Taking sides: nu-ilm vs old-ilm

hah, every single person on here thinks they are 'nu', if we're all nu, then who are the hataz from the oldskool?

I'm not nu, and I'm not old. I'm a rogue agent like Tom described me as ages ago!

Hi.

I'm one of the new boys. I know this because I googled my way in (social suicide around here huh) a few weeks ago and wrote a few antagonistic stroke mindless stroke keen like Roy posts which caused me to be systamatically ripped up by several of the rug'lars.

However, rather than being put off, I realised that I had discoverd a wonderful forum filled with wonderful people with wonderful things to say. And so I remain. Can't comment too much on old versus new ilx but I would say that what we seem to have here is a pretty vibrant stroke entertaining stroke enlightening forum. If it was even more so in the days of yore then, well, damn und blast.

Anyway, on a more personal note, if I properly hacked anyone off or anyone feels that my posts are totally for shit then I am most dreadfully sorry.

The reason I don't bother posting questions anymore is because with a few exceptions all one gets is stupid answers that question the question. IE "What's the supposed to mean", or "This question doesn't make sense" or "What is (x)". I mean, look it up, you're on the interweb. Make the words mean whatever you want them to mean, I don't care, just don't keep making me repeat the fucking question. Does everyone need everything liquidized into baby food for them?

Who decides who is old-ILM and who isn't anyway ? What's the cut-off point ? Though I've been posting very rarely in the last year or so, I've been on here since a month or two after the original forum was set up, and I really don't see all that much difference, except it's more crowded than it used to be, and there's less discussion of crappy 80s British indie bands, both of which are positive developments as far as I'm concerned. I'm wondering if all the people bitching against nu-ILM realize how massively offputting their attitude is to newer contributors - there's probably now a bunch of worthy people wondering if they're part of the problem, when in fact the only problem there is is a handful of people thinking that the fact that they've been around here for a while makes them hot shit (this is not directed at Graham, BTW, who I think has done a great job with this board).

Also, I find it very unfortunate that Dave Q isn't posting threads anymore - they had become probably my most favorite thing on ILM.

I think the only division that makes sense isn't to do with members but to do with what ILM is. "Old ILM" was a message board attached to a low-readership music website which reflected pretty accurately the preoccupations of that website. "Nu ILM" is a message board with a reputation and following in its own right which has been noticed by lots of other websites and discussion boards that would never have cared about it when it started up. The transition wasn't an 'invasion' or takeover or anything, it happened because old ILM was good at doing what it did.

This shift is irreversible whether people liked "Old ILM" or not. With the shift comes certain responsibilities, too - like thinking of the board as a 'community' and trying to be friendly to 'newcomers', neither of which the old ILM cared at all about.

(The "offputting to newcomers" argument I pretty much reject anyway. Most posters are made of sterner stuff I'd hope particularly since every internet forum since the internet began has had this exact same conversation, including many where I've been the 'newbie' and my general attitude has been 'sod that, I like it and I'm staying'.)

What Roger said goes for me too (except it would be 'keen like Ray' in my case).
Being totally new to things like this, it can take a while to tune into the rules of engagement, especially, when you feel so initially excited and overwhelmed by discovering the place. And to a nubie it really does look like all kinds of responses are allowed round these parts - some Q's are big and difficult, but some of them much more listy or facetious, and a lot of the contributors snappy one-liners are really funny, so it's hard not to want to join in. It's also so much more difficult to compose longer more thoughtful answers in the face of:
(a) So many scarily informed and insightful people, many of whom seem to already write in some pro/semi-pro capacity: I have no training or experience in music journo/writing, just a punter who's never even downloaded an MP3. It's easier to jump in at the shallow end - hopefully I'll eventually learn enough to
(b) Being at work and supposedly doing something else entirely! When you see a thread that engages your interest, you want to add to it NOW.

I haven't been sweary to anybody yet, and I think the closest I got to rudeness was my overly facetious attitude to the first Q I saw Roger F. post, but I know that I've gone crassly stomping into some threads with a HERE'S MY OPINION negative attitude, threads that maybe I should just have ignored (eg Postcard Bands) - it's just that with some -ve opinions that have burnt a hole in your mind for 20 years or so, the chance to publicly vent them is jumped on!
And often, as I tried to touch upon in a recent thread, I think music you hate can be as 'important' as music you love.

