Is Oldhammer dying?

Golgfag1

Golgfag1

Moderator
OK, I'm asking the question and I'm fairly sure there will be a howl of protest because some folks will be disconcerted that the question has been asked; but sometimes a question has to be asked:- Is Oldhammer dying? I'm not asking because of any animosity towards the Oldhammer ethos or any of its 'Leading Lights', but I'm concerned as I appear to be the only moderator who visits this Forum on a regular basis and other causes of concern.

Relatively speak, I've recently started a Blog and thus started surfing other blogs to see what's happening out on the web and to be honest found - not a lot to be singing about, apart from either some dissatisfaction or 'old-hands' resting on their laurels - As Their not posting anything on a regular basis, either on their Blogs or the Forum! If, they've moved their activity elsewhere - why am I not seeing or hearing anything about it? Or have they settled into a safe routine, within a 'safe' little circle of friends and their content with their lot; or have they found other things to occupy their time - Family, work or did they consider they'd done their bit, or found the Forum too hard an audience, as they'd be called to back-up their statements with reasoned conversation.

Now, don't get me wrong Oldhammer is alive and well in certain corners of the Web and being well publicized by the like of Asslessman, Zhu and Airbornegrove - stories of daring do are being crafted and dice rolled, with the rise of heroes and villians and the regular posts of what people are painting, but they're getting fewer.

So here's to a great howl of protest to see if anybody's paying attention?

To end on a positive note - I'm current working towards a large participation game - originaly scheduled for BOYL2022 (ten years of BOYL) but due to Covid will be 2023, where I'll spread the call for players via small vinettes here on the Forum leading up to the event, provide all the figures (one player's contingent is three hundred and sixty Black orcs! I've still to paint their standards and musicians, but the rest are done) and smile when my or the players plans don't go as intended! :lol:

Paul / Golgfag1
 
i think it’s more that forums and blogs in general are dying out. Some have moved on to quicker and easier delivery systems like Facebook and Instagram.

Oldhammer may be slowing down a bit, but I still see plenty of content on Twitter every day. I also see lots of new figure releases inspired by it.

P.S. Keep up the good work, it’s appreciated.
 
Hi Paul

I think it has certainly changed a bit over the years. I know personally speaking I had a lot more time when the forum started as it was in the depths of the recession and I had no work. Oldhammer was a welcome release from that reality at the time but then I went back to work about 6 years ago. I started posting less on my blog and here and as I returned to full time work, which involved a lot of travel and being away from home, I had less and less time. That's not to say I have given up but rather that I just have less time.

My time is also split with the local gamers here who play other (historical) games and a return to role-playing. It's why I joined the OWAC this year - to try and spend a bit more time on the very thing that brought me back into this hobby after quite a few years away. There is also the Facebook, twitter and Instagram effect as well. I find i get my fix from Facebook even if I find it irritatingly short term but have never gone near Twitter or Instagram and neither do I want to.

I have been planning on posting here again and on my blog but I just never seem to make the time. So in that sense thank you for bringing this topic up, even if it just means that I post a bit more here again :grin: .

JJ
 
Citizen Sade":r8on1akk said:
i think it’s more that forums and blogs in general are dying out. Some have moved on to quicker and easier delivery systems like Facebook and Instagram.

Oldhammer may be slowing down a bit, but I still see plenty of content on Twitter every day. I also see lots of new figure releases inspired by it.

P.S. Keep up the good work, it’s appreciated.
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Thanks for the swift response, if you hadn't I really would have been worried, yes I can undertand the distractions and calls of other media upon peoples time but are there too many? Are the trees not seeing the forest?

Thanks for the encouragement, but it does seem awfully lonely at times.

Paul / Golgfag1
 
Just John":3al4jctb said:
Hi Paul

I think it has certainly changed a bit over the years. I know personally speaking I had a lot more time when the forum started as it was in the depths of the recession and I had no work. Oldhammer was a welcome release from that reality at the time but then I went back to work about 6 years ago. I started posting less on my blog and here and as I returned to full time work, which involved a lot of travel and being away from home, I had less and less time. That's not to say I have given up but rather that I just have less time.

