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PostPosted: September 29th, 2009, 5:27 pm 
Queen of Eregion
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Nurrantiel Mashiara wrote:
I think people not being around has more to do with their outside lives than AU itself. It's not that the forum is wrong or the people here have done anything wrong, it's just that people are getting older and spending more time on other things. Even comparing myself from this year to last year at this time. Last year I was on here a ton, and this year it took me a month or so to really be like, "yeah, I'd like to start posting again."

Pretty much exactly this. ^

You can't get people to start posting again when clearly they've moved on. You can however get new members, which is what I recommend.

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PostPosted: September 29th, 2009, 5:29 pm 
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@ Haldy - Aww, well maybe you can pop in now and then as a random guest or something. :P

^ That's very true. But I think if everyone of us had 10 topics we had to respond to often and we eagerly looked forward to checking for replies all the time, we'd make the time to respond. I'm sure we've all had busy times in the past if we think hard enough, and if something has interested us enough and "ooh, I need to see if anything happened since I last logged on" we have managed it.

I'm not saying that is the true reason, as I think there are a lot of reasons, but I truly believe that to have an active AU, AU has to accomodate people who want to have a conversation and talk to other people and bond again. You can't do that with no topics that get people together.

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PostPosted: September 29th, 2009, 6:49 pm 
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Inactivity begets inactivity. It's true, we're all getting older, busier, and our priorities have shifted, and as a result less discussions have popped up, people don't have incentive to come back, and so we all just drift apart.

However, I think things are starting to course-correct. Coming into October, the Hallowfest is coming up and people want to come back and be involved in that, and then they start discussing other things and then people start making time to come back.

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PostPosted: September 29th, 2009, 7:21 pm 
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I think you all are bang-on on this one. :P

I know for me, I had pretty much totally lost interest in this place for a while... but, I dunno. I began to miss a lot of the people here... and yeah. Sure, it's quieter then it formerly was, it's to be expected. :yes: And I don't really think there's much to be done about it. Making new topics won't really help, me thinketh. I don't think people stopped coming on because topics were old and boring, really. They just... out-grew it, and found other ways to communicate with some of the people they met through here. I don't think there's much reason to worry, either. As Taur said, it'll course-correct itself. :)


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PostPosted: September 30th, 2009, 5:42 am 
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Sometimes I think these discussions often tend to lean on the notion that being on A-U (internet in general) means being a loser with no social life whatsoever, and being away from A-U (and internet) means having an active and healthy life offline. :P


Yes, it was meant as a provocative statement! :-)


I agree that there is a thousand reasons for people being here or not being here, or being here during a period in their lives or sticking around - or at least as many reasons as there are members!

I've been a member for over four years and surely my activity on the forum has varied depending on interest and what I was doing in my life outside A-U.
I have an extended social life and quite a busy schedule juggling 3-5 different jobs and school, and I see A-U as a pleasant pastime and a relaxing haven. I regard this place and all of you lovely people as being a part of my extended network. A place I choose to be, and choose to come to as well as I choose to see other friends outside A-U (RL) or attend socials, use facebook or MSN. For me it's just a way of being social with people I like - like I do in many other ways!

So yeah, I wouldn't worry too much over the state of A-U. Things change, it's the natural circle of life, like the waves never stop flowing there will always be people to flow on the tides. :-)

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PostPosted: September 30th, 2009, 1:13 pm 
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Eä wrote:
Sometimes I think these discussions often tend to lean on the notion that being on A-U (internet in general) means being a loser with no social life whatsoever, and being away from A-U (and internet) means having an active and healthy life offline. :P


But we all know this is not true although some may think that :P

[s]I hope you're right Eä.[/s] Okay.. wait.. I should be more of a positivist. You're right Eä. I do miss alot of friends who've been off here for a while but I know they're busy in RL but eventually they will come back. :yes:

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PostPosted: September 30th, 2009, 6:09 pm 
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Someone mentioned contests. I'd like to start up some new contests, because I know that that was one thing that always kept me--and the other graphicsy people, I'd bet-- coming back. There also used to be a lot more battles going on, but lately I haven't seen any battles at all. It seems like graphics here in general have been on the decline, which kind of makes me sad, because A-U, I think, has a very unique graphics subculture. I seriously haven't seen any graphics styles or such a dedication to changing-your-sig-ness anywhere else on the interwebs.

I'm guilty, though, of finding other websites to obsess over. D= I used to consider A-U as one of my "internet homes", the first place I would check when I got online, but now it's some horse sim forum that has a nice balance between being very active yet small enough so people get to know each other.