I get annoyed when people come to ILM and go 'oh ILM thinks this' and 'ILM thinks that', but only because in my eyes if you post to ILM you're part of it (also because they're usually dead wrong)

I'm probably guilty of what Tom has described there - but, when you first start trawling around these parts, you do come to thinking that there are certain attitudes which are a kind of 'ILM aesthetic' (eg, very broadly, the 'pop' over 'rock' idea, sophisticated dismissals of certain difficult-to-define ideas/attitudes which are 'naive' or CLOSE_YR_EYES_MARKS 'rockist' OPEN_EYES_AND_RELAX, an unequivocal celebration of wide-ranging eclecticism etc.)

I stumbled into this forum because I had for months already been going through a phase of obsessive re-interest in a particular musical period and its meaning to me, and googling a genre term led me here - but it has already become (disturbingly) addictive to keep reading these boards, and I really don't want anything bad to happen to them.
I have been wondering over the last couple of weeks whether I'm capable of having an interesting opinion on anything - but having just read Tom's last sentence, maybe I'll try to adopt that attitude.

Aaaargh.

should have been '....learn enough to paddle in deeper waters' or some equally inventive non-writer cliché.

RF: I'm sorry, there's just something in me which kicks everytime I see your name no matter how "ironic" it may be. Also, I think it is the "thinking" versus "cataloging" divide except I feel like the conversations we used to have we just can't have anymore, at least the old foax who've been through them so many times already. There's only so many ways to approach certain questions, then we move on -- so perhaps the old foax are a bit tapped out on thangs which always seem to arise again with a new wave of ppl. (cf. "rockist" -- which as far as I know was pretty universally understood by the old-ILM crowd without ever debating it because of a shared background in 80s MM etc.)

i have never read 80s MM.

Sterling - one of the good things Tom/Graham did was to add a FAQ section to this new board. I agreed with someone who wondered whether it should contain/have links to the 'ILM standard definitions' (as far as they exist!) of certain terms that newer people might never have encountered. Maybe one thing ppl should be encouraged to do is spend alot of time reading the archives before joining in - although it's SO difficult not to want to jump right in....

Sterling: are you suggesting I change my monnicker? Come on, you must be able to see past my pathetic satire of myself and the abstracted concept that is you [plural].

(it is a shame that dave q won't post questions anymore. his 'aerosmith's 'rocks' as first dub-punk album' thread made me hear that record in a totally new way, and his other questions are totally brain-probing.)

dave, please don't stop posting questions. even if i don't respond to them, i still treasure them.

yeah i always thought dave q's threads were fairly interesting as well...

Q's just fishing for compliments (us canucks need so much love). he also deserves them, damn it.

Revive.

I'm new here but not to music and certainly not to discussion groups. I find myself reading, on average, maybe 5 threads every few days. There are some smart people on here and worthwhile opinions for sure, but it all collapses under the weight of new threads with hundreds of posts. If you're not there when it happens it becomes a far less useful resource, and discussion goes haywire far too quickly.

I've never seen such pointed obsessiveness, opinion bashing, "ultimate decisions" (all this C/D and S/D shite), and the like -- quite the opposite of an informed, developing discussion of music. This thing should be called "I Stalk Music".

(Now that I reminded myself what this thread was about, I think I should have left it slumber: too much material directed at individuals. I just kind of wanted to show that this is not a new subject exactly.)

The "C/D and S/D shite" is a rhetorical device, not an absolute judgement, mosurock.

as a relatively new member let me say that i LOVE C/D S/D threads and lists and obsessiveness.

How do the people who have been here a really long time remain interested? I've been here two years and we're still talking about the same shit most of the time.

it goes in phases dave225: sometimes i think OMIGOD NOT THIS AGAIN!! and sometimes i think "haha i shall surely enjoy bringing a blank look to THIS fellow's honest open face"

Often it's less about what's being discussed and more about how it is -- which dovetails nicely with my 'mood over specifics' approach to music. ;-)

Yeah, I know, I know .. I'm just really bored with all of the threads right now...

''How do the people who have been here a really long time remain interested? I've been here two years and we're still talking about the same shit most of the time.''

heh, we've even talked abt how 'circular' the threads get.

I enjoy talking shit but the ans would be that you never know: a common topic will be explored differently by someone new...there might some interesting things when you least expect. and then you can get into flame wars...all good fun.