My time is also split with the local gamers here who play other (historical) games and a return to role-playing. It's why I joined the OWAC this year - to try and spend a bit more time on the very thing that brought me back into this hobby after quite a few years away. There is also the Facebook, twitter and Instagram effect as well. I find i get my fix from Facebook even if I find it irritatingly short term but have never gone near Twitter or Instagram and neither do I want to.

I have been planning on posting here again and on my blog but I just never seem to make the time. So in that sense thank you for bringing this topic up, even if it just means that I post a bit more here again :grin: .

JJ
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A question of time - No problem, just thought it was worth asking the question and if that encourages you make time and post, it's no bad thing in my book. :grin:

Paul / Golgfag1
 
I think this form is great. Lovely armies on display, WIPs even made miniatures to look at. Lots of information. Very lied back posting, slow paced ( I like that a lot ). Have a look-see on other armies and miniatures or scenery making, fiction writings, drawings while working on your own army or similar and post progress when you're done. Very helpful people here also. If nothing new on display you can always venture in deeper corners and find nice things. Like you're in big hall full of miniatures and all you see at the moment is in front of you and it's beautiful but you can always go little deeper and find amazing miniatures also.

Was on different forums car related decade ago but it was very toxic and spirit leeching so I left them and wasn't on any forum or look at one until I got here.
 
Golgfag1":1ytjej6x said:
Are the trees not seeing the forest?
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I think that this is the case. My feeling is that there are plenty of trees out there, but they either don’t know they are part of a forest or don’t necessarily feel that they are.

The problem, in part, I think is the transient nature of things like Twitter. You need to be following the content producers or someone who does or you’ll miss it. There is some more great content with more permanence that I see on forums like the Lead Adventurers Forum e.g.

V’s Return to Oldenheim

Cubs’ Old Citadel nostalgia

grubman’s Old School Diorama a Day

Maybe we need some way of flagging these sort of things to people here?
 
Have you considered the role that Covid has had? For 14 months or so people have not been able to play games, get together, share etc. So we have all become stuck in a rut at home. Other than painting my Skaven, and a couple of games of Bloodbowl and Bolt Action with the family, I have had no wargaming interaction. Well, that’s not strictly true. I have a small whatsapp group with 5 players on it who pre-Covid met up at least once a month but we haven’t done anything beyond solo projects since lockdown happened. The group chat is mainly pics of paint work now rather than discussing games.
 
It certainly does feel very different at the moment. Work/life balance, pandemic, also gaming is less Warhammery of late.

Have been dropping in here quite regularly but don't really post much, mostly lazyness. I'll try to fix that.

Citizen Sade":3kvziy5v said:
Maybe we need some way of flagging these sort of things to people here?
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Sounds like a job for a stickied thread? Like with the eBay ones? IDK.

I set up an Oldhammer subreddit years ago, and traffic there is slowly increasing, and there's some great stuff gets posted: https://www.reddit.com/r/oldhammer/

Gideon is doing excellent work on the history of WFRP, and looks at a lot of early Warhammer stuffs, well worth reading: https://awesomeliesblog.wordpress.com
 
I love that you have brought this topic up.

In some ways it really asks the question: What IS Oldhammer?

For me it isn't just about what models you have or how old they are or how well you painted them...

For me it is about WHO you are.

Oldhammer is about when we were kids that could certainly not afford what we were offered (mostly). It was about what we dreamed about. It was about the fantasy that we were all a part of.

It was about imagination, intuition, sculpting... and it really still is.


OLDHAMMER is about US.


We may not be so young anymore. We may need jewlllers headsets to paint, but we remember the old rules and the not so old rules, we love our old models, and some of us (especially me perhaps) love a good modern sculpt when we see it.


So I say, let us celebrate OLDHAMMER!

It is NOT about the age of the model, but rather about the age of the community, and we are NOT dead until we ARE dead and even then let our memory continue evermore!
 
If the current prices of old lead are anything to go by at the moment I’d say no (dammit!)

