A Request to Everyone - Please Read

It's January, and as you all know the forum gets very busy with rumours of transfers this month. This also leads to more traffic and posts in other sections. The circle continues as new people find the forum and more users join up and post.

On the downside, there has been a noticable increase in the "football" areas of the type of posts that say things such as "wages", "is he related to Connor Smith", "we need a left back", "too much like". We know it's the "in" thing to try and imitate Moog's humour, but it's becoming more and more disruptive in threads to the point where many people don't bother to read them.

Therefore, in January, and more importantly in the serious threads we don't want any of these smarta55 comments ruining these topics. Just use your common sense people and keep the comedy to the lounge area. Yes we know the trolls will be patrolling and looking to test the boundaries, and yes most of us laugh at Moogs outrageous comments, (it's called originality), but we get a lot of complaints, especially in transfer windows, about this behaviour in threads and we completely agree.

As mentioned above, there has been a notable increase in such comments recently, so it's time for a crackdown anyway. We would appreciate it if you respect this request.
Warnings, infractions and short term bans are available to us if required .

 

Hurrah, finally!!

 

*must not post Eddie Oshodi/Peter Griffin/Le Fondre comment* :rant:

 

Good decision imho

 

Glad this has come from you Admin, as I have been tempted to have a go at the perpetrators myself, but had I done so I would have no doubt have been vilified by the afore mentioned perps!!!

 

Well done Admin,it was becoming tiresome.

 

Just to stop any confusion can we not have a list of the banned phrases/in jokes.

That way there is no excuse for people to say "I did not know" and newbies will not accidentally stumble into getting banned in their first week.

 

It's OK. We know who the worst offenders are, one has already shot himself in the foot. There will be no problems if sense is shown.

 

none of those phrase mean anything to me. moog has gone too let field. 'we need a left back'?

 

related to connor smith ?!? what the hell does that mean!?

 

Great call, I shall be posting more often as a result of this decision

Please could you confirm that Moog is alive and well and hasnt been "killed off" so to speak?

 

He's fine, just on his annual soiree to Mykanos.

 

Thanks Admin.. just one more thing re all the silly phrases / comments that we're looking to stamp out... will this include references to that world class wide player we nutured and sold to Liverpool back in the 80's? Think his name was Phil Barnes or something like that?

 

Moog has been given way too much credit here....

 

Nice one admin!

 

I may need an increase in my forum WAGES to not post such piffle

 

Thank you so very much for this Admin, it is apparent that what was a source of purile amusement for a few, was obviously also a source of irritation for quite a few others.

 

Too similar to VOR.

 

Worth a two week trial surely.

 

this forum has definitely run its course. look at the users. most people on here would do better using the internet for only work and porn

 

Now there’s an interesting debate on its own

Admin posted elsewhere that we still have a healthy subscription of new members, which is always positive, but you are always going to get a good mixed and varied view. But I wonder how many registered members don’t post because of what they ready by others.

Realistically there is quite little competition in the way of creditable Watford fans forums. Glory Horns, here and erm…… Lets face it I bet the majority of people on here have registered, lurk or post on Glory Horns. That means that you are going to attract a vast range of members, from those that want to take football seriously to those who have a passing interest and may look at things from a lighter point of view.

The more of the “sheep posts” that there are the more people switch off and lose interest. Look how many of the more established and older members have drifted away or contribute less and less now than before, Caz G, Paddy, UEA, Nak, Cude ( less so ), Tring, Chewitt for example. OK Paddy was as much a pain as some of the joke posts and comments that Admin is talking about but it wasn’t a one word “wages” reply, it was often crap and waffle but with an element of a sense of humour.

Its not often now you see a new thread started by that many members, they tend to be started by a few regulars and usually some experienced and established members.

I’m sure I’m Ron Burgundy won’t mind me mentioning him personally as he knows how I feel about some of his posts, in fact I skip past most of them A because I’m old and boring and B because I just can’t be asked. But Ron is one of a group who like to click with the “in Jokes” that’s OK but because it winds some people up we then get the arguments, unrest and the loss of interest. In fairness to Ron its not just him, there are plenty of others and I have probably done the same in the past as well.

I’m not sure that the forum has run its course but I don’t think we are at its peek, despite the figures telling us that we have more members and more posts. Take out the expansion of crap it will be interesting to see where we are.

 

Members come and go for a variety of reasons. I've been coming on here for a long time now and seen various new posters emerge and become mainstays. Just how it goes. Some would do well in remembering that it's just an internet forum. While I enjoyed the jokes and found all the puns funny, I understand that some people didn't. Don't think it's worth getting all worked up about.

 

To answer With A Smile's post, which made some good points...

Yes, the site has a healthy mix of visits by current members and visitors, plus a regular stream of new registrations. I thought we'd start to tail off after year 4 as most forums do, but the enthusiasm from the mods and the users remains high, so we continue to build on past years and I see no reason why that should drop any time soon, (see footnote at the end).

Competition from other forums? No, not really a lot to be fair, just GH which I never saw as the competition but more as an alternative which isn't as school / work safe. However, if you take time to look around other football forums then I think we kick 99% of the others backsides due to having modern paid for software and mods who know how to use it. Trust me, we're light years ahead of nearly everyone else.

