MBB: College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin

[kiko]

Honestly, I'm not sure why we don't read anything about him here in this room. I think that our resident NCC fan has only posted about Matt Helwig once or maybe twice this season. I mean, there's no rule here that says that you have to wear a green uniform in order to get hyped on CCIW Chat.

This also isn't the only place there is discussion about CCIW and D3 players anymore.  On Twitter for example I've had a whole lot to say about how great Matt Helwig is.  Many others have too.

Well, congratulations. But, as I made clear in my earlier post, I'm talking about this room. What gets tweeted in that social-media cesspool is irrelevant to my point.

The fact that a lot of D3 discussion has migrated to other forums seems very relevant to a comment about how little is being posted in this room.

And I completely get why the youngs might feel less at home in this forum given (1) this sort of board is already not a common platform for younger generations, and (2) we can at times come across in a way that makes a newcomer feel like a trespasser.

[unanimous22]

Bob, thanks for posting each venue's COVID spectator policies next to the games on the schedule. I'm looking forward to attending my first game in about 3 years tomorrow at North Park, a nice and short 10 minute drive from my NW side abode.

Maybe a better question for Greg....will I be allowed to bring in a backpack and/or a yeti filled with water?

Thanks

[WUPHF]

It's funny how the perspectives are different.  I hate Facebook, precisely because I can't control it.  Unless I'm just going to unfriend 90% of the people I'm connected to, the company doesn't give me any way to curate what I see.  To me, that's the last place to go for community.

You can unfollow people and improve the experience, but Facebook is mostly adds and other posts from accounts other than what I follow so I never use it.

Twitter is relatively easy to curate.

I like the mute feature which allows you to mute various words, accounts and such.

I do agree that the trending feature needs to be mutable, but if you list your location as Krgystan or somewhere else, a lot of what is trending will be unrecognizable.  At least it was this way.

I do not necessarily think the decline of d3boards.com corresponded 1:1 with the increase in traffic elsewhere, but maybe I am wrong.  And, the boards are not that far from Reddit which has lots of Millennials.

[Ryan Scott (Hoops Fan)]

I suspect the decline of message boards has more to do with the increase in alternatives.  Every platform imaginable has comments and chat features.  Community continues to get built online in many different places, there's just more options.  The trend everywhere is to smaller, more differentiated communities.  The people who are still posting here are the exact people we all want to interact with - even if there are fewer of them, I, personally, feel the conversation has only gotten better.

[Dave 'd-mac' McHugh]

You can adjust what you see from Facebooks. Grouping individuals in "favorites" and the like and even indicating who you want to see more posts from. Then only have the Favorites group be seen or switching between the normal feed, recents, favorites, etc.

I have been tempted to get more detailed in how I follow things on FB just as I have on Twitter (thanks to Tweetdeck), but I haven't gotten around to it.

[sac]

Twitter is an easier "here and now" format, super easy to post and receives scores, make quick in game observations, link articles etc.

The message board is nice for longer conversations and/or broader discussion, but I think its been harder for newer posters to feel welcomed on the boards for the last decade or so and that is partially due to the karma function and its abuse but also just a function of having a large group of knowledgeable posters that can be tough to break into and accepted.  I really pitty new posters when they post their valid complaints or observation and get ganged up on by team d3hoops, but it happens and I'm sure it drives them away.   So there just isn't much new blood, so to speak. 

Anyway, been here forever now, and still like it mostly.

[Pat Coleman]

Generally agree we are not easily able to onboard new posters. Not sure who qualifies as "team d3hoops" but I think it is pretty clear that I have spent a lot less time on D3boards in general, and basketball boards in particular, over the past ... what, 5 years?

[Gregory Sager]

Honestly, I'm not sure why we don't read anything about him here in this room. I think that our resident NCC fan has only posted about Matt Helwig once or maybe twice this season. I mean, there's no rule here that says that you have to wear a green uniform in order to get hyped on CCIW Chat.

This also isn't the only place there is discussion about CCIW and D3 players anymore.  On Twitter for example I've had a whole lot to say about how great Matt Helwig is.  Many others have too.

Well, congratulations. But, as I made clear in my earlier post, I'm talking about this room. What gets tweeted in that social-media cesspool is irrelevant to my point.

The fact that a lot of D3 discussion has migrated to other forums seems very relevant to a comment about how little is being posted in this room.

Not as long as there are NCC fans who participate on this board who might have something to say here about Matt Helwig. Hint, hint.

But I do agree that a discussion of D3 basketball comment forums (forums is never going to feel right, but fora is too pretentious, even for me ) is very relevant to this room in general, and this is as good an opportunity as any to have it, seeing as how we're still a day away from the CCIW's next set of games.

