How alive is this Forum

How alive is this Forum? In the last few days we have had two 9 dan promotions in the UK which has attracted minimimal comment. Additionallly the VP of USJA has resigned from that position, criticising many aspects of USJA's governance and not a single comment!

What do you expect people to say?

We also have a three page discussion on the level of intensity in randori, which is probably a lot more relevant to the majority of people registered on this forum.

Well for one, I would have expected a lot of debate on the USJA resignation. Surely some curiosity would have been sparked by a resignation note alluding to unspecified irregularities and breech of process.

As for the UK 9 dan. I would have expected a bit of curiosity about them.

someone resigned. no debate needed there. are we gonna talk them out of it? we didn't get any info about what irregularities she'd seen, so unless someone fills in the gaps there's not much to be said there.

now that the BJA forum is back, I doubt that this is the place to look for intense debate UK 9 dan promotions.

There are more UK judoka posting here than on the BJA forum in my opinion. It is a nightmare trying to log into it. I gave up posting on there before it even went down.
Also isn't this a world wide forum?
If it is not happening in the USA then it's not worth mentioning? Is that the case?
As for the 9th dan promotions I agree with Jonesey. Jacks and Hoare should be at least considered for promotion.

I make a point of at least logging on twice a week. My primary interests, however, are the technical areas of this forum, and the history section (well, that and the occasional light-hearted threads concerning vital topics such as gadgets or scantily clad ladies)
In addition, I don't know much about jûdô in the UK, nor the status of jûdô in the States for that matter. I really should remedy that (and I've got the Bowen books sitting less than 3ft away from me for starters), but for me names such as Alan Pethebridge and Joan Love are just that, names. I'm slightly more familiar with the name Roy Inman, and from what little I know his record both as a player, coach, and administrator is solid enough to warrant the promotion, but that's pretty much it...

also, let's compare to the other forums. no posts for over a month on the old one, no posts since february on makoto forum. I mean really, what better option is out there?

I come to this forum about every other day or so. If not by my login then at least as a guest for sure.
I am here mostly to browse the techniques, judo discussion and history forums. Occasionally I glance at the kata sections too but turnover there is quite slow so I can catch up in a few days usually.
Good on Inman and McIver I suppose but what is happening in the upper echelons of judo does not interest me one bit. Sorry.
I like to be in the nitty gritty. One thing that disappoints me with this forum is sometimes someone will pose a basic question like "what is X" and then many of the response will be, "oh that, we already discussed that in the old forum". SMH...

I notice we all now have...."REPUTATIONS"? This is on top of and in addition to the negatives-positive posts? When are you going to introduce the stars and forum rank?

I think you have missed the boat in introducing puerile marking systems. A forum should be a place for debate with moderators. The divisive nature of some judoka makes posting on a forum rather a hit and miss situation. The added opportunity to 'officially' abuse and misuse these silly, totally unnecessary ratings, just makes any forum only fit for children who want to play. I feel uncomfortable posting here. Having such an awful amount of negatives it has obviously made me ask myself what the point is in posting here if all I do is upset of the membership?

There are too many threads here and in general this forum lacks the interest the old forum did and that is also understandable. Many of us placed a great deal of time and work on the old forum to see it in the state it is in now. I suspect some of the old group will have lost interest in seeing what was THE best forum on judo world wide, sunk?

One cannot undo the past and rather than take this opportunity to build on strengths I think this forum has too many of the negatives without the core strengths the old forum had to balance things out? One cant put the genie back in the bottle, the old forum had what it took despite the rows and silly forum ranks, stars etc, it was well visited and respected with a very diverse user base.

I don't think average people will risk getting bitten twice. IF general cyber judo reflects real world judo, numbers are dropping and dojo closing. IJF mentality is out of all control and in general judo is in trouble.

To this end in all sincerity who gives a flying fig when a political figure resigns and two more ku dan are just two more ku dan? Now if you want a real debate start a topic on what values etc should a ku or ju dan posses.

Mike

it's worth noting that you still have a positive reputation score. you my friend have been adamantly against any sort of ranking system for as long as I can remember, in fact more so than any other poster. yes, it's unnecessary. but so are nipples on a male. are you gonna go cut yours off?

the old forum is gone. I miss it too. but what can we do besides move on and rebuild? yes this forum has its negatives, but the biggest strength of the old forum was the size of it. and this one is still growing.

