Regarding the look of the forum, the forum software had to be upgraded, and it forced the forum into the look it has now. I just tried to add the yellow and blue that the old look had. I'm not sure if we could ever go back to the old look.
Any effort to work with the look would be appreciated :smile: . I'm also having problems with the emoticons. They are loading on my reply screen with their alt text and they show as broken when I click on them to add them to a post. This started with the upgrade. I'm using Firefox 26.0. They appear correctly when I submit the post.
TheRolesWePlay hit it on the head. Any articles the PokeGym ever supplied were written by players. Once players stop writing articles, it's hard for the PokeGym to keep supplying them. And let's be honest, did the PokeGym ever get applause for the articles? There were always arguments and complaints about them being too weak of deck ideas, having errors and issues, etc. In a rare case where a creator of the deck would write an article describing their new deck that just won a big event, it would get praise, but I feel in general people picked on the articles.
Yes, but while both you and TheRolesWePlay touch on what happened, you are not addressing the why. Why did so many
"chose to decentralize a hub of conversation," when the infrastructure was already here? Did they just feel it was time to spread their wings and fly, try something new and add their own innovative/creative design and perspective they could not do here? That could very well be part of it.
People who went through the article submission process said it was burdensome with the amount of revision and regulation. It made writing an article not worth it and a long, drawn-out effort.
Over-moderation has been discussed many times as a problem with PokeGym. I remember one overzealous moderator felt like he had to flex his moderating power against a PTO in the PTO's own thread
. That did not end well. There is one moderator in particular who is always saying something negative and incorrectly challenging posters with his own incorrect information. If he was not a moderator, he would have been infracted (or so I would like to think). There was a short time when "please don't infract me" was a way of ending posts despite the invitation to speak honestly about issues or were presenting a genuine and helpful comment that took a negative perspective.
And again, I ask why the PokeGym has to supply articles when we have some great sites on the internet that do it now.
Again I say
"Specialized information I follow-up with elsewhere but when I needed an introductory understanding of what was going on, I could always come here but it was normally so informative I would not need to. It wasn't the only site I would want to visit but it was the only site I needed to visit." and reiterating that that was the strength of PokeGym, as TheRolesWePlay identified it, a centralized hub of conversation. Again, it appears you do not think it ever was that, Prime. That in combination as a centralized hub of resources, as losjackal points out, the Compendium (while admitting it is in need of a fresh coat of paint and renewed spirit), ATRT, and the Labs, and the positive review of its trading features, made PokeGym the only website I needed to visit.
Why should PokeGym be the centralized hub? Because that is what it was. If PokeGym has decided to let go of some of those features, then there is the answer to "What happened to The PokeGym?" PokeGym decided to discontinue those features.
I've never understood why some people get rubbed the wrong way by mods. Don't break the rules and you won't get in trouble. If you break the rules, accept the consequences, and be an adult about it.
It is because the rules are arbitrary, archaic, and restrictive. Look at Jaeger's reply to losjackel,
"please remove your link to another site before you get an infraction from a mod." How are we encouraged to get our news elsewhere and come here to discuss it but not be allowed to link to other websites? For a while, mentioning the name of a popular social media websites were censored but it looks like that has been lifted seeing as you, Prime, have said them without being lectured. From the user's perspective, the rules have not kept up with PokeGym's changing purpose and from there it is a roll of the dice to see if an overzealous moderator is on patrol that day. A rules refresh may help change that reputation without actually changing the practice of keeping PokeGym a respectable atmosphere.