Where is.....

[Dennis Hultman]

It would be tragic, to lose members instead of them adjusting to the way things have to be.
I can understand that you are tired of the repeated theme of people always being angry about something all the time.
I wanted John to see a reason to stay, even if he can't call someone an "idiot".

 

[shrap]

I can understand that you are tired of the repeated theme of people always being angry about something all the time.

Unfortunately that is just human nature. There is no way you can have this many people on a forum and honestly expect there to be contentment at any time.

Bad analogy time..... just like with a town of 20-25 thousand people... there is always going to be a faction of the people that are not going to be happy with ANY decision the Mayor makes. There are just too many people involved for that to happen. Too many personalities, too many points of view.

It is just the way of the world, not something that is unique to Fauna.

 

[WebSlave]

It would be tragic, to lose members instead of them adjusting to the way things have to be.
I can understand that you are tired of the repeated theme of people always being angry about something all the time.
I wanted John to see a reason to stay, even if he can't call someone an "idiot".

Oh, I agree, for certain. I'm just not certain if I have had the bar too low for too long, and people got used to it, or my hopes of a better site because of raising the bar will create too high of a hurdle for most people.

I could certainly be at fault simply because I expect too much out of people. Quite honestly, I never would have dreamed I would hear someone say that they were dropping their support for this site because I will no longer allow them to call someone an "idiot" in posted messages here. So what do you say to someone like that? Offer to change the rules to keep them? Ask them to reconsider that what they want to do is really not in the best interests of this site? Or just say "have a nice day" and chalk it up as someone who just cannot adapt? When someone REQUIRES a fundamental change in direction of this site in order for them to be satisfied and remain, albeit directly contrary to what I consider as a prudent and necessary direction, then I am afraid that the last choice is the only reasonable one.

 

[WebSlave]

Unfortunately that is just human nature. There is no way you can have this many people on a forum and honestly expect there to be contentment at any time.

Bad analogy time..... just like with a town of 20-25 thousand people... there is always going to be a faction of the people that are not going to be happy with ANY decision the Mayor makes. There are just too many people involved for that to happen. Too many personalities, too many points of view.

It is just the way of the world, not something that is unique to Fauna.

The analogy is not all that bad, I think. So what does a mayor do in a town like that? It certainly is not feasible to just send the malcontents packing out of town. Any can surely leave if they find it all that unbearable. But what would a mayor do about a handfull of people who obviously don't have the town's best interests at heart and are only living there simply because they apparently WANT to complain about things with no real care at all about what they are complaing about?

Then we have another case of people from a neighboring town sitting in at town meetings pretending to be locals and vociferously complaining about the state of the town, and how the mayor runs it, hoping to get the populace fed up enough that they will eventually leave town and come over to their own. What's the mayor to do about them? They are hard to recognize from the regular folks, you know?

 

[Dennis Hultman]

I'm just not certain if I have had the bar too low for too long, and people got used to it, or my hopes of a better site because of raising the bar will create too high of a hurdle for most people.

I believe it may have more to do with people seeing that calling people out in the "old fashion" and the peer pressure did work for such a long time.
I have said my fair share of derogatory remarks and know it to be true. I also know that there are other ways of making a point and getting to the bottom of things and believe most of the members can function in either environment.

I believe that most of the participating members of Fauna that have posted on this thread are really here because they want to be a part of this community and want Fauna to succeed.

This is one of my favorite posts below. I know it’s an old one.

what you will find here is that there are a bunch of people whom are like minded about the way things should be done in business transactions. When someone posts a load of BS or someone gets themselves in the position of being unethical in the manner in which they are doing business, yes, you can expect to have this group of regular posters here make their opinions known. There are always minor disagreements, of course, but I think it would be much more surprising (and disappointing) if there were NOT a core group of people here whom were willing to attempt a form of peer pressure to have things done right.

After all, the only power the BOI has is this sort of pressure. There is no BOI police force going to go knocking on some bad guy's door late at night. All it can do is to be a public record of the dealings of someone that will be an open book to potential customers. It is the potential customers that will decide whether or not to do business with someone mentioned in here. The BOI cannot TELL anyone what to do.

So yes, if someone posts here and their argument is weak, lacking in details, or just plain unbelievable, they certainly may get 'jumped on'. But if they state the facts, make what they are saying clearly presented and truthful, they will NEVER have a problem here. That is the way is should be. NO one posting a bad guy or good guy post here should be taken at face value. It is not fair to anyone if that were to be the case.

