Recent Changes, Further Explained

[Tsar]

Originally Posted by NJSPEEDER

tsar, your examples point out that arguing with everyone drives people away, and mass bannings drive people away. i think those are both rather obvious points and well suported.
however, they are not really helpful to your position since we aren't banning everyone who doesn't agree with the new rules and we have explained several times that we are attempting to avoid conflict here.
also none of the sites you mentioned appear to have language restrictions. which is the only addition to the forum rules. which would be your only other point, which is still left unsupported.

Flscc did install language thingy, but what do you do when people keep breaking the rules? ban them. Ban a few too many and the rest will say goodbye too.

since the new rules have gone into effect, we have had more new members sign up than in the last 2 months and the active member count has gone up by 40+ on average. that is the progress we were looking for.

Your "active" member definition differs from mine. I mean sure two girls signed up who talk all the time, some wayfast clones signed up. If that's what you really want then be my guest.

perhaps your 10 minutes about a shiney ball were impressive to a teacher somewhere along the lines, but for us to make changes to the forums and the rules takes a lot more than some banter supported only by your personal opinion and examples that, at best, half meet the information needed to support what you feel so pasionately about.

my shiny ball example was in refering to how i can just get up and speak about anything. It has nothing to do with this site, it was just an example. [/QUOTE]

I feel like im done, ive shared my opinion and i already said its your website and not mine, I've seen THIS scenario play out more then one time. If you succeed good for you. If you fail ill come back and laugh at you like i promised. Good Luck.

Theres nothing you can really do about it. People are always gonna argue about BS. Tsar's doing a great job of it right now. And all this talk about being a "long time member", shouldn't you be trying to help the club expand and broaden the horizons? This club had out grown the old system and was in need of new reconstruction. The rules seem to have cut down on alot of the nonsense normally posted. We should really be looking for the good things these rules have brought instead of shooting down the entire idea.

[Mike]

this thread seems to be keeping Puffs tissues in business....it comes down to this.

if you dont like the changes = LEAVE
if you dont like the rules = LEAVE
if you dont like paying for the basement = DONT

other than that just give it up, signing on simply to argue and get people riled up gets you nowhere, and does nothing but put on page one the need for the changes.

before you guys started arguing with tim, many of the people that are agreeing with the changes DIDNT and now look at them....

its a simple thing to do, theres....ls1tech, fbody, f-body, ls1.com, ls2.com, nastyz28, firebirdv6, the other v6 forum, not to mention the regional forums...go pick another one if you hate it here

[chevygirl80]

Oh ********************************* ****************** ******************. ********* thing timed out.
******. (Are asterisks ok? )

I had a good first post too. Basically it outlined a few key points. I'm new here, so I'm not even going to pretend to know the whole back story. But from what I have read.....

1. This forum started small, I guess just a between friends type thing. And it grew bigger than any of the admins ever though it would.

2. That bigger group means there's even more variety as to what offends and what doesn't. I can empathize with the admins, even if I might not completely agree with some things.

3. My co-worker has a forum for us psychiatric counselors. And he told me he had to follow an agreement before he made the forum. That agreement holds him responsible for the content of his site.

For example, we've all the the "Dat N**** stole my bike" photo. Let's say someone posted it here. And someone got very offended (due to the N word), and decided to sue for racism. Not only would whoever posted it be in trouble, so would the admins for allowing it to stay on the boards. I don't know if this is true for the admins of this site, but that's the UA my co-worker has to abide by. Perhaps the admins here are just covering their arses. (Can I say arses? )

The only way you'd be able to keep it as it was when it started would be to keep membership to a select few. And from what I can tell, this is a forum for people who own/like/love/adore/worship f-bodies. I like the idea of a basement, but don't really like that you have to pay for it. But that's my opinion. While I may not agree with some of the changes, I checked a little box that bound me to a UA before I registered. I am confident enough in my education that I can get my point across without swearing. Although I do have a mouth like a sailor. So until I cough up the money for a paid membership, I'll abide by the rules I agreed to follow.

I would feel rather....dumb....showing up to a meet in a camry though. Unfortunately I'm the only one in my family who doesn't own an f-body, though my husband has promised that maybe I'll be thrilled with my christmas present this year. So for now I'll stay away from the meets and events.

Sorry to ramble on in my first post on here...It's quite possible I'm completely wrong on this, because like I said, I'm new, and I don't know the whole story.

[foff667]

Originally Posted by j0n

Quoted for a ton of good points.

