Midwest Forum Morale

Darkness day tends to raise spirits.

 

If there is to be a bottle share someone BETTER bring an Assassin or I'm gonna get pissed and call my mom.

 

Confession: I lurked on B.A. (1998 'til 2001) before joining and posting. Back then "Craft Beer" was only a term used by certain industry folks and a few more beer writers, as it was still the waning days of the "Micro Brew" boom.

Granted, I was living in Medford, Mass. during some of those years, and I didn't know ANY beer nerds 'round there -- the Brothers Alstrom included. It was strictly an online experience for me, then. But I'd originally cut my teeth on the (small) Twin Cities homebrewing community and the even smaller circle of folks involved in the local brewing and beer can collecting circles (Summit, Johnny's Bar, North Star Chapter), so it was always pretty friendly in the early to mid 1990s. But things do have a tendency of changing; Imagine the first Gitchee Gumee fest -- less than 200 people!

When I returned to M/SP (I'm originally from St. Paul) I jumped in and made an ass of myself here on B.A., almost immediately. I got a job at retail. I joined the Town Hall pint club... and I haven't slowed down since!

There's always been some back-and-forth here, and let's face it: It's rare that more than a couple of people will ever see eye-to-eye on anything.

I won't deny that there've been squabbles amongst regular users (and some drive-by posters and "peanut gallery" weirdoes who enjoy stirring the pot more than doing anything else) in the fifteen years I've lurked and contributed. But for the most part it's always been a good bunch of site users, here.

At any rate, it wouldn't be a bad idea to do an impromptu thing -- there used to be a lot more of 'em, hereabouts.

Cheers

 

From where I'm standing, morale is great. I have met (& continue to meet, including yesterday) fantastic folks through this website, & count myself lucky to have shared beers with many of them throughout the years.

I've said this before but I'll say it again for those who've only been around since 2013: since the day I joined, people have been moaning about how it was better here "yesterday". It seems like the regional forums were more on point 'yesterday', the ISO:FT forums were full of love & harmony 'yesterday', people were more reasonable 'yesterday'. there were no mules 'yesterday'...when in fact, there were just as many ass-clowns around six years ago as there are today (at least in relative terms!).

That said, there are things in the craft beer 'movement' that sometimes suck. Sometimes, people are going to point out that suck. Which doesn't mean morale is bad, or BAs are rioting outside of Surly. People bitch about the Twins, Vikings, wives, kids, all sorts of things that aren't perfect. Doesn't mean we hate them. Means we wish they were better. Especially the Twins.

So my advice is just relax. Have a(nother) beer. Find me at Darkness Day & I'll pour you whatever's in my hand. There's nothing wrong with the Midwest forum, just people being people. It's always been that way & probably always will be.

 

I too think the Midwest forum is pretty much same as it ever was (my first account was made in 2008 mainly for lurking and I ended up forgetting my login info hence this account).

For me this is by far my favorite forum on BA. Beer Talk and some of the others are just a complete disaster.

Anyways my morale is high! Hope everyone else's is too.

 

Shut up Corey. I hate you.







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I don't really post as much as I used to on this site and its not necessarily because of attitudes, its mainly just because it has become repetitive. Threads are useful in the beginning and devolve in to nitpicking about distro or perceived whining or a personal tiff between a few users but as it was said above, its always been that way. This site has always been my default because people post what they know and its all in one location (mostly). I tend to lurk on informational threads posting here and there just to see if anything I don't know about pops up. I'll post of the On Tap thread because its always been one of the best threads in the Midwest, aside from that I talk enough beer at tastings to get me by. People have come and gone in the short amount of time I've been here (lurker since 2010) and the long (old?) timers have always been a great resource. The people who use this site strictly to call others out and try to embarrass others tend to be marginalized enventually and move on.
Midwest forum relations at an all time high.

 

I just joined here and my morale couldn't be higher. Go to the "breweries opening" thread for a pick-me-up. Seriously, there's a new brewery opening every other week here.

Don't feel like a taproom? Summit, Surly, Indeed all available at every store in town.

Going up north? Jack Pine in Brainard, Bent Paddle in Duluth, and Castle Danger if you go further.

Crossing the border into cheeseland? How about some New Glarus!

Something from a small batch? There's Olvalde Farms bottles with the cool little cork on them.

How about stories about community support like U4ic in Belle Plaine?

There so much good local beer here you can't possibly try them all anymore. How cool is that?!?!

