I turned off my Discord account...

I didn't deactivate it but I disabled it.

I feel like I've had my fill of the platform. Constantly feeling like I never really fit in with any server I joined was a big part of it.

Discord is weird cause there are two big use cases I'm aware of that are a pretty big contrast from one another. You got the big public servers that are often used like a replacement for a wiki/forum all in one, then you got little private servers who are people that already knew each other that just wanted to chat over some games or get off dying sites like this one. Don't know which you are, but I'm only in the little private ones, and always thought joining one of the public ones would just be a weird experience

I joined a bunch of public servers but constantly felt like an outsider or, worse, the guy whose jokes always land poorly.

Which might be the case but I can't really feel like I belong when those are the conditions.

bachewychomp posted...

Discord is weird cause there are two big use cases I'm aware of that are a pretty big contrast from one another. You got the big public servers that are often used like a replacement for a wiki/forum all in one, then you got little private servers who are people that already knew each other that just wanted to chat over some games or get off dying sites like this one. Don't know which you are, but I'm only in the little private ones, and always thought joining one of the public ones would just be a weird experience

Yeah, I like Discord for keeping in touch with friends on smaller servers, but the ones that effectively end up replacing wikis/forums really rub me the wrong way. I hate the current trend of up-to-date reference material for games hiding in a Discord server instead of something a web search engine can turn up (like a wiki or subreddit, or even occasionally GameFAQs content). I understand that it makes some amount of sense for the discussions that lead to that material being developed to happen in Discord, since those discussions often happen among a relatively small group of people and conducting them in real time instead of on a forum is easier, but having the actual information stuck there feels really gatekeepy and is just plain inconvenient.

bachewychomp posted...

Discord is weird cause there are two big use cases I'm aware of that are a pretty big contrast from one another. You got the big public servers that are often used like a replacement for a wiki/forum all in one, then you got little private servers who are people that already knew each other that just wanted to chat over some games or get off dying sites like this one. Don't know which you are, but I'm only in the little private ones, and always thought joining one of the public ones would just be a weird experience

I've never heard of the former, but I suppose the Trombone Champ server would be close. But that's more for the access to custom charts.

Also, public community servers are way more common. They can vary in vibe depending on the community and size though. People that have millions of followers are way to chaotic and no fun, but people with under a million tend to be more manageable. Every one I've been involved in long term has had a comfortable stream of activity without being too much to keep up with. And there's always the few frequent posters who will always have something to say. It's a lot like PotD.

I used chat rooms and irc a lot growing up. That feeling is pretty normal if all you are doing is the discord chat. A lot of people do things outside the main chat, they do art projects together, play games, watch movies, body double. Its like the work water cooler, you have something in common and something to talk about together, but only having work in common doesnt really make you friends. Just friendly. Im in a few servers where I feel the same, its kind of awkward to talk in and I feel like Im the person who showed up to chess club wanting to play chess and instead found people who only joined to meet the kind of people who like chess but only want to play occasionally. and other servers Im more active in where it feels like a normal friend group. Im still generally the quiet one but I still know these people, I still participate, I understand the inside jokes and whats being talked about. Where I can ask if someone wants to do something outside of discord and someone might be interested.

in my experience people are way nicer and more real and genuine on things like discord compared to message boards

people that mostly use message boards have adopted really strange perspectives from what I see

Small community servers for niche interests are generally pretty nice in my experience.

Ew, discord.

Wow, I don't think I've ever heard of anyone hating Discord. I thought that was supposed to be the definitive platform now. You can get whatever you want out of it and nothing more.

slacker03150 posted...

A lot of people do things outside the main chat, they do art projects together, play games, watch movies, body double. Its like the work water cooler

Man, something about the thought of it being a place to "hang out" is kind of sad to me. I bet for lots of teenagers and younger adults that is some of the only socialization they've ever known.

Related to that feeling, one thing I don't like about discord is that it feels like a lot of things are happening in the moment. I wouldn't say forums like GameFAQs are better overall, but that is an aspect I miss, being able to just reply to stuff hours or days later and feel like someone might still participate. Discord is horrible for a compulsive type like me who tries not to skip over messages, cause I can easily end up on it all day trying to keep up. Reddit also doesn't really work for replying in an old thread since it doesn't push it back to the top like a forum.

