the worst. I occasionally wonder what an invite-only or password-protected imageboard would be like. sushi rollymity would be compromised to some degree, and the posting rate would be incredibly low, but quality would be way up.
No.240
>>20I'll be honest fam, half the issue was the new /pol/acks pushing for it.
First exodus /pol/acks were happy with the extra members until they started calling for a bunch fo rulecalifornia rollry.
No.241
>>239It would work if it had a common password that was changed every so often to keep it from leaking out. As long as the people inside only give out the password to certain people and don't let it be broadcast to everyone on the internet, then it should work
No.242
>>239>>241Passwords can be nice, but they can also cause problems if there's a few nofunz in the community.
No.244
It'll all be okay
;)
No.245
I like this place, it's comfy. Even if the topic isn't the coziest, like the ones above me said, the way you talk to each other is real nice. It's like getting to a feather bed after going through miles of steel wool.
I think I might stay, if you don't mind.
No.289
>>1864chan defined my life since 2005. i don't know what exactly it was, but i remember instantly clicking with the culture there. i fully understood the humor and absurdity, the controversies and discovery. of course i never talked about it to my friends IRL, though i'd drop a subtle reference now and then to see if anyone would recognize it it was always on the tip of my tongue. . it really was the secret cool kids club. i never thought back then about how the site would develop over the years. the magic is gone. my god i miss those days. the aura and vibe of it, the community that made it what it was. i was a lot happier back in those days. more enthusiastic, confident, mirthful, social. i've searched the corners of the interent for an archive of /b/ threads from the early 2006s and never found any of those gems. i get so nostalgic about those days it brings me to tears.
i've been awake on adderall for about 20 hours now and just discovered lainchan and this chan tonight. i've been reading threads for hours now. so refreshing to see such a drastic increase in post quality. i'll be refraining from posting for a while until i familiarize myself with the community.i'm in a zombified state right now so i know i'm not very eloquent in my ramblings right now.
at 26, i live alone in poverty in a small apartment with two cats and work every day at a small chinese restaurant busting my ass while being bossed around by people i can barely understand. old friends are gone, days of parties are over, and my refuge of the internet has turned into something i detest and obsessively browse with disgust. that's what i come home to. i became too sucked into 8/pol/ to the point i had to take an active measure to stop browsing. too hateful and toxic even for someone like me, considering i'm at a depressed point in my life.
i'm the result of browsing 4chan for 11 years. i could have been a higher functioning individual forged by old internet mentality, but i am the result of being a true /b/tard.
i have no regrets
No.300
>>186>do you rolls ever think about what happened to the super early (06-09) 4chan userbase?I started posting on 4chan in 2005. What would you like to know? I'm still single and I don't think I'll ever get married or have children; I don't get along in any way with the majority of people. I've managed to get a decent job and have bought my own 3 bedroom house.
No.303
>>300Why buy a three bedroom house if you're single and don't plan on marriage?
No.304
4chan has to die for imageboards to thrive again.
Only through a huge exodus, something new will be born.
Posting on 4chan comes with so much obligation about what posts should be like, that content creation and change becomes slow. Lurking feels bothersome.
Segregation between the boards is so big that momentum can't be build; /a/ and /b/ could be entirely different websites and no one would bat an eye.
At this point alternative imageboards have one problem;
There is no incentive to post about something on them.
This is simply due to the fact that threads on them are moving so slowly, that posting and lurking on 4chan simply becomes the more rewarding course of action, even if you will have to wade through a lot of shit.
For example, even though /a/ is kind of getting stale, you have at least fast moving threads; There is no reason for discussing anime anywhere else.
If centralized places like these would not exist, people would find new places, which may even fit them better.
The remedy of the alternative imageboard problem is simply gaining more users.
These users will have to come from somewhere, and they will need an actual incentive to post (even if it's just a lack of alternatives).
This will only be possible if 4chan dies.
(Secretly I hope that this won't be necessary, and that we can find different ways to attract people.
