We were discussing this in chat, and I wrote a couple paragraphs about this that I'd like to share. But let me be clear, I'm not attacking Brick Tale or anyone here, these are just my thoughts about the article.

Firstly, the golden ages. This was discussed earlier [on chat], but I think that it's important to cover. You say the golden age was between 2008 and 2012, but I'm sure many would disagree with you and say that it was in the early 2000s, or 2013 - 2015. There is no golden age. Until brickfilming is dead, there can be no way to tell what the "best" and "most influential" era was. Nathan made a good comment a while back about the golden age that has stuck with me.

"I think it's a mistake to label anything in the brickfilm community as a golden age because everyone will just talk about the age that THEY were most involved in"

And this, I would say, is remarkably true. I wasn't around during your golden age, nor was I around during the brickfilms.com golden age. But that's not the important thing to focus upon in the article, so I'll stop there.

There's a lot of weight placed on the shoulders of the big brickfilmers who were cornerstones of the community.
Even though you say "communities rarely die because a few important people disappear," you contradict that by saying that "without the major community members whose love of the brick came first, the consequence was still the same. As the focus of the bricklming community shifted away from the medium and more towards nuanced lmmaking."
This implies that the big ones like Zach and Fancypants and all the people you listed at the top (most of which i've never heard of actually ) were MOCers first and filmmakers second. I'd disagree here and go as far as to say it's unfair to say the community rested on the shoulders of big-timers.
Yes, sure, brickfilming has become a lot about honing the craft of filmmaking with LEGO, but I'm not sure that's a horrible thing. After all, would you rather watch a brickfilm that has 1 frame per second but has a giant MOC in it, or a beautiful and enjoyable-to-watch brickfilm with small sets that look large because of filmmaking tricks? Brickfilming has always been more of a magic trick to convince the camera of a certain reality than it has been to make something an actual reality and photograph it. If a brickfilm is just a slide show with words or music, is it a brickfilm? What about playing with LEGO with your hands in front of a camera? I don't have the answers because the term can be extremely fluid, but generally, it refers to stop-motion with LEGO. If one neglects the brickfilm aspect so much in favor of the MOC aspect, it may as well just be a flickr photo album with descriptions if the stop-motion doesn't convey the story effectively.

Secondly, you say that we need to get back out into the LEGO community and promote the brickfilming community. I agree... But then you imply that there's one giant unified brickfilming community that you're trying to mesh with one unified MOC community. Sure, you love the art form and want to share it and that's fine, but by saying "community" so many times, you imply somewhat of a unified group of people. I'd say there's more than one brickfilming community. BiM, instagram groups, youtuber groups, discord servers, etc. Even the "overall LEGO community" is so split up. MOC communities aren't all connected, and neither are brickfilming communitie,s obviously. And truth be told, it's hard to be a part of two communities at once. It's cool to say "I'm trying to merge brickfilming community and MOC community more" when the reality is more "I'm introducing stop-motion to these MOCers," which I wouldn't say is exactly a merging of communities. I hate to say it, but outside of the circle you're in, I've not seen any MOCers join the brickfilming community (that is, BiM and TPF because those are the two I'm most connected with).

And that's about it for my critique. It's long, sure, but I think it's important to address this since it's been floating around the web.

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"Whatever you do, do all to the glory of God." - 1 Corinthians 10:31b

Hey,
I know that I am not very well known here, but I've been registered here for quite some time actually, so I can sort of understand what's happening, although I might not have the same background knowledge and experience as some senior members here. I am particularly interested in this, because something similar has happened in the german brickfilming community (Brickboard), where I've been active in the years prior. But coming back to the situation with the MOC community and the brickfilming community, I think the resaon is rather simple when you think about it. I see it as the inevitable consequence of both communities evolutions. Back in the day, you mostly had some simple MOCs that weren't extremely big or complex, same with brickfilms, you just got your self a camera and grabbed some of your Lego and then started to create a brickfilm, everyone could do that and everyone could do BOTH. But as time goes on, things get more complicated and advanced, an "evolution" happens. Things thats were considered top-notch are now standard, things that once seemed impossible can now be realized, but at what cost? Newcomers have it way harder now in my opinion, because the standards are so high nowadays. Also it seems impossible to build huge MOCs now that take months to build and cost up to multiple thousands of dollars, and at the same time make those complex brickfilms that require countless hours of production time and very pricey equipment. But this is how things are supposed to work, if there wasn't any evolution, both of those "Lego franchises" would have died years ago, which they didn't in my opinion, they just changed and we must accept that change, or we will be the ones actually destroying the community. So the big guys have to keep producing and help the newcomers to grow, so we can inspire others with our movies to come and join us. We shouldn't say "oh yea the good old days, golden era whatever", but we should embrace the advances that we made and make even greater ones in the future. In the end it also comes down to competition, but in a good way, that it inspires people to try harder and do better, invest more time etc. I feel like I wrote way too much and people are gonna stop reading half way through that rubbish I wrote, but if you broaden this topic a little bit, which I certainly enjoy to do, it becomes very philosophical and I could talk/write for hours about it. Maybe I have false information, or my perspective on the whole topic is just not "wide" enaugh, so I would be happy to hear more opinions on this.
Thanks to whoever read the whole thing anyway.