And I completely get why the youngs might feel less at home in this forum given (1) this sort of board is already not a common platform for younger generations, and (2) we can at times come across in a way that makes a newcomer feel like a trespasser.

Both good points. The second, I fear, is one of the pitfalls of community, especially one that is well-established and of such long duration, and which has such a high percentage of long-term participants.

It's funny how the perspectives are different.  I hate Facebook, precisely because I can't control it.  Unless I'm just going to unfriend 90% of the people I'm connected to, the company doesn't give me any way to curate what I see.  To me, that's the last place to go for community.

You can unfollow people and improve the experience, but Facebook is mostly adds and other posts from accounts other than what I follow so I never use it.

Facebook's groups feature is where community really happens. It's funny, because, like Reddit, it's more or less identical to the comments-tree format that Pat originally used when he took over this website -- yikes! -- 25 years ago.

(If forty is the new twenty, and sixty is the new forty, then a quarter-century is the new epoch.)

Twitter is relatively easy to curate.

I like the mute feature which allows you to mute various words, accounts and such.

I do agree that the trending feature needs to be mutable, but if you list your location as Krgystan or somewhere else, a lot of what is trending will be unrecognizable.  At least it was this way.

This is a brilliant hack! Thanks for recommending it. My problems with the Twitterverse would be solved if I could wall myself off from the madness in the right-hand column.

I do not necessarily think the decline of d3boards.com corresponded 1:1 with the increase in traffic elsewhere, but maybe I am wrong.  And, the boards are not that far from Reddit which has lots of Millennials.

... which has a creepy reputation as well (Reddit, not Millennials), but I freely admit that that may be unfair, as I've only spent time on Reddit when sent there specifically by a search engine.

I suspect the decline of message boards has more to do with the increase in alternatives.  Every platform imaginable has comments and chat features.  Community continues to get built online in many different places, there's just more options.  The trend everywhere is to smaller, more differentiated communities.  The people who are still posting here are the exact people we all want to interact with - even if there are fewer of them, I, personally, feel the conversation has only gotten better.

Also a good point. I guess that community could be created anywhere if you look hard enough for it and are scrupulous in monitoring what's being presented to you and what you choose to look at. I freely admit that a big part of my problem with Twitter is my insatiable curiosity and my tendency to read anything in front of me that isn't an IKEA instruction sheet.

[Gregory Sager]

Twitter is an easier "here and now" format, super easy to post and receives scores, make quick in game observations, link articles etc.

The message board is nice for longer conversations and/or broader discussion, but I think its been harder for newer posters to feel welcomed on the boards for the last decade or so and that is partially due to the karma function

I think this is true, and yet it's a Reddit function, too, so it's not as though it's an entirely unknown feature to the general public. But I suspect that there are people who use or who might want to use Reddit that don't like upvotes and downvotes, either. It really does reek of the schoolyard and of some of the less pleasant memories many of us have of childhood and adolescence.

and its abuse

... which is one reason why I loved the Liberty League football board and the perverse attitude some of its older posters had towards receiving smites.

but also just a function of having a large group of knowledgeable posters that can be tough to break into and accepted.  I really pitty new posters when they post their valid complaints or observation and get ganged up on by team d3hoops, but it happens and I'm sure it drives them away.

I've probably been guilty of that, even though I try to make it a point to encourage new posters. I always worry that Pat's not going to come around and do his Welcome Wagon routine in time.

I've tried to only be negative towards the abusive and the hyper-obnoxious among new posters. And I do know what it's like to be the outsider, even in this little corner of the world known as d3boards.com, because that's what I am on the soccer boards. I'm never going to be one of the cool kids on that particular playground, because that playground has an overwhelmingly northeastern vibe to it, with NESCACers at the top of the social pyramid.

So there just isn't much new blood, so to speak. 

Anyway, been here forever now, and still like it mostly.

[lmitzel]

We've become an online community of middle-aged and old men here, young whippersnappers like Lucas Mitzel excepted.

And even then, when one of the younger people in said online community is in his early 30's... (so yeah, still a whippersnapper )

I feel like I was on the tail end of the message board era. I remember being part of a Nintendo online gaming forum starting around senior year of high school (I used to be a halfway decent competitive Pokémon player), and while I think that community still exists, most of us have in fact shifted from that board to social media. I'm friends with a number of people from that old site.

I still check here on a regular basis, but I feel like I don't post a ton except following games and when there's updates to our favorite sentient traveling trophy. I fall in the millennial basket, and definitely feel like I'm on Facebook, Twitter, or Reddit more. And really with those, as long as you avoid the comments section you're good.

Not as long as there are NCC fans who participate on this board who might have something to say here about Matt Helwig. Hint, hint.

I'll bite. That Helwig kid is pretty good. (I guess both of them.)

