OT: Canucks.com Forums shutting Down

[Brookbank]

Why what happened?

One thing new about the new forum is F bombs are permitted. All swearing is permitted as long as you don't go overkill. Which is good because swearing is a part of sport.

 

[andora]

What new forum?

 

[krutovsdonut]

can anyone explain the business decision on this.

i can see a team declining to get involved in a hockey forum but when you've got one established with a ton of highly focussed user engagement it makes no business sense i can see to shut it down.

 

[Vector]

can anyone explain the business decision on this.

i can see a team declining to get involved in a hockey forum but when you've got one established with a ton of highly focussed user engagement it makes no business sense i can see to shut it down.

Not seeing any conversion from the forum into actual $$$ spent. Shut it down saves on some operational costs as well as any headaches that have popped up over the years. Main reason, probably no one champions it anymore and when someone proposed a budget there wasn’t anyone to argue it should be kept around.

It’s also a growing trend. Forums are terrible for engagement compared to social media. Most places, even video games which have been a bastion for forums from the beginning, have shut them down. Either make content or open a free discord.

 

[Hit the post]

Not seeing any conversion from the forum into actual $$$ spent. Shut it down saves on some operational costs as well as any headaches that have popped up over the years. Main reason, probably no one champions it anymore and when someone proposed a budget there wasn’t anyone to argue it should be kept around.

It’s also a growing trend. Forums are terrible for engagement compared to social media. Most places, even video games which have been a bastion for forums from the beginning, have shut them down. Either make content or open a free discord.

Considering the Canucks are a fairly big entity (granted they're not the Rangers) but I question really how much money it costs them relatively speaking. True, there's money to made elsewhere but it seems to me costs aren't that huge an issue for them. Not like the old CDC was a bastion for anti-ownership rhetoric either (imho).

 

[RobertKron]

can anyone explain the business decision on this.

i can see a team declining to get involved in a hockey forum but when you've got one established with a ton of highly focussed user engagement it makes no business sense i can see to shut it down.

There really isn’t a lot of user engagement on a classic forum in the way that businesses are looking for today. They’re inevitably mostly just an insular group just talking amongst themselves, and that doesn’t really get you anywhere in a content-driven online marketing world.

Like, take HF for example. The only thing the owners can do to try to monetize it or really have any type of business case is to inundate it with basically ever more intrusive 1997 banner ads to the point of unusability. Well, that and likely try to monetize data and rent the place out as a data mining platform, but still it’s an outdated medium.

25 years ago, when the internet and online spaces were novel, there might be value to your brand in providing basically a free clubhouse for people to hang out, but in 2023 the world is almost more online clubhouse than IRL, so there’s nothing exciting about it, and the space really doesn’t get the Canucks anything other than potential headaches from data breaches or explicit/racist/sexist/homophobic/doxxing/whatever content or whatever else could happen.

It’s a bit of an expense, something that needs some level of management, and a potential liability that really generates nothing for the team. It’s not like the CDC forum does anything for the Canucks that isn’t still there if people are talking about the team on Reddit instead.

 

[Brookbank]

^ That being said, the death of forums has been vastly over stated over the years. I remember reading in 2013 how forums were all going to be gone in 2 years. Yet a lot of the blue chip forums from the early 2000's are still going strong. If you buy a new vehicle, boat, quad, pool, hot tub or anything and you need information on it, you join a forum. I had a Yamaha motorcycle, a truck and a Ford Edge. I am on a forum for each of them. And these forums are all from the early 2000's and have new content daily.

And when forums do die, its usually not from lack of members or activity. It wasn't in CDC's case either. Its usually some administrative issue.

 

[Brookbank]

What new forum?

CDC was shuttered and one of the admin copied it and launched an alternative. Unofficial Canucks Fan Forum

It has been running rather well considering how quickly it was put together and how busy it was for awhile there.

Does anyone remember Canucks Central forum ? That Chris guy was the admin. I just checked the wayback machine

 

[Bonham]

CDC was shuttered and one of the admin copied it and launched an alternative. Unofficial Canucks Fan Forum

It has been running rather well considering how quickly it was put together and how busy it was for awhile there.

Does anyone remember Canucks Central forum ? That Chris guy was the admin. I just checked the wayback machine

Used to be another good read, particularly with HW's rumour posts (which I always took with a grain of salt).

He pulled the plug after the riots in 2011. It also seemed like he was putting up with some harrassment online.

Some people went to Canucks Corner but I haven't read it in years. They enjoyed ragging on specific HF posters which was usually humerous considering it was all unmoderated.

Going down memory lane.

 

[Hit the post]

There really isn’t a lot of user engagement on a classic forum in the way that businesses are looking for today. They’re inevitably mostly just an insular group just talking amongst themselves, and that doesn’t really get you anywhere in a content-driven online marketing world.

Like, take HF for example. The only thing the owners can do to try to monetize it or really have any type of business case is to inundate it with basically ever more intrusive 1997 banner ads to the point of unusability. Well, that and likely try to monetize data and rent the place out as a data mining platform, but still it’s an outdated medium.

25 years ago, when the internet and online spaces were novel, there might be value to your brand in providing basically a free clubhouse for people to hang out, but in 2023 the world is almost more online clubhouse than IRL, so there’s nothing exciting about it, and the space really doesn’t get the Canucks anything other than potential headaches from data breaches or explicit/racist/sexist/homophobic/doxxing/whatever content or whatever else could happen.

It’s a bit of an expense, something that needs some level of management, and a potential liability that really generates nothing for the team. It’s not like the CDC forum does anything for the Canucks that isn’t still there if people are talking about the team on Reddit instead.

Meh, think what you think. I personally think Myspace will make a comeback. You'll see!

 

[rypper]

Used to be another good read, particularly with HW's rumour posts (which I always took with a grain of salt).

He pulled the plug after the riots in 2011. It also seemed like he was putting up with some harrassment online.

Some people went to Canucks Corner but I haven't read it in years. They enjoyed ragging on specific HF posters which was usually humerous considering it was all unmoderated.

Going down memory lane.

They had a 100+ page thread discussing hf boards. Pretty weird. Also I remember from lurking there was a lot of quasi misogyny and homphobia etc which seemed to fly.

 

[Bonham]

They had a 100+ page thread discussing hf boards. Pretty weird. Also I remember from lurking there was a lot of quasi misogyny and homphobia etc which seemed to fly.

Totally. It certainly got to be a bit much at times though it was entertaining to read their general disdain for this forum. The discourse was typically pro Benning so there wasn't a lot of objective conversation to be had during the dark years.

Posters used to frequently reference HW (even here at HF), though I found the rumours to be hit or miss. Overall, the Site was still better than CDC mainly due to Deb and the overall moderation.

 

[Jyrki]

^ That being said, the death of forums has been vastly over stated over the years. I remember reading in 2013 how forums were all going to be gone in 2 years. Yet a lot of the blue chip forums from the early 2000's are still going strong. If you buy a new vehicle, boat, quad, pool, hot tub or anything and you need information on it, you join a forum. I had a Yamaha motorcycle, a truck and a Ford Edge. I am on a forum for each of them. And these forums are all from the early 2000's and have new content daily.

And when forums do die, its usually not from lack of members or activity. It wasn't in CDC's case either. Its usually some administrative issue.

Message boards with existing bases have survived, but that's all there really is to it. The average member keeps getting older and mods/owners have less and less time/money because they rarely bring in meaningful revenue while having to bear the costs themselves. Most people who would've been new message board users are on Reddit or Discord instead.

 

[BrendanGaunce4Selke]

message boards are for the 30+ crowd.