Why I Stopped Foruming

Online forums can be a great place provided the members are as awesome as you would think you are (and should be fairly moderated IMO). You can find friends and learn lots of things. You can share ideas and discuss topics about anything, from the most mundane of things to the craziest ones, from online games to zombie apocalypse survival. But just like life, it has its bad parts, maybe even harsher.

Backtrack to around 2005, I found a great online forum. Moderators are respected. Members interact with each other as if they're brothers. The number of members online at any given time is big. Debates and healthy discussions are aplenty. In short, it's a lively community. I even made some friends. Of course, there would be those occasional trolls but none that would destroy the harmony of the forum. But to job and access issues, I lost access to that forum (which is now offline, may it rest in peace).

Forward to 2011, with my new job allowing me to access the internet, I was able to frequent the internet world. I learned new memes, watched new YouTube videos and got hooked to competitive Dota 2 tournaments. I decided to, maybe, start checking some forums again. Playdota was out of the question. I no longer follow the DotA 1 scene and as far as I know, the dota-allstars.com trolls and nazis live there. I decided to check out joinDota.com. It's forum seems to be a bit small, with threads mainly dedicated to Dota 2. I tried to reply to some of the interesting threads but holy shit, the level of trolling is ridiculous. Several unnecessary threads are being opened everyday. The level of rage and hate against players and against each other is painful to see. Plus, the moderators are not getting the love they deserve. Little by little my interest in interacting with other netizens are diminishing and I find it troublesome to reply already.

I tried interacting with the YouTube community but damn, it's much much worse. Everyone there seems to have god complex. And what's funny is that most of them already fucked either your sister, your girlfriend or your mother. Even a simple comment will be responded with "Fuck you! I hope you have cancer and die!" Seriously.

I thought that during the days when I was at the peak of my internet life, everything was way better compared to the level of trolling these days. It's possible that somewhere in the other corners of the internet world, it's already like this. But it's hard for me to accept what has become of the internet today. Everyone seems to be hating and raging. Everyone acts like a teenager with some behavioral issues. Not to mention Facebook is becoming a breeding ground for idiots and attention whores, but that's a different story.

I've mostly given up on forums. I still check the joinDota website for updates about the team's matches and scores but I rarely look at the forums. Sometimes I would see an interesting thread and I try to reply with a few inputs but that's just it. I would still see its usual dose of trolls, hate, rage, flames etc., but I don't respond anymore. I guess I'm tired of all this foruming bullshit. Or maybe I'm just more matured now.

I still visit Facebook and play Candy Crush, the manliest game ever. I also read a few twitter feeds, some occasional tumblr and instagram. The place that I enjoy the most these days is 9gag. Yeah, yeah, it's 9fag and the funny posts are diminishing but still, one does not simply visit it without scrolling down a bit further. No matter how fail a post is, you will still scroll down hoping to see a gem. And a few more. And a bit further.

Nyan!