Time To Cool Off

I have been back on Fauna recently, I know my participation level has drop dramatically. I was upset with the reptile community and I needed to take a step back and remember why I got involve.

I love boa constrictors, ever since I was young I have enjoyed holding reptiles, they fascinate me, I get giddy when holding a baby snake. Where I grew up, snakes were rare, the growing communities has driven them off. So every time I saw one it was like watching National Geographic. There is something about these creatures that get to me. It was during my search to share my hobby that I found Faunaclassifieds, along with a few other forums, but there was something about Fauna that kept bringing me back. Within that first year I met Laura, we exchanged PMs and talked on the phone before meeting at NARBC. Laura introduced me to a whole range of people.

During my time in the industry I have met some of the best people in the world. Laura, Bryon Marcia, Tere, Wes, Jeff Gee, Jim Flaherty, Bobby, Dennis Thomas, Rich, Mike Greathouse, John Schmitt, Dennis Hultman, Syd, Ginger, Cathy, Cheryl, Bob Clark, Pete kahl, Mark O'Shea, and etc. in person. I have made friends that I may never meet like Rick Carew, Harald, Chris, Gib, and etc. I also have become a thorn in the sides of liars, scammers, and thieves.

I have purchased and sold many animals. So why did I need to stand back? I wanted to remember what started it all for me. There was a time when these animals became a business and not a hobby. It was work, not fun. I already work too many hours in the medical field dealing with cancer. I was coming home and dreading having to feed and clean cages.

When I pulled my contact with friends here and being on Fauna, I returned to holding my snakes. I returned to watching my snakes hunt and feed on rodents. I love watching my 9 foot boa stalk and strike at a rat, she will stay still for a long time until the rat twitches and BAM! she nails it. Oh the joy to watch these creatures. They move around with a purpose, they have a reason to move, it is not because they are bored, but they are always going somewhere. Whether it be for food, shelter, or warmth, they have a reason.

So if I am enjoying my animals, why would I then return to Fauna? Good question. I would ask, why are you still here? Does Fauna have a purpose anymore? Are the forums still active? I have not been here so I must ask. What is the purpose of the BOI? Is Fauna the center for arguments or information?

I noticed threads in the Sound Off forum directly attacking members. I thought that is what HELL was for. We have members who were considered upstanding now dragging their knuckles acting like monkeys. According the the theory of evolution, if you believe it, we are no longer monkeys. According to the religious, we are the higher beings. Why are we acting like creatures that cannot reason with each other?

Even more discerning, members who used to never hesitate to contribute to Fauna now have no desire to ever do so again. Some see this place as a joke, recently I have seen a circus.

So what am I going to do about it? I am going to go hold my favorite snake. I am going to take pictures of my animals and I am going to enjoy them. Do I have any recommendation to bring Fauna back to an enjoyable place? I am going to return to the forums and spend more time there then I will on the BOI. This place was designed to bring together our love for reptiles, as such I am going to be sharing my love and knowledge on the discussion forums. This is were I will be, join me if you like.

I know what you mean, Michael.
Since the closing of the WS moderator program, I have opened threads on the BOI exactly 3 times...and I did so with something akin to the feeling one has as they pass a wreck on the highway - I didn't really want to look, knew I shouldn't...but somehow couldn't help myself. Each of those 3 times, I took the opportunity to think about how I felt about what I had read...and my impression of those whom had posted. I won't waste the space describing those thoughts - let it suffice to say that I likely will not be venturing into that realm again unless I see inquiries about people I have had transactions with (or know personally). Frankly, I haven't even bothered checking out people (I was considering purchasing from) for some time now.
I, too, have been making the effort to focus on the part of the hobby which brings me joy. That includes helping others sort through problems they encounter, as well as sharing pictures & experiences. I do those things in the discussion forums.
See you there.

Michael, I can't thank you enough for taking our phone call and running with it.

You see folks, i am on of those that Michael is talking about. My want to post but fear of the needless and endless backlash that has become common now on the BOI. Threads get so far off track with members attacking each other, accusing others of being trolls etc., and it has truly lost it's purpose.

