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Old 06-27-2017, 12:27 PM   #141
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I believe another reason for golf's decline is the amount of time it takes to play a round that doesn't have the action of a video game , considering how attention spans have gotten shorter. Being out on a course for 3-4 hours is exhausting for some people to think about.

One of my friends says his kids will happily play video game golf, but when he got them onto an actual course they were bored and complained on how long it was taking ("this isn't like the video game!"). Interesting.
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Old 06-27-2017, 01:37 PM   #142
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One of my friends says his kids will happily play video game golf, but when he got them onto an actual course they were bored and complained on how long it was taking ("this isn't like the video game!"). Interesting.
I took music lessons a few years ago during the time that the game Guitar Hero was popular. The instructor told me that he had a lot of new students that thought guitar would be cool but every one of them quit once they found out it wasn't that easy to play.
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Old 06-27-2017, 01:51 PM   #143
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I've been involved in trying to stem the decline in sailing and golf where I live, and it's not gone well. Right or wrong, the reasons given are:
  • less disposable income nowadays, golf and boating are more expensive than they used to be (relatively)
  • outdated rules & structure (with exceptions, an acute and totally unnecessary problem with golf & sailing IMO)
  • fewer two parents households
  • where families used to do some activities together, kids grow out of that much younger these days - would rather be caught dead than with Mom & Dad outside the house
  • way more competing activities now, sailing & golf don't have a chance with younger generations up against snowboarding, skateboarding, BMX, and many others, etc.
  • being outside doing anything is less common today, edged out by social media & gaming in more cases
  • many of the old pastimes take too long (all day), move too slow
  • and mostly if you've seen yacht and golf country clubs median age lately, why would anyone younger than 50 want to hang out there?
IME a majority of Boomers are hastening the path to oblivion for golf and sailing by trying to "uphold tradition" and resist any real attempts to change to attract younger generations. The changes they support are poorly implemented window dressing more often than not, and yet declining participation is one of the most common topics for conversation...
I too have explored the decline in sail boat racing from a theoretical point of view. Mainly because no one in power on the race committee wants to hear from a 38 year old just entering the sport on how it can be improved. My top observations over the past 11 years:

A) Fees for nothing. PHRF certs every year, sailing USA membership, race fees, where the fees for 1 entry is 2-3X the value of the first place prize. Then the race committee uses gov't marks, and a couple of cans of air.
B) Same winners with no PHRF adjustments to the boat year after year. Many of the boats who win year after year have stripped the boat, which was selected because of favorable PHRF ratings. This puts the "family" boat guy at a severe disadvantage. PHRF adjustment at the club or area level should be implemented to level the playing field for "beer can races".
C) Costly upgrades can mean the difference between winning and losing. If it costs you $5K+ every 3 years for new sails to stay competitive, wheres the fun in blowing college tuition, and future retirement just to play.
D) Long work hours... It seems very difficult for people to knock off a bit early every now and then for sailing.
E) Kiddie activities... Everyone is so involved in being at every ballgame their kid plays.

In my opinion AB&C can be controlled to help breathe life into the sport. D&E are shifts beyond the control of the race committees.
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Old 06-27-2017, 01:51 PM   #144
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Remember a guy walking into a local music store asking one of the guys if they had those guitars that play themselves.
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Old 06-27-2017, 01:51 PM   #145
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I agree that it is a fabulous game. I play both party and duplicate but much prefer duplicate because it, as you state, avoids the lucky cards factor, and the bidding is usually much more rational. Bidding boxes also are better than verbal bidding in several ways.

There is a local ACBL but they charge $8 for the beginner games and they seem to be an insular and offputting group from what I can gather. I'll probably play there sometime soon just to see for myself.

That's OK though, I play with my duplicate learning group weekly, another duplicate learning group monthly, my Dad's Friday group, my Dad's monthly group, my Dad's friends' twice-monthly duplicate group, and occasionally with my Dad's friends' Tuesday group.

I do try sometimes to get friends my age interested in the game but it's hard to convey its appeal. There is somewhat of an initial learning curve to get over that I think requires some motivation to start.
Sounds like you're into it with all the playing you do. Great. You're right about the learning curve. I laugh to myself when people talk about how they are good euchre players. They have no idea.

Sorry on the club experiences. That's unlikely to happen at our place & would be quickly dealt with when it did. Jerks are everywhere. It's self-defeating to put people off. Looks like there's a beginner's game on Thursday at 1230 at the Boise Cooperative. I think you'd find that the most inviting.