If you desire to build a judo forum where verbal debate and verbal randori take part then bridges need to be built and opened.

You want MORE posters when this negativity situation drives posters away? Now we are all given reputations. Just how condescending is that to a novice or genuine senior judoka?

I said when you started this slippery slop to unhelpful ways that the negative-positive system would just be the start and here we have the next phase, 'reputations'. Just who are WE as a group to go and pass a reputation to another poster? Are we judge and jury on our fellow posters and peers IN THIS FASHION.

WHY is it so difficult to understand that if a post pleases write a thank you, if the content disagrees then post a rebuttal. This average way of social intercourse is what adults do and would increase posts and maybe encourage new members and past members to join, something new and fresh?

Maybe I just don't understand what a forum is? Its odd though as I belong to dozens of them and this one is the most uncomfortable one for me to post on. Maybe as a moderator you should ask yourself why that should be so?

What do male nipples have to do with this debate?

Mike

Jonesy wrote:Well for one, I would have expected a lot of debate on the USJA resignation. Surely some curiosity would have been sparked by a resignation note alluding to unspecified irregularities and breech of process.

As for the UK 9 dan. I would have expected a bit of curiosity about them.

Your starter for ten. Come on don't just lay the fuse, participate. What are YOUR thoughts as if I didn't know.

Mike

genetic judoka wrote:it's worth noting that you still have a positive reputation score. you my friend have been adamantly against any sort of ranking system for as long as I can remember, in fact more so than any other poster. yes, it's unnecessary. but so are nipples on a male. are you gonna go cut yours off?

the old forum is gone. I miss it too. but what can we do besides move on and rebuild? yes this forum has its negatives, but the biggest strength of the old forum was the size of it. and this one is still growing.

I disagree - I think nipples on men are necessary

Yes, I think you and Hanon both have a point. We can't just pick up where ezoic dropped us off - we're not the same group, we need to build trust in the system to risk the debate. Once we're able and willing to risk the debate, we'll get some really good threads going. But, it's going to take time.

As for the reputation system - I didn't even notice it until Hanon pointed it out. Yes, I'm curious as to whether my rep is positive or negative, but barring that, what does it really tell us? the closer a person's rep is to 0 with a large number of posts, the more controversial a poster? Dunno. I do know I like both you, GJ and you, Hanon, and will read your posts because they are usually worthwhile or amusing (you both have a good sense of humor).

As for the 9th dans of the BJA - I'm not up on British judo enough to comment on how the BJA goes about promoting and who else is worthy. I'd read a thread about it, but that would mean having members debating the issue. I figure most of us are well away from 9th dan in the BJA system that there's not going to be a good debate about it atm.

As for the USJA, I don't know that we have the active board members of the USJA here, nor do I think that they really need to air their dirty judogi on this forum. Do they owe us more than Ms. Love has already given us? As far as I'm concerned, I'm just glad she's not giving up Growing Judo as she's turned it into an excellent grassroots publication, and she's still managing the regional directors - both have a much more direct impact on most of us.

Let's just get down to the business of judo and let the politicians take care of themselves. Let's keep participating on this forum and see what we can develop.

(and yes, I'm wagering on a respectably negative reputation, but as long as I can keep my WooHooShidan, I'm happy)

Stacey wrote:

I disagree - I think nipples on men are necessary

I think this was one of your best posts since long (for a Woohooshidan at least).

Stacey wrote:
Yes, I think you and Hanon both have a point. We can't just pick up where ezoic dropped us off - we're not the same group, we need to build trust in the system to risk the debate. Once we're able and willing to risk the debate, we'll get some really good threads going. But, it's going to take time.

As for the reputation system - I didn't even notice it until Hanon pointed it out. Yes, I'm curious as to whether my rep is positive or negative, but barring that, what does it really tell us? the closer a person's rep is to 0 with a large number of posts, the more controversial a poster? Dunno. I do know I like both you, GJ and you, Hanon, and will read your posts because they are usually worthwhile or amusing (you both have a good sense of humor).