So allow me to give some clarification, which I think is necessary for a full understanding of the article.

First, some context. The article was inspired by two things. One was a discussion had among the crew of the Frame100 podcast about why the podcast's growth seems to have stalled. The other was the consensus I found among individuals in the MOC building community that brickfilmers had largely disappeared. The second one is key, because it largely informed how I wrote the piece. The article was intentionally written primarily for an audience of builders (it was written for the RebelLUG blog after all) often in terms more understandable to them. An example of this would be my use of the term "golden age." It's not a term I like to use because it can be defined in so many different ways as Rio and Nathan note, but I used it because that's a term MOC builders use to refer to a time when brickfilmers and their work were far more well known in the broader Lego fan community. Another example would be the brickfilmers whose names I cite in the first paragraph. I selected the names I did because everyone should be able to recall at least one of them, since they came from all corners of the brickfilming community. The first 3 are names that you might not recognize, but that builders who are old enough ought to. Those 3 individuals weren't much for building themselves, but they were often good friends with people who were. This theme continues to repeat itself throughout the article, and hence is why there's probably a lot of stuff that sounds foreign or that you personally might not remember. Many of these guys I reference weren't on BiM and viewed brickfilming simply as an extension of building by bringing their creations to life.

Secondly I should note a few things about the title. I titled the article the way I did for a two reasons. One was that it was eye catching and got your attention. I'd say that given the number of people talking about it far exceeded my expectations, it certainly fulfilled that purpose. The other reason was that once again, it made the most sense to the building community, whose awareness of our community has been limited for some time now. The thing I regret however, is that people wrongly took it to mean that I personally think our community is "dead" when in the past year or so I've been on the record several times saying the opposite (see the Frame100 Podcast). The notion that the brickfilming community is "dead" largely comes from the rest of the Lego community, but unfortunately a good deal of discussion on the article seemed to be on whether or not the notion itself is true. I found this disappointing because my hope was for a debate on what else we can do to grow and expand our appeal as a hobby and a community.

Thirdly I should note my purpose in writing the article. This year I joined RebelLUG, a group generally considered to be the premier online Star Wars based Lego users group. The group is exclusive and notoriously hard to get join because of its status as a registered group in the Lego Ambassador Network. When I applied, I was surprised at how shocked members were to see that an animator was wanting to join them because of how rare it is to see brickfilmers talking to builders these days. People outside of our community more or less believe us to be nearly extinct, and I immediately wanted to change that. Getting in required a great deal of persuasion at first, but the effort was fueled for a desire to make it easier for other brickfilmers to join LUGs in the future. So far it's paid off, but one person working by himself can't generate the kind of change myself and many others are looking for though. Ultimately I decided to write the article as a means of generating discussion that would reveal who was on board with the idea and who clearly wasn't. That's why in many cases I phrased things in such black and white terms. In the end I intend to hopefully follow up with those who share my belief that it's in the brickfilming community's best interest to achieve greater unity with the broader Lego fan community and see what we can do to make it happen.

Hopefully this helps straighten some things out and guides discussion to a better, more productive place!

Not to put Nathan or Rio's "golden age" thoughts down, but I think, now that we're nearly into the 2020's, that we can make a fair judgement on what (if any) eras brickfilming has had. Unarguably, youtube brought brickfilming to a larger audience - but it was also it's seeming end. Brickfilms weren't popular in the 80's and 90's - but that didn't mean there were no brickfilms - on the contrary. Similarly, that doesn't mean there weren't small communities (likely pre-internet) in that era as well.