Clubs charge same to beginners & experienced folks alike. Beginners are probably more work for directors! $8 is within typical range to play though on the high side of average. I'd say $7 is average & have seen $5-12.

Duplicate players on average know WAY more about the game than party/social players (Money games are another story yet.), so bidding would be more rational. Fascinating to me all the different systems people use. Good Luck.
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Old 06-27-2017, 02:07 PM   #146
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Sounds like you're into it with all the playing you do. Great. You're right about the learning curve. I laugh to myself when people talk about how they are good euchre players. They have no idea.

Sorry on the club experiences. That's unlikely to happen at our place & would be quickly dealt with when it did. Jerks are everywhere. It's self-defeating to put people off. Looks like there's a beginner's game on Thursday at 1230 at the Boise Cooperative. I think you'd find that the most inviting.

Clubs charge same to beginners & experienced folks alike. Beginners are probably more work for directors! $8 is within typical range to play though on the high side of average. I'd say $7 is average & have seen $5-12.

Duplicate players on average know WAY more about the game than party/social players (Money games are another story yet.), so bidding would be more rational. Fascinating to me all the different systems people use. Good Luck.
Unfortunately, it's the people running the Boise joint who are the problem. They are apparently curmudgeonly and not welcoming to new players. But if I did play there, yes, the Thursday beginner's game is the one I would go to.

I played in a party game the other day where the lady running the game announced that partnerships getting set would be required to pay 10 cents per trick (20 cents if vulnerable or doubled, 40 cents if vulnerable and doubled) into a kitty that went to the overall winner. My Dad (life master) and I didn't like this because it skewed the bidding. Still felt that way after my Dad turned out to be the overall winner. $6 for first plus $10.60 in dimes. My Dad and I are good enough that over time we probably make back our entry fees plus a little, but I consider it to be cheap entertainment. Entry is usually $1/person and we play for 2-3 hours.

I've only been playing a year, but I play pretty much Audrey Grant / SAYC. The only modification I personally have made is that I will open 1NT with 2 doubletons. My Dad and I also have a partnership agreement that a 2NT response means support for opener's suit plus slam interest. One of my teachers says that it is much better to play the basic stuff consistently well rather than the complicated stuff poorly, so that's what I'm focusing on now. Oh, and trying to get better at counting suits. I can usually count four suits through 7 or 8 tricks, but when people start sluffing it gets tricky. It's also turning out not to be as valuable to me as I thought, since it takes away focus from other things and on defense at least there are not that many times where you have a choice that ends up making a difference.
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Old 06-27-2017, 02:10 PM   #147
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Old 06-27-2017, 04:01 PM   #148
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My 84-year-old father still laments the loss of groups of friends standing around a piano at parties singing old songs.
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Old 06-27-2017, 04:16 PM   #149
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My 84-year-old father still laments the loss of groups of friends standing around a piano at parties singing old songs.
We sit around a fire and sing along to acoustic guitars. And one nice thing about smart phone technology and the internet is that you can easily find the lyrics and chord changes to virtually any song you want.
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Old 06-27-2017, 04:34 PM   #150
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Fully agree. Did Palau in 2016 and loved it. We just can't bring ourselves to prioritize diving in colder water so Galapagos and Cocoa Islands remain on the list but may never do those. Too many warm water places we haven't done yet! [emoji41]
Just out of curiosity did the boats in Palau have ladders? Back in 1988 when I dove there (on a business trip to Indonesia) it was a small boat with a back roll entry and being pulled into the boat.
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Old 06-27-2017, 04:38 PM   #151
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I was going to say jump roping, but then I heard a young woman on MPR this morning who apparently is a Double Dutch champion.

A lot of youthful pastimes are gone it seems: paper dolls, color by number, homemade clay/salt figures, model airplanes, embroidery.

Hunting and fishing still seem big here in MN and WI. Bridge is popular here too, at least in my crowd, as is charades.
I suspect drones have taken over from flying model airplanes.
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Old 06-27-2017, 04:40 PM   #152
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Wow, I think that was going the way of the Dinosaur when i was a kid, I never knew anyone that played it.
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Old 06-27-2017, 05:13 PM   #153
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This is a great thread, but I'm way too late to it. So I'll combine several comments into one post.