I'm keeping my hopes up that the Hallowfest will stir things up here. And I have some fun random contest ideas for graphicsy peeps, so I might try and bring that back to life...ohmyword I have a claim to get caught up on oops.

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PostPosted: October 4th, 2009, 3:33 pm 
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aahhh, I'm glad this was brought up because the quiet-ness of the forum (and my own lack of ambition when it comes to popping on here and posting and such) has been extremely noticeable lately. I don't ever remember it being this bad... :erm: but I think you guys hit the nail on the head. TT, Ea, Nurr and Taur and so many more hit it right on. This is exactly how I've been feeling too... sad as it may be. :erm: There's just so much going on in RL for everyone and people are changing and moving on and not feeling like getting on the internet (or having the time to even!). And as Taur said "Inactivity begets inactivity". Personally, I think that could be one of the biggest problems here. I have hope that AU can rebound though. :) especially during the Hallowfest and hopefully also when The Hobbit is released.

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PostPosted: October 4th, 2009, 5:01 pm 
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I must agree with what everyone else has said. It's obvious that AU has slowed significantly because we've been busy, but that doesn't mean we should give up on it by any means. This place has become like a home for many of us [at least for me it has]. :yes: I've tried to come on as much as possible, but school has kept me busy. [As we speak I'm working on my French paper]. :teehee:

A lot of people I've talked to on here are 17-20 years old, and I myself am approaching that age range. Things get uber busy and we can't just drop everything to spend all day on the computer, even if we'd like to. Fact is, there are more important things out there than AU.

I strongly believe <i>The Hobbit</i> and <i>Pirates 4</i> will help things pick up here, since they're two of the more popular fandoms around here... but for now all we can do is try to log on as much as possible to keep things going. [Off-topic: I'll try to post in the LotR RP soon, guys ;-)]

Just my 2 cents on what's been happening around here. Whatever happens will happen - we can't really prevent it.


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PostPosted: January 6th, 2010, 7:44 am 
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How about a reunion party of sorts? Not like the Hallowfest or Christmas party, but a reunion where people who have sort of drifted can come back and catch up again. That might remind people that A-U still exist, and we're all reminded of the "good old times", and yet we see that the forum is still alive and well. I dunno, it's just a thought :P

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PostPosted: January 6th, 2010, 1:21 pm 
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Aw yes, a reunion. I remember we had a reunion awhile ago, all these years are starting to drift together (oh noes!), I don't remember if it was successful or not...I do remember one of the other mods mentioning that the chatroom was empty when it was supposed to be happening....We can always try again. There is nothing wrong in trying.

I believe that The Hobbit and Pirates 4 will spark the forum again. Especially with The Hobbit. I can definitely see a new wave of Lord of the Rings Fans coming in....which will be exciting!

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PostPosted: January 7th, 2010, 2:55 am 
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Nurrantiel Mashiara wrote:
I think people not being around has more to do with their outside lives than AU itself. It's not that the forum is wrong or the people here have done anything wrong, it's just that people are getting older and spending more time on other things. Even comparing myself from this year to last year at this time. Last year I was on here a ton, and this year it took me a month or so to really be like, "yeah, I'd like to start posting again."


There is this for sure, like has been said, people are going to Uni or college, or getting jobs, and can't seem to find time for AU anymore. Ive made a resolution to try and post more this year though, so it miht be ok :) That and the fact theres no new film fandom to inject some life into it, and many of the old discussions have reached a conclusion of some description. Thinngs like WoW, or 40K have not only regular updates of lore, but also enough dusty corners that are ambiguous to allow plentiful levels of discussion, while JRR and to a lesser extent christoper tolkien wrote it in such a way that alightly ambiguous sentances and small gaps in th emythology become discussion points. Dont get me wrong, I love Tolkiens works, but after a few years, it seems we've discussed most things.

Quote:
(internet in general) means being a loser with no social life whatsoever

Au contraire, Im surely being more social, coming across people from different continents and backgrounds; just through a different medium....

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PostPosted: January 15th, 2010, 7:28 am 
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^ I especially agree with what you said about a single film fandom. I remember that even as we were moving on from RotK, people were still very excited about the latest Star Wars movie, Pride and Prejudice, and Narnia in 2005, then Pirates 2 in 2006 and Pirates 3 in 2007. They were forum-wide epidemics that almost every participated in, and we haven't had anything like that since then. (On the contrary, we had a great divide.) Now, we all kind of pursue our own little obsessions and passions and there's much less uniting the whole forum besides smaller fandoms, graphics, and our own joy in each others' company (virtually speaking).