While doing some research in looking at some older threads on the BOI something really stood out for me. Back then 2 years and further, mods would lock down threads when the flaming started. Now they are endless and some times tackless and pointless attacks.

While we are trying to out some of the bad guys in the industry, things go terribly wrong and the members turn on each other. This trend has happened before, but quickly stopped. So I ask what is different now? Why is this behavior allowed? it almost reminds me of "survivor fauna" where alliances are made and anyone who dares to state a oppion that differs from the "alliance" is quickly chastised and taunted.

In a thread that is on the BOI right now, Robert Kelly was attacked, called a troll, and accused of being 2 posters. A private message was being answered, that pm was from me. An apology for busting his b....s over a deal that he had made with a vendor that I do not approve of. He had made a post that I agreed with and thought that he should know that if I was still a payed member, I would have given him karma for it. His returning my pm was thanking me for allowing him to have an oppion!

Marcia is a marvelous, fascinating and intelligent woman that was made out to be less than fitting to her part time ministry. I was so outragged by that I was lost for words. Marcia has walked me through some very emotional and trying times in my life, she spent hours on the phone with me, as a minister, as a friend, and as a woman. She asked nothing in return, she just loved me in spite of my own self loathing at that time. She saved my life in many ways that evening and I will be forever greatfull for her in site and wisdom.

The people that I have met in chat in person have touched my life in many ways. Michael Shelton is like a son to me, he and his wife were my first guest's in my new home after my divorce, they held me when I cried, we have laughed, and shared our lives with each other as family does.

Bryon Adzic...I could go on for pages on this special man. We met in chat on this site, a place that we go to every night. I now share his life with him here in Georgia. We but heads on many subjects, get to boa keepers together with different styles of keeping and things can get pretty tense at times. What we found that what has worked for us is co-operation and compromise.

What I miss the most about the fauna of old is the respect that we gave each other. Different opinions were encouraged to add a different layer and or dimension to threads on the BOI, especially if the proof that was offered was iffy or inconclusive. Now it is looked at as something that I don't even recognise as being a team effort.

I don't expect this to be agreed with by all, but please just respect me as a woman and member of this site that would like to see some peace among the members.

Happy Easter fauna.

I totally hear what you both are saying.
Quite frankly I am so sick of the drama and over extension on the BOI, not to mention I just do not have time to weed through everything and simply do not want to expend the time warranted. In talking and meeting people in person I find a lot of what I thought vs what goes on behind the scenes are quite different. Very disappointing.

I do however like fauna. If the need truely arises I skim thru the BOI threads hoping to weed out all I do not want to read and get to the point of it and decide. I do not want to leave Fauna or the people I have met here and with that knowledge and my love for my reptiles with others that feel the same about theirs I find security here. I do take my time off from here, perhaps instead of taking time off I will just frequent the more upbeat forums with people who share the same passion I have for reptiles.

Good post Laura, I agree with you all the way!

Laura Fopiano said:

In a thread that is on the BOI right now, Robert Kelly was attacked, called a troll...

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Laura,

I'm curious what you call it when someone brings up two old threads, one from 2004, solely for the purpose of creating drama. I call it trolling. If no one speaks up when such crap is started then things WILL continue to get worse.

My participation here has also been significantly reduced for a number of reasons. I participated in the Mike Greathouse (another troll) thread and I felt compelled to participate when that piece of crap thread about Chuck was resurrected. It wasn't to defend Chuck, he can speak for himself. It was to speak against that specific behavior. People may or may not like Chuck, but making it personal in that fashion was out of line. I stand by the opinions that I gave in both of those threads.

I honestly doubt that I will be participating in the BOI much in the future either. My plate is full with other, more emotionally rewarding activities both on and off line. But I will still call a troll a troll when I see one.

I was looking around today and noticed people were asking questions about their animals, after three hours, in some cases, still no response. In the past, these people would have had their question answered in a matter of minutes by more than 5 people. Along with in depth info that would be specific to the questioners problem. That is the Fauna I will work to bring back.