The only difference now is how the peer pressure will be applied. IMO

 

[ms_terese]

There are times when I know I should keep my mouth shut (or my fingers from typing), but I simply can't. This is one of those times.

First of all, I can't buy the Rozann/Wes conspiracy theory. It doesn't add up based on what I know of both of them. If that makes me "unable to read what this thread is actually portraying", then so be it.

That Wes almost orchestrated a bunch of people to donate $1,000 for his return? Or that Rozann could have been manipulated as she was? Or that perhaps Rozann wasn't manipulated at all and decided to blatantly lie all throughout this thread?

I can't believe that Wes Pollack would manipulate anyone to donate $1,000 for his return here. I don't believe that Rozann was manipulated by Wes or anyone else. I also don't see that she "decided to blatantly lie throughout this thread".

My belief is that if Rozann had looked hard enough, she could have found some antiquated posts by Rich proclaiming a desire to keep this forum free. I don't think that makes Rich a liar either...I think things change, and Rich had a right to make that adjustment. I think that Rozann gave a plausible explanation for the hosting situation. Maybe it's because I am familiar with Roz's absence from the forums for the last several months that I just don't find it unreasonable that she started the thread to get some answers about Wes.

The analogy of mayor I find to be a good one, so I'll continue to use it.

It certainly is not feasible to just send the malcontents packing out of town. Any can surely leave if they find it all that unbearable. But what would a mayor do about a handfull of people who obviously don't have the town's best interests at heart and are only living there simply because they apparently WANT to complain about things with no real care at all about what they are complaing about?

Nope, not if they pay their taxes and choose to continue to live there. You know, in a town that size, being mayor is hardly a high paying job; they usually have business interests on the side. They would normally have altruistic or civic-minded motives for taking on the job in the first place. I would think the mayor would be able to concentrate on the majority of the folks who do have the best interest of the town at heart, and reinforce the positive message of his plan whenever possible. Should he invite dissenters to move out of town, whether those dissenters be consistent complainers or volunteers at the local library? I think he'd be jeapordizing his chances to serve a subsequent term if he did that. Now, if he's sick of being mayor, tired of contributing his time and neglecting his other business interests for such an ungrateful population, then that's probably a fine solution for him.

Then we have another case of people from a neighboring town sitting in at town meetings pretending to be locals and vociferously complaining about the state of the town, and how the mayor runs it, hoping to get the populace fed up enough that they will eventually leave town and come over to their own. What's the mayor to do about them? They are hard to recognize from the regular folks, you know?

I would think the mayor would continue to emphasize his town's good points, if he believes they're strong enough to outweigh the tribulations. Yes, this situation is fodder for rants at other sites. It's very similar to the KS/FC blow out from a couple of years back, isn't it? I think both "mayors" campaigned pretty hard during that election, there was a lot of mud slinging, and both won some and lost some. How is this different?

I know, I know, I know...I'm welcome to leave if I don't like the way it's run here, everybody has a choice, etc. etc. It's quite aggravating to consistently read that, because it insinuates that members here aren't aware of their ability to leave. They are. Sometimes they simply want to express their opinion because they believe it to be intelligent or worth consideration.

 

[nicolai]

The advertisers are holding their own helping me pay the bills here, so I can keep this site free for everyone's use.

This all was set up so I could keep this site free for all of the users

My intention is to give people an alternative, particularly in a business sense. It actually disturbed me greatly to see how many people have hinged their entire future in this industry on ******* whims. There are people afraid to speak up against him for fear of his getting pissed and cutting off their sole source of income by banning them from his site. This is foolish on the part of those people to be locked in like that. And there have been several instances related on this site alone that tend to drive home that point.

Have things now come full circle???

 

[Bill_Leverton]

This is only MHO

John, First off that was an excellent post, It made me take a step back and really think, And for what ever this is worth I think of you as a man of integrity and I really wish you would reconsider, While I do see your point, if you were to go and other good guy's followed suit where would this site be ?? While I'm not one of this site's leading citizens any longer. I feel if everybody of integrity baled this place would turn into "Badlands" of this hobby and that would give Rich a Black Eye. While I do think that things need to change here, We have to find a common ground in which to make this work and it can't be Because I said so Attitude or If you don't like it theres the door. I think we should be able to sit and discuss things in an adult manner yes there are different opinions, I believe it is time we pulled together and not apart. Remember it only takes a home to make a community

 

[DThomas]

Have things now come full circle???