Maybe I will start by advertising sushi-chan in semi-related threads)
No.305
>>304>There is no incentive to post about something on themThis really isn't true. It is possible to have in-depth, rewarding discussions on smaller imageboards, even if they are painfully slow. If anything, posting on slow imageboards is actually better, since there's not a million retards screaming at eachother and trying to get as much shitposting in before hitting the bump limit.
The quality of the posts and the overall atmosphere of the site is what matters, not the posting speed.
>Maybe I will start by advertising sushi-chan in semi-related threadsPlease don't. This is probably the only imageboard on the internet that isn't total shit. I don't want a bunch of california rolls from 8gag/4shit to come and shit all over everything. Just let people discover it naturally by themselves.
No.306
>>305i agree that sushichan should be discreet, but this place has felt particularly slow lately, although ive tried to contribute as much as i can
No.307
>>304Even if it's a bit slower, there's some quality discussion on 8ch /a/
4chan's /a/ has gone to absolute meme-infested shit and /b/ hasn't been good for a long time
sushi is a place to have in depth, comfy discussions without feeling the pressure to follow arbitrary conventions or customs beyond what is comfty
high speed threads feel a lot more impersonal, whereas posting on a slower board like sushi feels so much closer to a community that carefully reads and responds to one another
No.308
>>306I'd rather have a good slow board than a mach-speed shithole.
No.310
>>308but if a board is too slow, discussions can die out and the place will just be a ghost town of visitors who post but are never patient enough to wait for a reply
No.311
>>305Places like this should still be easier to find than they are, though. I found sushi through the link to it on lain, which is gone now.
No.312
>>311why is kalyx so autistic
No.313
>>308There is a certain speed that feels ideal.
And I think sushi-chan is below that.
1 post every 10 minutes is great for an average thread.
1 post every hour is alright in my book.
But 3 days or such is too much for the site to feel lively.
>>310>>311I agree
>>305>Please don'tIf you want to stay alone on this site…
Anyway it's our job to make sure that new posters will read the mood and behave accordingly.
And I don't think that a few new posters would be a bad thing.
I'm not talking about inviting so many that threads will become massive and fast,
but rather big enough that some discussion can actually happen.
Especially since not even everybody from the old domain is here.
For example I found out about the new domain completely at random.
No.314
>>313Many small boards have traditional "watchers" thread where users can post every time they visit or just feel like posting. I don't know if such type of forced posting would fit sushichans mood, just that having a living board even with small talk is better than nothing. I like this place.
No.316
>>315Looks pretty comfy, but how's that oicunt internet?
No.318
>>316It's not too bad for me. We've got what's called the National Broadband Network (NBN) being rolled out
I'm assuming you're not Australian) and I was lucky enough to be one of the first places it was installed. Pic related is speeds I get while on a VPN.
No.319
>>318That's not bad, can you get that everywhere in Australia?
No.320
>>319Not at the moment. It's been plagued by government mismanagement. From what I understand it's going to take around 10-15 years, and even then not all places will have it. It also changed scope from fibre-to-the-home to fibre-to-the-node. I was lucky and got in on FTTH before it changed.
No.321
>>320I've always found 4chan and other image boards to be kind of dominated by Americans, have you run into many other people who browse in Australia?
No.324
>>321Sorry I took so long to reply, sushi was throwing up some weird errors at me and I've been away with work.
IRL, I don't know anyone at all who browses any chan
then again I have, literally, no friends at all. Obviously places like 8/aus/ is dominated by Australians, so we must be there but overall I believe that we are few and far between. In saying, we must have some presence for the "Australians = top tier shitposters" meme to have evolved as it has.
No.344
>>310Yes. But having a slow community builds in the person the feeling of waiting for the other to answer. It makes the person build their reply with time, as they are not bound to answer in less than five minutes. It lets you connect to the other in a more personal level, like if it was a letter.
It also lets you set your own pace, have a Saturday at night drinking mate and saying "Hey, I wonder what the guys at sushigirl said…", and getting to the computer and talking to people. To people. Not (really good, borderline people) markov bots.
I feel this kind of places lets me share more than just text, it's like I'm sharing my soul.
