When was the peak of Newschoolers

The-Rodent

The-Rodent

Active member
Since I have been back on a consistent basis I have realized that NS has slowed down a little. And there isn't nearly as many members online anymore. Ive been curious and was wondering-

When do you think the peak of Newschoolers was?

How many members do you think used to be online at a time at the peak?

I think that it has evolved a lot for the better and has made a lot of improvements especially to viewing videos but I miss the old days when everything was poppin :(

Lets reminisce in the old days

-(In before you've only been a member since 2011) This is my second account forgot password to other
 
Seems like it was 2007-2011..i was ln in 2009 but didnt get into until 2010..2008-09 maybe?

Seemed like thats when freeskiing was really "cool" but then again theres plenty of people still on here who joined way before i did.
 
I'm a fairly new member, but when I first joined in 2012, this site seemed more active (or the forums at least). And the NSG was actually entertaining.
 
I remember when NS made a collective ski movie with a bunch of members and there was about a thousand people online when they premiered the movie. I think that was 2009?
 
13513702:Tinga said:
I remember when NS made a collective ski movie with a bunch of members and there was about a thousand people online when they premiered the movie. I think that was 2009?
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I still have that movie on an old iPod. Pretty epic
 
09-2010 was some of my favorite but it depends what you're into. I love the cults and those died by 09.

Also in the olden days there were actually pros on here. I wasn't on here then because I was in full on knuckledrag mode.

04-09 it seemed like the whole region where I lived was on here. I miss all them guys.....
 
I joind in 2010, from all my reading over the years id say 2008-2011 was the height of NS. I noticed this forum seems slower than it used to be.
 
Tinychat moments were the best: nschat2, nschat3, nsfreedomchat, nsdojo etc

Those were times.

Also, thugaim.
 
Freeskier kid was awesome. To bad all those threads got deleted.

13514315:Bonzalo said:
Tinychat moments were the best: nschat2, nschat3, nsfreedomchat, nsdojo etc

Those were times..
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Yeah 09-10 was the peak of NS tiny chat action.

If I ever run for president I'll probably have pictures of my dick come back to haunt me.

YOLO
 
I first joined in early 2010. I didn't notice any decrease until about a year ago.

it used to be that in NSG and ski gabber the last replies on the first page of threads were like an hour or less ago. now there are threads on the first page that haven't been replied to in over a day sometimes. the website may not be dying but the forums certainly are.
 
13514569:mike759 said:
I know I've only been on a year so I don't need to hear it again, but I've heard this before, who is skierman?
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skierman was all, skier man was jesus, but skierman was mostly satan
 
13514572:CHORIZO said:
skierman was all, skier man was jesus, but skierman was mostly satan
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Oh look, another brand new member riding skiiermans dick.

It wasn't that he was too controversial, he just sucked at being funny, though he tried hard sometimes. He was brought back a few times and never was worth keeping around.
 
13514690:Sno. said:
yeah this ish
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Si.

When Rowen posted everday, and nomensteven was a guy that posted things and whatnot. I remember when iggyskier was making threads about building a skipress in his garage.....turned into On3P.

PH was poppin'.

I came to NS because I watched the original Road Trip Challenge, and the first hyphy edit and googled them later to show someone and there was newschoolers.com.

I think that was late 06 or early 2007. Didn't even know the forums existed for a few months.
 
I still post a bit, and still post a lot of words at one time, but in 08......I'd write a few novels a day in whatever political thread there was, and/or maybe just all threads. And then drew. would write a novel. And then Ben. would write a novel. And then skiminnesota would write a novel. And Aspenduke was a thing. And then axemurderer would write a novel, and then other things and now I'm old, don't give a fuck about basically anything that's posted, still occasionally write a novel, but I still love watching edits. It's come full circle.
 
Ive only been on here since 2012 but ive noticed a decrease in ns a bit but it will pick up again once the increase in the threads of how shitty ns has become goes down
 
I joined in 2010 and I had a feeling people we're gonna say that was kind of the end of an era for NS. It's weird because to me that point in time on the forum feels so much different, both due to the fact that it simply was and also because it was all so new to me
 
13514603:AlsoKnownAs said:
Oh look, another brand new member riding skiiermans dick.