If you are going to pick and choose the quotes you pull to throw everything back in Rich's face, how about you try to look at BOTH sides of the issue.

I am seriously considering setting up a paid subscription plan sometime in the future. I have about had my fill of people who I have suspended who simply register as someone else and are right back on within the hour. I have said time and time again that some sort of paid membership is the only way to control this sort of thing, but have felt that it just wouldn't fly with most people. Maybe the "no fly" still applies, but I'm at the point where I don't think I really care.

THAT was his main reason for implementing the paid subscription plan.

Plus, I will be honest, I'm getting tired of the time and effort (not to mention the cost involved) of doing this virtually for free. Yeah, the banner ads help, but I am still a long way from being in the black on this site.

Looks like the banners were NOT covering the cost of the site. Rich has been pretty much periodically upgrading his servers and bandwidth to cover the increase in users on thise site. Do you really have any idea how much a server costs to host this type of site, with this much traffic? That's not counting the Vbulletin license and the money he pays his programmer for all the changes he has made to make this a better and unique site for everyone.

This is no KS. No one here is banned for speaking up or disagreeing with how things are run here as long as it is done in a mature and civil manner. I'm not sure about recently as I have not been to that site in awhile, but the posts you have made questioning Rich would have at the least been immediately deleted over there and most likely got you banned.

It's when you start to beat the same topic to death over and over and over again that it starts to get old and starts to become nothing more than trolling.

You have been here long enough to know that NONE of us stiffle or ban for disagreeing with how things are done here. I find the implication that that is how things have become or are headed highly offensive.

 

[nicolai]

If you are going to pick and choose the quotes you pull to throw everything back in Rich's face, how about you try to look at BOTH sides of the issue.

THAT was his main reason for implementing the paid subscription plan.

Yes that is true. And everyone understands that and most do not complain about it.

Looks like the banners were NOT covering the cost of the site. Rich has been pretty much periodically upgrading his servers and bandwidth to cover the increase in users on thise site. Do you really have any idea how much a server costs to host this type of site, with this much traffic? That's not counting the Vbulletin license and the money he pays his programmer for all the changes he has made to make this a better and unique site for everyone.

I know that is is expensive to upgrade and maintain the site that is why I said it was more then worth it for me to renew my benefactor membership for the 100.00 membership fee as I feel it is a bargain.

This is no KS. No one here is banned for speaking up or disagreeing with how things are run here as long as it is done in a mature and civil manner. I'm not sure about recently as I have not been to that site in awhile, but the posts you have made questioning Rich would have at the least been immediately deleted over there and most likely got you banned.

Which is one of the biggest reason that i stay. Rich gives us the oppurtunity of free speech when we disagree with something as long as we keep it in a civil manner. That is also why I quit going to the leo forum over there that I was a long term founding member of. KS started be handled in a pre-WW2 enviroment where the dictator did whatever he wanted to do and deleted and changed everything he didnt like. While I do see some of the original people are still there I think most of the people ended up getting tired of the crap over there and ended up over here or elsewhere.

It's when you start to beat the same topic to death over and over and over again that it starts to get old and starts to become nothing more than trolling.

You have been here long enough to know that NONE of us stiffle or ban for disagreeing with how things are done here. I find the implication that that is how things have become or are headed highly offensive.

I posted that last quote to remind rich of his words from years ago as there have been people that stated the same thing here. I really hope your not going to play the "trolling" card with me as you can check all my posts and see that i am an avid poster in many forums and never I mean never lie about anything or try to imply things are better elsewhere or say that this isnt a great site and isnt worth paying for. What makes it a great site is that we as a membership or community or family as some say are able to talk about issues freely and we all understand that no matter how hard Rich tries he isnt going to make FAUNA a perfect place or a place that everyone is going to be happy all the time, that is why we at times speak up and let him know that maybe something isnt right and needs looked at before the gavel comes down and something is put into law.
This thread has taken many turns now from a where is wes, to lets raise money to get wes back, to was wes's banning right, to Rich outing a supposed wes/Roz coalition, to a cat fight, to a name calling/retaliation scenario, to a complaining of the enforcement of the rules and now to a defensive posturing on Rich's or Faunas behalf.
Remember one thing Dennis, no one here is out to get rich or fauna for anything, We just want a voice in the hopes he will hear the calls from the peanut gallery and takes those pleas into consideration. I do understand your hostility at people that you think are questioning Rich's authority or Bad mouthing the site, but if you look closely to all the recent posts you will see it isnt complaining or whining or bad mouthing at all, its the members reaching out trying to better what we have here as a community.

