Township Forum closing down

[dreadnought]

Hi Everyone,

As you can see in the official announcement here, the Township forum will be closed this coming Friday (April 24th). As it was the case with the other forums, we won't be able to create new threads or post in any of its sub-forums, but everything will still be available for reading, so the information is not all lost.

If you have any questions/thoughts, feel free to post here.

Edit:
Some of our forum members created a new, unofficial community, in order to continue discussing and sharing information about the game. You can find it here, if you'd like to join: Unofficial Township Forum

[Rocky_Ruud]

Dear Dreadnought,
Thank you very much for the hard work you did in the good years we had here.
I know, Bess and Nevada will give us a warm welcome on their FB group.

It is really really sad to read the curtain will fall definitely for this wonderful Platform for players with or without Facebook.
The closure of the Lounge was just one sign on the wall for that matter.

My question, and I am really hard fighting my emotions on this news, is:

Are we as Forum members allowed to start a Forum of our own, unofficially but related to the Township game?
And even more important: Can you please do you allow us to advertise for that here?

There is a whole community here that resists to share their personal information with Facebook and that would mean they will be left behind with only what once was a great platform.

I had the time of my life here...

Sincerely
Rocky_Ruud

[dreadnought]

Are we as Forum members allowed to start a Forum of our own, unofficially but related to the Township game?
And even more important: Can you please do you allow us to advertise for that here?

There is a whole community here that resists to share their personal information with Facebook and that would mean they will be left behind with only what once was a great platform.

If anyone will set up another forum that will focus on the game, i will be happy to post a link to it in the announcement (and perhaps Anna will post it in the official announcement as well), so those who want, will have another alternative besides facebook

[Neighbor Jane]

[QUOTE=Rocky_Ruud;1661525]Dear Dreadnought,




"There is a whole community here that resists to share their personal information with Facebook and that would mean they will be left behind with only what once was a great platform."

I agree with Rocky. I do not Facebook though I have 2 accounts. Facebook requires a cell number to link then pings it constantly throughout the day. I refused to tie a number to my personal Facebook account, so cannot even get in to see what my nieces and nephews are writing. This forum was GREAT. I am so sad to see it go but will get on and post if a new one pops up.

[Rocky_Ruud]

With a few Forum members we are working hard to set up such a new Forum so we will gratefully use this offer!

[Downton]

Great idea Ruud

Hi dread. Thanks for offering to post a link to the Unofficial forum.

This is the address below. It is clearly titled Unofficial on the page, and I have also included in the welcome message that it isn't connected to Playrix

Everyone who wants to join us please follow the link below. And keep an eye out for dreads announcement

https://township.forumotion.com

dread I really hope to see you there. Any help or support will always be welcome. And if you fancy joining more as a member that would be awesome too

Guys please try to join before the forum here shuts. so you can contact Me, _DD_ and Ruud if you have any trouble joining.

So sad to see this place closed down. I really loved it here and the players, Mods and Admin I have had the pleasure to meet

[Rocky_Ruud]

Great job dread, by adding the link to our new place in you announcement.
Where a door closes, new doors will open!

[cdosr]

Farewell Forum, so sad to see you go. Yes it will be read only but who known for how long. If maintaining it as an active forum cost too much, maintaining it as a dead forum doesn't make much more sense.

I am encouraged by folks wanting to start an "unofficial" forum and I will gladly participate in that. Hopefully we can capture some of the more informative posts from the old forum and give them a home in the new one.

Now a few discouraging (or disparaging) words.

Anna said:

But Township Family, our official Fan Group on Facebook is a perfect sub for it. The largest number of Township players from around the globe to interact, share ideas or design solutions, meet new friends, and celebrate achievements—all in one go!

I'd like to ask Anna (or those who make the decisions) if they've actually tried FB Groups, other than their official page where they post their announcements.

I don't know if any of you have visited or joined that group but it is a mess. While our own Bess and Nevada are mods / admins for it and they try to maintain some sembelence of order, it's like trying to hold back the ocean by digging a trench in the sand. There are over 100,000 people on that group and most just don't read.

FB is the kind of medium that encourages people to just post whatever is in their mind. And since the FB App (or browser interface) will give you a notification if anyone answers, likes, or mentions your name, you never have to go back and read anything else. The mods have set up a group of "fixed" or "pinned" posts with the Rules, common items like Recruiting, Odd things you find, Event scores, etc but nobody reads them. Instead they jump onto FB and post "Hey, I just got to level 20" and they include a screenshot of the "reward screen".

You have to scroll through hundreds of innane posts like

• "Do you like my town?" (with screenshot or 5)
• "Here's my score in Mine Time" (with screenshot)
• "I need friends" (screenshot of their friend code)
• "Join my co-op" (with screenshot)
• Simple statements or questions but are on some gigantic background (flowers, hearts, etc) that FB seems to favor.

The list goes on (and on and on). Again, no fault of the mods / admins, they try hard to direct people to the right place, post replies saying, in essense, that there are dedicated posts for this kind of thing and includes a link to it. But the next person who wants to advertise their co-op isn't going to read anything, not the rules, certainly not someone else's post which may include a link to the right place. Nope, they'll just write a new post and wait to be informed about replies. And so it goes. It must be frustrating to post the same reply over and over again, hoping to bring some order to the FB chaos.

Sure, you can scroll past a lot of it but there is a lot of it, so much to scroll by that you will inevitabily scroll past something interesting, lost in the chaff of "stream of consciousness" postings.

And, being the internet, the mods are subjected to verbal abuse for daring to actually "moderate", like removing inappropriate posts. And, being the internet, people (women) are just asking for and accepting friend requests only to be harrassed by Messenger chats, lewd pictures, men looking for girlfriends, yup, all that internet stuff you warn your children about.

A few frustrated people have gone off and created their own FB group, try to limit the participation to adults who know how to act like adults, and is ruled with a somewhat firm grip who will delete posts and remove people who break the simple rules. Maybe that will succeed or succumb if the membership gets too large to manage.

Anyway, I am disappointed that Playrix thinks Facebook is the appropriate mechanism to "interact, share ideas or design solutions, meet new friends, and celebrate achievements".

Time will tell if it settles down or if someone comes up with a good way to "mark, link, reference" useful posts. As it is now, people ask the same questions over and over. Others offer the same answers over and over. At some point, people will get tired of answering the same thing and just stop. I know I have.

Well, I'll stop now. I'll miss this forum, I hope the new one will have the same level of information and player participation. I hope I've not turned off too many people who might truly love FB but I know I share the same feelings as many of my game friends.

Charlie

[James Herriott]

I agree. Iam not one that lives and dies by Facebook. In fact I dont use it. I always felt ostracized because I didnt use it. I also felt left out of the events and other things related to Township that were on FB.

[Graylady]

Like Cdosr, I doubt Facebook can replace a forum like we have here. A well maintained forum is a We/Us collective. Facebook is a Me/Myself/I thing.

Good bye to everyone I met here. I am sad to see this community disappear.