Also, I believe the community ends up shaping the visitor, and it should stay that way. What I mean, is: Why come to a place where replies aren't tweets, if you're not patient enough to mull them over? It'd be like a form of elitism, but it comes from the structure of the community and not from an unwelcoming feeling to it.
No.583
>>186I first discovered 4chan back in early 2007 when I found a video on youtube which had comments pointing out where such "internet jokes" were coming from. Until months after I got to know the website all I did was just lurk since I've seen people get completely humiliated on /b/.
I think that, without a doubt what I miss the most is the old /g/.
Well, I still visit 4chan and 8chan even nowadays since I set up filters to hide stupid threads but it's no use, time and time again new stupid types of spam come and I have to set up new filters it's ridiculous.
I don't think a new chan that unites all the non-cancerous people would be the solution, that would turn out to be just a temporary fix that eventually would just end up the same as 8ch did.
What I think is the ideal option is something among the lines of what sadpanda does, apply somewhat arbitrary rules to filter potentially bad users from joining.
If there's no type of invitation/selection process than it will eventually result in a cesspool of shitty threads.
There's also a problem that many don't seem to realize: the internet as we know it is dying.
Dying in favor of desktop and mobile programs that serve the sole purpose of data input/output to/from a dedicated server backed by big corporations.
I personally don't think this is necessarily bad technology-wise but the fact that websites that adopt such features are generally backed by big corporations who are heavily against free speech deeply saddens me.
No.585
>>326The only thing making it seem bad is your own self, and your own awkwardness.
It's just some dudes, who probably share a lot of interests, meeting up and hanging out.
Whats weird about that? You don't have to forcibly drag chans into the way you interact, and then one could probably have a great time.
Drinking beers, talking about waifus or vidya; Seems pretty nice!
No.586
>>585I guess you're right, but I feel like I have a separate personality or side of myself that I'm only comfortable revealing sushi rollymously
No.591
>>590I think uboachan would be your best bet.
No.735
>>591It is close, but not close enough.
It seems I'll have to take matters into my own hands.
No.741
>>739Reddit is kinda weird.
It's much better for consuming, but much worse for interacting with people. Despite that, it has a rigid profile system where you must have an identity.
Then the whole karma thing being used wrong just becomes social media tier.
I feel you though, I post less and less, and only ever made a couple of threads years ago.
I think the constant arguing is just because of how split the world is right now, politically.
Everyone has locked down on extreme opinions (myself included) and if both sides come into contact they will end up shitposting until one side leaves and the area is then the "territory" of the other side.
That said, people in irc seem to get along better than people on websites usually, which is interesting.
No.778
>>21I'd read that, sushi.
No.800
>>590I like this idea. Maybe I'll demo a new board for the site.
No.1270
>>195I'd also like a source for this, but, in particular, I'd like to see the actual data, since the numbers here are proportional (percentages of internet traffic), not absolute.
Are the big giants actively pushing users away from smaller sites?
Or are the smaller sites maintaining a small, but steady userbase, while the giants attract consumers who would otherwise not be spending very much time on the internet at all?
My guess is that it's probably a combination of both, but it'd still be neat to look at in more detail.
No.1271
>>1270I don't think he's going to respond
No.1276
This was a very nice thread to read! Lots of good points and interesting discussion.
>>739>I'm so tired of everyone yelling at each other over minor differences in preferences and opinions.Is it just me or is it incredibly difficult to find a community that's inbetween this? Chan sites are usually the ones with a majority of rude people who enjoy disagreeing with everything and tumblr-like sites are the ones that are a huge hugbox where nothing controversial should be said.
No.1281
I feel like chan cultures main drive is the sushi rollymity. it's less about distrust and more about not having a name or history attached to your post to distract from the content of said post. there are no reputations. there are no upvotes. there are no popular figures. what becomes popular or notorious is the content of the posts, not the people who made them. and that's what there is to gain from chans.
I think you've got the wrong idea if you want anything more than that. in jokes and memes are a result of culture, but not all cultures result in memes and jokes. sometimes cultures just like discussing things and that's perfectly fine. as long as you're just here for discussion, there is plenty to be gained.