Call a troll a troll all you like. Then join us in the discussion forums.

All I can say is good luck to you all figuring out how to make this a better place. Everything I have tried has failed or somehow seemingly made things worse.

I have tried to give everyone all the freedom possible to allow this site to move in the direction that you all apparently wanted it to go. In some instances I had to make decisions that I thought were best in order to allow us to reach the next level. But that reach always seemed to be just beyond my grasp. Perhaps freedom is the problem.

A while back I heard ex president Clinton make this statement:

"When we got organized as a country and we wrote a fairly radical Constitution with a radical Bill of Rights, giving a radical amount of individual freedom to Americans, it was assumed that the Americans who had that freedom would use it responsibly.... [However, now] there's a lot of irresponsibility. And so a lot of people say there's too much freedom. When personal freedom's being abused, you have to move to limit it."

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I thought he was nuts. A communist in disguise. A president who wanted to trample the US Constitution and all that it stood for.

But now I wonder. Maybe I am just seeing a small sliver of humanity that has made our government the way it is. The reason why our freedoms ARE being curtailed at every turn.

Because we, as a race, just cannot handle true freedom. We cannot stand to allow others to exercise it and when WE have it at our disposal, we turn it into something ugly.

I tried a while back to be the knuckle slapper and crack down on the myriad of abuses that members were slinging left and right, and during that period of time, got threatened with bodily injury, lawsuits, and just general invective MANY times more often than at any other time during the history of this site.

Quite frankly, I just don't have it in me any longer to be "daddy" here and treat everyone like the children they often act as. I thought turning over the power to a larger group of people via the WS Mods program would make a difference. Again, more flak and further abuses from some people given that sort of freedom to make a difference here.

I don't know. Maybe I've just been far too easy on what I allow here. Maybe I hoped given enough freedom for a long enough time, people would come to appreciate this, learn of it's value, and perhaps make the changes within themselves to make sure it doesn't go away. I thought people came to this site for that kind of freedom, and was the reason some stayed. But now I'm not so certain. Almost 47,000 registered members and we can't get more than 900 of them to come back on any given day. So something is CLEARLY wrong.

But I can't see what it is. You can all say "the drama", but what exactly is that and who is doing it? When does a thread switch over from being a heated discussion to just garbage?

I've sometimes heard people say that they wish the BOI would go back to "the way it used to be". But what is that exactly? From what I remember (especially with Ritchie Luna <the Ferret> ) things got pretty damned heated back then too.

I recently banned Wes (again). Some people applauded that move and others were stating in no uncertain terms that I need to bring him back. One person even stated that I needed to apologize to Wes for banning him. In my opinion, the only way I could stop the breaking of the china in the china shop was by removing the bull from within it. But that certainly didn't please everyone.

I could ask for opinions here about exactly what to do to turn things around, but there will be no consensus on what is best to do. Some people will get pissed about the changes, no matter what they are. Some will leave because this site is no longer what they want.

People will tell me I just need to grasp the nettle and yank it out, but every third person will have a different opinion about exactly who or what that nettle is.

So answer me this: Is there ANY site out there that everyon unanimously considers to be perfect in every way? I'm not even certain that I could make any changes that would even please a majority, much less EVERYONE.

So what exactly do I do if there IS no solution? I've tried being heavy handed. I've tried being nearly rule free here. I've tried being involved as much as humanly possible. I have had people tell me to change things or they would leave, and I told them to have a nice trip. Other times I made the changes they asked for, and eventually they left anyway. And recently I've just been nearly completely hands off while the WS and site mods handled everything. People complained about EVERY DAMNED WAY I have tried to run this site.

I'll be honest, every time I go to open this site I think "Aw hell.... here we go....." And I believe a lot of you feel the same exact way.

Crap, I'm just rambling now and ready to start repeating myself. I've got to get to working on my taxes. Plus this is dead center in breeding season for my own animals.

