I have been around forums since they were called BBS's, even participating on 'flame war' boards. That was a long time ago, and I care more about my Crew fandom than I ever did about anything on those old things, so more deliberate and cautious was my first instinct.
I have been a poster on here for half of my life. Joined at seventeen. F-e-m-a-l-e. Emphasis on the fe part. This place was a bit of a circus at the time (no offense to all of my fellow long-time posters). I do not fully understand why this place would seem intimidating. I find both Facebook and Twitter to be tough places to carry any sort of meaningful discussion (Twitter very much so). For instance today, my husband tagged me in a friend’s FB post on poverty. If I had been on here, I could have seamlessly quoted various pieces of the comment, and then I could have responded to each particular point. FB is not set up for that. Neither is Twitter (save for the tweet of a tweet, which is annoying to find). I find Twitter to be a whole lot of noise and people just shouting out their opinions and trying to be the first to share their “takes.” No real dialogue. As for the anonymity, I would imagine that is why some of our fellow posters stick around here. Not that I ever cared about the notion of having anonymity.
Yeah, I've never desired to remain anonymous, as I had my photo as my avatar for years and years. I enjoy meeting people from here for the most part.
I absolutely agree with these sentiments. Twitter is where I go to read news. Facebook is where I see what my friends are saying about the news. BigSoccer is where I discuss soccer and soccer-related things with people who I may or may not know (I'm not sure for the most part) in real life.
I remember having an account in matchnight but didnt post much.....I lurked for a long time in bigsoccer before posting. For fun I looked at my original posts. My first wasnt even about Columbus, but a Colorado game thread. My second post was rewarded with a Mr Archer belt whipping in a thread about a former coach....he quoted me but my post was never directed at him The 3rd post was calling him a board warrior.....then I crawled back into my hole I came from. I didnt come back to the cbus forums to post for another year....I just lurked with ptsd that Mr Archer gave me. Bigsoccer was extremely valuable in travel planning for the 2006 world cup. Maybe because alot of us have aged, but I prefer this place and the people Ive never met more now than I did 15 years ago.
I used to check out the sports Usenet groups back in the '90s, before they got spammed to hell. Talk about the Wild West of the Internet. There were some truly bizarre personalities on Usenet.
Oh, hi. Had the worst happened a year or so ago, at least a few of you may have an idea what you'd be doing on Saturday nights in the summer. Funny anecdote: Back during the Netscape era, the bottom of the web browser would show the IP address of the site being contacted. There was a day when my local internet connection was down...except if you knew the IP address. Guess how many people were in the computer lab that day and guess what site they were on? FWIW, it was a T1 connection. Speaking to several posts, I'm sure @Bill Archer can regale you about the Rivalry XI, Topper, Mike Segroves, rivalries with other boards, how Bruce Arena was reading BigSoccer at the team hotel and how the site would crash when five people tried to post at the same time.
I started out on MatchNight and posted there. When it went under I got pointed in this direction. I lurked for YEARS. I found BS a good source of info and reasonable discussion, so I followed threads with some regularity. But, to me, it seemed people could be brutal on here. And I shied away from joining and posting. Things have mellowed out around here over time—or maybe I’m just less sensitive. I joined about five years ago, but I bet I lurked for a good 8 years before that.
I had a random thought a few days ago: This site has been around in one way, shape, or form for about 22 years. If someone was banned in, say, 1999 or 2002 or whatever... I know a few came back repeatedly (at least one guy under very similar names and in extremely short fashion), but I wonder how many of them came back years later and managed to stick around. If someone was trolling here as a HS or college student in 2001 and came back in 2009, there'd be no way to really notice. (I was banned via IP from a different site under really strict moderators. The moderators left the site and I'm now a VIP-type there.) Still, I'd probably be surprised. Edit ... It appears that not only have I had that thought previously, but such has actually happened. https://www.bigsoccer.com/threads/hi-can-i-reclaim-my-old-user-name-from-like-15-years-ago.2092188/
This sounds like me. I had an account on Matchnight then lurked here for years. I had an account and posted maybe twice before lurking again.
1) I have three brothers. You guys do not scare me. 2) I joined this place right after or during that whole mess. I think a lot of anti-..... sentiment existed.
The thing is, that whole mess scared off a lot of people. The level of vitriol, anger and hatred was sometimes frightening and it went on full-bore for probably six months and then simmered on a back burner for another couple of years during which it didn't take much to get it to flare up. That's really when this board got it's reputation, but as we all know, to this day if you say something ignorant you'll get a whacking.I've always said it's something like a bunch of friends sitting in a bar having a few. Say something dumb and our buddies will jump your shit with glee. They still like you but you're going to get a load of crap anyway. But the whole A****C*** thing wasn't so much on her; sure her actions precipitated it but she pretty much vanished shortly thereafter. There were instead one or two guys who seriously got up in the morning, grabbed a coffee and spent the whole day arguing that she hadn't done anything objectionable. Which, agree or disagree, got very very old and after a while the whole thing boiled down to WOULD YOU PLEASE JUST SHUT AND GO AWAY. The reply to this was more or less "sure, as soon as you agree that I'm right" After that I wouldn't have blamed any woman for avoiding this place like the plague, but it was never about her gender; she was actually very popular, something of a celebrity really, and people liked her. Until she pissed everybody off.
Was Matchnight linked to the Crew's website back in the day? I thought I remembered getting to a message board through their website but I couldn't remember if that was it.
Yes. And actually I think it was owned by Matt Bernhardt, but I may have that wrong. Can't recall the name of the jerk off who ran it who expelled me from the thing (everybody knows that story by now) and it was Bernhardt who made him undo it but I never went back anyway. That was before MLS took all team websites in-house. They could host a forum, link to a forum of their choice or ignore it altogether. A lot of them used to simply link to their corresponding BS forum. When MLS took over they initially tried to setup their own version but it was terrible and nobody used it.
I remember the names Lee Smith and Shane Murphy as people that did stuff for Matchnight. I came over shortly before MN went away and now regret everything...
Whether for good or for bad, currently this place is the most hospitable that I can ever recall. Hell we even have a welcoming committee led by @TKyle.
I took a few shots when I was first on--I had a little inside knowledge but couldn't say too much about it for a number of different reasons (basically about the reason for a player move--I knew why and had it on good authority but was not allowed to say more (and I consider that still to be the case)). But it's the standard baptism of fire around these parts. Go though it with a good nature and you're one of the gang....
I saw this message on FB, but tweets seem to show up better on here. We have received a lot of questions about what is going on with Crew Union as we head into the 2020 season. Below is simplest explanation. Tl;dr version: we're gone but also bigger than ever #Crew96 pic.twitter.com/rXl3K9eoh3— CrewSupportersUnion (@CrewUnion) February 20, 2020