Unfollowing Hunting Social Media Will Make Hunting Better: Matt Rinella Essay

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OregonSteeler said:
Touche....

But I also doubt they got the very initial "bug" of wanting to elk hunt by fumbling across Rokslide. They came here AFTER they watched BRO or ElkShape or whoever's YouTube video and wanted to become an elk hunter.

How many YouTube videos are about chukar hunting vs. elk hunting? Put more chukar YT vids up and that will second-handedly flow to higher participation in upland hunting focused web forums.
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I think you are probably right on this.
 
"Social media are interactive technologies that facilitate the creation and sharing of information, ideas, interests, and other forms of expression through virtual communities and networks." Wikipedia

and if you don't like Wikipedia, Oxford said about the same thing.

Not to diminish what previous posters have said "there is a difference in social media" Agree! Just don't want any of our valued members to make a hypocrite out of themselves.
 
I commend Randy taking time to address and answer individual questions to this thread. The fact he’s the only “influencer” to come here and join in the discussion says a lot about his character.

The radio silence from the other Social Media InstaFaceYTbros is revealing. Not that they’d jump online and join Rokslide, but this is a great thread had they had the balls to jump in and give their perspective.

I didn’t know many of those mentioned in this thread, so I spent some time on YT. Eye opening. Nothing I can relate to. But I’m 52, so I’m an old fart. 😎
 
Randy Newberg said:
With the character limit on Rokslide, I've quoted your last paragraph, as I think that summarizes your questions and critique. I will try my best to answer and I appreciate that you are honestly seeking an answer.
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You can't compare 1980's magazines to you and GoHunt's constant material on drawing options with a straight face. You and GoHunt explain the date, price, application requirements, everything down to tieing your shoe about applying for each western state. You also recommend that everyone apply in as many states as possible. It's clearly affecting draw odds, particularly in the last few years. You have stated that you're lowering the barrier of entry so more people can hunt the West. Now we're bearing the fruit of this effort.

Conservation is great and abundance mindsets are ideal. I think it's excellent to produce content regarding how to make an actual difference in putting more animals on the hill and opening up public land. So much of what you produce now seems to be how to apply and what states to apply for.

However, just talking about an abundance mindset without acknowledging growing scarcity for western hunting opportunities is unreasonable. Look at how people are moving to western states for lifestyle, hunting, etc. Huge numbers of new residents. Exploding nonresident application numbers. Abundance and creating more animals and access is not coming close to keeping up. When you aren't able to get enough tags to fill your show, that's when it'll hit home that scarcity is something to consider. At this time, you seem to have an idyllic hope that it'll all work and let's create more western hunters.

So it's selfish for western hunters to want to continue hunting a neighboring state, or even get tags in their state with all the new residents and nonresident applications? Is it selfish for eastern hunters to want to hunt their state for whitetail and go across the country to hunt the west as well? Everyone wants a tag or the second tag. Between the two selfish motivations I think the ones that live nearby and have hunted these areas for decades should be prioritized.

The door is closing quickly for nonresidents to have an opportunity to hunt the west without a bunch of points for deer and elk. You can pursue your message and show more respect for those who live in the west and don't want to see it more and more crowded due to influencer actions. Even if another state isn't the "best" value in your eyes, mentioning opportunities throughout the country would be helpful. Shifting to focusing more on predator hunting would be really helpful in addressing hunter congestion and point creep due to increased western hunt interest. It takes some researching but there are great public land hunts in the central and eastern US. If you want people to have a hunt experience to connect with hunting, hunting somewhere other than the west and for something other than deer or elk is what most people who aren't a resident of the western US are going to be looking at most every year coming up, unless they're sitting on high points in many states. That's the future.

You can pursue your goals without having such negative impacts on western hunters due to making it way too easy to apply and focusing prospective hunter interest on the "best" value options in a few Western states.
 
robby denning said:
And one final question, I haven't read through all the 18 pages, but everyone posting who's against social media is fully aware were all on social media right now? If that's been asked and debated, I'll delete
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I dont think Matt was saying not to use social media, even for hunting related stuff. I could be wrong, been a few days now since I read his article.

And I would also a forum is not comparable to Instagram/tiktokt/youtube/Facebook.

In order to find a forum like this one, someone has to search for it (for the most part) I found it with gear questions.

