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It's a simple law of averages.* This is most definitely a variant of the "It's Popular, Now it Sucks" trope.
However, there is a subtle difference between the time when the idiot segment of a given website's base of users (i.e. the forums, or comment section, or community or whatever you want to call it) expands and the time when the site in question just gives up completely and starts to actively cater to said idiots because they've become too big a part of the local population (and have driven away less idiotic parts of the population). The first is easily dealt with (just stop reading the comments), but the second... not so much, at least for a mere end-user such as myself. Well, no, actually the second is just as easily dealt with as the first (just stop reading the site altogether), but it's far more disappointing to have to do that, especially if the site used to be cool.
Usually there is an indeterminate grace period between when the first happens (and, based on personal observation, it always happens) and when the second happens. Some sites have already long since passed the point of no return as far as I'm concerned, and I have sadlyall but completely abandoned them because of it, outside of the occasional link I may happen to see back to them from elsewhere. Others seem to be quickly approachinghave reached that point, much to my dismay, but haven't quite arrived there yet, so there's still small hope. Some seem to be (barely) holding the line against the ever growing throng of morons (but even then, some concessions are already starting to be made to satiate the idiots), but who can say just how long they will be able to hold out? In the past I would have said that it would be enough to just stop reading the comment sections on these and other sites, but when the content of the sites themselves start to change to reflect certain aspects of the "community" that has built up around them, it's just not enough anymore. It is rather depressing at times.
In particular, obviously, I am talking about certain video game news/blog sites here as well as a few other, somewhat similar sites, but this applies to the Internet as a whole (see also: Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, LiveJournal, Youtube, et cetera).
* - But why does this always inevitably result in a downward shift (or perhaps spiral)? Why can't it be the case that the more people show up on a site, the greater the chance of those people being awesome (and not just in their own minds, which I think is a big part of the problem), rather than stupid?
However, there is a subtle difference between the time when the idiot segment of a given website's base of users (i.e. the forums, or comment section, or community or whatever you want to call it) expands and the time when the site in question just gives up completely and starts to actively cater to said idiots because they've become too big a part of the local population (and have driven away less idiotic parts of the population). The first is easily dealt with (just stop reading the comments), but the second... not so much, at least for a mere end-user such as myself. Well, no, actually the second is just as easily dealt with as the first (just stop reading the site altogether), but it's far more disappointing to have to do that, especially if the site used to be cool.
Usually there is an indeterminate grace period between when the first happens (and, based on personal observation, it always happens) and when the second happens. Some sites have already long since passed the point of no return as far as I'm concerned, and I have sadly
In particular, obviously, I am talking about certain video game news/blog sites here as well as a few other, somewhat similar sites, but this applies to the Internet as a whole (see also: Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, LiveJournal, Youtube, et cetera).
* - But why does this always inevitably result in a downward shift (or perhaps spiral)? Why can't it be the case that the more people show up on a site, the greater the chance of those people being awesome (and not just in their own minds, which I think is a big part of the problem), rather than stupid?