 

[Bill_Leverton]

Remember one thing Dennis, no one here is out to get rich or fauna for anything, We just want a voice in the hopes he will hear the calls from the peanut gallery and takes those pleas into consideration. I do understand your hostility at people that you think are questioning Rich's authority or Bad mouthing the site, but if you look closely to all the recent posts you will see it isnt complaining or whining or bad mouthing at all, its the members reaching out trying to better what we have here as a community.

Nick I couldn't of said that any better

 

[nicolai]

Nick I couldn't of said that any better

Which is why I said it!!!!

 

[Bill_Leverton]

Which is why I said it!!!!

Fine Be that way I see how you are.

 

[DThomas]

I posted that last quote to remind rich of his words from years ago as there have been people that stated the same thing here. I really hope your not going to play the "trolling" card with me as you can check all my posts and see that i am an avid poster in many forums and never I mean never lie about anything or try to imply things are better elsewhere or say that this isnt a great site and isnt worth paying for.

If I believed you a troll you'd have the warning points for it. My statement was a generalization of the way things have been going as of late. It makes no sense and does no good to contninously beat the same point to death. I have not seen one complaint here that has not been brought up before and addressed on many different occassions.

Please tell me, how many times does Rich or myself and the other Mods need to answer a complaint before it can be laid to rest? That is what I am getting at. It gets old and very frustrating to see the same thing again and again, especially after it has been addressed numerous times in the past.

What makes it a great site is that we as a membership or community or family as some say are able to talk about issues freely and we all understand that no matter how hard Rich tries he isnt going to make FAUNA a perfect place or a place that everyone is going to be happy all the time, that is why we at times speak up and let him know that maybe something isnt right and needs looked at before the gavel comes down and something is put into law.

Yes we are able to talk about issues freely. But, when they have been answered, again, what is the point to continously bring them up? All it does it add more fuel to the fire. Eventually, it will get to the point that frustration is going to give way to anger, egos are going to get bruised, and friends are going to become enemies. The site will continue to run the way Rich wants it to and the only thing accomplished in the long run is someone will probably get nuked during the process. Make your point, debate it a bit if you wish, but do not harp on it. And don't throw things in people's faces. That's when it gets ugly.

that is why we at times speak up and let him know that maybe something isnt right and needs looked at before the gavel comes down and something is put into law.

See above.

Remember one thing Dennis, no one here is out to get rich or fauna for anything, We just want a voice in the hopes he will hear the calls from the peanut gallery and takes those pleas into consideration.

Trust me, he listens to things brought up. We discuss many things in the admin forum that are brought up by the membership. That does not mean thought that he has to implement everything that everyone wishes. It is a precarious balancing act for him to run this site and you are right, not everyone is going to be happy. As many people have said before, agree to disagree and move on. The quickest way to get your complaint dismissed is to nag.

I do understand your hostility at people that you think are questioning Rich's authority or Bad mouthing the site, but if you look closely to all the recent posts you will see it isnt complaining or whining or bad mouthing at all, its the members reaching out trying to better what we have here as a community.

I'm not even close to hostile yet. You'll have no doubts if I ever become hostile, but I don't think I ever have on this site.

 

[nicolai]

I'm not even close to hostile yet. You'll have no doubts if I ever become hostile

Well I am not even going to worry about that unless rich loans you one of these.

 

[DThomas]

Well I am not even going to worry about that unless rich loans you one of these.

Oh, I have access to much more powerfull and destructive, umm, "devices."

 

[Lucille]

Oh, I have access to much more powerfull and destructive, umm, "devices."

Holy cr**, Dennis, exactly what IS that? It looks VERY
impressive.....
And you say you have even MORE powerful persuaders?

Heck, I'm insured by Smith and Wesson, but it looks like y'all are prepared for ANYTHING....

 

[Dr Owens]

Oh, I have access to much more powerfull and destructive, umm, "devices."

Jesus man! Like what? I'm not aware of too many weapons that can literally cut a man in half from a 1000 yards away....well, not anything non-military anyway.

 

[WebSlave]

You need to remember that Dennis is an LEO.

 

[nicolai]

hahahaha.....

You need to remember that Dennis is an LEO.

The fortune teller/palm reader/wiccan lady that I know says that the scorpios are the ones to watch out for...especially those that are born on or near hallows eve. Remember that the leos let the lionesses do all the hunting for them, they just wait for the meal to get caught for them and then they go and get the lions share off it.(pun intended).