On a social media platform you have algorithms specifically designed to feed you stuff that will make you stay on them longer. Which can be manipulated by "influencers" which then can be sold to companies and so on.

Social media gives a distorted perspective of what hunting is, which is why Matt says if you're using it you should show the good and the bad.

Instagram is filled with people shooting elk, personally I can think of 1 person maybe 2 people that I personally know in real life that hunt elk, 1 that goes out west to do it. On Instagram it's everywhere.

Likewise I know a guy who probably hunted 30 days this year, never shot anything, how often do you see that on Instagram? And how many followers would a guy have if the real ratio of hunts to kills was shown?

Another thing Matt mentioned is that you never see guys showing what they do with their kill, no pictures of dishes, about the only thing you see is another grip and grin when it comes back from the taxidermist.
 
JRam07 said:
Another thing Matt mentioned is that you never see guys showing what they do with their kill, no pictures of dishes, about the only thing you see is another grip and grin when it comes back from the taxidermist.
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I agree with him. and we should show that angle if only for the sake of the nonhunter.

However, I never assume because a guy only posts G&G he's not into the meat angle.
 
Riflehuntr19 said:
You can't compare 1980's magazines to you and GoHunt's constant material on drawing options with a straight face. You and GoHunt explain the date, price, application requirements, everything down to tieing your shoe about applying for each western state. You also recommend that everyone apply in as many states as possible. It's clearly affecting draw odds, particularly in the last few years. You have stated that you're lowering the barrier of entry so more people can hunt the West. Now we're bearing the fruit of this effort.

Conservation is great and abundance mindsets are ideal. I think it's excellent to produce content regarding how to make an actual difference in putting more animals on the hill and opening up public land. So much of what you produce now seems to be how to apply and what states to apply for.

However, just talking about an abundance mindset without acknowledging growing scarcity for western hunting opportunities is unreasonable. Look at how people are moving to western states for lifestyle, hunting, etc. Huge numbers of new residents. Exploding nonresident application numbers. Abundance and creating more animals and access is not coming close to keeping up. When you aren't able to get enough tags to fill your show, that's when it'll hit home that scarcity is something to consider. At this time, you seem to have an idyllic hope that it'll all work and let's create more western hunters.

So it's selfish for western hunters to want to continue hunting a neighboring state, or even get tags in their state with all the new residents and nonresident applications? Is it selfish for eastern hunters to want to hunt their state for whitetail and go across the country to hunt the west as well? Everyone wants a tag or the second tag. Between the two selfish motivations I think the ones that live nearby and have hunted these areas for decades should be prioritized.

The door is closing quickly for nonresidents to have an opportunity to hunt the west without a bunch of points for deer and elk. You can pursue your message and show more respect for those who live in the west and don't want to see it more and more crowded due to influencer actions. Even if another state isn't the "best" value in your eyes, mentioning opportunities throughout the country would be helpful. Shifting to focusing more on predator hunting would be really helpful in addressing hunter congestion and point creep due to increased western hunt interest. It takes some researching but there are great public land hunts in the central and eastern US. If you want people to have a hunt experience to connect with hunting, hunting somewhere other than the west and for something other than deer or elk is what most people who aren't a resident of the western US are going to be looking at most every year coming up, unless they're sitting on high points in many states. That's the future.

You can pursue your goals without having such negative impacts on western hunters due to making it way too easy to apply and focusing prospective hunter interest on the "best" value options in a few Western states.
Click to expand...
Ok. We disagree. We all have different life experiences that can lead us to different perspectives to the same problem. I'm good with that.

You asked me questions. I answered them as honest and forthright as possible.

I hope you get a mailbox full of tags this year and you have a great season.
 
Justin Crossley said:
I think it's kinda weird to take pictures of your food but here you go... lol

View attachment 354938
Click to expand...

Here we go! Chicken fried elk burger I made for Cash a few weeks ago. Melts in mouth.

bec667f2443fa9274b0c4936140030e2.jpg


8ed2e95b1e13321c2e531be962311874.jpg


(I singlehandedly just tanked draw odds for cow elk)


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
It seems like these discussions usually get shut down before any hard questions get answered so it's nice to see some back and forth. It's your forum, delete this if you want, below will be both civil and honest, as it has been.

Based on the 20 pages of feedback and lots of support for Matt's perspective I know I'm not alone in being genuinely curious what your guys (@robby denning, Averys, Justin, Pro Staff) think about the article and Rokslide's role in the state of the union.