If you all can figure out the perfect solution for this site, then please let me know. Because I honestly don't know what that is, and have just about run out of things to try. The only thing I can think of that I haven't tried is to just remove all moderation and just slam the door shut as I walk out the door myself. I really don't think it will help at all, and will probably be much worse, but all of the ideas I thought were "good ones" haven't really been that way.

So who the hell knows?

On to my taxes....

Oh, and I'm not taking the time to proof read this.

Rich,

It aint the site. It's the people. Or should I say the amount of people.

It is kinda like that nice small quaint small town that grows up. Once upon a time it was all strawberries and cream. Everyone knew each other by their first name, no one locked their doors at night, people went out of their way to help their neighbors, everyone went to the town functions and shared their lives with one another.

Then the small town grew into a big city. The population grew immensely, including a few that are bad apples who steal and take advantage of the trusting neighbors, so people stop taking the time to get to really get know each other, no one trusts each other anymore because of these things, they start locking their doors, quit helping their neighbors and stopped joining community functions and just do things with those they feel completely safe around.

Who said growing bigger was a good thing?

There are certain people who are there for almost no other purpose than that of trying to bait others into fights. There are people (like me) who sometimes allow themselves to get egged into those fights, and for my part in the recent drama, I apologize.

I can make a suggestion to prevent the bumping of zombie threads. When a thread has been stale for a period of time (six months?) lock it. Weekly cron job on the server should be able to go through the database and do it for you. If there is a need to add material to such a thread, a request can be made to the moderator to unlock it.

It's very good to see you back around, Mr. Shelton.

Good post, Michael.
Who knows what the ultimate 'answer' is? All I can say is that is can only help, to take joy in your critters, and to take time in the discussion forums especially if your knowledge can help another.

Locking threads?

It probably wouldn't work that well IMO. Anyone could just start in new thread and link it to the locked thread.

If people just thought a little more about what they expect to accomplish with their post maybe sometimes they would reconsider and not post. I know I have often.

Take the recent resurrected thread about Chuck. Sure the original post to bring it back to the top was out of line, but then there were 40 or so posts to the thread that kept it there, and had members bickering besides. If it would have just been ignored, as it should have been IMO, then it would be well down page 1 and lost again.

Good thread Michael Shelton, I believe others will be following your lead.

IMHO Starting a new thread in the BOI that is not related to a transaction should not be tolerated.
A good guy or bad guy post should be related to a business transaction between the poster and the subject of the post, a query asking about someone should be just that - a query asking about someone.

Thus starting a thread not involving a transaction simply to link to another thread should be a violation of the rules and locked.

It won't stop all the drama but it will stop the old thread bumping.

It's very hard issue. Not looking at any particular thread but as a whole, no- matter what stand is taken on the issue there will be a new thread from the other side of the coin stating we are curtailing peoples freedom. That we should allow everyone to post as they wish. That somehow we are protecting the scammers or liars because we don't allow enough off-topic posts.

I guarantee if the site takes a hard-line on posts some asking for it will be demanding that it be removed later because it somehow infringed on what they wanted to post. Frankly, I'm at a loss at what to suggest.

To the point of closing threads- I believe that it was hardly ever done.
Originally, if a thread spiraled out of control or a single poster drove a thread off-topic so bad the thread and/or poster was sent to Hell.

When strict enforcement was put into force Hell was locked and only available to subscribers. Maybe, with allowing people enough rope to hang themselves and the freedom given, you also have to give them a place to do so that will not give the impression that the whole site gives its approval of what is posted.

Good example would be the general discussion forums, sound off, etc.

Michael mentioned threads in sound off. Heck, I've deleted threads of that very nature only to be called on it by some that the information was needed.
There is absolutely noway to please everyone and you shouldn't try to.
Just try to do what you think is right and move on. I will try my best to enforce the rules as they stand.

I think that it is important to all to remember why you are here. I hope the vigor towards the discussion groups continue. I sincerely hope that everyone continues to stand on their beliefs and principles.

