With just days to go, E-ROLE has sent in this powerful eulogy to Three Speech, penned by some of our wonderful readers. Hankies ready y’all…

As we all know, all great things come to an end. Like the dinosaurs, the Roman Empire and a winning England team, Three Speech is to soon no longer exist. So I thought what better time to look back and ask how Three Speech was different from anything out there. I’ve asked a number of true Three Speech veterans for their opinions and final words for a site we all call home.

Fanpages:

“Now the time has finally come to say farewell, I will certainly miss Three Speech; not least for what it offered me, but for what it offered the video game industry as a whole.

The nature of this Forum with the lack of moderation of individual comment text has meant that anything I have submitted has (eventually) been published without editing, and for this fact alone, I am proud to be a regular contributor.

Once Three Speech has closed their virtual doors this week, if the alternate suggestion from Sony does not offer me the same freedom then I will not be participating. I have not bothered with the current European PlayStation forums as I find the content too difficult to navigate, and the US Blog is so full of “me too”, “first”, and “awesome” posts it just dilutes the content where somebody actually raises a worthwhile point or useful suggestion.

Three Speech ‘regulars’ voice opinions, raise issues, and offer suggestions the likes of which I have not seen anywhere else. It will be a real shame if the community built up here in the last two & a half years is forced to go elsewhere if the official Blog is not ready in the immediate or very near future.

In the meantime, if you would like to participate in the next generation of semi-official bloggery… please make your intentions known now, as I will be recruiting for “Four Word” soon “

Pabloamigo aka mrsatansdojo:

“In the vastness of the World Wide Web it’s all too easy for people to forget their manners, IQ and dignity. Whilst most of the regular contributors on Three Speech (myself included) can plead guilty to all three of the aforementioned misdemeanours at some point, I’ve often found it to be one of the only places on the internet where I can discuss the latest gaming news with a group of mature, thoughtful and insightful people (and John Sketch!).

For me, what the site was very successful in doing was fostering a mini-community of regular contributors and latterly, the world’s greatest Three Speech-related Killzone 2 clan

A look back through the archive blog posts reveals some amusing, intelligent and bizarre posts. Here are a few of my favourites:

Just imagine: The Joined Power of 32 Cell Processors!!!! Could Host Some Mean XXX Sites On That Server!!!
Comment by JohnSketch — Sep 27, 2007 @ 2:01 pm

Disappointed by the visuals… But there again I’m never happy. I never even cracked a smile for Bruce Forsyth’s Birthday.
Comment by E-ROLE — Feb 26, 2008 @ 11:41 am

My mouth hurts On a more Christmassy note – Just spent roughly 3 hours making a ginger bread house!
Comment by JohnSketch — Dec 21, 2007 @ 12:15 pm

All the best to all ThreeSpeech staff and posters, it was great while it lasted. Hope to see some of you on the EU Blog - I’m approaching it with an open mind. “

JohnSketch:

“I Iz Sad….the amount of hours, fierce concentration and work I skimped out on, fobbed off and plain old just “didn’t do”, whilst I’ve been following the articles on Three Speech and clicking “Reload Live Bookmark” on my RSS feeds for that extra serving of goodness….Really going to miss it.

Couldn’t have asked for a more fun crowd of gremlins, from Ramp to Crowd the Team have been really good to me and although I knew that this would inevitably end one of these years - I had no clue how soon it really was to be.
I hold out hope for somewhere else that would accept my insane ramblings, but doubtful I remain…so I holster my wit, hang up my hat and tuck away my drool bucket until that fateful day when Crowd give me the call to come back.

Should the EU blog be pants, we’ll band together and make our own - with blackjack…and hookers!!!
So long Three Speech…and thanks for all the fish.

takes his final bow*

gives you all a hug* “

Apnomis:

“I would just echo what has already been said about the unique community it built up of intelligent, entertaining and amusing posters. For a blog that was semi-official you would have thought it would have been a target for fanboy arguments, but aside from the infamous troll that is ZedZee it was a pleasure to visit each day. It was also allowed via my works firewall so was a great please to visit during a break!

In their About Us page they state:

“It is semi official, an informal means of communication for PlayStation. Importantly, we avoid censoring content here, so long as Three Speech is used constructively. We hope to create an environment that is balanced, open minded and intelligent, and that avoids the routine of fanboy warfare.”

And in that they succeeded, which is something they can be proud of.

They regularly featured user generated content or user suggested articles, something that made the blog a unique hybrid of official and unofficial content which set it apart from the crowd.

In general I don’t use the internet all that much nowadays unless it’s for something specific, there are only a handful of sites I make a point of visiting daily and Three Speech was one of them.”

So now you’ve heard from some of the regular users, how do you feel? Personally, I’m up for a European blog.

I place Three Speech in the same category as Edge.

No, Three Speech isn’t overly complicated to read, just to make you feel stupid.

Three Speech isn’t for the kids that buy Gamesmaster or proclaim they are “FIRST” to comment on a new post.

Three Speech is for a bunch of guys and gals that have a similar interest, a common goal in life and that’s to just have fun, talk about games, get away from devilish work and take time to relax.

I’ll miss Three Speech for those reasons, and the fact it was the only RSS feed I ever had.

We think Crowd DNA has done an excellent job over the years, maintaining a busy blog and moderating the nuttier comments must be strenuous work!