Forums themselves are what they are...lots of mostly good information sharing that can be chalked up to primarily "non-extractive" relationships to wildlife. Yes some unit specific stuff and photos with too much landscape cause issues, most have learned to keep that to themselves outside of pm's or e-mail. Many of us learn about conservation efforts and political issues (corner crossing for example) from forums that we might not have an informed opinion on otherwise, which is good. However this forum has launched a lot of influencers and as Robby noted, sold books, etc.

More than the general forum banter, I'm referring to what the article is talking about: relationships to wildlife that are extractive, monetarily driven, and "look at me". This is not an attack, it's a legitimate question about roles in fostering some unhealthy realities in western hunting.

How is selling waypoints to large bucks and bulls not a facilitation of taking directly from the resource for gain, without putting anything back into it?

There are staff, prostaff, and members here who's IG pages are full of industry hashtags and @'s (also some that aren't at all). For example, Jared Bloomgren's 11/4 and 11/23 IG posts; Justin Crossley's post from a couple days ago with the rifle. I don't know how to give examples without being specific...again this is not an attack, it's stating facts. How do you guys feel about Matt's perspective that's clearly antithetical to how you operate, and shared by many in the hunting community?

If all that stuff is justifiable to you because it's a business and you're making money then fair enough, it is what it is. It's a system that can put the product (cart) before the wildlife resource (horse) real quick, and has. I know the article helped me to do some careful thinking about my priorities and relationship to hunting.

Long story short, after hearing Randy's reasoning for doing what he does, why does Rokslide's Staff do what they do?
 
Randy,

Appreciate you wading into the mud on this one. It's a complex issue with valid points on both sides. I think it takes big stones to engage in this discussion at any level in a format as public as this one. That alone says something about your character to me...especially given the thoughtful responses you crafted. I agree that ALL of us tend to draw a line behind where we are standing. It's human nature. We all have moments of altruism of course, but if we're being honest with ourselves MOST of our decision making is driven by personal gain. Anyone that says otherwise is full of chit in my experience. You're drawing a line behind an approach that benefits you and your business, and others are drawing a line behind their own selfish motivations to have the type of hunt they desire...myself included of course.

I think both approaches have merits and it comes down to an issue of balance in my opinion. Too few hunters and we lack the allies necessary to preserve hunting opportunities over time. Too many hunters and the experience is sufficiently diminished that guys no longer enjoy the sport at all...and you end up back to the first issue.

I don't pretend to know the answer. I don't think there is just "one". What is good for one, is often to the detriment of another. That's certainly the case here. I do suspect you're going to see a continued erosion of NR opportunities in the west though. Non-residents don't vote in the states they hunt,.....and almost without exception that's how these decisions will get made. My own state of Idaho is going through this now, and it's going to get a lot tougher for NRs each and every year. Money can influence that to the contrary a bit, but when the dust settles that's what you'll see across the western landscape. OR, WA, and CA are harbingers for what's to come in the other states, and I don't see a way around it. It sucks for all of us quite honestly, but as you said that's the reality of a species that multiplies like rabbits.

I'm truly curious about something though. It might be rude to inquire, and forgive me the brashness of the inquiry, but you've categorized your businesses associated with hunting as a money-losing endeavor at least a couple of times now. The implication being that your efforts to promote hunting actually cost you money...and by associated that you're doing so primarily out of a self-less desire to promote an activity we all love.

Yet, I see you affiliated with multi-million dollar companies in Netflix, Leupold, OnX, Gerber, and Howa rifles to name but a few. Am I to believe that in spite of those associations you're somehow LOSING money on hunting?

Dave
 
Snowy said:
It seems like these discussions usually get shut down before any hard questions get answered so it's nice to see some back and forth. It's your forum, delete this if you want, below will be both civil and honest, as it has been.

Based on the 20 pages of feedback and lots of support for Matt's perspective I know I'm not alone in being genuinely curious what your guys (@robby denning, Averys, Justin, Pro Staff) think about the article and Rokslide's role in the state of the union.

Forums themselves are what they are...lots of mostly good information sharing that can be chalked up to primarily "non-extractive" relationships to wildlife. Yes some unit specific stuff and photos with too much landscape cause issues, most have learned to keep that to themselves outside of pm's or e-mail. Many of us learn about conservation efforts and political issues (corner crossing for example) from forums that we might not have an informed opinion on otherwise, which is good. However this forum has launched a lot of influencers and as Robby noted, sold books, etc.