No.1282
>>27Their IRC has me pretty discouraged about the site. It's basically just /g/ 2.0 in a lot of ways, which I find really disappointing since the show embodies a lot more and should be attracting specific types of people, which, I guess you can still sometimes find there in the sea of millions of tech people.
No.1283
Some people might disagree with me here, but I think a huge thing about imageboard culture, and a major part of what attracted me to it, was that there was always a lot more weird people, for better or worse. So I think there is truth to the mentality that a lot of sites like these get ruined when too many "normalfags" find it. I notice on 4chan nowadays if someone makes a weird comedic post you get these typical "what the fuck bro?" type reactions, where as I remember that kind of stuff being typical or even the basis of a lot of the humor back then.
While I enjoy the sushi rollymity, this is the one aspect of being sushi rollymous I didn't like, it made it very hard to reach out to people you normally wouldn't find anywhere else (unless you literally just ask them to go on a IRC channel or ask if they have X chat client)
I also think since there are so many different uses, cultures, and mentalities that emerged out of imageboard culture now, that making new imageboards with focuses on different aspects of these is good instead of trying to recapture the "glory days". I think people should be thinking forward into how to further branch this out and evolve it to make new things, new cultures that will be remembered as their own glory days.
No.2262
One of the things that started to piss me off in 8chan was the, uhm I dont know how to describe it, but it was the weaponization of the hobbies and the media we love
in /tg/, /co/, /a/ what have you sushi rolls started to clasifiy their favorite things as fascist or communistic or reactionary, etc. almost like they were trying to justify their enjoyment with their political aligment even if it was absolutely contradictory to their belief system.
I still remember that sushi roll posting trans anime shit in /christian/ just to troll the trad weebs there.
No.2298
>>186I think that many of them died. Yes, really I think they died.
Some of the greentext I have seen where of the most absurd things anyone with and ounce of self-preservation would not try. Like blender dick or the sour cream ecosystem, or the attempted/succeeded suicides/rampages.
Many of those cases it is unknown if the OP lived or died. What if they tried some crazier shit and actually did die? What if they ended up in the nuthouse? Kicked out of house and died on the street? None of it is far out of the realm of possibility.
I believe what made early 4chan so good was how you could find ANYBODY there. Now that privacy has become very hard to keep, that and the overall consolidation of the internet, has lead to 4chan just becoming a place for people to LARP like the old days, except none of them know how to do it, only how to act like how people did in greentext pictures.
No.2299
>>1282Can you elaborate on what you mean by /g/ 2.0 for someone who isn't familiar? As the other sushi roll pointed out, I find the imageboard lainchan quote interesting for the quality of discussion which you don't see on other sites. And are you talking about lainchan or arisuchan?
No.2300
>>2298Maybe they just grew up and moved on? I used to do a lot of crazy, stupid stuff for a gag when I was younger, but I don't have the same energy nowadays.
No.2302
>>2262yeah, its really weird. i feel like you can't just talk about hobbies anymore; you MUST discuss politics as well. while politics are part of everything (especially w/ media like videogames or music), i think that the political discussion has somehow become more important than the hobby discussion. threads discuss the jews that control the media more than the actual aspects of videogames.
No.2303
>>2302was there ever a time when /v/ genuinely discussed the fine details of videogames? i never paid much attention to it until around 2012, and by then it seemed to be overrun with stupid /b/-tier memes, R34 dumps and >tfw no gf threads stifling out any real conversation
No.2309
>>2303Spot on, was always a place for dumb fun. Then the userbase grew up, learned what politics is, and got political dumb fun.
No.2316
I dream of a new imageboard to again take the counterculture by storm.
No.2328
I only come here occasionally and only now stumbled on this thread because this board doesn't get updated all that often. I got into imageboards fairly late in the game comparatively (2009-2010ish), when that sort of "original culture" was dying. Frankly I got in far too young and it's probably poisoned my ability to socialize for life. But I still crave that old sort of "shitposting" that used to happen online. Nobody does anything for the sake of fun anymore.
