Topics can be opened, you can comment and chat with fellow club members, you get a notification when a topic is made 'Top Spot' and pinned, there's also a bunch of emoticons that influenced a line of IdentiTee shirts, and you can also hire managers to help you run the club. Sounds good so far. This is the gist.

From this point, clubs have tons of usages: role play, advertising, chatting, winning items, and some have even conducted campaigns for dolls to win certain trophies. But if I remember well, that kind of club is outlawed during MSW season, as it features a single doll. You can even just congregate with dolls that have similar interests as you. Nobody's posting but maybe you can message that one doll to talk about... nuclear physics for example.

If only it would be that simple.

Let's consider the technical aspect of the clubs, first. The system overall is pretty updated. If the club is getting bigger, it means you'd have to leave and join the club again to get notifications when a top spot topic is pinned. If 50 more dolls do the same... well yeah, you have to constantly repeat the process. There's no reliable way to get notifications. On the other side, you can get notifications even if you are a fairly old member of the club - but it means that you're among the only 50 dolls that do get them. The others will be as frustrated as you have been.

There's also the whole Forbidden Language thing. Dude. Sometimes you can't post something because it shows up as 'Forbidden Language' and you don't even know what to correct, so you have to resort to sending someone a private message, checking in what you sent, and see what has shown up in asterisks. Normally, the little misspell should be underlined so you can correct it before posting.

Can we also talk about how you can't 'subscribe' to a certain topic and get notifications about that? If you do a role play, for example, you'd have to refresh the page every single moment, paranoid, that maybe someone replied and you're supposed to do something. If there was a feature I'd love to have implemented in clubs, it is a notification subscription. And maybe, if someone quotes and replies to you, it would also be cool if you were notified. Tell me it's not a good idea. Of course, you could opt-out of it if you don't want to get any sorts of notifications.

The club system is outdated and I'm sure I'm not the only one who resorted to third-party social platforms to keep in touch better with my fellow club members and friends.

What other technical suggestions do you guys have for clubs? I'd be more than happy to even write about them if I have enough.

Now, let's move onto the social aspect of the clubs. Oh boy, here we go again.

Look, it's a game and we are all human behind the monitors. And because we are human, we are far from perfect and we can and do make terrible mistakes. This means that it's pretty natural to have encountered all sorts of unpleasant experiences in clubs, just like we did while chatting with strangers and joined parties. Am I right or am I right?

I've seen all kinds of people joining, owning, and managing clubs. There are the newbies that joined solely for the Academy task and bury several topics and posts in emoji and gibberish. Dude, people have been put effort to open and keep engaging discussions. Why did you do that? Why don't you just try to actually read and give input to what's happening around you? I mean sure, it's just a task, but instead of putting random emojis, just say 'I like seals too!' in the StopSealKilling club (for example) and be done with it. If you start to grow roots in this game, you wouldn't like others to mess up your topics when someone wants to mess them up.

Have you also seen those tyrannic club owners around? Belittling and holding tight leashes on their club members and even managers? Not only that I, used to tug at my collar from time to time, but it's pretty unnerving to see real people, dolls, believing that owning a club is giving them God-like rights over their members, who usually say nothing so they can get, sometimes, a free gift. Yes, having everyone trample over your work is not a good thing. But neither is snapping everyone in half for daring to step wrong. I'm just saying, it's a game. 

Now, luckily, the amount of NSFW material has been toned down a lot on this site. I mean, it's nothing compared to the 2010s. And even if most of us, the players, grew up, you will still see your average Disney Channel villain wanna-be trying to belittle you and others for all kinds of reasons. Now that I look back, I find it pretty ridiculous, but the 14-year-old me and younger were affected far more than I wish I had been. It's much more serious the younger you are, and even when you're grown up, it can leave metaphorical scars. Or can even affect you in adulthood.

But every platform has mean players, trolls, gossip-and-drama-mongers, and people with superiority complexes. Stardoll is no different. What I wish for was an even more efficient way to keep out the bullies and harassers.

And yet, after the storm, comes the sun. I have personally met lots of incredible people while owning, joining, and managing clubs, and I'd give them up for nothing. You just have to have the patience to navigate through the glitches.

The Club System needs a major overhaul, but removing it altogether permanently would do more bad than good, in my opinion.

But I'm not done yet. Let's see what Pim and ADU have to say about clubs!

"The Good: Participating in contests, and the opportunity to meet new people. It's probably best to only check-in for updates from staff.

The Bad: Drama. It can get toxic in discussions that are not related to fashion. Its as if some people treat it like high school. It can get cliquey. Imagine a bunch of 20-somethings just gathering out of boredom. Not everyone feels welcome due to the language barrier or a sense of intimidation due to differences in views.

The Ugly: Whenever someone decides to treat the Royalty Club as a trash bin to bash on anything, including staff, and complain, I can feel my brain cells deteriorate. People turn into angry mobs and turn on each other for really trivial reasons. Sometimes the demands can be really unreasonable. I used to think “If people spent more time trying to fight the right causes, and volunteered the time they spend hating on SD forums, in real life, the world would be a better place.” Considering current events, I think I may have been right."

~ AllDolledUp, 2k20

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“I’ve never been a huge fan of clubs on Stardoll. The feature seems outdated and it takes a fair amount of effort to actually find a club that’s active and keep it running. I’ve joined very few clubs, and often times don’t join more even when asked to. It adds clutter and while I am willing to vote for people if they leave a genuine comment, I just hate being asked to join 5 random clubs a day that I know won’t be active. I also don’t like the concept of clubs that offer rewards for getting new members, it seems kind of like a Ponzi scheme if you ask me. Chats or private messages offer easier communication, and to be honest I just don’t see how a club is worth the effort.”

 

~ Pimient0, 2k20

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I want to thank my friends for their insights! But now...

 

What do YOU guys think about the clubbing system? What's to change? What do you love? What do you hate? Tell us in the comments for free internet points. Seriously, I will read them. 

Cheers!