It wasn't that he was too controversial, he just sucked at being funny, though he tried hard sometimes. He was brought back a few times and never was worth keeping around.
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Yo chill i didnt make an account till a few years ago
 
13514794:steezysteeze said:
I joined in 2010 and I had a feeling people we're gonna say that was kind of the end of an era for NS. It's weird because to me that point in time on the forum feels so much different, both due to the fact that it simply was and also because it was all so new to me
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The rise of facebook and mobile were very detrimental to the forums. People these days aren't hanging around on their laptops all night, rather staring into a tiny screen with a shitty input method. Very hard to bang on in endless threads under those circumstances.

As well, the mainstream social media offers a very curated experience where you can tailor your friends and block trolls.

Its definitely very different these days. Going through a huge re-birth, though I think its going to end up being the best thing that ever happened for us.
 
13514849:Mr.Bishop said:
The rise of facebook and mobile were very detrimental to the forums. People these days aren't hanging around on their laptops all night, rather staring into a tiny screen with a shitty input method. Very hard to bang on in endless threads under those circumstances.

As well, the mainstream social media offers a very curated experience where you can tailor your friends and block trolls.

Its definitely very different these days. Going through a huge re-birth, though I think its going to end up being the best thing that ever happened for us.
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Do you see the forums regaining strength within this rebirth or ns adapting with social media? Or neither lol
 
13514849:Mr.Bishop said:
The rise of facebook and mobile were very detrimental to the forums. People these days aren't hanging around on their laptops all night, rather staring into a tiny screen with a shitty input method. Very hard to bang on in endless threads under those circumstances.

As well, the mainstream social media offers a very curated experience where you can tailor your friends and block trolls.

Its definitely very different these days. Going through a huge re-birth, though I think its going to end up being the best thing that ever happened for us.
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For sure. Facebook really started picking up steam mid 08. By mid 09 it was ridiculous. I agree as far as the smart phone too. I love to type)obviously based on my retardedly long responses) and am always going to be the guy hammering away on my laptop.(only had a desktop this time last year too lol)

For me, one of my favorite things was the cults. And I feel it's unlikely to get anything like that going again. So some of my favorite things were in the past, but you guys have done a great job with updating the site. The news section is bumping now to the point where some days you almost get pissed because there's too much good news and nobody will read it all because it's a lot at once. Things like that. Also the what's hot page in general. NS seems to have a solid presence on facebook. I don't fuck with twitter or instragram so idk about them angles.

Idk, seems like you've done a good job to stay relevant. For a site that's 16? or whatever years old, and with so many radical changes in technology in that time period, as well as the sport itself, that's pretty cool.

I was a member of a few snowboard forums that were dead by 06-07. NS has gone through some major changes/phases over the years, but it has always landed on it's feet, and managed to keep growing/becoming increasingly legitimate.

*I was just making sure my keyboard still worked.
 
13514869:Chubz. said:
Do you see the forums regaining strength within this rebirth or ns adapting with social media? Or neither lol
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I see the forums being dramatically different from what people remember as the 'glory days'. For one, shitty trolls have to go. They completely overran the site, spilling out of NSG to everywhere as the quality members/pros pulled out of the forums and migrated to other forms of social media. People got sick of reading the bullshit - hell many (if not most) of today's crop of pros grew up on NS. Once they became a lighting rod for the trolls, they got sick of reading it.

Culling the fucksticks is going to hurt NSG bad. It will never be the same. I think for those who love NSG, that was a special time and that time has come to a close. NSG will become a place where there's off-topic discussion, some ridiculous behavior, but overall a shadow of its former self.

The other forum categories will pick up in quality, though I imagine not speed. The simple fact with speed is people don't hang around on their keyboards all day/night using newschoolers anymore. Its a mobile world and this is only increasing. Mobile is much more about content consumption than it is participation.

The quality will be a good thing though. We can beef up the conversations in the ski-related categories, and those who post will adhere to a higher level of quality. You're already seeing good members come back, and industry/athletes pick up their posting behavior. Though there will be a lot less discussion, the discussion that happens will be much better.

Content also will detract from the forums - the story you would have told in a post will now go in news. That edit you want to highlight will be in the video gallery, and the discussion around it in the comments. The nature of the forums will be only about discussion, not blended into every other aspect of what is here.

