Subj : Re: PLEASE ADD status
To   : August Abolins
From : Dale Shipp
Date : Tue May 11 2021 12:33 am

 -=> On 05-10-21  08:17,  August Abolins <=-
 -=> spoke to Dale Shipp about PLEASE ADD status <=-

 AA> Or.. when fidonet and othernets were more active, maybe users  
 AA> managed to do most of the legwork tracking things down? now  
 AA> users (the conversationalists) have moved on to the internet  
 AA> (forums/chats) and use their smartphones for that.

I would agree with you that is the case in many echos.  However, it has
not been true for the only echo I really care about -- COOKING.  Most of
the participants there have been users over the past decade.  The number
of participants and the number of messages have declined, but the echo
remained to be an echo of people talking to people about common
interests, mostly food.  As such it was usually in the top five echos
for volume among the echos that were not basically robot posts (e.g.
weather).

Unfortunately, I have concern that even that echo is in the throes of
death.  It has received two blows in the past few months that are
causing it to possibly drop below critical mass.  The first was the
death of the moderator (who was not a sysop) a few months ago.  The
second blow was Ed Koon pulling the plug on DOCSPLACE, which was used by
many of the users.  I think that all of those who are regulars have now
found other BBSes they can use, but it was nevertheless a serious blow.
Time will tell whether of not the echo will survive.  I hope it does.

                               Dale Shipp
                  fido_261_1466 (at) verizon (dot) net
                              (1:261/1466)


.... Shipwrecked in Silver Spring, Maryland. 00:33:39, 11 May 2021
___ Blue Wave/DOS v2.30
--- Maximus/NT 3.01
 * Origin: Owl's Anchor (1:261/1466)