The conversation moved to http://ask.clojure.org ? (Just guessing)

People have just stopped using it in preference to other forums

Clojurians Slack, Clojurians Zulip, Clojureverse, http://Ask.clojure.org , Clojure Redit and occasionally stack exchange/overflow were alternative channels that became more widely used than the mailing lists (for many different reasons) I didnt even think to include the various Clojure mailing lists when I wrote an article on connecting with the community https://practical.li/blog/posts/cloure-community-getting-help/

they still exist and I moderate things there but I think discussion have moved elsewhere

Thank you everyone. > Clojurians Slack, Clojurians Zulip, Clojureverse, http://Ask.clojure.org , Clojure Redit I will add discloj too. All these places come after 2018?

Some of them started before 2018, I think, but there were years of overlap where mailing list use decreased, while use of those other things increased.

It is highly unusual for any decent size community of users to switch overnight from one communication mode to another.

unless the old way was simply no longer available.

There is a graph I made summarizing the % of Clojure survey respondents that used some of these communication modes, by year, collected over the last 5-6 years or so, where you can easily see the % of people using the mailing lists gradually decreased over multiple years, and other things increased over multiple years. I don't recall the link to that chart right now, unfortunately.

@U0CMVHBL2 if the link springs to mind later, I'd be curious to see it!

@U04V70XH6 Do you happen to recall the location of the graph I am thinking of? I think I added a page to some site that you showed me a couple of years ago, with background on the question of whether/how to "move" the Clojure community from one communication mode to another.

Found it: https://github.com/clojurians/community-development/blob/master/clojurians-slack-archive-notes.md (the chart I am referring to is at the end of that page)

Looks like I have not updated the chart in several years....

A significant update since that page was written, of course, is that we are currently enjoying the benefit of a free commercial Slack license for Clojure, although that free gift might be taken away at the decision of people at Slack at their discretion.

Thanks Andy, I appreciate it!

Here's the image in case anyone else is curious:

yes appreciate the work!

Interesting that only the mailing lists really took a big hit while everything else was mostly stable... ...I suppose IRC took a hit took, but I think a lot of that was due to problems on freenode (and why it moved to libera instead)?

https://www.surveymonkey.com/stories/SM-_2BH3b49f_2FXEkUlrb_2BJSThxg_3D_3D/

Q17 is now for comparison

That doesn't even list IRC... was it deliberately not an option or were responses just statistically insignificant?

things that get very low in responses get dropped. in 2021, we only had 14 people that said they used irc, so it was dropped in 2022 and that carried through to 2023

Ah, thanks. That makes sense.

2022 had 17 irc mentions in the other open response, 2023 had 1 irc mention

@U05KCAL988Y This Slack started in March 2015. I'm not sure when ClojureVerse and Zulip got started. I think Zulip was 2018? > All these places come after 2018?

@alexmiller Thanks for that surveymonkey link for 2023 results. Is the raw data available there somewhere? I only saw the charts.

I am adding 2021, 2022, and perhaps 2023 (if I can get the raw data) to that chart. So far after 2020 looks like no major changes, except for the expected swap in numbers between in-person and on-line Clojure conference/meetups

Never mind. I think Google found the full results for me.

Hmm, maybe not. I keep getting a page that when I click on anything related to a chart, it shows me only that chart, but no numbers.

i.e. no tables of digits