And that's just off the top of my head. I'm stoked just typing it all in. It's truly a beer renaissance here. I haven't really seen any low morale here but maybe I just haven't gone into all those threads. I don't read everything here. If there is low morale here just think about the above and you can probably even come up with even more great things to lift your spirits.

 

I don't think that is true though. Take the good and just ignore the bad; good information is good information. The rest is just noise

 

My wife, kids and I had the pleasure of meeting @MNBeerGeek and his wife today. We had some good beers and talked about beer, laughted at my weird daughter and life in general. We had a great time and personally, this is what I think beer advocacy is about, enoughing good beer, good company and good conversation.

While it won't fix everything, I think it would be great to have a semi regular meet up at a taproom or bottle share. It could be every month, quarterly or whatever frequency that works. Who ever can make it, can make it.

With fall quickly upon us, a pumpkin/fall beer bottle share could be fun. I have a 13 and 14 Southern Tier Pumking and Warlock I have been itching to try side by side. I would love to do it with more people and we can discuss the differences. I am also getting 2 east coasts pumpkin beers (no idea what they are, but they will be here soon) I would be more than willing to share as well. I envision these bottle shares just being casual, so no whales or even hard to get beer needs to be brought, just something to share and good conversation.

If anyone is insterested in a bottle share or a scheduled tap room meet up, speak up and we can start working on getting something setup.

 

I'm in for a bottle share! I've done a couple with friends and they are always a good time. Would be great to meet some other MN BA'ers too!

 

If there is some interest, I probably could talk the wife into letting me host it. Only issue is I live in Albertville.

 

There are times when you have to take some of these Midwest posts with the proverbial grain of salt. It is a website dedicated to drinking beer. You should expect some posts are written while consuming said product.

 

I think the morale here is just fine!

 

I nominate you to be the Grand Wizard. Start a new thread organize it up. I'm fully in support, because I know most of the old-timers around here & I'm getting awfully tired of them. New blood would be welcome!

 

Morale is solid in my eyes. I've met some really great people through these forums in the past two years, that I now consider friends. I enjoy the conversation with most everyone on here, even the heated ones for the most part.

 

I've only been on BA for about a year, so I can't comment on the long term trends here. However, I am on another (non-beer, and very niche-oriented) forum that I've been active on for over a decade, and I see a number of broad similarities:

1. Strong group of core members who are constructive and active. A subset of whom account for a large fraction of posts.
   
2. Lots of lurkers. Probably more than one thinks. Occasionally they might poke their head up... or not.
   
3. The guys who share the passion for the topic, but can really be jerks
4. The occasional troll who probably could care less about the topic, but likes starting a crapstorm
5. The newbies. Often who start out with some post that is overly-trodden-ground, overly-basic, or overly-broad. Although it seems most of those are in forums like beer talk and not midwest.

From my other forum experience, although you might find things ebb and flow on a short term basis, over the long haul you never get rid of guys like #3 and #4. But as long as the core group #1 is present and active, you just need to look past the jerks. And, in some case, protect the newbies from the jerks because without new blood, the attrition in your core group will eventually kill things off. Example in the beer talk forum is the newbie asking what the difference is between a lager and a stout. The responses were all constructive and helpful at various levels of detail, but if the first poster had said something like "That's a pretty stupid question - do you know anything about beer?" others need to hop in (*) and say "ignore so-and-so, he's an a**hole. But the answer to your question is ... And welcome to the forum, glad to have you aboard". Similarly, if someone's first post is something that's been asked 300 times before, the response is not "Oh, not this again!" but "interesting question, here's a link to a thread where that was discussed."

If you've got a good core group and nurture the newbies, you can't let the fact that some folks don't seem as constructive get you down. Just one guy's opinion.

Bottom line: I like the midwest forum. It's the only one I read on a daily basis.

(*) no pun intended, but hey - it works

 

I guess I just miss the days when the Midwest forum was just about Minneapolis and an occasional posting about KC (usually complaining that there is more than one city in the Midwest). Now it is all about Iowa and interlopers thinking we would include Wisconsin in our fun.

I kid, I kid. I have met some great people because of this site and because of this community. I wouldn't drink anything from maximum12's hand, but I will steal the remaining bottles of infected BA blackout from his cellar. As more people join the site there will be more clashes of (perceived) personality. Usually once you meet up with the person you realize they aren't such a douche. I know that most of my friends have figured that out once they met me. Some may still think that though.

 

Unfortunately for some here you are only as cool as what you have in your cellar. Other than that I think this place is fine.