Hello everyone!
This wasn't supposed to be the first post of the new year but alas, I am still working on that one off and on again because of course, I gave myself another massive prompt. Ha!
Today's topic will discuss the future of digital communications in the hobby and a bit of an anchor point to note how we got where we are now (to the best of my knowledge, I wasn't around to experience all of it myself).
We're talking about this today, because it was revealed this week that a certain social media app that focuses on short form video content looks to finally be driven off the market after a number of attempts by the US. Should this plan come to pass, the app will no longer be available new in app stores and existing copies will not receive software updates, which will eventually render the service unusable.
While it is not a platform that I have participated in directly, it is certainly an incredibly influential social media empire. Most of my exposure to it has come in the form of re-uploads to other social media platforms and sites. Honestly, I owe quite a large chunk of my mental health self-discovery in the last few years or so to folks sharing their lived experiences on the platform, which drastically changed the views I had on a diagnosis that made me realize I was actually one of them. For that, I will always be grateful.
The model horse hobby experienced quite a spike in community growth in 2020/2021, as folks were not able to travel and cut out other expenses or activities, this led to a large number of people rediscovering old hobbies or gaining new ones. I believe that the app we're discussing had a hand in helping that along. Consider that some of the biggest hobby accounts have accrued *millions* of views across their videos - in comparison to other popular social platforms which are similar, the differences are simply staggering.
Prior to the current era of digital media, there have been many ways in which hobbyists have communicated.
The hobby as we know it today first originated in the 1960's. Young people have always been the pioneers of the hobby and back then, it was no exception. Horse loving teens and 20-somethings were the backbone that built our foundation. Folks found each other organically, first by chance meeting of other model fanciers in their local communities, and slowly expanding their networks by meeting mutual friends. Hand written letters (penpals) and even phone calls were common for building relationships. By and by, these bright eyed young folks founded clubs based on model horse interests, local, regional, and later, national/international. Through these clubs, they created print newsletters and held photo shows.
As these clubs and friendships grew, the newsletters gained more polish, shows grew in size, and live shows became more commonplace as well. In 1975, Breyer itself joined the media party and began publishing JAH. The format within the first few years went from a small folded brochure to an actual more substantial magazine by 1979. In 1984, the publication schedule grew to 5x per year, and in 1995 the bi-monthly (every other month) releases that maintained through 2010. Prior to 1984, there were 4 or fewer editions per year.
Through JAH, collectors were able to gain a larger reach to their community by advertising models for sale, penpal requests, and event announcements in the Classifieds section. (I am not certain how early that was introduced, since I don't own any copies of JAH prior to the 90's I believe.)
In the 90's, the advent of more widely available internet brought to life a number of internet forums and discussion boards, especially the tech-savvy folks of Gen X and elder millennial age who were the young adults and teens at the time. Forums such as Model Horse Blab (which still exists), Fallen-Leaves, Cascade Models (I am not sure if that's the full name but I'm recalling "cascade" as a term linked to forums so I think that's at least a partial name of one, please forgive any errors!), and Yahoo Groups. Beginning in this era was also blogging - a practice which has ebbed and flowed in popularity since, but has maintained at least some level of presence throughout as a media preference of the hobby community.
Forums continued to be the mainstay of digital communication into the 2000's (and by "2000's" I only mean the first 10 years) alongside the print media hobby magazines, though unfortunately the print media side fell off drastically throughout the decade as internet reach expanded, and most outside of JAH did not even make it to 2010. I don't recall much hobby adoption of sites like MySpace at that time, and other social media/video content sites didn't gain traction in the community until a little bit later - the last few years of the decade did see some early establishment of the YouTube hobbyist community.
Once we reach the 2010's, things get a bit more granular as technology moved forward at a rapid pace. JAH ceased the bi-monthly format in 2010. 4 issues were published in 2011, and then the magazine became a once-a-year publication in 2012, tied to enrollment in the Collector Club as a perk for members. This format has remained for the past 12 years.
Interest in forums as the mainstay of hobby communication began to fall off in the early 2010's. While the "book of faces" site drew in the current young people at its introduction (millennials), I'd say by around 2012 or so it had caught the attention of the older generations and within just a couple of years it was no longer considered the "hot place to be" for the Zillennials (micro-generation between millennials and Gen Z usually considered to be folks born in the late 90's and occasionally the first couple years of the 00's) and eldest Gen Z. However, the site quickly established a popular hobby following, and events like the closure of Yahoo Groups and rifts within the forum communities served to support this.
The "groups" feature in particular has been a popular way to connect with like-minded hobbyists. There are endless options, it seems, both from the perspective of various niches within the hobby, but also a lot of overlap on the same topics because anyone can make a group. As a result, there's some duplication because either folks aren't aware of the other groups existing...or they don't get along with the other group owners. I could probably make a whole long rant about how the Groups format is really poor for archiving discussions, bringing new people up to speed, and actively contributes to rifts within the community, but that should be for another post.
For better or worse, Books of Faces has maintained its dominance over the majority of hobby discourse, despite the very many folks who refuse to use it for a variety of reasons. While other social platforms have proved efficient at connecting individual hobbyists and forming bubbles of friends that way, they don't offer the same wide reach/wide coverage of various demographics or easily searchable older conversations the way forums did. So, while it may be easier to find friends, it's harder to be exposed to a wide variety of hobby knowledge unless you know other people who are already into that or you know where to look. That's simpler coming from those of us who came into the age of social media already decently well or very well informed on the breadth the hobby has to offer, but I imagine it can be difficult for anyone jumping in without that prior foundation.
