- Joined
- Feb 24, 2014
- Messages
- 33,610
- Reaction score
- 26,429
- Location
- Oceania
- Gender
- Male
- Political Leaning
- Libertarian
Wow. I discovered it by accident, but it seems it even has some of the old posts I put up on IMDB all those years ago. LOL now I can start bashing people again. :mrgreen:
How MovieChat dethroned IMDb as the go-to place to talk TV and films | WIRED UK
How MovieChat dethroned IMDb as the go-to place to talk TV and films | WIRED UK
On February 20 2017, hundreds of thousands of comments were permanently removed from film fan site the Internet Movie Database, more commonly known as IMDb.
For over 16 years, IMDb’s message boards had chronicled the thoughts of ordinary people as they watched hit blockbusters (“Where are the sharks?” – user Corinaam on Titanic), beloved classics (“Can you find a wife like Mary today?” – MajDutch on It’s a Wonderful Life), and Shrek (“Shrek is a metaphor for racism in America!?” – TMC-4 (3838)). But two years ago, IMDb decided to remove the boards.
The reason the company, which is a subsidiary of Amazon, gave for the purge was that the message boards were “no longer providing a positive, useful experience” for their users – in short, there were a lot of bigots.
Like many spaces on the internet, the IMDb message boards were plagued by racism, sexism and trolls. Yet despite the bad actors on some forums, the loss of the boards was perceived as a tragic moment in internet history. Hundreds of thousands of people had posted hundreds of thousands of thoughts over almost two decades, and it was all going to be lost. That is, until Jim Smith had an idea.