I think this forum is great, but can see that (in terms of posts) it’s struggling compared to a few years back. The Facebook sites are obviously active, and they are relatively easy to post and respond direct to but they also don’t seem to have much ‘discussion’. Maybe people have run out of things to be nostalgic about? Also I think the number of blogs on oldhammer have dried up a bit, but I can see that they take time to do individual blogs - and even lead adventure forum seems quite quiet these days.

I can’t speak for gaming, simply because I don’t have a circle of friends who are interested in that side of things (my wife is kind enough to humour the odd board game now and again, but compared to more modern games like catan, Carcassonne, etc some of the old GW stuff are, let’s be frank, a bit dated and it’s only really nostalgia that drives my interest).

BUT I’m interested in painting up old lead - which is something I can do solo - and having a couple of places to post stuff and get some feedback from likeminded people is great. Twitter is great for me for the convenience of posting and immediate feedback- butter others there is Instagram, Reddit, blah blah blah

I have posted stuff on Facebook but I tend more to simply click the ‘like’ button these days - and I think the identification and valuation side has been hijacked a little by lazy people seeking prices for eBay.

Would love to get involved in the gaming and BOYL at some point - that was what brought me here in the first place - but getting there is an issue for me and looking at it from afar I think it seems to have a golden period and we are now in a silver age when people are interested in later GW stuff and some of the original guys from this forum have moved onto other things.

Whatever - I’ll continue to support as long as you continue to run the forum. Been a pleasure to be able to participate here and hope you still have the enthusiasm for a while longer.
 
Citizen Sade":5a2n4uyy said:
i think it’s more that forums and blogs in general are dying out. Some have moved on to quicker and easier delivery systems like Facebook and Instagram.

Oldhammer may be slowing down a bit, but I still see plenty of content on Twitter every day. I also see lots of new figure releases inspired by it.

P.S. Keep up the good work, it’s appreciated.
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I agree with this. I have found that forums in general are much quieter these days. Even the 'big' Warhammer forums are quieter than they were and some have closed.

Other social media on the other hand is booming. The oldhammer FB page has I would say at least a dozen projects every day and posts get hundreds of likes and comments.

I have found the same with Epic. What used to be the hub of activity (TaccComms) seems to just have a small group of dedicated posters. If I post some miniatures on there I'm lucky to get a dozen views. In the middlehammer 40k group on facebook the same images get thousands of views, dozens of likes and shares and there are a very sizeable volume of people posting on there.

So, I would even go one step further than Citizen Sade and say it's prospering! But the way people access media is changing away from desktops and towards mobile devices (I can take an image and post on Facebook in seconds) and so the population are moving with it. Although I hope it doesn't happen altogether, as I find forums can be better for reading large bodies of text and actually have discussions, certainly better than social media.
 
Oldhammer isn't dying: it's just that the internet is dying apart from 4 or 5 megasites. Oldhammer on the internet is primarily now people posting on facebook. I don't especially like facebook, I don't think it's a great fit with Oldhammer because it's all about scrolling and scanning, which generally means it's about the flashy and new and quick, and Oldhammer isn't really any of those things. I prefer long-form stuff because I'm more that sort of person, hence blogging... I do see that traffic's down at the blog but then I generally put that down to being a boring sod!

But oldhammer itself dying? Nah, largely because it's spirit is in the games we play when we meet up and to me there seems to be more appetite for that than ever. Just we haven't been able to meet for a while because of the plague!
 
I agree with the general consensus that it's just as, if not more, popular that it's ever been, it's just that the activity has moved.

I do tend to prefer the permanence/searchability of blogs and forums over the somewhat temporary nature of Facebook/IG/Twitter, so it's a shame that most of the content is over there these days, but it is what it is. Also, as with the nature of these things, some of the 'old faces' have drifted off to do other things, so their (possibly louder) voices have quietened down, but they've definitely been replaced with a plethora of newer regular posters.

TL:grin:R: It's as healthy as ever, but it's unfortunately on Facebook.
 
Thanks for the responses people,

Given current circumstances in the Golgfag household, with not a great deal of games being played and only the continuous grind of working my way through the lead mountain and participation in the OWAC and occassional daliences with other forms of media I thought the question needed to be asked - as I'm obviously not seeing the wider picture - which appears to be a lot rosier than I anticipated.