As the 2010's progressed past the first few years, a new social site joined the mix - while it's main focus at the time was sharing images rather than discussion, it was the new preferred platform of the youngest generation. It became a nice way for folks to showcase their hobby art and collections. However, as the decade progressed, that platform was purchased and some of the functionality was changed along the way. It's still a good option for sharing photos and video, but it is no longer the newest one. I do expect that with the dropping off of the app formally known as "music . ly" some folks may return to the older mainstay, especially since it has similar video posting options.
Before we get too far into the decade, we do need to address the foundation of the video sharing digital chapter, YouTube. As I stated above, YT with its foundations as a site for folks to share their lives and artistic creations was a good fit for small niche hobbies like ours, especially before all of the commercialization came along. In the late 2000's, some hobbyists began posting content to the site (for example, I think the earliest BreyerFest coverage videos I've found date back to 06 or 07, though they're mostly videos of the covered arena performances).
The primary age group of hobbyists posting to YT in the early years ranged from young millennial to elder Gen Z, though it definitely skewed younger than some of the other sites we've discussed (in terms of earliest adopters). As such, there was less focus on hobby discussion topics for educational purposes and more artistic related endeavors. Making films using models as "actors" was a very popular niche within this community. There were also collection tours and other styles of video that appealed to a wider demographic, but broadly, the early YT hobby circle & audience was teens and younger. (On a personal note, I was in college at the time I discovered hobby YT I think, probably around 09/10 when the model horse films were definitely the Hot Thing, and I was just a bit too old to appreciate the genre.)
Hobby videos in general continued in popularity into the early 2010's, but I believe they dropped off for a while after that, as the creators either aged out of their interest in the genre or life got busier for them. It's been interesting to watch over the past 10 years or so as there have been a few "calls to return" to breathe life into the genre, both from creators returning to their channels and from younger folks who grew up watching the original content and were inspired by it. Along the way, haul videos became popular, as well as reviews of events (especially BreyerFest), and even more educational/historical content. There are a number of millennial and older folks who have made their own channels, more than back in the earliest days at least. YT offers short form video content as well, so it will be another potential migration option. It's also one of the longest-standing platforms around these days.
And now we loop back around to the mid-2010's. As another beloved social platform met its demise, our main character for today started gaining interest. (I do not believe there was ever much hobby activity on that 6-second video platform.) Originally, Main Character started life with another name and had a reputation for an oddly specific genre - teen boys lip-syncing to music. However, that app eventually became the titan we know today, gaining notoriety over the late 2010's and then having a massive spike in 2020, because millions of people were stuck at home needing some distraction and entertainment.
During the past 5 years in particular, BreyerTok as a community grew in size and became beloved by many. It has particular attachment from Gen Z and Gen Alpha, who are the early adopters of this tech. Of course, like other social sites, there are also plenty of older users - though I believe this is largely millennials and Gen X. BreyerTok has had the power to reach folks who felt alone in their enjoyment of Breyer/the hobby and empowered teens and kids to feel more comfortable in their love of horses rather than having to hide it in every aspect of their lives. I hope this helps with the common trope of either packing away or selling off entirely collections in high school/college/in a young relationship out of fear of judgement (though it's still totally valid to pause hobby involvement for time constraint reasons of course), only to later regret that decision and jump in again later in life.
So, where do we go from here? I do believe that since the app is video-focused, platforms like YT and IG will offer the closest alternative in structure. But there's certainly also opportunity for new apps to launch and court those who need to migrate (I've heard a little bit of talk about this, there might be something coming). As far as other hobby connections go, there are the older platforms of FB or even the potential for forums to make a comeback. (FB while it has been going downhill in spurts over the last decade+, is facing down its own potential for mass migration, though out of users being fed up with how it's run more than anything - there's just no similar alternative that's presented itself at the moment.)
There are also other modern platforms like Discord which offer a different format for communication. I do like Discord, it offers a decent amount of customization for guiding different topics of discussion into defined categories, but for going back and reading historical discussions I don't think it's the strongest. It also requires knowledgeable folks at the helm of a server, and a good balance of activity + easy enough conversation to follow & jump in. Servers are also "islands" that aren't connected to anything larger, so say if you're in one server that focuses on hobby art, you'd need to know someone who is in a photo show server if you want to talk about that and your current server doesn't have a space for it.
I've noticed an uptick in folks in my circle talking about bringing back or starting blogs or getting around to making things on YT, which is certainly nice! I may not jump on the blog train as hard, but since I do have an existing space for it, so I can write more often if I choose to.
I don't know if there's very much interest in live streaming as far as the hobby goes, which YT offers but there are also sites dedicated to streaming. It's not a hobby that lends itself the best to that sort of thing the way gaming does. Some folks may have an interest in watching art streams as something to give them the motivation to do the same or have relaxing content going in the background. Maybe there'd be some interest in a hobby educational, Q&A type stream where the creator sets a topic each stream and answers live questions? Unfortunately streaming is not the most practical media option, especially since it's often super long form content (1 hr+) and unless you go with the YT option you have to have an external site (like YT) to archive your streams to so anyone who missed can go back and watch.
I'd also like to shout out Model Horse University for working on a site that's a hub for a variety of hobby related endeavors - education primarily, but also links to artists' websites, event notices, and other group based activities. You can find that here: https://modelhorseuniversity.com/ At the moment, the only social-based service offered is the posting of links to hobby zoom gatherings.
Regardless of where you make your hobby digital "home", I very much echo the sentiments of many successful creators I follow to diversify your avenues! It's not a good idea, especially for anyone making money off their content, to solely have a presence in one location. Those who have somewhere to jump off from the migration already will fare this tough time better than those who have to start over new.
If you made it to the end, hooray! Here are a couple of photos of new arrivals in January!
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