I'm with Sida on The Hobbit. I'm really hopeful there will be a burst of enthusiasm and a wave of new people when it comes out. It'll be strange, though, going back to the days of fangirls, misspelled names, less than fantastic grammar, and character confusion. :teehee:

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PostPosted: January 15th, 2010, 11:11 am 
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Well apparenty they begin filming The Hobbit this June, and unlike LOTR, they won't be able to quietly shoot the movies, so I reckon there will be lots of leaked pictures around for everyone to talk about. ;)

New things are being confirmed everyday. Ian McKellen, Andy Serkis and now Hugo Weaving and Cate Blanchett have been confirmed so.... it's going to be a busy year I think for The Hobbit.

I do think though, when it comes to new members, it might be people like to join a forum if the site is still updated and regular. That's what I would do anyway. I know Arwen is busy, but I think when the Hobbit comes out, you know. It might be good if everything was current and on top of things.

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PostPosted: January 15th, 2010, 12:46 pm 
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I agree that The Hobbit and possibly PotC 4 might re-kindle the activity again and I also think it's a wonderful idea to have reunions. We did manage to get hold of some of the old, disappeared members last time we had it, right? More of that please! :-)

However, I also believe that we, the members who read this, you and me, right here, right now, are the ones to make A-U. We can't go about reminiscing about old times without looking forward too. Most of us have beautiful and fun memories from this place but there are so many more to come. What I'm trying to say is that it's all about our attitude. If we want A-U to be active, we post. If we want A-U to live, we stick around. We can't rely on movies to come out or other external events to happen to generate that interest and activity we dream of - it might or might not come. We have activity NOW. In a thread complaining about inactivity we have people posting, sharing and discussing - that's activity!

It's all about US really and what we want to make A-U, not the old members or the ones to come, but us who are here now. It doesn't have to be a formal commitment or anything big... it's just about checking in once in a while, like checking your e-mail or facebook, keeping up, and posting here and there sometimes. It's not that big. I mean we still like coming on A-U and a lot of other people do too so there will always be someone around. :-)


Calloniel (PD) wrote:
I don't ever remember it being this bad... :erm: but I think you guys hit the nail on the head. TT, Ea, Nurr and Taur and so many more hit it right on. This is exactly how I've been feeling too... sad as it may be. :erm: There's just so much going on in RL for everyone and people are changing and moving on and not feeling like getting on the internet (or having the time to even!). And as Taur said "Inactivity begets inactivity".

Well actually, my post was supposed to be a more positive one. :-) What I meant was that for me AU goes hand in hand with other social online networks, I consider people here my friends the same way as I have friends that I see offline (I don't like the term RL, since I connect with people online as well as offline and often both).

mephiston, lord of death wrote:
Quote:
(internet in general) means being a loser with no social life whatsoever

Au contraire, Im surely being more social, coming across people from different continents and backgrounds; just through a different medium....

I'm not sure whether you happened to respond to my statement out of context. Again what I meant was an exaggerated and provocative statement meant to challenge the seemingly all too general notion that being online equals being a loser.
We all know that is not true. :-)


And also: SIDAAAA!!!! YOU'RE BACK!!!! :hug: Back from ..ehh.. that exotic place you had gone off to?

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PostPosted: January 16th, 2010, 12:10 pm 
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Ea, you bring up a very important point. We need to stop dwelling on the past activity of the forum and move ahead. People change, things happen, people move on, but, we're here and that's what is important right now. Let's enjoy the company we do have now. One can never go back, only forward.....It's up to us for the forum to be active.I have to admit, I wasn't active these last couple of months, granted school was dominating it, however, I did lurk quite a bit. Maybe we should draw out the lurkers....However, people sometimes come back on their own, if they have time or would like to be a part of something.

JF also brings up another great point, people like to join things that are active. True! When forums start "dying" or start becoming inactive with few active members, I generally leave or just forget about it because no one else is putting in the effort to be active. So, it's up to us to keep posting and continue being active, eventually people will come......As for the site, Arweb will be very busy this semester, so I don't think the updating will come sooon.

So, I guess, in conclusion, let's all be active posters together and keep A-U aliveeeeee! For A-U! For Frodo's eyes! Errrrr......

Ea: Yay! I am back (well, mostly) from Morocco! Everyone keeps calling it exotic...I just call it.....awesomenessssss.....errr not so exotic......

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