Lost in NCC's victory last night was Blaise Meredith hitting the 1000 point plateau. He's the 29th Cardinal to reach that milestone. All the more reason I'm bummed for the two week layoff; prior to all the postponements there's a strong chance he'd have hit it at home, and I have yet announce a Cardinal joining the club. (I think I've done pregame ceremonies or something once or twice, but that's not the same.)

[Gregory Sager]

Lost in NCC's victory last night was Blaise Meredith hitting the 1000 point plateau. He's the 29th Cardinal to reach that milestone. All the more reason I'm bummed for the two week layoff; prior to all the postponements there's a strong chance he'd have hit it at home, and I have yet announce a Cardinal joining the club. (I think I've done pregame ceremonies or something once or twice, but that's not the same.)

I can't help but think, though, that in a weird way it's sort of appropriate that Meredith joined North Central's Thousand Points Club in a game at the Carver Center. What better way to overcome the bad memory (or perhaps the bad loss of memory) of smacking your coconut on the backboard after going airborne at full speed than by reaching the elite 1K milestone in the same gym?

[kiko]

The fact that a lot of D3 discussion has migrated to other forums seems very relevant to a comment about how little is being posted in this room.

Not as long as there are NCC fans who participate on this board who might have something to say here about Matt Helwig. Hint, hint.

Um, its quite relevant irrespective of what fans of his school might have to say on this forum.  One likely reason for the relative lack of posting about his play is that a lot of conversation that used to happen here is now occurring elsewhere.

I've seen two NCC games this year, and none since mid-December.   Would you like me to start prattling on about a player I've barely seen?   He is clearly one of the top players in the conference this season and I think his numbers speak for themselves.

I do not necessarily think the decline of d3boards.com corresponded 1:1 with the increase in traffic elsewhere, but maybe I am wrong.  And, the boards are not that far from Reddit which has lots of Millennials.

I see a lot of hard data about media consumption and platform usage as part of my 9 to 5.  Without sharing proprietary numbers, there is a very clear link between decline in usage of more mature forums such as message boards and increases in other platforms.  These often show up less in number of users and more in frequency of usage, depth of engagement, and individual consumers' pecking order for which touchpoints they gravitate toward first for specific needs.  Changes -- whether adoption/abandonment of new touchpoints or simply less frequent usage of legacy platforms -- are much more rapid and much more pronounced among centennials and millennials than older generations.  That has an outsized impact on this site because it specifically and exclusively covers a topic that is, in theory, more likely to be of interest to the youngs.

One undercurrent of this natural evolution in what people use relates to barriers to usage.  As much as I enjoy this forum, a boutique site like this is always going to face massive headwinds when trying to compete for clicks and eyeballs against global social media platforms.  Facebook, Twitter, Insta, Tik Tok, etc. are all backed by massive marketing and SEO investments, and they train consumers to use their platforms to engage on a broad array of topics.  If you're already on Facebook for a group covering a particular topic, it's pretty easy to join a different group for a completely unrelated topic.  Reddit is not exactly a social media platform, but it also has this same dynamic from a breadth standpoint in a way that d3sports.com does not.

[WUPHF]

I see a lot of hard data about media consumption and platform usage as part of my 9 to 5.  Without sharing proprietary numbers, there is a very clear link between decline in usage of more mature forums such as message boards and increases in other platforms. 

I am sure this is true, generally speaking, but I feel like the decline in posts over time did not directly correspond with the increase in #d3hoops traffic on Twitter.  I say I feel because I have no data on the matter.  I would have to go back to particular points in time to illustrate my point.

An interesting question for you and others: why was the CCIW football forum so much more active than the basketball thread?

[Gregory Sager]

The fact that a lot of D3 discussion has migrated to other forums seems very relevant to a comment about how little is being posted in this room.

Not as long as there are NCC fans who participate on this board who might have something to say here about Matt Helwig. Hint, hint.

Um, its quite relevant irrespective of what fans of his school might have to say on this forum.  One likely reason for the relative lack of posting about his play is that a lot of conversation that used to happen here is now occurring elsewhere.

You make it out to be an either/or thing, which it certainly isn't. Case in point: the person who brought up Twitter here in the first place, Bob. He may be an exponent of holding D3 basketball dialogue on Twitter, but anybody who doesn't think that Bob is right here on the CCIW board touting his boys in green like there's no tomorrow hasn't been reading the CCIW board.

I've seen two NCC games this year, and none since mid-December.   Would you like me to start prattling on about a player I've barely seen?   He is clearly one of the top players in the conference this season and I think his numbers speak for themselves.

See? Was that so hard? 

[duckfan41]

There is another poster on these boards who may be younger than you all may think  And I'm hoping that the Wheaton men have better luck in Decatur tomorrow than the women did recently...