As for the 9th dans of the BJA - I'm not up on British judo enough to comment on how the BJA goes about promoting and who else is worthy. I'd read a thread about it, but that would mean having members debating the issue. I figure most of us are well away from 9th dan in the BJA system that there's not going to be a good debate about it atm.

As for the USJA, I don't know that we have the active board members of the USJA here, nor do I think that they really need to air their dirty judogi on this forum. Do they owe us more than Ms. Love has already given us? As far as I'm concerned, I'm just glad she's not giving up Growing Judo as she's turned it into an excellent grassroots publication, and she's still managing the regional directors - both have a much more direct impact on most of us.

Let's just get down to the business of judo and let the politicians take care of themselves. Let's keep participating on this forum and see what we can develop.

(and yes, I'm wagering on a respectably negative reputation, but as long as I can keep my WooHooShidan, I'm happy)

There is wisdom to what you wrote.

Years ago, forums were also still in some kind of experimental phase, but this is different now. You see the same with other Internet media, like chat rooms of Facebook. Nothing was out of limits, not even for children, until people started realizing that there were also adult people posing as children with only one thing in mind, or until people suddenly learnt that someone else had obtained credit cards in their name and other info on Face book was being abused. In other words, the experimental phases seem to lead to some spontaneous adjustments.

About 6-7 years ago the forum reached was thriving. There may be many reasons, but one of the reasons was that much useful information on judo, not previously commonly available in Western language judo books became accessible. Much of that hunger in terms of what people wanted to know about judo has now be satisfied. Take a look at YouTube. There used to be a time we were hoping there would be some footage of Mifune on the Internet, and a long time before I remember the excitement I personally had when someone had found the reels of the 16 mm movie with this largely unknown film. Today the situation is different. Everyone in judo has now seen the movie. There used to be a time we were wondering if kata videos too would be posted on YouTube. Remember the first images of advanced kata, then a period came where every month there were 2-3 new videos, that too has now stopped. A point of saturation has been achieved.

When one mentions high-dan rank promotions there often isn't really much to do or write about. One can congratulate the people, which is usually the professional thing to do whether sincere or insincere, or one could criticize them. One should, however, wonder if that is then really the place and time to do so. It's not up to what someone writes to change anything, and it soon becomes finger-pointing, but most of all it becomes personal, with the people themselves never having asked for it to become personal or spread out on a public forum. Sometimes there are private conditions that may have contributed to something like an illness and which people themselves for good reason rather keep private.

Besides that, people may have opinions, and those opinions may very well be very accurate, but ... still they are not a jury or the High Commission that guards and approves or disapproves something. I think it CAN be different when we talk about historic facts or situations such as for example why Kudô Kazuzô didn't make 10th dan etc. One is no longer invading privacy there, and the historic context may have an educational purpose that helps in understanding evolution, politics, protocol and history of Kôdôkan.

With regard to what goes on with regard to public office held by people in organizations, Stacey has already pointed a few things. Who is served by public speculation ? Certainly when an officer retires it seems to me they have chosen to return to private life, and I think that deserves respect.

I guess one could say ... there is a time and place for everything but this here might be neither the time nor the place. Low activity on a forum is not necessarily bad. It may also reflect that people have grown. Even though a forum serves inter alia to express opinions, not every opinion needs to be publicly expressed. Sometimes we have opinions we may choose to express privately or not at all. When it is about judo skill and knowledge, expressing our opinion if that opinion is one of skill, insight and knowledge may help solving a tangible problem, may help someone forward. But when it is about other things, then sometimes not expressing our opinion about it, sometimes as well in public as privately may be doing a better service than when insisting to expressing it.

It all depends. In some cases it will reflect a certain numbness. I anticipate that soon people will stop reacting to IJF rules changes, because we have reached a point that people are numb and become apathetic. What we see now is for the first time in history a large divide and many clubs no longer following the IJF during club instruction. When the IJF banned head-diving any sensible teacher would also prohibit it in his club. With the latest changes the divide is larger than ever. In many clubs there is now a large gap between normal club judo instruction and IJF contest rules, while other clubs try to adapt. Many clubs realize that there is something moronic about not allowing anyone in randori to do kuchiki-daoshi, te-guruma, morote-gari, kibisu-gaeshi. So the apathy and indifference to rule changes, unless such indifference is blocked because you still compete yourself or coach serious competitor, will grow. You will see similar things with forums and Internet media. People who at one time spent a considerable portion of their time on this or that social media suddenly become indifferent. This maybe because something else much more important has entered their life, such as for example a new baby, or some personal misfortune like a disease, a divorce. It's probably not a bad thing when we come to realize the difference between virtual and real, and choose for the real even if that means much less or not any time spent anymore to the virtual reality.

