FWIS3

Is anyone about? I think I'm the only poster since Monday. Everyone on vacation? Patiently waiting for me to go away?

I'm here. I even think I posted once or twice this week.

I do wonder if FWIS is fading. I wonder if one problem is that we have fallen below some critical mass of active members.

I also note that more people from FWIS post on Facebook now then here. The problem with that is there are things I want to say that I'm not comfortable talking about on Facebook.

Bigger-picture-wise, I wonder if the day of the BB is passing. BAUT/CQ also seems to be dying very slowly. For whatever reasons, I think people now go to their own blogs, and to Facebook, Twitter, etc. more than they go to BBs / Forums.

Sadly, I think swift has the truth of it.

I don't come here as much as I used to. It's just not the same. And because of our privacy settings, we can't draw new blood. We've also had a high ratio of deaths when you consider the number of members.

If anyone has any ideas or desires to reinvigorate this place, maybe now is the time to speak up.

I don't post much on Facebook, My main reason for hanging around there is to make snarky comments on someone else's posts.

Haven't posted much here lately because, frankly, between the death of my mother and the fact that I didn't get the Amazon job, I'm not in a very social mood these days.

Reason # 6012 to hate Facebook...

Lol

I have become somewhat of a lurker. I actually only make it to FWIS one or two times a week. Time is in very tight supply these days.

I check in a few times a day. Mostly from my phone, so it's difficult to post responses.

And right now I'm in the middle of (for the 5th time in the past year) the most intense stressful time at work. Won't let up for a while. Mostly from the Colombia grant so at least it's a worthy project stressing me out.

And the one at the moment is planning for an event tomorrow celebrating Pluto and New Horizons.
http://www.bellmuseum.umn.edu/ExploraDo ... /index.htm

I'm putting together all of the listed activities. It's pretty fun! Just very time consuming on top of the three other major projects I am working on. The New Horizons picked a really shitty time for this flyby. They weren't factoring in my schedule at all!

And for the record, as I've stated before, I love facebook. For the most part it's filled with astro geek stuff, because the pages I like are all NASA and other coolness, and tons of my friends do cool things in the planetarium world. And a lot of the rest of my friends on there I would have no idea what they are up to so it's great to keep in touch. The deadweight? I just unfollow them so it doesn't take up my time.

pumpkinpi wrote:The New Horizons picked a really shitty time for this flyby. They weren't factoring in my schedule at all!

Must have picked up a tailwind.

Only at FWIS: A thread about how no one is posting creates the most traffic.

pumpkinpi wrote:And the one at the moment is planning for an event tomorrow celebrating Pluto and New Horizons.
http://www.bellmuseum.umn.edu/ExploraDo ... /index.htm

That sounds wonderful. Wish we had something like that around here. All three of us would enjoy it.

pumpkinpi wrote:And for the record, as I've stated before, I love facebook.

Zuckerberg just called. He apologized but said your monthly check is in the mail.

In 2 years... I could just turn out the lights....

Let's just see what happens....

pumpkinpi wrote:I'm putting together all of the listed activities. It's pretty fun! Just very time consuming on top of the three other major projects I am working on. The New Horizons picked a really shitty time for this flyby. They weren't factoring in my schedule at all!

Actually, when the planning for New Horizons started in 2000, I'm sure they had in mind "Hey! Let's make sure the flyby is at a really bad time for Pumpkinpi!".

Old people just get tired

As the FB stalkers know, I've been on holiday. Sitting in the airport now though, so I'm sure I'll be sufficiently lazy at work to post more here soon enough.

Deliberately tried to ignore electronic devices more than usual this time. That was a good idea.

Bad idea though, this is the first time that I'm really kinda bummed to be heading back to Amsterdam. I was in New Hampshire for the first time in a few years where I used to spend every summer, so a week felt rushed. And I've got a shit ton of work to get back to this next year which I'm not super looking forward to... and of course I was supposed to be wrapping up by this point, so a year where you feel like it's a tad of indentured servitude doesn't help my mood I'm afraid.

Rommie wrote:....so a year where you feel like it's a tad of indentured servitude doesn't help my mood I'm afraid.

A year? Try 29 3/4.....

