State of the nation - future of these forums.

[Duckman]

I thought I'd make a new thread following on from Rob's earlier post on the state of the forums.

I was wondering when someone was going to bring this up.  Well, here goes.  All good things must come to an end folks and since Ian left it has felt that this place is coming to an end.

I've been thinking things over recently and with so little going on here, and so few people left, there's not really much point in keeping this place going - both financially for me and time wise.  I'm hardly ever here either these days.

While Ian and I have kept the podcast going and pretty much all of our interactions with listeners is via social media, I did want to give the forums a chance to keep going too.  Just because we all built something really cool here and I know people are good friends thanks to these forums.

That said, 2017 is going to be my last year on these forums.  Life has moved on and while I'll always be super proud of this place and the people I've met down the years, there's not a great deal left to do.

When Ian, B, Judge and I started this place all those years ago it was to give efedders an alternative community to be part of.  I think we did a pretty good job in getting this place off the ground, drew a strong community to it and we had a lot of cool times.

Looking back, ending the association with efedding and trying to make this the podcast community was a mistake.  People came here for efedding reasons, not the podcast.  It took me a long time to work that out.  I always assumed people would listen and support us from here as a default.  That wasn't really very fair on my part.  We should have either passed the forums to someone who was still involved in efedding or closed it.  Either way we should have had a clean break but trying to keep the people on the forums part of the community through the podcast was always something I wanted to do.

We've had to grow the MFX audience with a solid foundation of people we met through efedding and these forums, but our biggest success has come with getting an audience outside the game and our established community.  It's been a long slog to get there but since 2011 we've been able to make MFX podcast something that's more than just a show for people who know us via efedding to listen to.  We're on a network now, we have hundreds of regular listeners who don't know us from efedding, and while we can't do shows every week, we've just gone past 150 shows and the buzz and enthusiasm for it is still there with Ian and I.  We're going to be relaunching our website and merch pages shortly and continue to look to ways to spread the word of MFX.

We couldn't have made it without the support of people we met through efedding.  That said, none of us are involved in efedding any longer.  A lot of people have moved on with their lives to other things and while the community we built here will never be forgotten and always important to me, it's certainly not what it used to be.  I'd say we're running at about 10% of what we used to.  If anything the forums are a bit of sad reminder of what we used to be.

So come the end of the year I'll be hanging up my boots too.  What happens with the forums from there is up for debate.  I'm happy for someone to take on the hosting costs etc of it, hell you can change the name and make it your own place if you want.  But I think it's time I was honest with myself and you guys and let this place go for good.
Of course for people I know via social media and the podcast not much will change – most of those people don't come here anymore or never did.  The people I don't know outside the forums I will miss our interactions.  If you want to stay in touch please do.

So yeah, that's where I am with all of this.  I started efedding 17 years ago.  So much has changed in that world, in the real world and in me as a person.  But all good things must come to an end and I feel this is the right time to end things.  To prolong it any further is just ruining the good memories of what we made here.

Anyway, that's where I am with all this.  Feel free to drop me a line if you'd be interested in taking on the forums and we can no doubt sort something out.  Or if you want to talk about anything else.

Thanks for reading folks and thanks for being a part of one of the best things I've done in my life.

Peace
Sam.

[T-Bonizzle]

*tears*

[Alex Smiley]

I sent Duckman a message on FB in regards to this, but I wanted to post here just a few quick thoughts:

- I totally understand trying to make the boards a community for the podcast, and in some ways I still think it was the right call even if things didn't go the way you expected them to.

- The hobby of efedding is in a weird place in general right now, with very little in the way of eW resources and community outside of a couple sites and everyone doing varying levels of interaction on social media.

- If people want to remain on these forums, and continue building this community, I will be upfront and say that I'm certainly interested in shouldering the responsibility of paying the hosting costs and dealing with any support issues that come up. I'm very much interested in keeping the community going, and bringing back efedding aspects, if others are interested in being a part of that.

Heaven knows we gotta keep FWL, HIFL, and the like running...right? lol

(EDIT: Quick follow up on bringing back efedding stuff...I still have all the old eWrestling guides, FYI lol)

[Knuckles]

"if im goin' down, im goin' down in a BLLLAAAZZZEEEE of GLOOORRYY! and im takin' everybody with me" - shawn michaels

[Rob]

Thanks for everything Sam. Its been a wild decade and there's been ups and downs but mostly ups. I've enjoyed getting to know everyone here.

