I don’t read Vox SBNation but saw this interesting tweet about the end of its Sounder at Heart blog/pod/website. Was SBNation kind of a super BigSoccer? And what caused Vox to do this? Just curious, had no knowledge…
Same here, MJ -- totally unaware of SBNation until I saw a tweet about it. From the tweet, I inferred that it was more like Medium for articles about MLS teams rather than a forum but I haven't checked.
It's a network of team-specific or city-specific blogs with paid writers, as well as comment sections that in some cases had very active online fan communities. It's owned by Vox Media and the company is shutting down most of the MLS and NHL blogs and laying off the writers.
Vox is a completely separate company. It could continue to support its blog sites covering teams if it chose to do so, just as traditional newspapers can send reporters to games if they choose. Apple has nothing to do with that.
Extratime had a sort of eulogy about SBNation. They said they relied on these journalists for the opinions and minute details you only get by following a team. It sounded like a big step backward for MLS. Funny that the Vox execs would do this when MLS’ goal is to hype itself up during the next 4 years, or that MLS would refuse to fund any of it. They said 29 clubs were covered by SBNation, but there wasn’t one for the Quakes. I only found an SB Nation Bay Area from 2012. Well, at least we avoided that layoff…
So, we Quakes fans survived without SB Nation all this time but we should be sad it’s gone? Kind of like DVR for me. Didn’t use it; won’t miss it.
I’m not sure about 2012, but Center Line Soccer - which used to independently be its own thing and first had SSV’s own Jay Hipps as its main writer before handing the reigns over to Robert Jonas - eventually joined the SB Nation network sometime in the middle of that decade as the Earthquakes’ representative site there. Jonas had a long tenure there (including writing the article that’d later be used to help launch The Official Q thread ) before moving on to The Athletic. LA-based writer Alicia Rodriguez then chipped in to cover the writing duties there for the early Matías Almeyda years before eventually returning to solely cover the LA teams… and the once proud CLS has sat idly ever since. GO SAN JOSE EARTHQUAKES!!! -G
I enjoyed the Center Line folks. Joe Nuxoll was a great photographer, too. Nuxoll donated some awesome professional photos for the SSV annual dinner silent auctions over the years.
I put off getting a DVR for awhile, and then when I got one it was like, "why didn't I get this sooner"? And, "I can't imagine living without this now." I think it might have been former KGO radio host Ronn Owens I once heard say, "Tivo is god".
I feel sorry for the other fanbases' loss, but my real point was that we are such a small team, we are apparently the only MLS club without SBNation coverage. Altho Goodsport says Centerline Soccer was SBNation for awhile. I didn't even know Centerline soccer is now defunct. And the DVR is great. I wish all streaming sites worked like a DVR. DVR is so much easier to use than On Demand.
With Everton, Liverpool, ManU and I forget who else is up for sale, it feels like there's got to be a real estate analogy for what all these big bucks American billionaires have done to the price and possible collapse of the EPL. The league is starting to feel like a San Francisco penthouse in an earthquake. Or a NY penthouse in a pandemic.
I don’t stream or do On Demand, either. I miss plug-and-play 12-inch black and white TVs. If the game was on you watched. If not, you didn’t. And you didn’t have to worry about where you placed the remote.
I thought there was some update about 5-6 years ago when there were massive delays in response while the old system was being migrated to the new one. Among the things lost were reputation points... I spend some time trying to defend the delays to less IT aware folks on here, even pissing one individual off so much I was put on their ignore list...
All the coding is dated from 2001 with updates to the system in 2007. But they just stablized the site thrn and removed features. Any admin can re add the features to the interface. Doesnt even have a dark mode which proves its dated. This places security is also awful i was abme to dox this place and get all the coding in ablut 5 minutes. Most of the admins and mods arent active. Ive reached out a bunch and it takes forever for replies. Im attmepting to buy this forum but navigating up the channels is taking forever. They update the firmware and security oftrn but still dated.
You would think with SB Nation losing the MLS stuff that at least these forums could be grown into more activity and perhaps increased financials for Big Soccer.
Yes, I'm a big fan of the Smithsonian so that's why I've entertained myself with my favorite type of people, angry old men. It's kind of a fetish of mine, but angry fat old men usually have interesting stories to tell and lots of information to learn. It's what nerdy fetishists glutens for pain and angry does. I am not fond of Dialup, that round phone thing that was shown here awhile back, and Yahoo Chat Rooms. Lots of sarcasm above, but lots of truth... figure out which is which lmao. I also rather talk to someone who can give me just as much bull shit as I give out. Makes life more interesting. SIMP men who run and hide behind a wall that can say stupid things, and not accept stupid things back shouldn't be allowed online. I obsess over weed, porn, beer, eye shadow and makeup pallets. I'm quite simple.
Yeah but Forums are so outdated, you have to completely overhaul the UI to be attractive. It's not very attractive. I had to mod out my shit just to have a dark mode on this forum. It makes it much nicer. I shy very close to the hard line of hacking which I try to stay away from, but hex code modes and UI mods are very common these days. However in the age of Reddit, Twitter, Facebook, Facebook Groups, Instagram, and especially Discord, forums are becoming irrelevant. I enjoy this place though because its nostolgic and I like the cast of people here, even JassyJ, its very 2006. However if it was more customizable and updated with the times, and there wasn't a shit ton of dead forums the place would cosmetically look nicer, you also need to interface more of a social media aspect to BigSoccer and you'd probably attract more. A facebook/twitter/forum of sorts smashed together for soccer fans would be interesting. Discord has a bunch of channels just liek this for specifics, broken into topics and it flows, they stream games all the time and you can have real time discussions with people watching games in 4k. The MLS Discord I'm in has over 10k+ people, and its always active. The Quakes subcord is decently active. A lot more hostile then anything that could happen here. If you say stupid shit expect stupid shit back, the problem with Big Soccer its very P.C. and Sensitive Needs.
And as a toddler, when you continuously playfully pull the dial off the Zenith TV when you think no one’s looking and waddle off to hide it under a bed. Or so I’ve been told. GO SAN JOSE EARTHQUAKES!!! -G
It’s hard to find good places where people will at least listen to other ideas and thoughts. Most people these days are simply shouting down others because they are convinced they are right (I am as guilty of this as anyone). There are a lot of lurkers that simply want to get information and learn things. Big Soccer can fill that void. You have taught me a lot of things I didn’t know. Thanks for sharing the info!