The Woodwind Forum going offline

[ghostler]

Today I received word: The Woodwind Forum Going Dark

After 20 years, the owner is closing the site. I mentioned in the thread this forum is good for those interested in clarinets.

[Windsong]

That is a true shame.

We are on the wane, as well. This was once a very lively place. Young humans have no use for forums, it seems.

[ghostler]

We will likely follow suit shortly.  Young humans have no use for forums, it seems.

Sorry to hear that, Windsong but understandable. These forums cost money to run; reading between the lines, changes in hosting services fees, URL registration and forum software fees have increased considerably?

I was on F***b**k and Tw*t**r, but closed T. 6 years ago and F. 5 years ago due to censoring over ideologies versus tradition forum abuse rules. Still am members of a few forums hanging in there. I've given up on social media in its entirety.

Some forums like the Stunt Hangar Control Line Forum and Café Saxophone Int'l Forum encourage donations to help support the forum. Believe it or not, some still fly model airplanes connected to cord or fine cable with a handle to make them stunt within a circle. (Remember the Cox and Testors plastic ready-to-fly model airplanes with small internal combustion engines sold in toy stores and store toy sections some 30 years ago or more?) These 2 although free to join and post, encourage donations to help defray forum costs. That seems to help bind some to the forum.

However, the amount of participation in even them is down some from what it was like 20 - 30 years ago. I miss the old forums with Yahoo and Geocities. There were all sorts of groups and topics. There were some alumni groups of bands and schools I was formerly a member of, a lot of neat things to talk about, bind people together about. Some were private so information posted was confidential, which helped. All of that is gone.

Social media just isn't the same. A lot of historical information was lost when various groups abandoned traditional forums and went to social media. S.M. is not a good repository for historical information.

[ghostler]

There is a 10 minute video by the creator of Clarinet Perfection archived on Woodwind Forum, just posted today, explains background and reasons for discontinuing the forum:

[Windsong]

I agree that Social Media is not at all the same as a good old forum. It takes deliberate effort to visit a forum (no feeds or "you might also like" nonsense) and its members get to know one another over the years.  They work together to build and solve and explore.  Social Media is a smearfest often, with lack of civility or any reasonable regulation or expectation.

This is not to say that Social Media platforms lack any merit, but the format is not for me.

I have been a member of several truly great forums, but almost all have ceased, or are ghost towns.

[350 Rocket]

Very unfortunate. First the Conn Loyalist, now ClarinetPerfection. The old ClarinetPerfection site was a trove of information.

Hopefully some Woodwind Forum members find their way here.

The impermanence of social media makes it nearly impossible to search for and find information posted previously, and places like Reddit are rife with misinformation. The rise of AI chatbots has only made things worse. Forums were traditionally well-moderated enough to keep a fair level of trustworthiness.

[ghostler]

Very unfortunate. First the Conn Loyalist, now ClarinetPerfection. The old ClarinetPerfection site was a trove of information.

Helen, one of the TWF admins offered to host ClarinetPerfection on her website. Maybe she might be able to pitch in and do the necessary conversion work to get the pages to work with her website software. This may overcome the reluctance of the owner, Steve, who lacks resources, I gather possibly time.

Hopefully some Woodwind Forum members find their way here.

I posted this site for others to migrate to.

The impermanence of social media makes it nearly impossible to search for and find information posted previously, and places like Reddit are rife with misinformation. The rise of AI chatbots has only made things worse. Forums were traditionally well-moderated enough to keep a fair level of trustworthiness.

I am still a model airplane buff, recently someone posted on Stunt Hangar Forum a Ewe Toob A.I. produced historical document on Leroy Cox's model airplane engines and planes produced by Cox in its old Santa Ana, California factory. It was riff with inaccuracies obtained from forums, social media. It was basically "infotainment". Showed engines and processes from Duke Fox's factory in Fort Smith, Arkansas, non-Cox plastic ready-to-fly airplanes, Estes, Penrose, Colorado electric airplanes, basically a mismash photo collage to keep the eyes entertained; Cox and other content mixed in. I gather its goals were to garner the originator maximum monetization points and popularity hits.

[ghostler]

I could not help but notice the following Post #6:
https://cafesaxophone.com/threads/goodbye-woodwind-forum-aka-going-dark.42574/#post-636910

If I may, a shameless plug for the ClarinetPages forum forum to replace that aspect of WoodwindForum.

Thanks, Stocker, good pitch for this forum. Just curious, but could that be one of you? 😁

The WF is now closed as of today.