Re: what;s happened to our newbies?

Dory, while people of all ages and both genders (and transgendered
folks as well!) are diagnosed with M.S., the basic "M.S. Profile" is
still to a large extent younger people in their 20s.

I think younger folks use Usenet a lot less frequently than those of
us in on the 'net in its earlier days. It's all about "social
networking sites" these days, for many.

MySpace, LiveJournal, and Facebook *all* have M.S. communities of
their own. I think many, many people find it more convenient to have
that one certain site where you can do it "all" -- stay in contact
with your friends, make new friends, listen to music that bands put on
their LJ and MySpace accounts, and post in a number of communities for
specific issues as well -- M.S. here, politics there, local events the
other place, etc.

I know, for instance, that LiveJournal has *four* separate communities
devoted to M.S.: one for everyone, one for people who have M.S. only,
one for more research-oriented posts, and a brand new one called
"NonIdiotsWithM.S." (LOL), started up by someone who was tired of
people posting things like "M.S. will kill you within a year of
diagnosis" or "M.S. is an entirely psychological disease; if you just
took this supplement or meditated or sought therapy, your disease
would disappear," etc.

MySpace also has several M.S. forums; I haven't visited my MySpace
page in *ages*, but I'm still listed as a member of "San Diego M.S."
-- because I live i San Diego and I have M.S.! ;->

Usenet in general has a bad rap among a lot of folks, myself included
to a large extent. In fact, I was surprised to find out how much I
enjoed ASMS, as my more usual experiences iwth Usenet newsgroups is
spam, flame wars, misinformation, more spam, and more flame wars.
=:o There is some of that here -- we've *all* seen spam, we've all
seen people post misinformation, and we've probably alll seen at lest
a couple flame wars. ;-> Thing is, the social networking sites also
hve misinformation, and the occasional flame war, although there
really is a LOT less spam.

The majority of people with M.S. I've encountered personally on places
like MSpce and LJ are newly-diagnosed. The "old-timers" are often
those wh've been dx'd for, say three to five years.

I honestly don't think it's a matter of newbies coming to check ASMS
and deciding it's not for them; I think a lot of newly-dx'd people
don't even really know of its existence or check Usenet groups -- when
they'er dx'd, they've already *got* a MySpace, LiveJournal, or
Facebook account, so they look there, where they already spend a lot
of time, for M.S. groups.

It also kind of does solve a problems we've seen here from time to
time -- you can use the same page to post in different forums, so
there's less political, religious, or other "hot button" topics in the
M.S. forums themselves, because one single click will bring the user
to a whole list of other forums for politics, religion, etc. Heck,
they've even got forums that serve as spam traps in a way, like "Hype
your MLM business here" and forums dedicated to discussing porn. ;->

The social network sites also have mobile phone capabilities -- you
can download and read your page right from your cell phone, which
Usenet I don't believe is possible...? They can also ban users from
being able to post, easily and pretty effectively -- something many of
us have wished for with certain regular trolls and spammers at ASMS.
The times, they are a-changin'!

Happy New Year! :D
XO,RD
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