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Post by hledgard on Jan 19, 2024 20:35:00 GMT -8
Your comments ring true, 4aapl. I have really liked this site for years, long before AAPL was such a dominant stock. I hate to see it go downhill, as indicated by the global reasons you mention above.
I went to a wonderful concert tonight by the Toledo Symphony. It was only half full. I believe the issue is bit like above.
There is so much competition for people's time these day, mainly through the development of large screen TV's and TV coverage of sports. The coverage of sports is wonderful. Many, many people stay home and watch television. It is certainly having a negative effect on movie theaters and going to concerts.
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Dave
Member
"It's tough to make predictions, especially about the future." Yogi Berra
Posts: 4,103
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Post by Dave on Jan 20, 2024 0:24:26 GMT -8
Except for going to see Top Gun at a theater last year, I haven't been to a theater in many years. There was once a time that I would a time that I would go to a movie quite regularly, but with the option of a home theater I lost interest and going out soon became a hassle. The cost of admission was bad enough, along with the cost of concessions, which were outrageous, I found the biggest deterrent were the people that I had to share the theater with. Loud, inconsiderate, messy people. Sadly I see the movie theaters going the way of the TV Guide. But a classical music concert is a whole different experience. Different people.
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4aapl
Moderator
Posts: 3,634
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Post by 4aapl on Jan 20, 2024 13:34:21 GMT -8
I guess I see that things change, and you have to change with them if you want to keep doing well. There are some movies that do better on a really big screen. But there is a lot of stuff that doesn't matter much, and with such a wide selection of movies available over the years, at times going to the movies just seems like a bad choice. Especially with a large group, for a mediocre movie (I'm thinking of certain ones we have seen at xmas with the relatives, with up to 20 of us there at $12 or more a head). But something like The Greatest Showman was wonderful to see there. A couple families have season tickets for some of the plays that stop in at Reno, and it sounds like it works out to be a fun time. The same thing is true for our summertime symphony, and summertime outdoor Shakespeare plays. But on both they mix it up, not just having the nighttime shows, but also having some daytime ones that might be shorter where families are encouraged to come. As for this site, I checked over at PED this morning, and he has done a good job of listing benefits to make the paid site "worth it" to a good group. But one way to think about it is like a club or gym, where you are happy with what you have and keep on going, maybe seeing it change over the years but not really hoping from one to another on a whim. And they can coexist, as long as they maintain critical mass to pay the bills, or here to keep some traffic and viewpoints up. But one can choose to just stick with what you have, even if there is slow attrition away from the place, or one could constantly work on tweaking things to keep the user level up. But most of the busier places don't seem to have the quality level that I would hope for. I know some of my posts lately have spelling or tense errors (some is my fault but I have witnessed autocorrect causing more of those now than in the past), but some of these places like stocktwits and reddit I have trouble even figuring out what they mean. Part of it is the mindset of "at long as I get my point across, then the grammar, spelling, punctuation, and capitalization doesn't matter". But at some point it's worse in readability than I remember the translation of Faust being. Some can be blamed on the UI of using a small phone screen with smaller textbox, or being a sloppy typer when trying to be quick. But that's not all of it. I guess I'm getting old In big business there tends to be merges and acquisitions at some point, especially as things mature. Reading the wikipedia for Lam Research (rode a chairlift with a guy working there) a week ago reminded me of how much consolidation there sometimes is. If this discussion forum was a business, we would have bought out some competitors or been bought out by now, similar to how proboards itself was bought out (and thus development was halted). But with this being a free place, with no costs but also no business push, instead we just remain even if the group has slowly shrunk over the years. And a part of that is due to Apple being such a different company and investment than even 10 years ago. The stock price is nearly 10x the size (stock app says up 882%). It's just a whole different beast, which partially means that people don't need to talk about it as much. Instead most people can just sit back and not think about it too much, even if it is fun to make guesses about the future. If instead we wanted to adapt so that we could grow, we'd want to think about what other investors wanted to read and talk about, whether they are newer investors, or just have a different set of goals or viewpoints that the ones currently active here. That might mean getting down to the fundamentals, looking more at the dividend, talking about some high risk/high payoff options, talking about some low risk opportunities, comparing to other tech stocks, or comparing to other big steady companies. There are a lot of things that we just don't really discuss much anymore, that might be much more interesting to someone looking to get into the stock or who hasn't owned it for very long yet. But then again, it's probably those people that would do best at least starting these conversations, and then you need to let others see that you are having these conversations. If that was a direction we wanted to go, we'd have to get our name out there, likely by crossposting a bunch. Make the 8 second TikTok or YouTube Quick Video, post on FaceBook and StockTwits, and drive the traffic this way. Since84 would reach out to past posters to try to get them back, but for longevity and enthusiasm at the cost of potentially less long term history and wisdom, it might be best to work on adding fresh faces rather than guest appearances from the past. That's just one way. It depends on what we want as a whole, since unlike Ped who is making some money off of it and so can push forward with gusto, I enjoy the place but don't want to make it into a full time job. If we have a direction and a plan, I'm sure we can work together to help move things in that direction. Or if someone does want to make it into a full time job, paying or otherwise, we could migrate that way too.
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Post by hledgard on Jan 20, 2024 19:34:39 GMT -8
Very thoughtful, 4aapl ! !
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Dave
Member
"It's tough to make predictions, especially about the future." Yogi Berra
Posts: 4,103
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Post by Dave on Jan 23, 2024 11:32:34 GMT -8
A couple of ideas that could make the AFB more visible would be to once again join an already established Mac website just as the original AFB was with The Mac Observer. I have no idea how that could come about, but it could benefit both parties. The other idea could be to make a YouTube video about the AFB with its history (only the good bits) and its location. Perhaps Lucky or the many other members here could give their history of success with AAPL as an example for others to follow.
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