As far as I'm concerned the bottom line here is that Tim and Justin have painted themselves into a corner regarding the club's "expenses". While domain names and hosting fees need to be paid, a variety of things that have put them into the position they're in were just wasteful spending. Take the Nats for example. I don't know of anyone that supported the idea to have 46 different race classes, and 65 different show awards. All these classes needed awards which i believe Tim and Justin paid out of pocket. Simply eliminating a ton of needless classes would have saved them money, and for anyone that attended the ECFBN, it would have lengthened the racing beyond 2 rounds.

As for the debt involved with t-shirt, hoodie, and calender sales, a pre-order could have been arranged, which would eliminate any out-of-pocket expenses for the admins. However, they chose to spend the money and order them without any preorders.

Basically my opinion is that you and Justin dug your own graves here, and making a ton of nazi rules in order to beg for sponsorship is not the only way out. Be smarter with your money, don't mandate check boxes before someone can post.

I totally agree...I said from the start they shouldve just done something through cafepress...the profit margin wouldve been slimmer, but Ordering $1000 in hoodies or Calendars and then hoping to sell them in a couple of weeks or months time just isnt the smartest business decision in my opinion.

They brought up the quality of cafepress stuff...I bought an LS1tech shirt & hat ~3 years ago that I wear to this day that show very little wear...hat I think I lost at some point but was very good quality.

I've got a YEAR of hosting for ~$80 for my website with 1000gb of bandwidth...

As far as the nats goes a better agreement with the host would be their best bet...I mean if your bringing in 100 or 200 cars @ $20pop + food/drinks at the lemonade stand I would say the track is making some money off of the deal why not throw the club $100-200 kickback money for getting the people there. That would keep the site running for at least a year from what I can see...and maybe even get them $ for keeping the software they use updated

We also now have several sponsors which i know is bringing in a few bucks a month. Yes there have been a few threads on here that may have gotten out of control, in that case MODERATE THEM! We've got 2 admins & what 3 mods now for a board with 1000 members? Seems to be more then enough to keep the piece & keep the cursing down to an acceptible level if thats what this is really about.

In the end I think a wiser business plan needs to be in place unless your trying to make a living off of this site which I doubt can ever happen...at least at this point in time I don't see it.

Think smart guys.

[Tru2Chevy]

Originally Posted by foff667

I totally agree...I said from the start they shouldve just done something through cafepress...the profit margin wouldve been slimmer, but Ordering $1000 in hoodies or Calendars and then hoping to sell them in a couple of weeks or months time just isnt the smartest business decision in my opinion.

They brought up the quality of cafepress stuff...I bought an LS1tech shirt & hat ~3 years ago that I wear to this day that show very little wear...hat I think I lost at some point but was very good quality.

I've got a YEAR of hosting for ~$80 for my website with 1000gb of bandwidth...

We avoided Cafepress from the beginning because of past quality issues that Tim and I had both experienced with their products. We made the decision that we did not want to potentially sacrifice the quality of our merchandise for the ease of ordering that Cafepress offers.


Bandwidth is of very little concern to us. Most hosting packages that are out there have more than enough to support three or four sites our size. Running a message forum with anywhere from 50-75+ members on at any given time uses a lot of system resources (both CPU and RAM), and using a host like the one that your website is on would cause the site to be shut down for over-utilizing system resources every other day. You may remember that happening to us more than once near the end of our initial two year contract with our first hosting company. We had more than outgrown a shared hosting solution, and needed to find either a dedicated server, or a virtual private server to meet the website's needs.

If you can find a host that offers either a dedicated server or a virtual private server, and gets quality reviews similar or better to our host (Knownhost) for less than ~$400 per year, please, by all means, let me know.

- Justin

[foff667]

We avoided Cafepress from the beginning because of past quality issues that Tim and I had both experienced with their products. We made the decision that we did not want to potentially sacrifice the quality of our merchandise for the ease of ordering that Cafepress offers.

Thats fine...then setup preorders & buy very few extras...if you don't get enough preorders don't order...that simple...if theres only a 50/50 chance you'll get your money back on whats purchased don't do it...from what I hear there are still T shirts left over & yet hoodies get ordered & then theres whining about "we don't have enough money to support the site" BS bad business decisions are costing money you don't have is what its coming down to.

Bandwidth is of very little concern to us. Most hosting packages that are out there have more than enough to support three or four sites our size. Running a message forum with anywhere from 50-75+ members on at any given time uses a lot of system resources (both CPU and RAM), and using a host like the one that your website is on would cause the site to be shut down for over-utilizing system resources every other day. You may remember that happening to us more than once near the end of our initial two year contract with our first hosting company. We had more than outgrown a shared hosting solution, and needed to find either a dedicated server, or a virtual private server to meet the website's needs.

