Lately I see more and more alternative/niche *chans.
They've always been a thing, I know, but I seem to notice more and more since the big "8chan exodus" took place.
Feature-wise, 8chan simply has more than 4chan - but for a lot of people, they've been going to 4chan for years. Some people have left imageboards behind entirely, some people dig in their heels and won't move until the site itself goes down for good. They've spent more time talking with random, nameless users than they have with people they see on a daily basis. 8chan itself seems to be having a bit of an identity crisis on certain boards. Do they want to become New 4chan, the only difference being fewer site-wide rules (leaving boards free to be as heavy or light as they want), or do they want to be something unique?
People say "this /a/ isn't as good as that /a/", or "this *chan is too slow/too fast" but I think that presupposes all /a/'s need to be spiritual successors to 4chan's /a/.
It's a bit like saying "Hitler invaded Poland" - while not incorrect, it isn't an entirely accurate statement by itself. Hitler ordered his army to invade Poland, he didn't solo that shit.
Likewise, a board (or a *chan as a whole) isn't just it's image, it's not a singular entity, it's an ephemeral thing. Users find the page, some leave in disgust, some die IRL (rip in rip /a/nons) and some are there forever. Some sites are dominated by a single board with an overwhelming population that spill over into other boards hi /pol/, how's it going? Sometimes memes ascend past in-jokes and become "unwritten rules" to the uninitiated. It's like that story about the monkeys and the ladder - http://i.stack.imgur.com/MyQki.jpg as users join and leave, what may have been a joke becomes a rule, and what may have been a legitimate unwritten rule becomes a joke. After so long, a reasonable practice becomes ritual - perhaps the ritual is justified and still serves a good purpose, but it's still a ritual, followed simply because it has always been followed. If you were around when moot pulled the n/a/ruto stunt, it was a big deal because it flew in the face of what a lot of users saw as a long-standing, hard rule. Some welcomed the change - others claim that was the beginning of "the death" of /a/.
Maybe it started as a joke. Maybe banning a narutard a day really DOES keep the Gaia away. Who can say?
Running a *chan is like grilling a small fish - you ruin it with too much poking. Yet, if you let people run amok, your site will be run into the ground/covered in spam.
A shit community on a great board is a shit board.
A good community on a shit board is an okay board.
A shit community on a shit board won't stay up long enough to matter.
A good community on a good board doesn't exist for long
I forget where I was going with this, and re-reading doesn't help, but I think my point was that YOU (and everyone else) make the boards how they are.
Imageboards are dying, and we're all necrophiles
The Preceding Post has been confirmed 100% Truthiness Guaranteed Opinionfact by Prof. Dr. NeonTiger, pseudoscientist extrordinare