Good to see you around here again Michael..........

Boy where to start lol, I have to agree things have changed and some things not for the better. Maybe Sammy has something there but I also see real changes in some people here as Michael pointed out. People that I used to have a lot of respect for that now tear into anyone and everyone at the drop of the hat. Others who are I assume somewhat afraid to post here now for fear of getting stomped on.

We also seem to have a real rash of folks using obvious fake names posting away on the BOI. I would think that after the Greathouse fiasco that tolerance of that would be nil, especially when those same folks are here just to stir things up and take threads into left field. Heck I tried to piss one of them off and get him going and can remember the day when in trying to do that I'd have gotten help from members who saw what I was trying to do, instead I get a 'why waste your time' . I know why I go to the BOI and it is to help if I can and try to out the bad guys, yeah sometimes I get some fun out of it but I'm there for a reason.

Wes has been mentioned here and hey the guy has gone off the deep end somewhat, but folks here helped him get there. Yeah he was always blunt and rough but he used to be focused. I saw when it changed with him, the Bill Leverton thread where people kept after him because he wouldn't out and out blast the guy. People came right out and asked why he wouldn't in that thread and made disparaging remarks towards him because he didn't fry Bill there . We exchanged a few PMs over that and the way people looked at him there really bothered him, soon after Wes went away on his own for a while.. When he came back he wasn't the same guy we knew here, he didn't have the focus anymore and would go off on most anyone. How many here thought very highly of the Wes we knew two or more years ago and don't think as highly of him now?

Rich, things here have gone down hill and one of the reasons I think it has is the changes you keep making. People don't tend to like change all that much and when things change they take a while to get used to the change. But when they seem to be settling into the new Fauna you go and change it again and it gets folks uneasy all over again. One change you make will make some happy and others a bit pissed but then you change it again and those who were happy with the way it was are now a bit pissed so over time you get most everyone upset . Sort of how things are around here now, we just had another change and the natives are restless and many had not even settled into the last change or the one before that.

I've mentioned this before , people seem unable to separate the BOI from the rest of the site and especially the people they see most active on the BOI, they see folks tearing into some bad guy or here lately anyone on the BOI . Many see how that person is on the BOI and think they are or will be the same in the regular forums.

When you look at the forums page the BOI just looks like another forum here, is they some way to set this up so it isn't right in the middle of everything. People see this whole site as the BOI or they see the BOI as being Fauna, not all that many see them as separate things. Randy

ravensgait said:

Rich, things here have gone down hill and one of the reasons I think it has is the changes you keep making. People don't tend to like change all that much and when things change they take a while to get used to the change. But when they seem to be settling into the new Fauna you go and change it again and it gets folks uneasy all over again. One change you make will make some happy and others a bit pissed but then you change it again and those who were happy with the way it was are now a bit pissed so over time you get most everyone upset . Sort of how things are around here now, we just had another change and the natives are restless and many had not even settled into the last change or the one before that.

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Randy, I think that is a great point. It aint necessarily the specific changes that have been made, but the constant change itself that has contributed to things going downhill. Outstanding observation, Randy. If I could give you karma I would.

Interesting concept. So if I see the ship apparently heading towards the rocks, I should just go ahead and allow that to happen rather than shaking up the passengers by changing the course?

That isn't a very healthy business model to follow.........

WebSlave said:

Interesting concept. So if I see the ship apparently heading towards the rocks, I should just go ahead and allow that to happen rather than shaking up the passengers by changing the course?

That isn't a very healthy business model to follow.........

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Two things here Rich.

First, there is a difference between making tweaks and full blown changes. What has occurred often has been full blown change.

Second, I never said the changes were the sole reason, only that they have helped contribute to things going downhill. Some of the reasons you will never be able to control or stop. Hence my post about a small town growing into a big city. There are just downsides to it that come with the territory of getting big.

There are other factors as well. Many in fact. As much as we want there to be a simple answers to all our problems, very often there are not. We just have to sleep well at night knowing we did the very best we could.