What the #*(% happened?!?!

I was just wondering if anyone else asks themselves this question when logging into ATS these days? i admit i didn't register until a few months ago, but for 2 years i enjoyed coming here for intelligent commentary from intelligent people, but it seems that that has entirely dissapeared. i enjoyed engaging in discourse with friend or foe, but now it seems, in many threads, that its alot of 7th graders insulting eachother. anyhow, just thought i'd share my piece with everyone, and that i think it a shame that ats is coming to this.

As the forum grows, the general quality of posts is bound to deteriorate. ATS is not the tightly bound community it once was, and there are fewer core posters here who are serious about maintaining a high standard of discussion.

There is, I feel, a problem in that literally hundreds of people join, make a few ill-informed, worthless posts, then never return. Most of our active members however submit quality content

I wouldn't get too worried, I've seen many intelligent debates on threads daily, including recently, that don't turn into personal attacks (which are really quite juvenile)

I agree with you.

I haven't been here long, and I have found most people to be really nice and friendly, but the odd few certainly have a very sarcastic childish attitude.

I have posted many threads and most of the time I get sensible replies back, but other times, I get silly sarcastic remarks.

No need for that really!

I have not seen many flames on these forums in my short time back. This place is a haven compared to some of the other places I post at that need special parts of the forums just for flames and a small army of admins/mods

I think the board is way more peaceful and mature then it was a few months ago..I think the mods/admin have alot better control of maintaining the peace then they did in the past.

One thing I notice is that people in forums or online will always give some 2cent, smarty comment and never come back when someone asks them why they said that..I know some of these people don't talk to people face to face this way, I just think it's easier to be a smarta$$ online then it is in person-maybe some sort of complex these folks have or something? Who knows? Who cares? If you don't have something meaningful or logical to add, then don't type-that's what I say and think..
Magestica

It runs in cycles I suppose. When I first came here,about a year ago,this place was pretty brutal.There were a few people that just liked to bash and flame.I don't want to mention any names(Lupe).
Very little in the way of good conversation,just liked insulting people for their beliefs or thoughts.
This board has come along way since then.

other times, I get silly sarcastic remarks

I try to say something meaningful along with my silly sarcasm! Well, not in this post, but you get the idea...

There was a similar topic to this around January.

The war came and people came flooding here to give their views.
Debate was heated but generally intellegent.

My own experience is that the site goes through periods of settlement and then has great surges forward.The quality never really falls backwards and if this is a period of settlement then the record views and registered members is hard to explain.

I guess ATS is what you make it.The staff can facilitate your ability to express yourselves but only you can actually do it.

As Cider has said many join,post,and never come back but the important thing to bare in mind is that the numbers of regular,active,and intelligent members is actually rising in a ratio to the new members as a whole.

i try to use whatever sense of humor i got to try to lighten the mood in whatever way i can, however sometimes i think it goes over the wrong way, i mean no offense to anyone.

Read the debate that DragonRider and myself are having in the Debate Forum. If you think it's at the level of 7th graders, and beneath this website's old standards, I will never start a single thread again.

I got warned for that PC so i try not to be funny.

ya, we'll keep that kind of humor for the chats lmao.

that was great!

Youre rite about that PC better leave it for the chatroom.

Yeah great topic.
I love irony.
Yeah I'm sick of people posting crap unintelligent comments too
Taa Daa
just like this topic, fu*k off you plank of wood

thats pretty funny, lexus. i made this thread so people who feel the same way could post. me, a plank of wood? i think you have your parties muddled. if you would ever like to debate i'll crush you, and it seems the real irony lies in your poorly comprised, childish response. you are exactly the type that needs to wander off into the sunset.

Hey gore

Either you missed reading this line in Panther's post:

"I love irony"

OR

I missed reading it in yours.

Your irony plank of wood.

Originally posted by goregrinder
I was just wondering if anyone else asks themselves this question when logging into ATS these days?

I think you'll see that two things have happened, if you really take the time to examine what's going on:

1- The ATS community is now HUGE with an average of 220+ members visiting every day, and over a thousand guests stopping by every day.

2- When any online community gets that big, people tend to want to get to know each other, and discussion of core topics "seem" to take a back seat to discussion of general events and personal chit-chat.

As compared to one year ago, there are far more new on-topic threads in the various conspiracy forums on a daily basis. However, the pace at which we see general chit-chat threads has increased even more... this is natural.

One way to guage our importance as it relates to our main subject matter, is to do some simple Google searches on core ATS topcis. This forum comes up in the top 50 (and often top 10) returns on nearly any topic you try. This was not the case one year ago.

Our popularity is because members are discussing important issues that are rarely discussed anywhere else, with the level of quality and thoughtfulness you see here.

True William,

I see your point, everybody wants to know everybody, Thats why Chit Chat is the most popular forum.

In time everything will go back to normal like nyeff said.

Goregrinder,
I'd agree that there are too many, "man, "im hung over" type one-liner posts on the board these days, and that people sometimes use the boards the way ATS Chat should be used... But there are also some very detailed, well-written, and thoughtful posts out there...

If anything, the problem isn't that new people are creating so many 'fluff' posts, but that so few people are responding to the good ones. In this regard, both the old and new folks are to blame... as the one-liner type posts wouldn't dominate the boards if people took the time to understand the more complicated ones. Look at the UFO board, for instance... since even the old timers here seem to have totally accepted the Lear and Bennewitz views on UFOs/Aliens, it's often impossible to get a thread going about documented and well-researched UFO incidents, simply because the old-timers don't want to talk about anything besides 'reptoids' and 'hybrids'.

OK, my note here has been a little unplanned, i admit, but my point is that the old timers often encourage pointless chatter about being drunk, horny, or whatever on the non-chit chat boards.