Is There Something or Someone You Miss on DOA?

I am still in touch with @ravendolls . She’s out of the doll hobby these days, but I’m sure she would be tickled pink to know that people still love her face ups. I don’t think she’s going to be back, though only she could really say that.

I miss her, and a whole load of people that I lost touch with when I moved from Livejournal to Facebook. Janne and crybabymommie. I see cbm on Instagram, and that is a good place too.

In terms of people who are no longer with us, I miss Marsh too, and kellyhime. I still have clothes they made for me.

Gettin’ old! Lol

 

I miss how it easy it was to find local groups! Some of my first friends in new areas where because of meet ups. Though I finally figured out facebook works better for that now.
Also miss the bustling artist market that used to be here. A lot of artist have found new mediums to work with

 

I miss @Anna I don't know her very well but she was always so nice and I loved meeting her at Dollism Plus USA.

@pegapup I can't put into words how much I miss you.

 

I miss @Therealwalter he is gone and I miss seeing his dolls. I know he was older like me but I'm saddened he isn't here any more.

 

I miss seeing project journals that revolve around clothing.

I'm probably an example of pot calling kettle black, because I don't do this, but there used to be so many people who would post project journals of elaborate outfit progress pictures, and now hardly anyone does this.

 

I do love them! If she does come back, I have a blank Bellosse head waiting...

 

I will let her know. I know she’d be delighted to learn how much everyone misses her talents...

 

There's a lot of people and dolls I miss, Marsh has to have an honourable mention, I was a regular customer and she was genuinely lovely as a human being, taken far too young. A lot of the seamstresses and atelier's, Soda, Apple Avenue, Softly she Walks, Brennil etc Faceup artists like Lachlana and Bread17. A lot of the original Shiwoo Crew and their lovely dolls.

I think of coming back to the community often, but when I do sometimes pop in here and there, I don't have a clue where to start anymore really, so I guess what I miss most is the ease of knowing everyone and everyone knowing me.

 

I hear you. I actually used to follow you on DeviantArt because your Lishe is what got me in this hobby! I took a hiatus for about four years and actually had to message the mods to get me back into my account because it'd been so long since I logged in. I've found that communities on facebook are really nice and a making couple of local friends helped ease me back into the community.

 

I think often of @essiekl, who passed away a few years ago. She was so kind and sweet.

 

That's such a nice thing to read, thank you for remembering Orly and the old community!

 

Wow, I feel so old all of a sudden since joining DoA and reminiscing the past . For the people/members I miss, bread17 comes to mind first because she painted my very first resin baby (Reaiah) not just once, but twice (when she greatly improved her face-up skills). Dorrie crew wise, she rocked the manly muscular El and one of the most handsome I've ever seen .

For having the most memorable dorrie crew, I could name a few:

Nezumitoo (I love browsing through her photogallery, especially of Jenova and his diva lover(?) Fuan, the classic beauty Megumi, and heck, even the naughty Shiwoo twins )
Lachlana (man, her original characters such as Maru Tenzen, Jaden, Rowen, Lachlan, etc., still remembering them so fondly especially her photostories posted in LJ )

'Might add more as I take a deeper trip down the DoA memory lane.

 

Hana / @ShallowSleep (asai_nemuri on Instagram). She painted my Crobidoll Lance girl in 2010. Her last post on her IG was about health issues and she's unlikely to paint faceups again. I'm very sad about this - Hana was an outstanding artist - and I'll treasure my doll's beautiful faceup as irreplaceable.

@marsh of Marsh Pants, and @Elena of Spite & Malice wigs. One of my boys still wears a S&M wig, really outstanding quality.

@Nezumitoo's photography and custom feathered wings (made by Syrinxfox). Getting a pair of Angel Hunt Syrinxfox wings was a pipe dream that was never going to happen, but I could dream. (Thanks Brightfires for the correction!)

The dolls, styling and photography of @byouyuuken and @thesaraghina were huge inspirations for my crew. Both have gone dormant too.

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As for community... while I miss the old camaraderie of DoA -- the familiar names, the anniversary events -- I've accepted that times and technology have changed, and the community is a lot more dispersed nowadays. Not necessarily a bad thing! The BJD hobby is still flourishing and growing, just in different places - and it's OK to go to those places. Now that I'm back into BJDs after a long hiatus, I've found my main community on Discord. This suits me, because I've been using Discord for a long time, and it's very good for back-and-forth chat and active discussion. And I've received so much encouragement, inspiration and stimulus to do more with my dolls!

That said, I also appreciate DoA for being a steadfast presence in the hobby landscape, even if it's lost a bit of its former dynamism. That's OK too, because DoA is very good at being what it is. When I returned to BJDs from my very long hiatus, this was the first place I returned to -- and I'm still coming back. I can't imagine it's easy for the forum and the mods to endure criticisms and the changes in technology, dolls, and hobby community. So I'm grateful that DoA is still around and holding steady, and I'll do my best to contribute and advocate for this forum.

 

I miss my friends, especially @tygati who was the first dolly peep I ever met IRL. She helped me come out of my shell quite a bit and got me into actually meeting up with people. She's not been on in a looong time though, and I've lost contact irl as well.

 

Honestly, I miss…buzzing forums. While it is good and natural that the hobby has spread beyond the central hub that was DoA, I think that traditional internet forums are a near-perfect home for hobby discussion. So while I don’t miss this being the only place for BJD content on the English-speaking web, I miss how amazing of a resource it was when it was at its peak. Does that make sense? Imo subreddits and Discord channels can be great but it’s hard to beat forums for archiving purposes and for the ability to foster niche discussions.

 

Seconding ALL of this!!! I'm so sick of modern social media that is designed to mine your existence for data. I miss the olden days! If we could just get everyone to move back...

 

I think other models of social media work fine for like…life updates, photo sharing, sales, etc., but forums are just so good for hobby discussion specifically! I wish they hadn’t largely gone out of style.

 

To me it has nothing to with functionality, but is all a privacy matter and a political choice.

Something I LOVE DoA for sticking to and not change is the fact that the amount of data mined is very minimal. Very few tracking cookies and the banner adds very rarely contain anything that my borwser add ons detect, at least. And that is not something I could say about many places these days.

As for the main topic of the thread. I do miss some of the activity, for sure, but as someone who never got used to the higher post rates of the more socially focused sites, I'm not sure the difference here compared to the past is that big. I mean, there is still always more new posts than I could possibly keep up with. I usually just keep an eye on the areas I have the greatest interest in and I try to hold myself to the rule that if I want to enjoy other peoples projects, doll photos, advice and reference material, I better contribute myself as well, to the best of my ability.
I do miss the old lay out, though. The new one, I guess it's to make it more mobile friendly or something, but all the dead space between everything is so stupid. I spend just as much time just scrolling and scrolling to get to the stuff I want as i spend actually reading. I know it's something most people adapt to and don't even notice anymore, but it still bothers me every time I log in.
But, the forum still works, it's still moderated and it's still a nice place with lots of great people, so I'm not going to complain too much.

And I whole heartedly agree with those who said this is the best format for hobby content. It's clean, on topic and reasonably easy to search. Everyne who comes where does so with BJD in mind.