I have been puzzled for quite some time since I joined about the record statistic for the number of users at any given 5 minutes of time-- even recently, the record of 128 guests hasn't come very close.

Was there just a general decline from that point, or something else mysterious?

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On Go proverbs:
"A fine Gotation is a diamond in the hand of a dan of wit and a pebble in the hand of a kyu" —Joseph Raux misquoted.

I'm not so sure that our forum stats are even working

No idea what made that day special, but yeah, forum traffic has dropped significantly since the early days. John Fairbairn, who doesn't post anymore, once called it "No Life in 19x19" when he checked back in.

If you look at the people with the highest post counts, we all started in 2010-2012, and a number of those people are very quiet or barely post anymore.

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Occupy Babel!

Yeah, really sad to see that since I only started later and like this forum a lot. Is there just to much contest from other places to discuss go?

I suspect that Reddit is picking up a large percentage of new people looking for a go forum. Maybe Facebook, too, though I'm not on that.

I post Brady's Blunders here for two reasons. First, by posting links to here in my comments I hope to help grow a forum that I've enjoyed. Second, I can save my game records without needing to build my own website.

I doubt my first reason has succeeded much, sadly.

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- Brady
Want to see videos of low-dan mistakes and what to learn from them? Brady's Blunders

I didn't thought that those two are that great to discuss because you don't have tags for making goboards or implementing sgf-Files. Or did that change since I looked last?

I agree that L19's ability to host and organize files is superior.

But people just link to eidogo on reddit, like in this thread.

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- Brady
Want to see videos of low-dan mistakes and what to learn from them? Brady's Blunders

r/baduk is an awful lot busier than it was back then. It was essentially dead for a good while.


Across the web though there's been a move of traffic away from forums. A very large portion of traffic is coming from phones now and people flock to sites that cater to both desktop and phone well. Thus the rise of forums like the OGS ones. I'm not convinced that's what's happening here as much as a demographic shift with the younger ones think of checking for a Reddit first combined with the standard attrition of users/players.

I can kinda see how L19 could appear a bit 'crusty' to a new, young player. This old forum format isn't appealing to young people who are accustomed to simpler, more spacious designs with bigger buttons and inputs. The trend is to make content easily accessible, fast, and pretty on a phone. L19 doesn't have much of that going for it. It reminds me of an old Windows application from the early 2000s.

What it does have is great content, a plethora of experts, and some good vibes. Personally, I get what I need from L19, but I can see a place for a fresher look and more streamlined experience. (And by the way, /r/baduk is just one giant category which I think counts in its favor to those who want instant gratification without digging into sub forums).

I used to be active here years ago. I check up on the forum occasionally and it's always the same five people posting. It looks pretty grim to be honest.

/r/baduk doesn't have the same feeling of hopelessness. It also has 10K subscribers, compared to 4K on this forum.