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I posted this in the State of the Forums thread and got the following reply from Jeffrey:greazeball posted:Getting new users has to be done via the front page and social media channels. Jeffrey of YOSPOS posted:This is a really good idea. Directly and forthrightly stating what the site is, why it is the way it is, and why it's good should be a basic function of whatever landing page new users end up on Let’s run with it. Be the change you want to see and all that. Post articles ITT that you think would help explain what this site is to someone who’s never visited. It’s time for some brand maintenance, what do you think people should know about this place? Here's my attempt at a general introduction/pinned article on a revamped landing page. If you don't like it, write a better one! -------------------- Greetings from the early 2000s! Something Awful is a time capsule of the internet, a proud relic of the days before ad-supported engagement-seeking time-sucking hellsites of brainless upvoted cookie cutter clickbait bullshit was the only stuff you could find. No algorithms suggest things for you here, because that just encourages what the algorithm likes instead of what people like. SA isn’t a low-effort site where you can scroll endlessly through the day’s most engaging posts and just double-tap to like something. You’ll find stuff but you’ve got to look for it. You can use the search function, but this place is more like a weird library where you browse titles for something interesting and then flip through to see if it’s worth checking out. There’s good stuff inside (for varying definitions of good), but you have to actually read the threads to find it. This is intentional. We’re a community (several communities, actually) of posters who care about what we post and who we post with. There are no likes, thanks, badges, rewards or anything to collect. We post because we love it. It’s more like a conversation than a popularity contest. Good posts get more people to post. Bad posts get challenged and insulted. Bad posters get removed. That’s right, we have an active moderation team who eject bigots, shitheads and unfunny assholes every day. It costs $10 to make an account, so these people either gently caress off forever or re-register and get banned a bunch of times and the site makes money. Most people just pay $10 once and have a good time. The spirit of the early internet lives here. We’re weird, cranky, funny, opinionated and pretty welcoming for the most part. Start browsing the forums (they’re split into pretty major categories, there are hundreds of threads under each one) or register an account if you want to post. There are lots more articles on this front page if you want to learn more about SA. -------------------- Post your intros or more specific info you think would help explain more about why the forums are the way they are. Some other brainstormed topics I haven't fleshed out at all:
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Dec 10, 2022 15:58
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Dec 10, 2022 16:18
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when i want to talk about a video game i can't talk to real people about it because they would walk away so this is a place to talk about a video game and it's slightly less whiny than anywhere else on the internet for that i've found so far
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Dec 10, 2022 16:19
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One idea would be some kind of cliffs notes like this, hitting the main points of why SA is a better social experience than every other garbage website: Something Awful is a haven to escape the worst parts of what the internet has become. From the very beginning, our motto has been "The Internet Makes You Stupid," and our goal here at SA is to keep out the worst parts of what makes the internet stupid on other websites. What do you hate about the modern internet? Everything is built around advertising! Other sites are built around advertising because they are free to use. At Something Awful we charge a registration fee and require you to pay for things like custom avatars so that we don't have to rely on advertising income. We do not run outside ads, and because of this our incentive is to run the website in a way that makes users happy instead of a way that makes advertisers happy. Everything is run by an opaque algorithm! There is no algorithmic curation or moderation on Something Awful. There is no robot working behind the scenes determining what content you see or what posts get you banned. We have subforums for discussion of just about anything but only you decide what topics you're interested in, and actual people run the website instead of leaving moderation to an AI algorithm. Every website is overrun by bots! Bots aren't interested in a website where you have to pay to join. The posters you interact with here are real people from all over the world. It's so hard it is to have a conversation! Social media sites are built around showing you what's popular, and they are built in ways that can make it very hard to follow a discussion instead of being shown whatever has the most upvotes, likes, or retweets. SA is built around threads organized chronologically: you see everything in the order it was posted instead of seeing more popular things first, making it very easy to just talk with other people about your interests. Everything is dumbed down to fit in the length of a tweet or a tiktok video! Our forum software allows and encourages longer posting, which gets just as much priority in the forum as short posts. One of SA's cherished traditions is knowledgeable people educating others about their subjects of expertise. You can find in-depth information on just about anything here, and the forum setup means that you can take your time instead of being forced to make everything bite size or worrying that you missed something. Everybody is self-serious and whiny all the time! SA was founded as a comedy website and will always be a place where jokes are allowed and encouraged as long as they're funny. There are lots of opportunities for in-depth discussion of whatever you're interested in, but this is also a website where you're expected to have a sense of humour about it. Every site is overrun with horrible people! We may be rude and elitist, but we don't tolerate bigotry or hate speech or the other nasty things that have overrun a lot of social media sites. Requiring a registration fee keeps out most people who just want to trash the place, and we do our best to get rid of anybody who decides to waste their $10 on being an rear end in a top hat. vyelkin fucked around with this message at 16:57 on Dec 10, 2022 |
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Dec 10, 2022 16:54
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o1twDYSyMss
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Dec 10, 2022 16:54
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Bigg rear end turd buster, the turd busting out the anus, the vermicular greased up b-hole slide of the itinerant log, the bootyhole burster gushing from the back-end splatterhouse like a dog heaving up horse feed, the bunger somehow, someway, exactly replicating the sound of a cat hurfing-and-gurfing a slobber slick sphere of hurrball.