If you can find a host that offers either a dedicated server or a virtual private server, and gets quality reviews similar or better to our host (Knownhost) for less than ~$400 per year, please, by all means, let me know.

point taken, I'll ask around though...im still a mod on some sites that have a good amount of traffic

a few other notes
a. bubba428-chill out you went off on Tsar for no obvious reason other then seeing bubba in his post...otherwise it might be time to change your SN
b. I really don't have a problem with conforming to any new rules...honestly I don't even know what they are, but new rules = change for some which most people don't deal with well especially on a "public" forum. I will say moderate their posts & if they don't then ban them...temporary or otherwise.
c. Stupid threads should be dealt with similarly to threads with personal attacks or cursing and you guys all know the recent threads that are popping up that im talking about.
d. I had a few other points but Im old & forgot the rest of them...besides my head hurts from just reading through all the pages of bickering about the new rules.

Good luck guys...hopefully it will all work itself out in the end.

[firehawk1120]

Well, once again i have to say it seems like the majority of the people who have a problem with the rules are the ones who have nothing of intelligence to add to the forums. All they want to do is attack people, make fun of them, drop f-bombs left and right, and pretend it's their own personal abuse site with their 3-4 friends (clique).

The more adult / mature people can see how acting like civilized human beings is in the best interest of all involved. I'm all for joking around and busting chops and goofing around with people, but when it gets to be malicious and degrading which I think some people get off on then it's just not fun for people anymore.

For the people who can't control themselves and think they are hanging out with their frat brothers on a Fri. night getting drunk if you don't like it don't let the door hit you in the ass on the way out.

For the rest of us we will continue to have fun, share information, eventually when the weather warms up start going to gatherings, and generally have a good time.

I congratulate Tim & Justin on the improvements and hope the unwanted eventually make good on their promises and disappear. In the meantime I'll continue to use the ignore feature so I don't have to read their pathetic posts.

Welcome to all the new members and good luck on a bright future NJFBOA.

[Untamed]

Originally Posted by chevygirl80

Like I said....I'm not showing up to an F-body meet in a Camry.



That would be a ....

LOL I do exactly that!

But I do own a Trans Am, even if it isn't currently roadworthy (due mostly to lack of proper documentation). The club looks past the daily drivers and just welcomes people in who are at least remotely interested in f-body cars. That's what I like most. A bunch of folks here are real gear heads, some of whom do it for a living. But the rest of us are just enthusiasts; and whether we get our hands dirty or not doesn't really matter.

Don't let the Camry stop you from joining in the fun. Doesn't stop me.

1988 Trans Am
2005 Camry

[BonzoHansen]

By request, I cleaned up a lot of the off topic posts. If anyone has any more requests, or questions, please feel free to PM me. Carry on.

[NJSPEEDER]

Originally Posted by foff667

Thats fine...then setup preorders & buy very few extras...if you don't get enough preorders don't order...that simple...if theres only a 50/50 chance you'll get your money back on whats purchased don't do it...from what I hear there are still T shirts left over & yet hoodies get ordered & then theres whining about "we don't have enough money to support the site" BS bad business decisions are costing money you don't have is what its coming down to..

if we did it that way we would have ordered 14 t-shirts, 8 hoodies, and 22 calendars.
people don't preorder and it is illogical to go back and reorder only to wait again, especially when the result would be t-shirts that cost $30 each because of set up fees and no discounts for ordering quatities.
there is a pattern of people not being these items until they can see them in person. that is why we are willing to order them and let the money be paid back. the t-shirts made their money back and a little bit extra for club expenses and the hoodies will work out the same way.
what we need to do is get caught up and start putting a little bit of money away for the club so that we can plan better events and activities and get the club inorporated properly without having to wonder where the money is coming from.

i can't explain how much fun it is helping to run this club and if i had the money to pay for it all out of pocket i would do it happily. it has just outgrown what justin and i can afford to cover.

[NJSPEEDER]

thanks everyone for your feedback. i hope we have cleared up many of your concerns about the new rules and the direction the club is going in.
we truely appreciate everyone being willing to share their feelings. sometimes it is tough to accept change, but our research and mcuh of the early response indicates that we are headed in the right direction.
i hope to see everyone next week at the texas roudhouse or some of the other meets throughout the summer.

thanks