OT state of the board

[Tender Rip]

Ah, too bad my prescient, precious and precocious previous takes got deleted by the system upgrade.
I had the problem solved.

Alas. Here we are.

 

[Gallatin]

So I have been member of these boards since before MA Fleury was drafted, but I seldom ever post, only lurk. I have been reading almost daily for nearly 20 years for the discourse, the insights on prospects (there used to be articles lol), to check out trade rumors, etc.

I logged in today because for the past few months I have been increasingly disturbed by the behavior of the posters. The constant negativity, the juvenile name calling of the gm, the bickering between people in every thread is embarrassing.

I'm nobody on these boards, and I could not care less how this post is received. The fact is that this sub in particular used to be full of insightful posters who could disagree and yet not be constantly petulant towards the team and each other. You can't get through a single page of any thread relating to the team without an argument about how Sullivan has ruined this team and the gm is garbage, and it makes me realized that many of you have not gone through Rico Fata headlining the team, or Jagr being counted on the single handily drag the team into the playoffs with no hope of beating the devils or flyers. And if you have, you've forgotten how to constructively speak to other people.

This place has become shameful, and I hope it changes before Sid and Geno hang them up for good.

Another mostly lurker. Ignoring several dozen regulars makes it a lot better. But yeah we're missing key folks these days.

 

[Freeptop]

I've dropped down to going long periods of time between even reading the boards, because most times, I can pretty much predict what I'll see in a thread, and end up being right, because it's the same thing, over and over and over again.

But I do agree with others that this is mostly the result of a combination of nostalgia and the Pens being on the downhill part of the curve, plus the general tendency of the internet that people are usually more vocal when they're upset than when they're happy.

I started lurking here for years before I finally created an account, so I'm pretty sure I've been reading the boards at least, since at least as far back as Fleury getting drafted.

It is no exaggeration to say that it generally takes about a year, at most, before people start complaining that the coach is terrible because:
1. They favor veterans over prospects! (Said about every single coach)
2. They don't make adjustments! (Because they didn't do that one thing that posters decided the Pens should do)
Such talk (mostly) drops off after a Cup win, but picks right back up the next time said coach loses a playoff series.

Similarly, GMs also get heat pretty quickly:
1. Why aren't they trading off every veteran on an expiring contract? Don't they know how to do proper Asset Management?
2. They draft poorly, because they didn't draft X prospect that the boards went gaga over prior to the draft (I call this one the "y u no draft pulkkinen, shero?" complaint, after the meme that went around the boards for a while. For the record, the players they drafted ahead of Teemu "who's that again" Pulkkinen were Rust and Kuhnhackl).
3. All the bad contracts they gave out! (This can be said about literally every GM on every team ever - no GM bats 1.000, but if they don't, you'll hear about it for the rest of time)

So, yeah, the past wasn't really all that much better. For my part, I think I mostly did a better job of having a good ignore list going back then. My own drop-off is really just a reflection that my own interest in following the small intricacies of the team is dropping off (turns out having kids as well as more responsibilities at work make it so the amount of time I can use for just reading and posting on the internets drops dramatically in proportion - who knew? )

 

[wgknestrick]

This is a forum where just about everyone is allowed (and encouraged) to post their thoughts. It's what makes this place great. If anyone doesn't get that concept, then why are you here? We can't all coddle up to anyone's particular ideal of what this should or shouldn't be. If posters piss you off, then you can block them. Just like if the real news of the world doesn't agree with you, watch Alex Jones instead.

Or we could all have open minds and try to learn something from each other. I can guarantee that this team isn't nearly as good (or as bad) as most people at the extremes think. It does frustrate the hell out of me though in a lot of ways.


And I realize this about myself sometimes:

 

[Coastal Kev]

This is a forum where just about everyone is allowed (and encouraged) to post their thoughts. It's what makes this place great. If anyone doesn't get that concept, then why are you here? We can't all coddle up to anyone's particular ideal of what this should or shouldn't be. If posters piss you off, then you can block them. Just like if the real news of the world doesn't agree with you, watch Alex Jones instead.

Or we could all have open minds and try to learn something from each other. I can guarantee that this team isn't nearly as good (or as bad) as most people at the extremes think. It does frustrate the hell out of me though in a lot of ways.


And I realize this about myself sometimes:

Very well stated, the world would be a much better place if people used your post as a guided mantra.

