Armus wrote: ↑Sat Aug 14, 2021 8:30 am
I have my own thoughts on possible causes of this development, but my goal here isn't to editorialize, it's to present facts, and the fact that one game has stayed basically the same in pandemic-adjusted terms while the other has dropped precipitously would seem to indicate that there's reasons other than the pandemic. I'll leave the possible reasons for this divergence between 1e and 2e participation as an exercise to the reader.
TLDR: the factors contributing to 2e decline are 1) COVID; 2) 1e nostalgia; 3) volunteer/board errors; 4) increasing demands on time while experiencing decreasing levels of energy (i.e. age); 5) bad actors on the forums and in the community; and, 6) lack of prompt and decisive response to those bad actors.
I rarely participate in these forums anymore - much for the same reasons I rarely play anymore and rarely volunteer. But, assuming that a) participation in 2e really
is down and my lack of interest is indeed part of a wider trend, and b) your post is a genuine attempt to discover information about this trend so as to reverse it, I wanted to present my insight for whatever it may be worth. I'm only speaking for myself.
COVID, and its ripple affects on economic, political, and social life is definitely a factor.
1e is about that right age for Gen-X and Xennial nostalgia to kick in. Don't believe me? Look at dream card groups and forums - the content is overwhelmingly 1e-centric and has been for years. That's a factor driving 1e participation that 2e doesn't enjoy quite yet.
These two factors shouldn't be dismissed or treated as trivial. But they aren't the full story.
2e leadership and the Board have both made some missteps over the last couple years. That's not unsurprising - any volunteer organization suffers the same sort of missteps from time to time - and always will. We're all only human. If I'm being honest, I have to acknowledge that reality. But the story doesn't stop there either.
Now, speaking only for my own lack of participation: for various reasons, I don't get the same satisfaction out of playing 2e anymore, or volunteering, or participating in these forums. I'll elaborate, and I submit that my experience is shared by others - and that makes it a significant part of the story.
- I'm starting a new career as a teacher. I'm currently putting in 60-70 hour workweeks. This leaves me fairly exhausted.
- I'm not 21 anymore.
This means that taking the time to regularly keep up with these forums, to volunteer, and to put together decks and schedule events and show up and play them represents a very high opportunity cost. To an extent, that has always been the case for me. I think that's the case for lots of us. We have lives. We have careers. Some have kids. In short: there are increasing demands on our time and we don't have quite the energy we used to.
But over the last 18 months or so a fifth factor has been introduced that has increased the opportunity cost past the point it makes any sense to put aside the time and expend the energy.
- The last 18 months to two years has been defined by an incessant negativity, dishonesty, and general unpleasantness gleefully displayed on these forums by a select few community members who seem to take enormous pleasure out of creating conflict and making other people unhappy.
This has made everything about the 2e experience far less fun. And, while most (though not all) of the worst actors are now, thankfully, no longer actively present on these forums, there are an even more select few who remain that expend a great deal of energy defending those absent former community members and attacking anyone who sees their departure as a net good using a very selective interpretation of events (to put it politely).
Now, this is nothing unique to the internet. Every site has keyboard warriors who get off on warping reality and making their corner of the internet an unpleasant place. But - and this brings me to the sixth and final factor - most other websites are far more aggressive and prompt about dealing with such nonsense than TrekCC historically has been. Simply put, in most other internet communities, even other Trek-related internet communities, the kind of bad actors I'm speaking of aren't permitted to hang around long enough to do much damage and this fact tends to send a message to others who might be inclined to support them or follow in their footsteps.
Why does this matter? Well, since I started graduate school in 2014, participating in this game always involved a very high opportunity cost. But, it used to be more fun. Now that it's less fun, it makes less sense to pay the cost. So I don't.
That means I don't participate in events anymore. But it also means I don't run events anymore either. Atlanta, to the best of my knowledge, has put in no bids for events in 2022. I have no plans to do so. I am not aware of anyone in the Atlanta group that wants to pay the cost involved in taking over my role - for much the same reasons I've articulated above. Some may have noted there was no Trek at Dragon Con this year. That's why. I don't see there being any next year - at least not with the involvement of anyone I know in the Atlanta group.
Over the last few years, Atlanta has hosted some of the most successful and well-attended events in the country - particularly for 2e. And while no one person can take credit for that, I was the person who planned, organized, and promoted those events. I don't anymore - and no one has stepped up to take my place. As far as I know, no one local wants to, and for many of the same reasons.
So, there it is. If participation in 2e is declining and if, Brian, this is something that genuinely concerns you, I'd encourage you to think long and hard about the above. Because it is my sincere belief that the behavior of those I'm referring to, and the lack of prompt and effective response, are two of the most significant factors driving down interest in 2e - maybe even the two most significant. In other words, those former community members and those insistent on ignoring or tolerating their antics, or, worse, passionately defending them at every opportunity, are killing this game - or at least have dealt it a very serious blow from which it may never recover.
I may be only speaking for myself, but I doubt I'm the only one that feels this way. I
know I'm not the only Atlantan who feels this way. If this community has any sense of self-preservation left - of which I am honestly uncertain - then those responsible for keeping this game alive have to come to terms with this reality. The first step in solving a problem is admitting that it exists.