Thumper wrote:Is anyone about? I think I'm the only poster since Monday. Everyone on vacation? Patiently waiting for me to go away?

Well, I was on vacation. I'm sure that explains it.

The place has really livened up since you got back.

Thumper wrote:The place has really livened up since you got back.

Hey, I'm trying to do my part; I tried to start a political fight about guns and even that couldn't do it. I could toss in some religious stuff too if you like.


Wait, wait, wait.... I got the perfect thing to start a major fight.


Pluto isn't a planet!

Swift wrote:

Thumper wrote:The place has really livened up since you got back.

Hey, I'm trying to do my part; I tried to start a political fight about guns and even that couldn't do it. I could toss in some religious stuff too if you like.


Wait, wait, wait.... I got the perfect thing to start a major fight.


Pluto isn't a planet!

Doesn't matter what scientists call it. We've now been there, and we'll keep learning more about what it IS!

Swift wrote:

Thumper wrote:The place has really livened up since you got back.

Hey, I'm trying to do my part; I tried to start a political fight about guns and even that couldn't do it. I could toss in some religious stuff too if you like.


Wait, wait, wait.... I got the perfect thing to start a major fight.


Pluto isn't a planet!

Ha ha!

Thumper wrote:

Rommie wrote:....so a year where you feel like it's a tad of indentured servitude doesn't help my mood I'm afraid.

A year? Try 29 3/4.....

Yeah, I don't know how much it comes out here, but I sometimes have a flair for the dramatic.

thumper, thank for saying things that had to be said. so why has this happened and what can we do about it? i would truly hate to see the group vanish.

sfc, i think that you're right. between death and illness we no longer have some of our most prolific posters. in addition, i believe that several people have never returned from facebook. for others, life appears to have gotten complicated and demanding. (and where have you been, cm? oh, off enjoying the occasional bout of profound sadness and 2 rounds of surgery and rehab.)

so what to do? well, why not contact someone whose posts you've missed and tell him/her? beg, plead and grovel.

swift - sorry but you'll have to ty much harder to start a fight. for inspiration take a look at the religion wars between fz and yosh. (and where are they now?)

grapes - just whom are you calling old? are you familiar with the concept of fighting words?

Regarding the FWIS winding down angle- yes, it's been happening a few years now. Which is a shame, but like others I'm not sure what to do about it.

I think Internet forums in general are no longer as popular on individual sites, in favor of Reddit (which essentially runs as some huge forums with millions of people, and literally thousands of smaller ones) and Facebook groups. My astronomy campers last month weren't very interested in an Internet forum like what we had when I used to attend a decade ago... but they did set up a subreddit and FB group (both private). So that's what the kids these days are doing for sure.

I have liked the idea of a small private forum. You can go back and review threads, reference individual posts, have separate sub forums. Maybe you can do all that on FB but I'll never figure it out. It looks like a junky stream of consciousness thing that's hard to go back and search, or weed through the trash. Whenever I get on my own page I don't recognize it. There's all kinds of stuff there I didn't put on. If I click on it, I'm instantly on somebody else's page looking at more stuff I don't know or care about. You wouldn't believe the amount of junk I have on my page and I only have 4 GD friends! Plus I get emails all the time that someone posted a F'ing picture I don't care about or changed their freaking status or what not. It takes me 10-15 minutes in the morning just to go through, try to see what it's all about, then delete those emails.

According to The Kid, her group of friends are using FB less and less, apparently on to bigger and better things. But she has to have her nose stuck in the phone for hours on end just to keep up. I don't have that kind of time.

But here if we have to choose between very little traffic, or a bunch of stupid, petty, mean fights, I'll take the former.

I have formed one private group on Facebook, with a couple of people we hike with. Actually, I only did it because I had too - we used to arrange our hikes by e-mailing back and forth. Then one of the people, Annely, started using the FB message function. I hate the messages on FB, they are just so hard to read and use. I mentioned several times about going back to emails, but when that didn't happen, I started the group. She seems to like that.

Problem with groups is that even if they are public groups, I don't know how you find them. I also don't really trust Facebook.

I also like having an alternative identity. There are somethings I want to say without my real name.