4chan itself is dying, slowly. It's not the top dog anymore. And I guess the culture on the site seems to resemble the slow death.
If you make a thread starter that's a joke, it'll get deleted immediately. And what was once a sort of ironic meanness has now been turned into a cruel toxicity. It's not being mean for the sake of having fun and joking about, it's being mean for the sake of satisfying your own ego.
The Internet nowadays is a shithole. The problem may just lie in there being too many people online these days, in far too centralized places, none of which are actually good. The old specialized internet, where you find a small forum for your interest and meet a few people there, is basically gone. I have my own friendgroup that I've made online and they're basically what I stay in because there's nowhere fun to go.
I don't know if the old imageboard spirit could be revived. I think what's gone is gone. It's pointless to wait for some grand new imageboard that will rapture all the true old believers into some heaven. I think it's best to think outside the box and try to create a new imageboard that doesn't seem alien to modern internet users, while also keeping the same values (freedom of speech, fun for the sake of fun, etc) that made old imageboards great.
No.2330
>>2328I know exactly how you feel. 4chan is the same as Twitter, where the users make posts for (you)s similarly to how one tweets for likes and retweets. It's the same idea of posting content that is relevant and evokes a response from the viewer, so it's all reactionary bullshit everywhere.
No.2335
>>2330there's a kind of subtle yet significant difference in that 4chan is truly sushi rollymous while twitter requires an account/alias, as well as needing followers to have a significant effect. Twitter can also suspend you randomly without warning, meaning that all your follower gathering can go to naught. The result is that in addition to people stirring up shit with obvious bait (which is so obvious because kids these days can't recognize bait to save their lives), you have a shitty reactionary side and a shitty woke side. The reactionary side tries to gather other reactionaries by making fun of leftists, and the shitty woke side tries to gather followers through making incredibly awful, unnuanced takes like, for example, arguing that all anime is pedophilic because of neotenic features or something. Not to mention that you have a lot of normalfags, the fucking president, all mashed together into this weird hodgepodge that is either beautiful or awful, depending on the day.
No.2338
>>2335It's very hard to argue nowadays that twitter, or reddit for that matter, aren't superior places than 4chan.
Yes you can get silenced but so what, the difference in content quality is a joke and as >2330 stated it's not like they are being honest because they want those yous anyway.
When a site gets too big it needs moderation to retain quality, or else it happens what it happened to 4chan. Fortunately that means nothing at all for the future of imageboards, places that have a couple obvious advantages over regular sites like no signing up and the freedom that well used can provide things that no other social media site can match. They are very easy to use too, so I doubt the concept will really die anytime soon. (for all the bad publicity what made 8ch interesting was making being a board owner really easy, like a subreddit really)
Hopefully a new method emerges that doesn't end up in a popularity contest or shouting into a void, but it depends on the users really.
No.2339
>>2338I'll tenatively agree with you but only if you cultivate where you are: if you aren't careful who you follow on twitter you'll end up with a shitty feed that does nothing but make you feel bad, and reddit subs that go over >70k followers begin to rapidly decay into garbage. The brief stint where I actively used reddit turned me into more of a hipster than the entire time I used 4chan, as any decent subreddit I joined would slowly become flooded with users and vastly decline in quality
No.2341
It will never go back to the way it was sadly, people on major imageboards take themselves way too seriously. Like a group of sushi rolls wouldn't raid habbo and claim the pools closed while making swastikas because it's just a really dumb but funny thing to do, it would actually be a dead fucking serious attempt to get their political opinions into the spotlight.
It's not just the politics either, the reason why pepe hasn't been replaced by a newer meme is because he isn't a meme anymore. He is more of a mascot now for being a "true" sushi roll, if you post something new it's immediately presumed it MUST have come from reddit because it would be outsider humour.
People are too desperate to fit in on 4chan or they identify personally too much with being an sushi roll, and you're mocked if you're not just repeating racist words, posting frogs and discussing conservative opinions about anything regardless of whether the subject is political in of itself.