I think this forum will be fine. I don't see an 'old JF' because this one doesnt seem to be the 'new JF'. I read 'forumsmotion' at top and see it titled 'E-Judo' on page. What's the name? I don't think many know this forum is here yet and also that the many, in the meantime, are witnessing the judo identity crisis (via IJF) which makes it easy for them to thought-off judo and simply consider a throw game until...

And, not to kiss butt, butt +1 GJ. Kudos to admin in getting you to mod. You were somewhat late in the JF but you seem to have a good well-rounded concept of judo that you can explain well. Can maybe be airy-fairy sometimes but I saw pics of your wife and have to chalk it up as accomodating the non-fighters in judo.lol <j/k. I might've have said worse if you were a bjjer.lol But, you seem to have read alot of guys, like CK and Hanon..etc who are judo and JF vets, who might soemtimes get bored of the sme old questions; and you can do reasonably decent there in point form as well as be thinking scrappy for the younger fellas.

ah. You're a physics guy. I forgot. Whipty-do then.lol

I would say that the forum is doing very well, new members every week, and now more posts each day than I have time to read!

seems to me to be an enjoyable place to visit, with very few problems within its membership.

I agree with Jonesey that it is odd that no one has picked up on those two topics, maybe we need some opinions posted there to spark debate?

Dunno..

Q mystic wrote:I think this forum will be fine. I don't see an 'old JF' because this one doesnt seem to be the 'new JF'. I read 'forumsmotion' at top and see it titled 'E-Judo' on page. What's the name? I don't think many know this forum is here yet and also that the many, in the meantime, are witnessing the judo identity crisis (via IJF) which makes it easy for them to thought-off judo and simply consider a throw game until...

And, not to kiss butt, butt +1 GJ. Kudos to admin in getting you to mod. You were somewhat late in the JF but you seem to have a good well-rounded concept of judo that you can explain well. Can maybe be airy-fairy sometimes but I saw pics of your wife and have to chalk it up as accomodating the non-fighters in judo.lol <j/k. I might've have said worse if you were a bjjer.lol But, you seem to have read alot of guys, like CK and Hanon..etc who are judo and JF vets, who might soemtimes get bored of the sme old questions; and you can do reasonably decent there in point form as well as be thinking scrappy for the younger fellas.

ah. You're a physics guy. I forgot. Whipty-do then.lol

I have read this post at least ten times and for the life of me still have no idea what you wrote? Are you STILL on the weed

Might be a language-generation gap?

How are you?

Mike

The reupation system is a way of letting people know if you contribute something of value. Of course, petty people could use it to act out a vendetta but really, they have bigger problems in life if they take this seriously enough to do that.

Also, this forum is fairly active for a traditional martial arts board. Even Bullshido's traditional boards can go for days without posts and their membership/viewership is much higher/more established.

We have all kinds of good opinions and experience here, I find. Hanon, CK, Ben Reinhardt, Stacey and others I don't re-call off of the top.

Hanon wrote:
You want MORE posters when this negativity situation drives posters away? Now we are all given reputations. Just how condescending is that to a novice or genuine senior judoka?

You should be proud of your reputation. I have ten sock-puppet accounts that I use for the sole purpose of giving you a - for every post you make and you still have a reputation of 35!

Dave R. wrote:

Hanon wrote:
You want MORE posters when this negativity situation drives posters away? Now we are all given reputations. Just how condescending is that to a novice or genuine senior judoka?

You should be proud of your reputation. I have ten sock-puppet accounts that I use for the sole purpose of giving you a - for every post you make and you still have a reputation of 35!

Hiya Dave,

No idea what a "ten sock-puppet account" is. Sounds viral!