I think as you said Ian leaving and the end of FBL was the writing on the wall, and whether it was the sheer failure of bringing it back or Mafia games going on and on, nothing has quite worked the same since.

Regardless, massive thanks to you buddy. At one point this was my home on the internet. I'm so grateful for every thing you and the other admins have done.

[Adam Wrong]

I have to say I was coming here for the fbl and prediction games and seeing that both have stopped I seldom pop in.

I have recently started efedding again and so if people keep that resource up in a way, shape or form

I will keep listening to the podcasts when I can and contribute occasionally. So will keep listening to that

I keep in touch with some of you, if you want to I'm on Facebook...

And if some of you fancy feeding again hit me up

[Doug E Fresh]

I have always and will always appreciate being invited here to be a part of the community and all it offers for everyone here regardless of where the future is headed.

[T-Bonizzle]

Someone take the place over for 2018...I'm not ready to not have a tab to this website always open. It's been that way my entire adult life.

[Judge]

Someone take the place over for 2018...I'm not ready to not have a tab to this website always open. It's been that way my entire adult life.

You keep a tab open even after we moved to Discord?

[T-Bonizzle]

Yes

[Cory]

MERGE WITH ESPN?!?! I dont know, these forums always run faster for me.

[! JDM The Professional !]

Definitely a sad fate. This place was a big part of my life the last 8 years and even when not posting I've checked in 2-3 times a week.

I quit efedding shortly after joining EFK but got back into it for the 2010 Experts tourny. I was out first round but absolutely loved reading the tournament. It was some amazing writing.
Over the years we've enjoyed countless games of mafia, secret santa, hilarious podcasts and fun (heated) discussion. I'm so grateful to have shared these memories with many of you.

<3

[Dorling]

Made some good friends over the last few years on these forums, have even been lucky enough to meet some of them in person. I came here for the e-fedding originally, but always found a reason to stay.

One of my fondest memories was running 'the ruins' zombie survival RP game, and of course being an incredibly successful FBL general manager (!). I enjoy keeping up to date with people in the good news/fitness threads, and of course keeping up to date with wrestling and footy stuff. Most of you guys are on my facebook or twitter these days, but those that aren't feel free to add me (@Dorling83 on twitter and Chris Dorling on facebook - the Chris Dorling on or near a boat probably).

If someone else takes over, I'll keep stopping by. If you guys hang out elsewhere and haven't invited me yet...well...sad face.

Massive thanks to Judge, Ian, Sam, B (who I think advised me to come here) and everyone that's kept the place going for us all. And to everyone else, you are my internet buddies and always will be.

[Duckman]

I haven't had the chance to get back to Alex yet on this, my niece and nephew have been here all weekend so I've been running around looking after those two wee maniacs.

Anyway, hoping to be able to transfer everything over to Alex in the next few weeks.  How he sorts things out from there - rebrand, add remove boards etc, will be up to him.  We'll discuss how to do the change over.  I've got no problem keeping the boards where they are now in terms of hosting if that'll make things easier.  I can always give Alex access to the host account so he can make changes, deal with any tech issues in the future. 

If Alex is looking for a clean break and to host the boards on his own I'm sure we can sort that out too.

As far as hosting goes, it's due to renew in November, so I'm hoping we'll get everything sorted out before then.

Alex, I'll come back to you during this week and we can get things moving forward.

To everyone that's left messages - thanks guys.  It's been a long road and a lot of fun here.  Will always be proud of what we did here and the excellent people we met down the years.  I'm sure things can keep going in some form with Alex at the helm.  Knowing him, he'll do it ten times better than we have in the last year or so.

A change of direction and someone in charge with more commitment and interest will certainly go a long way to keeping the boards alive.

Stay in touch here and either Alex or I will update once we get things sorted out in the background.

Cheers. 

[Fnord]

Yeah, I was sorry to see the steady decline that this place has come to with activity and sorry to see you go, Duckman. Does that mean you're quitting FWL mid-season?! *gasp*

I'm glad Alex is going to take it on and keep this place alive. I'm still using it for FWL until I can solidify FWL's future standalone! I'd be happy to help Alex with support and moderation and do my best to help with activity moving forward.