NephalimTechno posted...

in my experience people are way nicer and more real and genuine on things like discord compared to message boards

people that mostly use message boards have adopted really strange perspectives from what I see

Probably because (small enough) discords are more community-moderated in a way that somewhere like GameFAQs isn't. I mean that in the sense that we don't really know who our mods are on PotD, obviously I'm aware they are also just community users, but they feel more like cops here.

The other thing is, if you're talking about PotD in particular, our problem is we've watched you spiral in real time over the course of many years, so it can be hard to be as sympathetic

I went crawling back.

I'm still pissed off about the platform but without a better alternative I found my decision to be hasty.

Solid_Sonic posted...

without a better alternative

You know you can just log off, right? You don't have to spend your time on the internet. I don't do this either, but I'm just sayin'

bachewychomp posted...

Related to that feeling, one thing I don't like about discord is that it feels like a lot of things are happening in the moment. I wouldn't say forums like GameFAQs are better overall, but that is an aspect I miss, being able to just reply to stuff hours or days later and feel like someone might still participate. Discord is horrible for a compulsive type like me who tries not to skip over messages, cause I can easily end up on it all day trying to keep up.

I don't find myself compulsively trying to keep up, but I do definitely have this issue. Somebody will say something I want to respond to, but because I didn't respond right away (whether because I didn't see it until later or because I saw it but opted to put off responding), the conversation as moved on and it feels too awkward to bring it back up, so I just end up not saying anything. By contrast, as you say, if I want to chime in on a discussion on GameFAQs, it's completely expected that I do so hours or days later because that's what everybody is doing.

Really, Discord has the same problem that real-life conversations have for people that are a little (or a lot) socially awkward, which is that unless you have something to contribute to whatever's being said at a given moment, you don't really have an opportunity to participate in the conversation. Discord can be a bit of an improvement there because people with niche interests who have trouble making IRL small talk because they don't share enough interests/experiences with most people they encounter can more easily find a decent-sized community of people that do share those interests/experiences, but more general discussions still fall into the same issue.

bachewychomp posted...

Man, something about the thought of it being a place to "hang out" is kind of sad to me. I bet for lots of teenagers and younger adults that is some of the only socialization they've ever known.

It's the main way I hang out with most of my friends these days, largely because we're scattered across different provinces. It's not a total substitute for spending time together in-person when we're able to, but it is nice to have a weekly drop-in chat where sometimes we play games together. I wouldn't say that I feel socially deprived for that, though the fact that I live with my girlfriend and therefore nearly always have at least one person around probably helps there.

Salrite posted...

But that's more for the access to custom charts.

That's an example of what I dislike about Discord being the primary hub for game content: If you don't join the Discord, you don't have access to those charts (I haven't played Trombone Champ yet, so I could be missing that the charts are accessible elsewhere, but for example's sake I'll keep talking as though my assumption is correct). For somebody who's more casually dabbling in the game that just does a google search for custom charts, that means those charts won't show up and they'll miss out on them unless they dig deep enough into other communities to find "check the Discord, that's where all the good stuff is," decide that they're committed enough to exploring the game further to actively join a community for it, then figure out where those charts are hiding in said Discord server. There's no opportunity to find the content as a guest stumbling upon a community that has it available to the general public.

I recognize that a big part of my objection is my own shyness/social anxiety causing me to feel like the step of "actively joining a community" (particularly having to specifically request to join, even if I know it's often automated) is a much bigger deal than it is, but I still have some significant concerns about the model. The fact that stuff doesn't show up with a simple google search is a big one, since I'm pretty sure that's still how most people look for help and builds and whatnot for games, but also I'm concerned about how stable that information is, given that any of those Discord servers could be shut down at any time. I guess that's also true of wikis or other sources, but at least web archiving exists to extract historical content if that ends up coming to pass.

NephalimTechno posted...

in my experience people are way nicer and more real and genuine on things like discord compared to message boards

I've noticed this too.

There's something about forums that just encourage people to be their worst selves. On Discord, it seems like the people behaving like jackasses tend to be in the minority, especially in smaller, more close-knit servers.

I can tell you for a fact that I far more closely resemble my real life personality on Discord than on this site, because over there I feel far less of a need to be defensive.

I wouldn't see the point of being in a group unless it's specifically friends or regarding a special interest. I am in a CRT TV discord and a Gameboy modding discord but don't really visit unless I'm actively working on something. I'm in a server with friends so we can coordinate gaming. I was in a streamer discord but I realized that I don't give a shit those types of communities.

adjl posted...