13514909:AlsoKnownAs said:
For sure. Facebook really started picking up steam mid 08. By mid 09 it was ridiculous. I agree as far as the smart phone too. I love to type)obviously based on my retardedly long responses) and am always going to be the guy hammering away on my laptop.(only had a desktop this time last year too lol)

For me, one of my favorite things was the cults. And I feel it's unlikely to get anything like that going again. So some of my favorite things were in the past, but you guys have done a great job with updating the site. The news section is bumping now to the point where some days you almost get pissed because there's too much good news and nobody will read it all because it's a lot at once. Things like that. Also the what's hot page in general. NS seems to have a solid presence on facebook. I don't fuck with twitter or instragram so idk about them angles.

Idk, seems like you've done a good job to stay relevant. For a site that's 16? or whatever years old, and with so many radical changes in technology in that time period, as well as the sport itself, that's pretty cool.

I was a member of a few snowboard forums that were dead by 06-07. NS has gone through some major changes/phases over the years, but it has always landed on it's feet, and managed to keep growing/becoming increasingly legitimate.

*I was just making sure my keyboard still worked.
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Cults is a tricky one. We had HUGE plans for cults, and loved the idea that we were providing private groups since well before any other social media did it. The problem was the technology behind them was extremely complicated, and as people got into facebook groups it laid waste to the cults very rapidly. We'll simplify them dramatically, and perhaps just leave in place private forums which you can create. Whether or not this will ever bring life back I don't know - though I'm suspect cults are simply a thing of the past. Facebook groups are too good, and its hard to have a compelling reason to visit a site like newschoolers to have a private discussion with your friends.

The tie in with the rise of mainstream social media is spot on. Its been extremely difficult to figure out exactly where we should fit as all of that came to play. Hell, those companies didn't even have to make any money while having development budgets in the hundreds of millions funded solely by Venture Capital. Its like being a small business when Walmart shows up in town.... most of them are just going to get annihilated except the few that get nimble as fuck real fast.

I'm like you - I'm on a keyboard all day and can't stand typing on a phone. So I love forums, and I love having discussion in them. I'm kind of happy that all the quick-posting shitheads are getting lost in snapchat or giving up on typing their quips into our mobile interface. As each one of them leaves, it opens up more opportunity for quality discourse about the sport we are all so passionate about.

And yeah, NS is sweet 16 this year. Fucking crazy if you ask me. That means that if you started on this site as a 16 year old shithead, you're probably a 32 year old lawyer who is married with 1-2 kids.

Whatever the challenges of the future are, I'm excited to see what it brings. This community is amazing. The absolute best time to be a newschool skier was at the beginning... when there was like 2-3 of you in the park and you were instant homies just because you had twins on. Fuck everyone else, and fuck the part-timers - we're the core of skiing and that is rad as fuck.

I see a huge future for events. What's better than the latest fanciest online community technology?

Fucking skiing together.
 
I'm on my phone a lot, simply because it's easier to have on me all the time. I know it's been brought up a million times but having an app could help. I understand that's easier said than done.
 
I haven't been on here very long but it feels like everyone has just gone soft. Eheath and a handful of other members are keeping the forums alive and actually interesting these days
 
13514818:nocturnal said:
Dropped off in about 2012 it went down hill. All about omybosh
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that and everyone got all sensitive and butthurt all the time. NSG turned into some kind of tumblr shit
 
I actually think forums and communities are going to begin to make a comeback as the youngins require something "new" and well... you can only remake snapchat and vine so many times. What was old always becomes new again. Kids will think, whoa.... these people have exactly this topic in common with me?! great! I think the key is optimizing the UI for mobile to make it a better experience. It doesn't need an app, but incorporating the ability to use the camera and have notifications would probably make a big difference in getting people hooked.

I'm actually not that surprised that there hasn't been a major community app take off since the thing about communities is that they require a very specialized structure depending on the nature of the community. NS is very media heavy... a knitting group would need instructional pages and tutorials. A music group would require better ways of importing audio and so forth. It's difficult to have an all around community app that can be customized on a per group basis. I am a bit surprised though that the only other functional related community I've seen is pinkbike. Snowboarding, skateboarding, winged sports, and surfing all have a ridiculous amount of sites but nothing that seems central to their community. Snowboarding and Skateboarding could almost duplicate ns in entirety. But I guess the audience needs to want it. There was a forum on transworld snowboarding back in 2001 or so that was pretty active... I think that was gone though by 2004 in favor of resort forums which then died out by the time facebook became public.
 
