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Conflict between sissyfighters and these two camps shifted, likewise, from the playground in 2000 and onto the boards in 2001. Generally, insults concerned board skill and style, not gaming ability or personal digs, (although these became more common towards end of 2001). Cloning was more important activity on the boards in threads, not in rooms on the playground (Cons!ckster, AlvaStar's possie, St.Shrew); and thus so multisessioning became the use of "Sockpuppets" with which to post in a disguised manner. No not "playground cheat", nor "playground clone" as in 2000, but "board troll", "board hoaxer" or "board sock" became the most favoured put-down lines in the game sissyfightv2001.

In sissyfightv2001 opinion of a player's sissyfighting ability was thus judged on their board style, skill and strategy first (so long as they posted to the boards) playground gaming ability and personal attributes, second. The playground was now merely the extension of board gaming activity, not vice versa, as the year before.

This is well-demonstrated by an event I witnessed the eve sissyfight player nicorrete was known to have broken his back in an accident, prompting many concerned posts on the boards.

Basically, I was in a room that night (using a sock) with Ray-Ray31 when she severely caution what seemed to be a newbie (in a chat-happy good mood). It had entered the room and had interrupted the silence that had broken out, and for this reason it had apparently disrespected nicorrette. Ray-Ray31 acted as if the game was a thread, that the newbie "obviously" had to know all about nic, and that the playground game was subservient to events of gaming life on the boards: the newbie was in the wrong so should leave the room. Naturally, the newbie appeared confused and left shortly thereafter.

Towards end of 2001, however, many were getting very frustrated with the intense fights on the boards. Wooman's Christmas suicide threat perhaps can be seen as the symbolic death of board gaming. Although the cry for help was almost certainly a legitimate one, not a game, the reactions to it exposed that people of all "classes" were sick to death of being suspicious about everything people wrote to the boards; in some sense they wanted certainty, to know the real from the fake, and board gaming did not provide this.

This urge for reality increased in line with the growth of personal contact between sissyfight players in 2001 (by correlation I wouldn't indicate causation, although the two might be related). Particularly, "sissy-meets" began to become more organised and increasingly influenced the nature of the games on the board, and this set the scene for the next stage of sissyfight, version 2002.

Sissyfight2002: The Year of the Community

In Sissyfight2002 the game is set to get more personal. You thought the Christmas period was bad? There is more of that to come, but it might not feel so bad because we'll become unthinkingly accustomed to it, like we have the other changes. Now, the game is evolving to a stage where the people - we are no longer "players" - will be judged on personal attributes first, board skills second, gaming ability third. Real people and real identities will increasingly become attacked on the pretext of maintaining "community spirit". A battle concerning what one's personal identity is with respect to what the community identity is (what things the community believes in and stands for in terms of tastes, beliefs, who has right to speak their mind and what they can say when they do), will likely be central to sissyfightv2002.

Thus in 2002 people will be judged less on sissyfighting ability, or board personality (the "talkingtina effect") or other board gaming skills. They will be judged on who they are (or appear to be) in reality. The boards (and playground) will increasingly mediate sissyfightv2002 games going on, for many, "behind the scenes" in real life, as personal contact between players increases further and people become more interested in personal issues and their real-life news events.