Past Gymnastics Message Board Memories- Which was your first message board?

[Amber]

Can you add a world forum category where we can post threads regarding other countries? in that way they will all be i the same forum

 

[RAFIKI]

The danger with that approach is that it assumes USA gymnasts are primary and every other country is secondary. It almost reinforces the current imbalance. Unless of course American only threads go there as well and WAG is for wider scope threads.

 

[MaryClare]

Can you add a world forum category where we can post threads regarding other countries? in that way they will all be i the same forum

I really don’t think this is the way to go.

There is nothing preventing anyone from posting about other countries. We’ve had a very active British news thread for years and I recently started a Russian one. We usually get great updates when there are national competitions in China thanks to a couple of users.

If you want to chat about other countries, please please start a thread! I would be very interested and I know others would too!

 

[MaryClare]

The part about not being able to find these resources in other languages is both a little surprising and quite disappointing. Thanks for sharing that, though.

Would it be useful for us to include, say, an Italian language forum about Italian gymnastics specifically even though the rest of the site is in English? (And similar for other cases?) Or would the use of English elsewhere essentially negate any interest in an Italian sub-forum?

I don’t think having forums in non English is a good idea at all. We don’t have the numbers to make a success of it and it rather excludes people who might be interested in following these countries but don’t speak the language. I am already talking to myself in the Russia thread and that’s when it’s in English

Gymworld did have some other language forums but other than the Dutch one, they were never very active and that was with a user base that was majority English 2nd language.

The point I was trying to make was that there aren’t any non American spaces on the gymnternet anymore. Equally for English language and other languages.

 

[IratePanda]

Many Europeans are multilingual. Most Americans, alas, are not.

@MaryClare We really do appreciate the Russia updates!

 

[Denn]

The danger with that approach is that it assumes USA gymnasts are primary and every other country is secondary. It almost reinforces the current imbalance. Unless of course American only threads go there as well and WAG is for wider scope threads.

Yep, American threads would have to get a tag like everyone else to decrease the imbalance.

ETA: I agree that it's a good goal to be more of a "this is worldwide" place than a "We welcome people worldwide, but American-heavy" place. We can work on that in coming months.

 

[Denn]

I don’t think having forums in non English is a good idea at all. We don’t have the numbers to make a success of it and it rather excludes people who might be interested in following these countries but don’t speak the language. I am already talking to myself in the Russia thread and that’s when it’s in English

LOL, yes, but that's partly because you are direct and thorough.

I do appreciate that people here tend not to write repetitive posts as responses. I am in a Music Theory group on Facebook that is the total opposite. 100 people all respond to say the same stuff over and over and it's like drinking water from a firehose.

Maybe I'm off here, but I do feel like it could be helpful if some members here used the reaction icons more — to let people know they are reading and agreeing (or appreciating or disagreeing, or whatever). that way, posters making the effort to provide information or perspective know they are being seen. quick and easy but useful... Not every post, but key posts in a thread.