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Dec 10, 2022 17:01
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If you have to meticulously explain why something is good maybe it just sucks? Especially if this is supposed to be a comedy site? Like how many websites did you discover because there's a 1000 word essay on the front page. And it's not like there's hundreds of people stumbling onto somethingawful.com and getting confused and leaving. No one is even reading the front page. Either put content on there that makes people want to link to that content (which hasn't happened in like 20 years) or just forward somethingawful.com to the forums.
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Dec 10, 2022 17:07
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Schweinhund posted:If you have to meticulously explain why something is good maybe it just sucks? Especially if this is supposed to be a comedy site? Like how many websites did you discover because there's a 1000 word essay on the front page. This, if you have to describe the site keep it under 100 words. Or just post this: Lil Swamp Booger Baby posted:Bigg rear end turd buster, the turd busting out the anus, the vermicular greased up b-hole slide of the itinerant log, the bootyhole burster gushing from the back-end splatterhouse like a dog heaving up horse feed, the bunger somehow, someway, exactly replicating the sound of a cat hurfing-and-gurfing a slobber slick sphere of hurrball.
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Dec 10, 2022 17:25
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Lil Swamp Booger Baby posted:Bigg rear end turd buster, the turd busting out the anus, the vermicular greased up b-hole slide of the itinerant log, the bootyhole burster gushing from the back-end splatterhouse like a dog heaving up horse feed, the bunger somehow, someway, exactly replicating the sound of a cat hurfing-and-gurfing a slobber slick sphere of hurrball. of course, but "itinerant"?
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Dec 10, 2022 17:43
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Lookit those
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Dec 10, 2022 17:52
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Schweinhund posted:If you have to meticulously explain why something is good maybe it just sucks? Especially if this is supposed to be a comedy site? Like how many websites did you discover because there's a 1000 word essay on the front page. I think it'd probably be useful to have something about why SA is how it is. You and I and anyone who was around in the early 00s has an insanely different conception of how you can consume internet content from anyone who got on a few years later in the myspace and facebook years. Looking at SA in curiosity is going to totally puzzle someone whose first heavy internet use came after modern social media. It's not a bad idea to address what everyone clearly hates about big socials now and why SA has avoided those things. Honestly any kind of statement along those lines would be better than a construction gif uploaded by the last living person who knew how to operate the front page CMS years ago. Short is good but having some kind of a longer manifesto like OP's as well isn't a bad idea either. Or maybe it is, gently caress it. If I were Jeffrey I'd make an attempt to get press for having a web 1.0 somehow-still-alive gay comedy website as a novelty, and be able to point to some statement about why SA has some advantages over the blob. I dunno
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Dec 10, 2022 18:07
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Somethingawful: if you lived here you'd be home by now!
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Dec 10, 2022 18:07
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Deep Glove Bruno posted:of course, but "itinerant"? With more new posters on board, we get closer to solving the traveling poo problem
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Dec 10, 2022 18:48
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Thank you for visiting Something Awful! Do you like jokes and comedy? Let me know when you find some! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x3SxEOvAOEg
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Dec 10, 2022 18:56
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Zoomers don't read, convert the essay to TikTok dances
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Dec 10, 2022 18:56
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a gif of a cartoon sign post in a cartoon desert proclaiming: "welcome to somethingawful. if you're here for the violent rightwing insurrection movement, please sign up in the gleen greenwald thread in cspam"
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Dec 11, 2022 01:45
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Advertise that the site is both Funny and Leftist and people will flock here to see which one is the lie
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Dec 11, 2022 01:54
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sa is the best place on the internet to find anonymous bathroom sex in your area
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Dec 11, 2022 03:29
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I wanted to reply but an ad moved in front of my thumb/cursor 
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Dec 11, 2022 03:52
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im gay
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Dec 11, 2022 04:01
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Dixville posted:im gay so what
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Dec 11, 2022 04:05
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greazeball posted:The spirit of the early internet lives here. Would make a great closing line at the end of the somethingawful tourism ad.