I don't find myself compulsively trying to keep up, but I do definitely have this issue. Somebody will say something I want to respond to, but because I didn't respond right away (whether because I didn't see it until later or because I saw it but opted to put off responding), the conversation as moved on and it feels too awkward to bring it back up, so I just end up not saying anything. By contrast, as you say, if I want to chime in on a discussion on GameFAQs, it's completely expected that I do so hours or days later because that's what everybody is doing.

Really, Discord has the same problem that real-life conversations have for people that are a little (or a lot) socially awkward, which is that unless you have something to contribute to whatever's being said at a given moment, you don't really have an opportunity to participate in the conversation. Discord can be a bit of an improvement there because people with niche interests who have trouble making IRL small talk because they don't share enough interests/experiences with most people they encounter can more easily find a decent-sized community of people that do share those interests/experiences, but more general discussions still fall into the same issue.

It's the main way I hang out with most of my friends these days, largely because we're scattered across different provinces. It's not a total substitute for spending time together in-person when we're able to, but it is nice to have a weekly drop-in chat where sometimes we play games together. I wouldn't say that I feel socially deprived for that, though the fact that I live with my girlfriend and therefore nearly always have at least one person around probably helps there.

That's an example of what I dislike about Discord being the primary hub for game content: If you don't join the Discord, you don't have access to those charts (I haven't played Trombone Champ yet, so I could be missing that the charts are accessible elsewhere, but for example's sake I'll keep talking as though my assumption is correct). For somebody who's more casually dabbling in the game that just does a google search for custom charts, that means those charts won't show up and they'll miss out on them unless they dig deep enough into other communities to find "check the Discord, that's where all the good stuff is," decide that they're committed enough to exploring the game further to actively join a community for it, then figure out where those charts are hiding in said Discord server. There's no opportunity to find the content as a guest stumbling upon a community that has it available to the general public.

I recognize that a big part of my objection is my own shyness/social anxiety causing me to feel like the step of "actively joining a community" (particularly having to specifically request to join, even if I know it's often automated) is a much bigger deal than it is, but I still have some significant concerns about the model. The fact that stuff doesn't show up with a simple google search is a big one, since I'm pretty sure that's still how most people look for help and builds and whatnot for games, but also I'm concerned about how stable that information is, given that any of those Discord servers could be shut down at any time. I guess that's also true of wikis or other sources, but at least web archiving exists to extract historical content if that ends up coming to pass.

There's also the issue that Discord's search is broken. It will show page numbers that don't exist and give back blank results.

Smaller servers are better for me. I'm part of Deltas PotD server and a Sex and Sexuality one. The later is because the board here got the axe and I wanted to keep in contact with most users on that board.

Edit: I will say I like how less restrictive Discord is compared to here.

being on discord directly led to me getting three modded nintendo switches for free

adjl posted...

That's an example of what I dislike about Discord being the primary hub for game content: If you don't join the Discord, you don't have access to those charts (I haven't played Trombone Champ yet, so I could be missing that the charts are accessible elsewhere, but for example's sake I'll keep talking as though my assumption is correct). For somebody who's more casually dabbling in the game that just does a google search for custom charts, that means those charts won't show up and they'll miss out on them unless they dig deep enough into other communities to find "check the Discord, that's where all the good stuff is," decide that they're committed enough to exploring the game further to actively join a community for it, then figure out where those charts are hiding in said Discord server. There's no opportunity to find the content as a guest stumbling upon a community that has it available to the general public.

I understand this complaint. At least with this example, the Discord server functions as a repository and common location for modders to post links to their content. Technically, you might still be able to find those links elsewhere as their generally just Google Docs. A lot of charters will upload videos of their charts on Youtube, although I suppose most will post links in the description to the server where you can access the link to their chart. But what's the alternative? An online forum? Most of those would have you make an account anyways. Easier to just make one Discord account and have access to any community.

adjl posted...

I recognize that a big part of my objection is my own shyness/social anxiety causing me to feel like the step of "actively joining a community" (particularly having to specifically request to join, even if I know it's often automated) is a much bigger deal than it is, but I still have some significant concerns about the model. The fact that stuff doesn't show up with a simple google search is a big one, since I'm pretty sure that's still how most people look for help and builds and whatnot for games, but also I'm concerned about how stable that information is, given that any of those Discord servers could be shut down at any time. I guess that's also true of wikis or other sources, but at least web archiving exists to extract historical content if that ends up coming to pass.