4chan in its heyday was good because there was no particular identity associated with posting there other than that you probably enjoy anime. You literally couldn't be wrong by posting anything there, now it's very easy to post the "wrong" thing and get piled on by "I've been here since 2011, 4chan has always been political and always hated anime, now go back to reddit" oldfags.
No.2342
>>2340You're better off with a normal message board or something. Textboards aren't really comfy for such things, with a forum or a IRC you can create a more tight knit group.
No.2343
>They're heavily censored these days, I find that the mods on these create-your-own-board sites really abuse their positions and remove far more than they should.
That has never been the case. Otherwise, textboard/imageboard quality wouldn't be so shit. "Free speech" is just open-season shitposting for idiots and racists. What we need is MORE moderation and BETTER moderation. Moreover, we need more community awareness and discussion of what quality content looks like.
No.2359
>>2335>Not to mention that you have a lot of normalfags, the fucking president, all mashed together into this weird hodgepodge that is either beautiful or awful, depending on the day.I feel like life has steadily got progressively more absurd since ~2014 due to shit like this as it's resulted in this slow merging of the worst parts of the interwebs into mainstream culture. What a bizarre world we now live in.
>>2338Regarding imageboards 4chan will probably continue to dominate with much smaller imageboards like this one floating around unless there's another big schism to drive users elsewhere. With 8chan this was GG (and to an extent /pol/ harbor) - they forced over enough people that the site actually became viable for users who don't like "small imageboards".
>>2343I'd rather have no moderation at all than what passes for moderation on 90% of websites nowadays. People have become so insulated in their little corners of the interwebs, there needs to be more free for alls where people can actually run up against each other and learn about opinions other than their own.
No.2361
>>2359You have to go back.
No.2362
Happy to have been able to read this.
I wish i had discovered imageboards earlier, i feel like i missed out on alot of cool stuff.
I have been browsing image boards since 2017 or so. So saying im a little late is an understatement. And im sad being 4 years late to this thread (Im really new to this website to)
In general i feel like I have been born to late to see the wonders of the world. I feel like everything I like is in a continous state of decline. And that trying to step away from the mainstream. And find an unique place is just getting harder.
But yeah one off the things I instantly noticed when i started lurking 4chan/g/. Is that the place is devoid of any meaningful discussion. And from the start i felt like it was just a void (whole of 4chan felt like it was dead when I arrived (except for wg i still frequent there alot))
>>40I think this is beautiful. I might make a wallpaper out off it cause i find it very inspirational.
>>2335I disagree on one front here:
"(which is so obvious because kids these days can't recognize bait to save their lives)"
I dont consider it a lack of recognizing bait, but that its the opposite. Recognizing bait and then springing the trap or saying something funny or unique about it, is just more beneficial.
Cause if people see it and find youre remark funny or correct. Then they will share (retweet/xpost/share the link) it and you will get more social recognition for saying something funny.
Thats why imageboards are so great cause there is no incentive for being controversial for social recognition. Its just really youre opinion then
That just my 2 cents.
I have said my share I will now return to lurking.
No.2363
>>2362If you think people on imageboards don't try to game the system in the same way they do on other sites for the reward of interaction you're deluding yourself.
No.2364
Chan casualties:
8chan
>el paso shooting >christchurch mosque shootingEndchan
>bærum mosque shootingMeguca
>halle, germany shootingI warned you lat, why didn't you delete /pol/ instead of just making it incomprehensible? No one even uses that board anymore.
Chan description:
>8chan is the home of qresearch, https://qmap.pub/>unusual fringe and magick boards>second most home of controversial conspiriacies imgboard beside 4/x/ 4/pol/ and other occasional 4/b/ disclosure>home for egyptian, korean, and international boards for years>gamergate, most other boards are 4chan clones (tv, v)>still alive, pic related
>Endchan>Librejp bunker, eventually becomes their main 'chan'>aside from it, most boards are 8chan clone but less discussion, bunker for 8chan when it 504
>Meguca is a dedicated site for 4/a/ radio, puella magica madoka memes, and occasional /v/ or blog.>the main feature is live posting.>unusually enough, it was the most active fringe website openly discussing esoteric practices and also vampirism. Also coincides the fact that meguca is about 'magic'.What I think should happen, make these 'reopen' under Vanwatech and make a loki site (because tor sucks).