So please, if you see something worth-while, post details of your find here, so that at least this gruff old ogre can see there is a light on the horizon :lol:

Paul / Golgfag1
 
Dear members,

The forum would have died a year ago (abruptly and without warning) due to the lack of action and decisiveness from the moderators. I urge members of the forum to subscribe to the Community Usergroup and to take part in some of the issues mentioned in the The Future of the Fomums post. The lack of interest and/or replies is quite disturbing. Most of the active moderators do not seem to be active anymore and need to be replaced. The forum has hosting issues that need to solved to secure a long term solution.

My apologies for posting this here, the lack of interest and/or replies in the Community Usergroup has left me with no other options.

Kind regards,
Dreamfish
 
I'm still very happy to offer (professional) hosting services if we can figure out the longer term route forward regarding management of the board and so forth (although at the time technical hosting turned out to be less than straight forward given legacy versions of software required, but those are solved at least for day one). I know some of the lack of success last time we looked was down to having the time to dedicate to work on the project, potentially porting code or writing a new theme, etc. When I've finished my current (paid) projects I'm happy to try and have another look at things with regards the technical future, but I believe we got as far as having the current instance of the board running okay on my infrastructure - well there is still a version running right now :) if you want to shift things.
 
The Solution

I've planned to write up a forum resurrection post to share on Warhammer forums. Here goes at last:

The reason old forums are dying is because of their lack of easy direct image upload.

This is a great pity, because forums with their rational layout and archive mode are vastly superior to social media with their gone-with-the-wind setup. You cannot find stuff again on social media, so forums should be the natural go-to-place. Accumulating content on a forum over years and years and showing up on search hits should help keep it afloat.

Now there has recently arrived a solution to the woes of forums! We've tried it out for 1½ year on Chaos Dwarfs Online and it's worked well. There have been some child sicknesses, but the technical warts are surprisingly few and have all been solved.

The solution is called Discourse.

Not Discord, the chat program, but Discourse Forum software.

Discourse has a rational layout and archive mode like any proper forum do. A few small features are missing, but we've seen some implemented over the last year, so they may show up. And most importantly Discourse has easy direct image upload.

I say it again: Discourse has easy direct image upload. Like social media sites do.

Discourse holds the key to our troubles. It has allowed declining Chaos Dwarfs Online (for whom we've fought a drawn-out rearguard battle as a skeleton crew hosting contests and salvaging content) to suddenly resurge in strength. We're back up in numbers and activity and experiencing a new golden age of membership. We've always had good quality of anything on CDO, but now we're back in quantity as well.

The issue is that you need to reboot the forum. Start all over again with Discourse Forum. From CDO's experience I can tell you this is well worth it: Just make sure to advertise the resurrected forum thoroughly on relevant Facebook groups and so on, and don't be shy to mass E-mail forum veterans about it. Be polite, "in case of interest", and describe in short form the new forum with easy direct image upload and mobile-friendly mode.

Now, rebooting a forum means that the old one with all its content is left hanging. Therefore we at CDO are in the slow sporadic process of salvaging and transferring all worthwhile content from the old site to the new. This will take years, as we have so much membermade content there: Art, stories, army books, tutorials, you name it. But it will happen.

Remember that forums are treasure troves of hobby creativity. They deserve to live.

I wish to recommend anyone rebooting their forum to scan their archives for the best of the best, and salvage them for re-upload to their new Discourse Forum. Don't let your best gems be lost, folks. It's however understandable if most of the project logs and so on will have to go. Few are prepared to manually salvage thousands and thousands of pictures like I did back in 2017 during the Photobucket crisis.

Keeping the old forum open in parallell with the new means double costs, but we have a pillar of our community chipping in to help, so it's managable.

I will end here so as not to drag on longer: The key point is that we finally have the software needed to resurrect forums! Reboot with Discourse if you wish your forum to be revived, and be prepared to spread the word.

Best of luck, gentlemen.

dfcYK8a.png


Recruitment poster for Chaos Dwarfs Online Discourse Forum.
 
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