Posted By:
E, DanielNo doubt at all what Lee is saying is true, there is less meat to many of the card threads and fewer of the hobbyists who used to give opinion now do.
Its hard to see friends and people you admire not participate, there was an established feel you could count on and relate to - daunting but to be respected and observed carefully before any real soul baring.
But, as Joann said so nicely: "They give people like me a chance to participate - maybe long enough to acquire true card knowledge."
I mean, isn't that the larger question. Sure its nice to be surrounded by just the people you have friendships with, admire alot, but those people leave the hobby, move, lose interest, and frankly - die, and if you haven't allowed and encouraged new participants then you're left with nothing.
If we were to set hard and fast rules that brought old time posters back AT the expense of newer members, do we get a guarantee those seriously experienced people will stick around long term, post regularly with content that's valuable to us all, not go off and start their own board or simply take up a new hobby?
Me, I liked the tenor of the board a few years back when I came here. It was robust and intellectual and not a little intimidating. I spent many a day nervously checking to see responses to my posts, almost too nervous in case I got chewed out to even scroll the threads, and some posters definitely made the experience less than it might have been.
I don't know whether I like the new board as much in terms of material discussed, but when the new tides come in that's what you get. Renewal, removal of some things that had been there before, and the possibility of a treasure being deposited before your eyes.
If we don't encourage it, then where do the next Ted Z's come from and how will we know their worth without making this a welcoming place. The guy/gal that comes on here originally and posts on a grading thread - thereby recieving Ted's total dismissal - may in fact have the only complete set of tangos complete with advertising and packaging, passed down through his family together with stories hitherto unknown in the hobby. And we get a chance to scare him away by pissing on his first chosen post, or encourage him to stick around and share more of what he knows.
Lee's lament to me sounds more of a despair at having lost control of the spirit of the place, that enough of his friends have left that as a group it has become almost impossible to set some posters in their place and make THEM change to meet the feel of the board. I understand it, indeed I can't believe the reckless feckless nature of a couple members who have assumed equal ownership of this board regardless of how little time and content they've added to it.
But who am I to remind them of the board standard flying at the title page. I only just got here too in the scheme of things.
Daniel