 

[Glamor Toad]

So I have been member of these boards since before MA Fleury was drafted, but I seldom ever post, only lurk.

Not to be totally OT but it's funny I've read that a couple times on this place. I did too. I was searching for a radio stream so I could listen to the draft. I only really started lurking here because I remembered this forum when we didn't get to draft this guy Alexander Ovenchicken or something and wanted to learn about this other big Russian that didn't score as many goals but seemed like a great consolation prize.

 

[Glamor Toad]

I lurked for a long time but started thinking maybe there was a decline in the discourse so I decided I would try and pitch in a little.


Fat lots good THAT did us

 

[66871]

I haven't read this entire thread so excuse me if this point has been made. The rise of what might be called 'open' social media over the last 8-10 years has really poisoned the well in closed shops and in some cases, the 'real' world.. On places like reddit and twitter and some spaces on facebook, you might only ever engage with another user once in your entire life -- which leads to people just letting it rip with insults etc. Hell, on reddit I don't even read the usernames so everyone I'm interacting with is essentially anonymous.

On this forum, I recognize maybe 20 names and then there's probably another twenty who I vaguely recall having seen before. It's a smaller community with repeated interaction with the same people, and I do keep that in mind and try to be a lot more corteous than I am on reddit, for example.

As I said, this does seem to be bleeding into our real lives. I work with politicians and some of the emails, dms etc that they get are downright nasty. And I'm not talking about people like Bernie Sanders and Ted Cruz. I'm talking about people who are state representatives getting paid peanuts or local offiicals not being paid at all but putting in the time to make their city/town/village run.

I don't have any magic solution to all this, but I just wanted to point out that if you are using the same language, pattern of insults etc here that you use on twitter or reddit, you are contributing to the problem identified by OP.

 

[canadianguy77]

The internet pre-2007 or so was awesome. Only the most knowledgeable amongst us (by and large) were online. Pre-2000 was probably the best era for it though. But they made the barriers to entry so easy that you're almost an outcast if you don't have it. So yeah, the internet has been dumbed down by orders of magnitude over the last 15 years, and it's made almost everything worse.

When you're a kid, there's always 2 or 3 kids in your class who never seem to get it, and take up all of the teachers' time. Well now that they're all grown up, in the age of mass social media, they get a say. They never used to.

 

[Night Shift]

This is a forum where just about everyone is allowed (and encouraged) to post their thoughts. It's what makes this place great. If anyone doesn't get that concept, then why are you here? We can't all coddle up to anyone's particular ideal of what this should or shouldn't be. If posters piss you off, then you can block them. Just like if the real news of the world doesn't agree with you, watch Alex Jones instead.

Or we could all have open minds and try to learn something from each other. I can guarantee that this team isn't nearly as good (or as bad) as most people at the extremes think. It does frustrate the hell out of me though in a lot of ways.


And I realize this about myself sometimes:

Very well stated, the world would be a much better place if people used your post as a guided mantra.

The internet pre-2007 or so was awesome. Only the most knowledgeable amongst us (by and large) were online. Pre-2000 was probably the best era for it though. But they made the barriers to entry so easy that you're almost an outcast if you don't have it. So yeah, the internet has been dumbed down by orders of magnitude over the last 15 years, and it's made almost everything worse.

When you're a kid, there's always 2 or 3 kids in your class who never seem to get it, and take up all of the teachers' time. Well now that they're all grown up, in the age of mass social media, they get a say. They never used to.

Very well said on all 3 accounts. I do remember mid 90s internet sports talk message boards and I remember it being much better back then. Maybe because it just was the new thing and people weren't glued on the net 24hrs 7days.

 

[Ms Maggie]

The doom and gloom folks are making the safe bet. Probability is on their side. Not rocket science.

Hockey makes me happy. So I follow the Pens. Great diversion. That's my story.

 

[Dipsy Doodle]

If anyone has an issue with the board, making it better is pretty simple.

Contribute something useful yourself, and if someone's taking up time/energy with nothing but trolling or repeating the same nonsense, block them.

 

[Tom Hanks]

If anyone has an issue with the board, making it better is pretty simple.

Contribute something useful yourself, and if someone's taking up time/energy with nothing but trolling or repeating the same nonsense, block them.

Sorry I’ve been busy

 

[Dipsy Doodle]

Sorry I’ve been busy

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Man's gotta prioritize

 

[Ugene Magic]

Sorry I’ve been busy

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A Tom Hanks siting...