I believe today we're just seeing a more digital mirror of that. Brickfilmers are tending towards stoic social media giants for sharing their brickfilms, mocs, etc. But, again, that doesn't mean the community is dead.

Something I would have liked to have seen Brick Tale bring up is the steady rise in average brickfilmer age, as well as the rise of the average brickfilm's quality.

I love a well-animated Zach Macias video as much as the next guy, but, part of the reason "2008 - 2012" saw an increase in newcomers was because of people like ForrestFire101 - who's content (at the time) was sub-par to say the least. But it was funny, creative, and seemed more easily achievable - especially to the newcomer.

Now, with such a steep learning curve to get to the same level as the average brickfilmer today - I feel that it's pushing some away. It has nothing to do with the niche-like atmosphere of, say, BiM, or the fact that some brickfilmers started taking on larger projects/left the community. - at least, IMO.

Similarly, I think the downfall of Toys R Us could hint to another possible reason for less brickfilmers - gaming. While kids still play with toys, it's in shorter increments, and only between using tech - which is now (for many) an essential part of everyday life. There isn't as much time for something like stop-motion (which takes FOREVER) when you can just play one more quick match in Overwatch or watch some livestreamers play that latest game you're vaguely interested in.

I do 100% agree with the article's original intention - as Brick Tale further fleshed out in his post above. MOCers, Lego fanatics, and (perhaps most importantly) kids, have a lot less exposure to brickfilming now than in the past. And we need to change that.

Doug Vandegrift, when he released Pirates, posted about it not only to this community, but to eurobricks, and other sites as well. ForrestFire teamed up with the Epic Rap Battles guys to do a collab a few years ago - and The Lego Group themselves have been promoting brickfilming and MOCing through contests and their films. However, forums, individual's pages on facebook/twitter/instagram have kind of gone the way of the personal blog - once an easily accessible medium, now relegated to but a few popular ones.

When I hosted my brickfilming contest this year (SHAC), I admittedly, promoted it fairly weakly. (Non-promotion, more accurately) Aside from a slew of mentions during the contest on Twitter, and co-promoting it on BiM and Brick-a-brack, I didn't post anything on youtube, nor did I ask any other brickfilmers to promote it on other platforms. Yet, I still got more entrants than the summer contest, and even beat BRAWL's inaugural entrant number.

The community is obviously still strong, even if a bit smaller than it was before (when it was less connected, might I add). All we can really do to expand it is to amp up awareness. Not of BiM or individual brickfilmers, but of the films and hobby as a whole.

I completely agree with this statement.

YouTube  |  Twitter  |  Instagram  |  Frame100  |  Matthew 11:28-30

Ouch

You might have a point if it were my only reason for choosing the title. But even then, your accusation mischaracterizes what clickbait actually is. True clickbait is intentionally deceptive and the motive is almost always viewership for personal gain. My article is neither of those things. To say that eye catching titles are bad when they headline honest and constructive opinions is to impugn every journalist that's ever published an opinion piece.

I'd also say that your tone here might imply that I've struck a nerve. I know you did not want a thread created for this topic because it allows people to express themselves in as many words as they need, but assuming you're an open-minded individual, I can't imagine why. Wanting to suppress discussion for any reason doesn't look good on anyone. It signals that their ideas alone aren't good enough to persuade folks on their own and protect the status quo. If an idea you don't like holds no water, then you should have no fear of others being convinced by it.

This comes off a bit hypocritical to me, Brick Tale, as you're both criticizing Nathan's succinct and intentionally head-strong banter, while at the same time seemingly putting down his viewpoint by sneeking in references to elitism "suppressed discussions" "letting people expless themselves" and the like. That's not needed on BiM.

No. Clickbait is any title/headline/image that grabs attention to the point of "baiting" people into reading/watching/clicking. I didn't mention this in my original post, but the article's headline is a bit clickbaity. A regular "catchy headline" or "impactful hook" is completely different. Words like "killed" and "community," when no one has actually died, aren't that far off from "What Killed Brony Fandom?", "Why the Last Jedi Failed," etc.

I'm not meaning to suppress discussion - only, I'm (as an admin) trying to keep this thread on topic. This could easily divolve into argument from here - and that's not only bad for critical reaction, but also will make the community look bad. Be respectful of everyone's opinion - even if it is in the form of a jest or a put-down. Don't attack their approach just because it may weaken your own argument.

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