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Dec 11, 2022 04:14
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Listen furries, while we're not really down on you guys anymore (hell I played a catboy in FFXIV) that dude who posted the apology article is a fuckin' idiot who we're constantly laughing at and he didn't speak for all of us even though he claimed to. Seriously, the dude was an absolute dipshit. Like, "if he got any dumber we'd have to put him in the sun and water him" dipshit. But he's not alone, we are by and large all absolute dipshits. And I know you are too. So pay 10 bucks for an account that can be taken away from you at absolutely any moment at the whim of people who never had the slightest bit of power in their lives before they got modded. It's not as bad as it sounds and it's still better than Reddit could ever hope to be. thanks ilu, whh
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Dec 11, 2022 04:14
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Smugworth posted:so what I miss that guy
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Dec 11, 2022 04:18
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William Henry Hairytaint posted:Listen furries, while we're not really down on you guys anymore (hell I played a catboy in FFXIV) that dude who posted the apology article is a fuckin' idiot who we're constantly laughing at and he didn't speak for all of us even though he claimed to. Seriously, the dude was an absolute dipshit. Like, "if he got any dumber we'd have to put him in the sun and water him" dipshit. Phiz Kalifa is that guy and he's indeed a grade A tuna can sized chode
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Dec 11, 2022 04:20
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I am frequently reminded and made to feel very happy and even proud of the people in these forums. Looking at the stupid furry hate, rampant slur use, general 90s kid dipshittery that bled into the 00s Internet, but fast forward to the present and everyone has... well, "matured" is an awkward word choice. I'm just happy that we evolved while shitheaps like 4chan absorbed the worst of us like a gross sponge. Also just really amusing to consider how many of us turned out to be trans, autistic, gay, furries, etc., those things that in an earlier time were just vaguely understood concepts and groups we once ignorantly and freely mocked. I mean, I really feel bad about the furry treatment. I think they were one of the last demographics to be pulled out of the "it's okay to insult these people venomously and relentlessly" pool, that pool that is now full of republicans and also Lowtax
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Dec 11, 2022 04:28
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Furries are still gross There isn't a way to dress up like a children's cartoon character and turn it into a sex thing that isn't gross.
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Dec 11, 2022 04:32
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ninjoatse.cx posted:Furries are still gross Then don't turn it into a sex thing. I know some furries. I don't know what they do in their sex lives, they just like to imagine themselves as anthropomorphic animal-folk. It's parallel to anime dorks dressing up, or theatre nerds dressing up, or video game dweebs dressing up. Which maybe earns some mockery to a degree, but not the vilification they receive.
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Dec 11, 2022 04:41
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credburn posted:Then don't turn it into a sex thing. but anime dorks dress up as people, theatre nerds dress up as people, and video game dweebs dress up as people. furries dress up as animals
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Dec 11, 2022 04:44
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I know some. Like all things, if they try to shove it in your face, cover your eyes and run away
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Dec 11, 2022 04:48
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just put the pigs huge balls on the front page and you click the left ball to signup or the right ball to login
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Dec 11, 2022 04:50
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We used to be a minor big deal 20 years ago, so maybe if you like stage MILFs you'll like us.
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Dec 11, 2022 04:52
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Welcome to the sausagefest
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Dec 11, 2022 04:53
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Das Boo posted:We used to be a minor big deal 20 years ago, so maybe if you like stage MILFs you'll like us. I do, and would like to subscribe to your newsletter
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Dec 11, 2022 04:55
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If you're not a star poster on Reddit, you should try out Something Awful - instead of your posts getting algorithmically sent into obscurity, everyone here has to wade through your particularly brainworm-ridden thoughts to get to the rest of the conversation!
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Dec 11, 2022 05:20
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Do you miss the old internet? Do you long for those halcyon Web 1.0 days when the posters were real ones and the only people tracking everything you do online were weird forum nerds? We sure do! Here at somethingawful.com we believe in the way things used to be—except for the slurs. We don’t do that anymore and maybe furries are ok now but also maybe not?! Give us  , sign up for the forums, and find out for yourself!PS: we never liked lowtax
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Dec 11, 2022 05:25
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Alucard posted:If you're not a star poster on Reddit, you should try out Something Awful - instead of your posts getting algorithmically sent into obscurity, everyone here has to wade through your particularly brainworm-ridden thoughts to get to the rest of the conversation! THIS!!!
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Dec 11, 2022 05:26
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Don't forget SA goons helped get rid of some SERIOISLY BAD poo poo on Reddit
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Dec 11, 2022 05:37
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SA fuckin hates pedos that's why we've never allowed any to be moderators
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Dec 11, 2022 05:39
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The front page should be a plain background with the following text:brilliant plan to attract by reverse psychology posted:Welcome to Something Awful.
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Dec 11, 2022 06:08
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