More than the general forum banter, I'm referring to what the article is talking about: relationships to wildlife that are extractive, monetarily driven, and "look at me". This is not an attack, it's a legitimate question about roles in fostering some unhealthy realities in western hunting.

How is selling waypoints to large bucks and bulls not a facilitation of taking directly from the resource for gain, without putting anything back into it?

There are staff, prostaff, and members here who's IG pages are full of industry hashtags and @'s (also some that aren't at all). For example, Jared Bloomgren's 11/4 and 11/23 IG posts; Justin Crossley's post from a couple days ago with the rifle. I don't know how to give examples without being specific...again this is not an attack, it's stating facts. How do you guys feel about Matt's perspective that's clearly antithetical to how you operate, and shared by many in the hunting community?

If all that stuff is justifiable to you because it's a business and you're making money then fair enough, it is what it is. It's a system that can put the product (cart) before the wildlife resource (horse) real quick, and has. I know the article helped me to do some careful thinking about my priorities and relationship to hunting.

Long story short, after hearing Randy's reasoning for doing what he does, why does Rokslide's Staff do what they do?
Click to expand...
solid question.

A clarification if it was directed at my scouting business. We've never just "sold waypoints to large bucks and bulls". We were operating long before waypoints had been invented. That langauge was invented by other businesses that came later. Most of the guys we help (10-20/year) shoot avg to better than avg animals. We feature some of the best on our page (as it gets peoples attention and builds our legitimacy) but also the regular stuff. I retired from the scouting portion over 5 years ago, and have one subcontracted employee who handles the on-the-ground scouting. I just run the billiing, funnel the inquires, and keep the website alive.

I'm also a licensed outfitter on private to clear up any confusion on our page as it's there too. While I guided in the past, we serve almost exclusively self guided hunters on the properties. Show them around, then they hunt on their own and retreive their own game. They pay about half (or less) than fully guided hunts and I attract much better hunters with this business model than the guided.

For Rokslide, it's a money make for me. Has to be. I put way way to much time into it. I currently have two other jobs (one mentioned above) and my full time job. Hope to retire two of those and just run rokslide someday.

We use Rokslide's IG/FB to grow the site, that's why you'll see many of our articles over there with links back to the site. And yes, we use all the hashtags and lingo too.

Most of our writers have social media too.

History will judge if we're "ruining" hunting. I beleive we're filling a space that is in demand, just like the old ads in the back of Outdoor life, and their Letters to the Editor space.

The internet changed everything and short of collapse of the modern world, the old way of doing things ain't coming back.

We do all need to show hunting in a positive light on an off social media.

In my personal robby opinion, we need more hunters, not less. Good game management has to be the rule. In my personal experiences, I see about the same number of hunters as in the 80s. maybe less in some areas and more in the backcountry. Hunters are better now, and I'm causing some of that. But I learned from the generations prior to mine too. Good game managment has to be the rule. But if we lose hunting (didn't one of our states just lose or are losing spring bear hunting), none of this will matter. The only hunting will be the very very rich.
 
idahodave said:
I'm truly curious about something though. It might be rude to inquire, and forgive me the brashness of the inquiry, but you've categorized your businesses associated with hunting as a money-losing endeavor at least a couple of times now. The implication being that your efforts to promote hunting actually cost you money...and by associated that you're doing so primarily out of a self-less desire to promote an activity we all love.

Yet, I see you affiliated with multi-million dollar companies in Netflix, Leupold, OnX, Gerber, and Howa rifles to name but a few. Am I to believe that in spite of those associations you're somehow LOSING money on hunting?

Dave
Click to expand...

Just because revenues are big doesn't mean that they're profitable. Pinterest, Peloton, Lyft, even Airbnb are all huge corps (Airbnb is valued at over 1 Billion if I recall) and lose money every single year.
 
Randy Newberg said:
In my mind. If someone feels otherwise for their interests and budget, I suspect they will do the opposite.
Click to expand...

OK we disagree.

No way does a businessman not make some sort of a profit by promoting their business for years and years.

Dont piss on our boots and tell us its raining.

Good on you for making a profit, but I tend to agree with @Riflehuntr19 in what he's posted

Keep on - Keeping on
 
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