I sometimes get concerned with myself and the way I view certain aspects of life. This negative 'thing' is one of those very things I just cannot get my head around. I have 75 negative votes, now that in any bodies book is an awful lot, in fact I think I hold the record. That in itself is not a problem. What bugs me is I have no idea WHY?
You see when we give a positive it is an obvious endorsement of the post at minimum. I would still rather add a thanks you in writing.
The negative vote....I don't know what it is I have been given one for? There is no feedback no discourse just a red mark?

How can I grow and learn from that? How can I make change? It just feels like my post is not appreciated. That would be fine if I just knew WHY?

NO ONE worth their title of teacher walks around a class saying wrong, wrong, wrong to his pupils? Of what value is that. OKAY the student knows its wrong but what is wrong and how does the student make it bloody right?
I can only keep upsetting fellow posters here IF they don't write what they find incorrect with my posts. It is so painfully obvious to me I feel embarrassed even writing about it.

Perhaps I am the only one who bothers to write about this stuff as others may just think why bother and leave or even worse not join in in the first place.

WHY start out with a system that is flawed? If a member can explain this to me I am more than wiling to learn. At present I have 75 negatives and no idea why? Hardly a learning tool. It will also obviously discourage me from posting.

Mike

Hi Hanon,
Good to see you're still trying to fit in. It sounds like you might want to start a topic just to get feedback about what people don't like about a few of your posts -- that should liven up the forum.

Seriously, I'm sure there are a lot more people benefiting from your posts, at least when you talk about judo. The negative votes on specific posts can give you a hint about what might be rubbing people the wrong way, but let's not make the forum into a therapy session.

JudoSensei wrote:Hi Hanon,
Good to see you're still trying to fit in.

No, no, no. Don't try and fit in, be yourself, share your views and sod those that disagree or dislike your comments.

You can't please everybody all of the time... so why try?

JudoSensei wrote:Hi Hanon,
Good to see you're still trying to fit in. It sounds like you might want to start a topic just to get feedback about what people don't like about a few of your posts -- that should liven up the forum.

Seriously, I'm sure there are a lot more people benefiting from your posts, at least when you talk about judo. The negative votes on specific posts can give you a hint about what might be rubbing people the wrong way, but let's not make the forum into a therapy session.

Hello,

I need the therapy! In all fairness mate I have given others enough of it over the years. lol

If something bothers me I see nothing wrong in writing about it. It is those who fight for things that make the world change.
You mention there may be hints in the negative posts. It becomes VERY confusing when the post gets half a red and half a green mark? What does one make of that. I have mentioned I have 75 negatives. On the upside I have 100 positive also a forum record, now what do you make of that? Now perhaps you understand the absurdity of such a system, it simply means nothing with the exception of peeving a poster and preventing a member from posting due to fear of how there post will be received.

If any member would like to PM me I would be obliged. It is not my desire to come here and upset posters.

Nice to see you about. How are things with you? How are you filling your retirement time? Hope you are well and in good health. We should talk again one day.

Mike

still learning wrote:

JudoSensei wrote:Hi Hanon,
Good to see you're still trying to fit in.

No, no, no. Don't try and fit in, be yourself, share your views and sod those that disagree or dislike your comments.

You can't please everybody all of the time... so why try?

I try to be a team player! I make an effort not to offend. Imagine what I was like when I was young and was less carful?

I don't have the luxury of sounding of at posters no matter how much I may feel peeved with their comments. I don't want to come here and pi55 people off I would rather stay offline and pi55 of people in my family! (not really).

Plus this is NOT just about me and how I feel. I use me as an example. I know by PM and email a number of ex posters and old JF members don't want to walk the same path again and when this forum opened it was different, it was free from these trappings, it was fresh and friendly. Now we are at it again. Judging each other, giving each other reputations..
Think about this. How can this be correct? How does this build friendships? When you walk into a judo club are you rated at the door? What do you think Kano would make of this judgemental attitude being perpetuated and encouraged by the very system we call kano judo?

What truly pisses me of is this is a forum, you know we are supposed to read then write. That is the idea, social intercourse not blindly passing useless negative on each other. If we disagree with a post is it not the point of a written forum to write a reply challenging the poster?

When this new group opened we saw some of the old members try again, some have not bothered. Maybe we need to do all we can as a judo community to ensure there is a place here for every poster with a genuine interest in judo. The way to do that is polite debate.

Mike