13515010:Mr.Bishop said:
I see the forums being dramatically different from what people remember as the 'glory days'. For one, shitty trolls have to go. They completely overran the site, spilling out of NSG to everywhere as the quality members/pros pulled out of the forums and migrated to other forms of social media. People got sick of reading the bullshit - hell many (if not most) of today's crop of pros grew up on NS. Once they became a lighting rod for the trolls, they got sick of reading it.

Culling the fucksticks is going to hurt NSG bad. It will never be the same. I think for those who love NSG, that was a special time and that time has come to a close. NSG will become a place where there's off-topic discussion, some ridiculous behavior, but overall a shadow of its former self.

The other forum categories will pick up in quality, though I imagine not speed. The simple fact with speed is people don't hang around on their keyboards all day/night using newschoolers anymore. Its a mobile world and this is only increasing. Mobile is much more about content consumption than it is participation.

The quality will be a good thing though. We can beef up the conversations in the ski-related categories, and those who post will adhere to a higher level of quality. You're already seeing good members come back, and industry/athletes pick up their posting behavior. Though there will be a lot less discussion, the discussion that happens will be much better.

Content also will detract from the forums - the story you would have told in a post will now go in news. That edit you want to highlight will be in the video gallery, and the discussion around it in the comments. The nature of the forums will be only about discussion, not blended into every other aspect of what is here.

Cults is a tricky one. We had HUGE plans for cults, and loved the idea that we were providing private groups since well before any other social media did it. The problem was the technology behind them was extremely complicated, and as people got into facebook groups it laid waste to the cults very rapidly. We'll simplify them dramatically, and perhaps just leave in place private forums which you can create. Whether or not this will ever bring life back I don't know - though I'm suspect cults are simply a thing of the past. Facebook groups are too good, and its hard to have a compelling reason to visit a site like newschoolers to have a private discussion with your friends.

The tie in with the rise of mainstream social media is spot on. Its been extremely difficult to figure out exactly where we should fit as all of that came to play. Hell, those companies didn't even have to make any money while having development budgets in the hundreds of millions funded solely by Venture Capital. Its like being a small business when Walmart shows up in town.... most of them are just going to get annihilated except the few that get nimble as fuck real fast.

I'm like you - I'm on a keyboard all day and can't stand typing on a phone. So I love forums, and I love having discussion in them. I'm kind of happy that all the quick-posting shitheads are getting lost in snapchat or giving up on typing their quips into our mobile interface. As each one of them leaves, it opens up more opportunity for quality discourse about the sport we are all so passionate about.

And yeah, NS is sweet 16 this year. Fucking crazy if you ask me. That means that if you started on this site as a 16 year old shithead, you're probably a 32 year old lawyer who is married with 1-2 kids.

Whatever the challenges of the future are, I'm excited to see what it brings. This community is amazing. The absolute best time to be a newschool skier was at the beginning... when there was like 2-3 of you in the park and you were instant homies just because you had twins on. Fuck everyone else, and fuck the part-timers - we're the core of skiing and that is rad as fuck.

I see a huge future for events. What's better than the latest fanciest online community technology?

Fucking skiing together.
Click to expand...

This was a pretty epic post
 
13514315:Bonzalo said:
Tinychat moments were the best: nschat2, nschat3, nsfreedomchat, nsdojo etc

Those were times.

Also, thugaim.
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Getting blackout wasted on tiny chat was the best
 
I stopped using NS regularly around 2009 or 2010. I think that coincided with the forums being overrun with hate posts, and trolls. Now I check it pretty regularly.
 
13515248:SDrvper said:
I would guess that the peak was last winter, the amount of views, content being uploaded, comments on videos etc was more than i've ever seen before.

