Dying Message Boards

by **jsaluki080** » November 14th, 2023, 9:50 am

Disclaimer: Ill-thought- out tipsy post ahead

Why does this board seem so much less active? Are message boards in general less active cause younger ppl steer towards alt social media thingy or is it that the MVC hasn't been as good in recent years or something else?

**Sponsor**

by **unipanther99** » November 14th, 2023, 10:29 am

Yes to both, but probably more to do with demographics. Would be interesting to poll age brackets on here, but for me - messages boards were big when I was a student in the late 90's, so I'm sure a lot of fans my age (48) and older kind of stuck with it.

The Valleytalk days were a little more wild because I would guess more active posters were in their 20's. Now that most of us are middle-aged or even older, you don't get as many of the hot takes that spark engagement.

by **TBS_20** » November 14th, 2023, 11:56 am

A lot of boards have just moved to reddit, as well. Not MVC boards but in general.

by **So iLL 24** » November 14th, 2023, 1:19 pm

X, aka Twitter, is killing message boards. You can make a username and comment in real time.

by **TylerDurden** » November 14th, 2023, 1:54 pm

jsaluki080 wrote:Disclaimer: Ill-thought- out tipsy post ahead

Why does this board seem so much less active? Are message boards in general less active cause younger ppl steer towards alt social media thingy or is it that the MVC hasn't been as good in recent years or something else?

Don't forget how much Shocker fans liked to hear themselves speak.

by **PretzelDawg** » November 14th, 2023, 3:14 pm

I got my start on message boards at SIU in the early 90s. I loved going to the ESPN site just to stir it up on Friday afternoons during college football season.

I still spend too much time at IllinoisHighSchoolSports.com all year. The interaction among sports fans has died off like crazy. I was hoping to find more talk here when I joined, but there isn't much too it. I came here, because the Saluki message boards were just odd and lost tons of traffic about 10 years ago.

I do agree that message boards were there for a bunch of old guys in their early 50s to late 40s for the most part. I wish younger people would get on them. The interaction on Twitter just isn't the same as most people read and like a Tweet without real interaction taking place like message boards provide. It was/is a blast to find a community of like minded people in the sports realm.

by **DUBulldog** » November 14th, 2023, 4:16 pm

jsaluki080 wrote:Disclaimer: Ill-thought- out tipsy post ahead

Why does this board seem so much less active? Are message boards in general less active cause younger ppl steer towards alt social media thingy or is it that the MVC hasn't been as good in recent years or something else?

Can't speak for anybody else, but I don't post much on here, because there's almost no discussion about the games themselves. More posts on people predicting the games vs actually discussing the games.

Back in the Valleytalk days, it felt a lot more like family. A very strange, dysfunctional family, but family nonetheless.

by **racernation** » November 14th, 2023, 5:37 pm

Making this board mobile-friendly would be a big help.

by **bleach** » November 14th, 2023, 6:19 pm

DUBulldog wrote:
jsaluki080 wrote:Disclaimer: Ill-thought- out tipsy post ahead

Why does this board seem so much less active? Are message boards in general less active cause younger ppl steer towards alt social media thingy or is it that the MVC hasn't been as good in recent years or something else?

Can't speak for anybody else, but I don't post much on here, because there's almost no discussion about the games themselves. More posts on people predicting the games vs actually discussing the games.

Back in the Valleytalk days, it felt a lot more like family. A very strange, dysfunctional family, but family nonetheless.

I started in about 2002 and it was THE way to follow the games. Loved when someone would post virtually play by play of another game. Nowadays there just isn't any need for that with every game televised. I do wish there was more game talk too.

by **MissouriValleyUnite** » November 14th, 2023, 11:26 pm

My first year was 2005-06, but from what I remember, MVC games weren’t on often if you didn’t live in a school’s immediate market. ESPN3/+ didn’t exist until many years later. I remember streaming radio calls via the internet and following games on ESPN.com’s gamecast. Then I’d occasionally read the boards.

We had ESPN Full Court on DirecTV, but the games were mainly BCS games that didn’t get picked up nationally.

It was the Valley’s golden age, but I don’t remember many games on tv.