The good thing about a lot of the larger hubs, and this one specifically, is that you don't even need to engage in the community at all. Like, ever. You could make chart requests if you'd like, I have and have had some made for me. But if you wanted, you could just lurk and download charts to your hearts content.

But like, you're here aren't you? Posting daily. What's the difference?

Even still, I understand the reservation because I had it myself for years, simply because I didn't understand the platform. Once I was given a reason to join, it quickly became something I really appreciated.

adjl posted...

Really, Discord has the same problem that real-life conversations have for people that are a little (or a lot) socially awkward, which is that unless you have something to contribute to whatever's being said at a given moment, you don't really have an opportunity to participate in the conversation. Discord can be a bit of an improvement there because people with niche interests who have trouble making IRL small talk because they don't share enough interests/experiences with most people they encounter can more easily find a decent-sized community of people that do share those interests/experiences, but more general discussions still fall into the same issue.

No, I understand this too and experience it myself. But it's not too hard to reference a post from a day or two ago, depending on how quickly the chat progresses and respond with something relevant. And if it does feel awkward, you can just lead with a "So I'm totally late to the conversation, but". Most people aren't going to be weirded out about this and even bring the conversation back again. Personally, I find it easier than in person group conversations, because there really is no smooth way of bringing back a conversation that has moved on from 20 minutes ago. And I don't need to look at everyone's judging eyes, so there's no reservation.

And at least in your case, from how you post here, you have enough social awareness and are intelligent enough not to do weird shit like post random stuff in the wrong rooms or respond with random emotes. You're one of the better posters here and I'm sure most communities would welcome you openly.

Salrite posted...

But what's the alternative? An online forum? Most of those would have you make an account anyways.

To participate, yes. To view/download the content? Often not so much. Most forums and especially wikis are publicly viewable (especially subreddits, which would be the main alternative because Reddit kind of took over the Internet from smaller forums). Anyone can wander in, read the information/download the file, and continue on their way without needing to make an account and request access to the community.

Most significantly, though, content on forums, wikis, and modding hubs is visible to search engines. if I search for, say, character builds for an RPG, for a lot of games that are 3-4 years old I'll get a handful of old reddit discussions, some old youtube videos, and an assortment of those SEO farming nonsense sites that just regurgitate high-level summaries of those other sources. For anything that reflects the current meta, I have to either dig up somebody referencing content that has come from the Discord (which is sometimes a link to the same Google Doc the Discord would provide), or find a link to the Discord and join it myself. It's not something I'm going to find with a cursory Google search. That may be okay for me because I don't approach the Quest for Big Numbers so casually that I'd be turned off by having to do a bit of digging, but for the many people that don't share my love of recreational spreadsheets, that means the best advice is pretty inaccessible. That, I consider to be a significant problem.

Plus, as I mentioned, web sites get archived. Discords don't. If anything happens to those Discords, there's potentially quite a lot of valuable information/content that goes with them.

Salrite posted...

The good thing about a lot of the larger hubs, and this one specifically, is that you don't even need to engage in the community at all. Like, ever. You could make chart requests if you'd like, I have and have had some made for me. But if you wanted, you could just lurk and download charts to your hearts content.

But like, you're here aren't you? Posting daily. What's the difference?

Probably the main difference is that I've been posting on GameFAQs for over 20 years at this point and it'd feel weirder not to, but even with that I'm still not exactly comfortable hopping into other boards to do anything other than lurk. Past that, though, creating an account on most forums is entirely an automated process. Joining a Discord server (I already have the account), however, involves specifically asking a person to join. I know that for most big servers it's either effectively or actually automated anyway, and there's pretty much no chance that my request would be turned down because that's just not how public servers work, but the fact that the process is framed as asking a stranger to do something for me makes me hesitate because that's something I'm particularly uncomfortable with.

Mostly, though, that's just me. It doesn't make a whole lot of rational sense because it's not a rational discomfort.

Salrite posted...

And at least in your case, from how you post here, you have enough social awareness and are intelligent enough not to do weird s*** like post random stuff in the wrong rooms or respond with random emotes. You're one of the better posters here and I'm sure most communities would welcome you openly.

Probably, but I'm still cripplingly shy and that makes joining new communities/conversations uncomfortable, even if there's no rational reason for the discomfort. I appreciate the vote of confidence, though.