The thing is, all of these is part of Albert Pike's WW3 blueprint, even if these individuals acted on their own.
Too much adrenochrome lets them simulate the future, thus giving them the edge to build it by their design - this is your enemy, you don't have to believe in what I say as whatever you may say or claim wil never change the facts.
No.2374
This entire thread gives voice to my nebulous feelings. I feel loss, but then I wonder what exactly I lost. At the same time, I feel like a burden has been lifted from me. I browsed 4chan from 2010-2014, then 8chan until 2016. The change wasn't inspired by gamergate, but because 8chan had a furry board. I left when a user of that board created some system that bypassed the captcha to spam it with random posts from 4chan. The board had low enough traffic at that point that each thread was just a series of non-sequitur with a few actual posters who were surprised to still see each other there. It was an alienating experience. I could have used other boards, but I came to the realization posted in
>>1381, that I wasn't having fun.
Looking back, I don't know how to feel about my brief six years. The negatives have already been enumerated in this thread: paranoia, self-loathing, political extremism, etc. One thing that sticks in my memory was how strange it was that a group of supposedly freethinking outcasts would place so much emphasis on conformity to their standards. It was simple peer pressure. There are so many examples I can think of. Perturbator did a Q&A on 8/mu/, and which went well until /pol/ asked if they could use one of his songs in an anti-immigration video, and spammed "cuck" for hundreds of posts when he said no. Then there was the buzz around the lunar eclipse on the 27th of September 2015 being the moment when the Jews launch their bid for world domination and/or the global economy shatters. It was ludicrous seeing people getting banned for even questioning it.
There were good moments, obviously. I met people I'm still friends with now. I used /fit/ to get fit, /loomis/ to take up art as a hobby. There was this one really funny chick who played through Otome games while typing in all caps to get everyone hyped up.
Ultimately it wasn't as big a part of my life as it was for most people, so it's tough to say whether I miss it or not. I don't use social media that much, and I think that's been good for me. I have a solid family and growing network of people I hang out with in real life, so I no longer have that deficiency of social interaction that imageboards once filled. Maybe it would be best to just remember the good and let things take their course, whether that be a return to the golden days, transforming into something new, or just fading away. I stumbled over this site only a few hours ago, and although I won't stay, I want to say that seeing an imageboard dedicated to comfy is heartwarming, and that you're all wonderful people who deserve everything they wish for.
No.2375
>>2362oldfag here
you didnt miss much
/g/ was always devoid of meaningful discussion
vid related
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ihfoAxVRhw No.2383
Just a random rant…
I don't go back that far, I arrived in late 2009 / early 2010 and stuck to r9k the entire time. The culture on r9k at that time was fine, lots of nice people recommending me good movies and books to read, a lot of interesting threads from people around the world in different occupations and with unique interest. I heard about Wizards for the first time, not realising I would become one a few years later. It was really quite comfy back then for me, and I didn't mind the evolution of the board over time for the most part. If anything, my main problem was with tripfags who were always building cliques which would routinely disrupt normal threads by 2013 or so.
I've read a few threads from archives from earlier 4chan and it doesn't really appeal to me, though I guess I was never a weeaboo. I don't know, something about the way a lot of the threads were based around stories that were presented as if they were real, and plenty of people acted as if they were real, but were obviously fake - I can't stand that aspect, and that was present on r9k when I first got there. Things like 'The Tales of Fionn' just felt like a huge waste of time to me, though some people obviously got a lot out of it.
I just miss the sincere posting. Back in 2011-2013 I was struggling with a lot of depression, on my own without a job due to being bullied out of it, with social anxiety, etc - it was just really nice, it felt like some magical force had brought all these unique and genuine people together, and many of them were going through issues similar to my own, or even if they weren't similar - reading about other people's struggles helped give me perspective, and then there were still lots of fun, interesting threads and stories. It felt like I was getting to pry into all these hidden places, with sushi rolls claiming to work in interesting jobs or have lived through all sorts of unique experiences.