I honestly think that a lot of you guys who think its dead are just stuck in the past & using the forums! The forums =/= the rest of the website
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No I was just saying that all the forums used to be poppin and that was always great getting to read and comment on a lot of stuff all the time because there was always new content (weather the content was always A+ material or not is a different story). Was just kinda saying I missed the old days and all the shenanigans that was Newschoolers. But I also love the direction of where NS is headed and I especially love nstv and just the abundance of edits always out. I think it is only going to improve too with the content and quality of members like mr bishop said the quality of content will be better.The website has definitely done a lot for a lot of people which I think is pretty cool.
 
I joined when I was pretty young back in december of 08. i postwhored everywhere and got shit on by most of the old time members, rightfully so.

people just don't invest the same amount of time or energy into forum discussions. The consequence to this is, obviously, less content. people aren't creating cults like they used to, largely due to the fact that the cults traffic close to no activity (besides LM, which has slowed down quite a bit as it is). Hell, I remember joining the "learn to write with your bad hand" cult which generated at least a hundred members and tons of stupid yet amusing content by those that desired to become ambidextrous. members aren't ripping apart the newbs anymore which, as a product of 'NS hazing' if you will, is something i miss. all in all, the forums just aren't a priority for a lot of members anymore. I remember back in '08-'10, i'd post something in a thread and refresh the page 5 minutes later. Within that time frame, i'd have garnered 2-4 replies to whatever stupid, troll-ey post i made. i miss seeing a lot of the same people around. i miss the joy of finding out that some of the big posters on NS were in fact older kids from my home mountain. in general, i miss how tons of people created E-reputations for themselves, and every post they made reaffirmed whatever preconceived notions I had of that poster. Yes, there are still trolls. yes, there are still post-whores. yes, there is still funny, quality content in NSG. it's not just of the same quantity or magnitude.

these forums just aren't generating a lot of new and engaged posters. we've lost many involved members presumably to real lives - they aren't pimple faced teenagers scouring through posts and talking shit to eheath for being a fatass. most of the involved members that we have now have been around for a while. let's face it, 13-14 year olds nowadays aren't really interested in the forums like I was when I first joined. They'd rather scroll through instagram or facebook and watch an edit or picture that NS posted, then check the pictures Cayla the neighborhood slut posted just below it on the newsfeed. social media has evolved to the point where you can combine all of your interests into one feed. you don't have to retreat to an internet forum anymore to fulfill your ski fix. thus, those kids will never be exposed to the amusement of NSG.
 
13515300:Shewlur... said:
I joined when I was pretty young back in december of 08. i postwhored everywhere and got shit on by most of the old time members, rightfully so.

people just don't invest the same amount of time or energy into forum discussions. The consequence to this is, obviously, less content. people aren't creating cults like they used to, largely due to the fact that the cults traffic close to no activity (besides LM, which has slowed down quite a bit as it is). Hell, I remember joining the "learn to write with your bad hand" cult which generated at least a hundred members and tons of stupid yet amusing content by those that desired to become ambidextrous. members aren't ripping apart the newbs anymore which, as a product of 'NS hazing' if you will, is something i miss. all in all, the forums just aren't a priority for a lot of members anymore. I remember back in '08-'10, i'd post something in a thread and refresh the page 5 minutes later. Within that time frame, i'd have garnered 2-4 replies to whatever stupid, troll-ey post i made. i miss seeing a lot of the same people around. i miss the joy of finding out that some of the big posters on NS were in fact older kids from my home mountain. in general, i miss how tons of people created E-reputations for themselves, and every post they made reaffirmed whatever preconceived notions I had of that poster. Yes, there are still trolls. yes, there are still post-whores. yes, there is still funny, quality content in NSG. it's not just of the same quantity or magnitude.

these forums just aren't generating a lot of new and engaged posters. we've lost many involved members presumably to real lives - they aren't pimple faced teenagers scouring through posts and talking shit to eheath for being a fatass. most of the involved members that we have now have been around for a while. let's face it, 13-14 year olds nowadays aren't really interested in the forums like I was when I first joined. They'd rather scroll through instagram or facebook and watch an edit or picture that NS posted, then check the pictures Cayla the neighborhood slut posted just below it on the newsfeed. social media has evolved to the point where you can combine all of your interests into one feed. you don't have to retreat to an internet forum anymore to fulfill your ski fix. thus, those kids will never be exposed to the amusement of NSG.
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I love this and reading all these posts
 
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