Several years ago, my wife joined a local philanthropic organization. She eventually became their chapter head.
I had not joined. I would go to things as her guest. Summer cookouts, Christmas and Halloween parties. I helped set up and tear down their Pride booth. We ended up forming a polycule with another couple who met my wife through them.
Today I finally joined. Not because I habe any particular affinity for the organization. Not because I want to be a part of that community. Really just to support my wife. This started as a minor little hobby for her but has ended up being a big part of her life. What “joining” really means is applying for access to their Discord server. It is OVERWHELMING.
I feel old and un-hip. I used to use Discord more often several years ago to occasionally play videogames with friends. During the pandemic I ran a D&D campaign and then a movie night with a friend group, usually like 3-5 other people. I have needed to join a few servers for support for videogames and emulators because, and its already something I really disliked because those things really are better off on publicly-readable, archivable, traditional forums instead of in a bloated chat app.
But this organization’s Discord is on a completely different level than anything I’ve seen before. Hundreds of members, dozens active at all times. Dozens and dozens of channels. Tons of buttons and links and reactions and gifs. I had to mute my desktop sound. All the usernames are in weird, unique, and illegible fonts and colors. Its hard to associate the usernames and avatars with the people I’ve met IRL.
And on the mobile app every time I look at the list of channels I get an ad for Monopoly Go that is somehow getting past our VPN and Pi-Hole. Now every time I look at Discord i have an angry red circle with the number of things I haven’t looked at yet listed. All the channels with new things become bold and get a dot next to them, demanding my attention. My wife said she’ll show me how to mute a lot of it.
The whole thing feels… Gameified. Its a skinner box pulling on my brain, trying to draw me in. Both Discord as a whole and this server in particular feel like they are screaming at my eyes, demanding attention. I miss the old forums that were designed to be accessible at your own pace, on your own terms.
Several years ago, my wife joined a local philanthropic organization. She eventually became their chapter head.
I had not joined. I would go to things as her guest. Summer cookouts, Christmas and Halloween parties. I helped set up and tear down their Pride booth. We ended up forming a polycule with another couple who met my wife through them.
Today I finally joined. Not because I habe any particular affinity for the organization. Not because I want to be a part of that community. Really just to support my wife. This started as a minor little hobby for her but has ended up being a big part of her life. What “joining” really means is applying for access to their Discord server. It is OVERWHELMING.
I feel old and un-hip. I used to use Discord more often several years ago to occasionally play videogames with friends. During the pandemic I ran a D&D campaign and then a movie night with a friend group, usually like 3-5 other people. I have needed to join a few servers for support for videogames and emulators because, and its already something I really disliked because those things really are better off on publicly-readable, archivable, traditional forums instead of in a bloated chat app.
But this organization’s Discord is on a completely different level than anything I’ve seen before. Hundreds of members, dozens active at all times. Dozens and dozens of channels. Tons of buttons and links and reactions and gifs. I had to mute my desktop sound. All the usernames are in weird, unique, and illegible fonts and colors. Its hard to associate the usernames and avatars with the people I’ve met IRL.
And on the mobile app every time I look at the list of channels I get an ad for Monopoly Go that is somehow getting past our VPN and Pi-Hole. Now every time I look at Discord i have an angry red circle with the number of things I haven’t looked at yet listed. All the channels with new things become bold and get a dot next to them, demanding my attention. My wife said she’ll show me how to mute a lot of it.
The whole thing feels… Gameified. Its a skinner box pulling on my brain, trying to draw me in. Both Discord as a whole and this server in particular feel like they are screaming at my eyes, demanding attention. I miss the old forums that were designed to be accessible at your own pace, on your own terms.
That sounds exhausting