Then a lot of drama took place which I didn't mind at the time and made sense in the context, but by 2016 or so things felt very different, and things went rapidly downhill from there as far as i'm concerned, to the point that today its unrecognisable. It's just filled with irony soaked meme shit, it feels like a wasteland so I've managed to stop going there the past few years more or less. The worst thing is this feeling that all the genuine people have evaporated, I was probably already a little older than the average poster when I started, but where are these people now? Most seem to have evaporated. I think a part of it is just the changing demographics of the net, and the younger generation don't really see the net in the idealistic way people my age do. To me it felt like the internet was allowing, or was going to allow, us to really transform the world for the better, to relate more honestly and create dreamworlds together or something, to expose powerful lies in the world.
This is relevant to my feels: themidnight.bandcamp.com/track/youth
One thing that hit me about modern r9k when i paid a visit last year or the year before was seeing a bedrooms thread where all the bedrooms seemed to modern, affluent, filled with things. I don't know if this is just a generational thing or something but it really drove home how different things had become. Years ago I remember it being filled with struggling wagelsaves, NEETs etc who were practically on the poverty line. Not that I want to celebrate that, but it certainly felt like people actually had genuine struggles. Last year after the Christchurch shooting the ISPs in my country blocked 4chan. It WAS just a matter of using another dns server to get around things, but what felt worst about this was people's apathy, "oh just change to opedns" or whatever. Feels apathetic, especially when I was online in the second half of the 90's when the internet felt more like a 'wild west' type thing, and governments appeared to have no clue when it came to the internet and we were almost defiant.
No.2385
>>2374Reading this honestly made me feel happy. Im glad you found your own inner peace.
No.2602
>>2374>I feel loss, but then I wonder what exactly I lost.I have similar feelings. As addicted to it as I was at the time, I can't honestly say it was a good thing to be a part of.
I went on 4chan for around roughly 2004 to 2010, so I got to see the "golden age". And as fun as it was at the time, I'm certain that it fucked me up. Looking back, so much of the internet, not just communities like 4chan but also the internet personalities of the time like Maddox, was all about wallowing in negativity and picking fights just for the sake of it. It was fun to rant about anything and everything nonstop, but immersing myself in hostility for 8 hours a day had to affect my mind. I was enjoying wasting my time on threads whose ephemeral and fast-paced nature made me feel like I was always witnessing something unique. I felt hardcore for being completely unphased by pictures of gore and beecock, which was a dumb thing to be proud of. I was a high schooler when I started going to 4chan, and at that age, you have dumb ideas about what's cool. Thank god most of the dumb shit I said was sushi rollymous.
In an abstract, emotional way, I feel like '00s internet was the most fun I ever had and ever will, and that things will never be better than they were then. And maybe that's true, maybe I'll never look back on anything as fondly as I do those times. But really thinking about it, what did I get out of it? What are the hazy memories of that era of 4chan that I still carry with me, now that the hard drives I saved everything to then are long gone? Dumb memes about bringing back Snacks, firin lazors, and Dial Soap? Hours-long arguments about anime, video games, and the front page redesign? Gore threads and porn dumps? How much would I have truly missed if I had spent less time on 4chan and more time doing anything else?
Still, I'd be lying through my teeth if I said I didn't miss it more than anything. I have a longing that can never be fulfilled for a time when the weird was regular and no one cared who you were. I would gladly trade away the stupid bullshit of the social media era for the stupid bullshit of the era of imageboards and forums. At least it was a freer, less corporate kind of stupidity.
I guess it doesn't matter if it was good or bad, because it's gone now and it's never coming back.
No.3563
damn, everyone posting in this thread should kill themselves
No.3569
>>2604stupid comic still kinda gets me ;_;
No.3571
>>2602I'll still contend that the modern web is infinitely more negative than the old. People were rude and edgy back then, but they usually didn't take it that seriously. Nowadays, everyone is dead serious about everything, and it's exhausting.