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So after reading this thread, which was quite interesting, I think we can conclude that "things change over time". Big question is "is the change accelerating?" Seems obvious that it is but why? Probably demographics (baby boomers aging) and technology? Any other theories?
One of my favorite philosophers, Eric Hoffer, once commented that the only constant about change is that the rate of change always continues to accelerate. If you think about it, that has always been true and pretty much explains why older people have more trouble adjusting to new technology.
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Shooting sport. My kids don't want to even touch the firearm.
Surprisingly, they might change their minds later. I got DW interested in shooting about ten years ago, and she has since influenced at least a couple dozen of her friends to try it. I was amazed.

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True enough, but try to tell that to a bicyclist. A while back these people at least used bells or said "passing right". Now they just silently fly by at 15-20 mph.
This might be a regional thing. I walk/run on bike/pedestrian pathways all the time, and 95% of cyclists here are very polite, using "On your left" as notification that they are passing.
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Old 06-27-2017, 05:20 PM   #154
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Originally Posted by jollystomper View Post
I believe another reason for golf's decline is the amount of time it takes to play a round that doesn't have the action of a video game , considering how attention spans have gotten shorter. Being out on a course for 3-4 hours is exhausting for some people to think about.

One of my friends says his kids will happily play video game golf, but when he got them onto an actual course they were bored and complained on how long it was taking ("this isn't like the video game!"). Interesting.
I took a lesson from a pro recently, and she noted that an 18 hole round, which usually takes 4 hours +/- 30 minutes, only requires 15 minutes of real focus/concentration at most. If you average 90 strokes, that's 10 seconds per shot, sounds reasonable to me. That means the other 3 hours 45 minutes are spent walking, driving, waiting, talking, etc. I like golf, but the kids may have a point?
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Old 06-27-2017, 05:36 PM   #155
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I am going to ask without googling it myself (intentionally) - I wonder how golf is doing in Scotland?


Golf was more of a people's game (not the elite), originally. Also, "the people" mostly played stroke play games, which is much quicker than medal (pick up when your out of the hole - when the match is over head back to the 19th hole directly...). I feel that agonizing over a 3-footer for a 7 on a par 4 epitomizes some of the time problems with golf in the US particularly.
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Old 06-27-2017, 05:44 PM   #156
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Good point. But you forget that in this case the injured party put himself in the injurers domain. Not true on the public sideWALK!

One thing that does help us walkers (including default walkers like me who own no car or bicycle)is that our sidewalks are in such bad repair that anything other than a trail bike will ruin tires and wheels in a week of use by the usual sidewalk loving bicyclists.

Ha
Ha, I stayed in your neighbourhood (Capitol Hill) a few years ago. It's a lovely neighbourhood with lots of trees. I found the sidewalks quite dangerous, because the concrete pavers had been pushed upwards by tree roots. I had to constantly watch my step to avoid doing a pratfall.
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Old 06-27-2017, 06:06 PM   #157
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I come from a family of golfers and never could get excited about it- maybe because I have poor gross motor co-ordination, although I also find it boring. Why spend all morning on a course when I can get in a good cardio workout in a fraction of the time and be better off?

Another thing that may have killed golf- they lifted the restrictions on women too slowly. Many clubs allowed only men to become full members, meaning that a single female executive who wanted a membership so she could entertain clients there couldn't join. Even more had times when only men were allowed on the course- an artifact from the times when men worked full-time and women had more flexibility. Enlightened employers stopped paying for employees' memberships to clubs that were "exclusive" in one way or another and that meant a lot of golf clubs.

And I still think it may have been because it's slow and boring!
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Old 06-27-2017, 06:11 PM   #158
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Agree with others... hunting and fishing seem to be languishing.

Also, square dancing. Golf is more slowly going away.

We go to the movies quite often. In sarasota there is a theater that is $2 in the afternoon and $2.50 at night... popcorn is reasonably priced as well... a small popcorn and soft drink for $5.

Here at home, senior price is $4 and popcorn about $6.
Hunting and fishing have indeed been languishing, which is why state parks/wildlife departments are trying to get more involved with birdwatching, which is still growing.
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Old 06-27-2017, 06:15 PM   #159
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Old 06-27-2017, 06:18 PM   #160
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When i retired I was all gung ho to go fishing. I remember my father taking me maybe once or twice and I went a few times with maybe 50 people from work. I had a blast. I go on a half day charter, Im sipping my morning coffee, almost everyone was drunk within the first 2 hours of the trip. Fishing was the furthest thing from their minds. When i came home the bride asked me you think you want to try the full day one? Hahahaha. Yeah, fishing like I just described is off the list now too.
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