Regarding older established members who post little these days. It happens. It's the life-cycle of a forum. Gone but not forgotten. The new users are the lifeblood of the place now, and even those who I have run-ins with will no doubt be legends one day. I don't know of any forum that doesn't lose established members over time.

One thing to remember that I almost forgot this week, and that's that you cannot please all of the people all of the time. It's impossible. We also make mistakes from time to time and hold our hands up when we do. Have I been over zealous with the new rules for the month? Perhaps. Will it in turn lead to a much better forum? D4mn right it will.

Anyway, here's something to chew on. I'm trying to change career this year, and I mean a proper, complete "about turn" type of career change. I've been in my industry since 1989 and I want out. If I'm successful then my time on here is finished, so a new reign will come. Beware :sign13:.

 

I'm not in favour of curbing the sense of humour that has developed on this forum. It developed in the transfer threads because of endless inane speculation about players, particularly high profile stars we had no chance of signing. These threads became repetitious round ups of 'wages', 'too similar too' etc. It's the wrong way around to consider they interfere with serious transfer talk as much of the talk was daft and inspired the humour.

And who says it's not funny? Eric Morecambe used to delight the country with a signature wiggle of his specs. No one complained he did it every time.

I would worry that controlling the chat too much would strangle a great forum.

Good luck with the change of career. There are worse things than measuring women for their underwear though and Mrs Moose says you are good at it.

 

I tend to agree with that. I don't post very often, but thats not due to the 'comedy' replies, its because generally people have already said what I have to say or I have no 'ITK' information. Personally I enjoy IRB and JB's replies, they lighten up what can turn into very dull threads about players we all know we will never sign. The way I see it is, if you want purely accurate and on topic news, use the Official sites.

However, as Admin said: You can't please all the people all the time.

I actually think recently the forum has got better, after taking a dive in the early parts of last year. The newbies seem to be integrating well after a few confrontations back then.

As for the career change, good luck Admin!

 

Sup guys

 

Hey, this is a fantastic thread, one of the best and sincere I've ever seen anywhere! It's opened my eyes up a bit ...

I'm a 'mod' on Reading's "Royals Rendezvous" and we're babies - just entering our second year of existence. So not surprisingly everything is on the up. A block of about 50 of us were getting really cheesed off with WUMS/multiple identities etc. on the old BBC 606 Reading board, and chose to go independent at christmas-time last year and not enter 'en mass' to the well-established (and then only) Reading forum HNA. We're now over five times that, and given where we came from do tend to edit out any sign of bad language etc. pretty fast. But our members thank us for it. And... it's a very friendly place where opposing fans are listened to, and we have good relations with forums from about half of the Championship sides - only one has given any aggro at all, in fact (no name!). Your comments are right, this seems a fine, and modern, forum.

So, now knowing something about us, what advice could you offer us from experience? Remember, we're only 12 months old. Seven on the moderation team, plus several other 'assistants' as well, so good involvement. How do you look for tell-tale signs that things might not be going right? And why a falling off period after about four years existence or so, as someone said? It'd be good to have any comments, to help us heed these things before they arrive.

daib0, always in peace!
Royals Rendezvous

 

Hi daib0, I'll try to give my top tips learned from the last 5+ years.

If you're open and honest with each other and your users you'll go a long way. If you **** up then say so. People appreciate honesty and transparency. If users PM you then always reply, keep communications open and encouraged and you'll soon get a feel for what's liked and what's not on the boards. Don't be afraid to open lots of forum areas, then close the one's that go unused. Clean up the whole place now and again, and make sure one of the mods enjoys doing such a thing, (you know who you are)! Don't be afraid to confront people who post aggressively and MUST have the last word, their posts stop others from posting and will in time kill your forum, remove such users if you have to. Don't get rid of the trolls or wind up merchants too soon, the best ones give the forum some flavour. Know who your trolls are, (there is lots of software to help you). Be work and school safe, it will pay dividends in the long term. Install mods that users can use when there's nothing going on, like an arcade, bookies or money system. Know your software and use it's features to the full.

As you've seen on this thread, you can't please everyone, ever. Get used to it. Make sure you have a top mod if you don't have an Admin, someone who will make the difficult calls, take the abuse and wave the stick at times. That way the other mods can use the forum as users and moderate without fear, that's vitally important.

Apart from that just enjoy the place, post as a user not a mod, and when you **** up badly, (we all do), take a few days off and come back a wiser mod.

 

Admin, I think I speak for everyone when I say that we appreciate what you do as without you and the other mods this forum would simply not exist.

I do think you have been a bit over the top and unclear with these new rules (take the three posts I made and was banned for as an example with only one of them containing the Moog humour that you cited as breaking the rules). But as I say it is your forum and if that is the route that you want to go down then that is your call.

However, I must say that it is very frustrating when you see the inconsitencies since the rules were brought in. Before and after my ban I saw various threads go off topic, various classic examples of Moog humour and the vast majority of them went without even a word of warning let alone the infraction that I recieved upon making my first comment that contravened the rules. Fair enough, you can't check every thread but when you see this thread itself with those sort of comments and that they have gone without warnings or infractions you start to wonder about the consistency and whether or not you were just waiting to pounce on certain people.

 

Moog will be delighted when he comes back, a new type of humour named after him.

 

As I keep saying, we can't please everyone. Think back to school, when a good kid suddenly does something stupid, they're usually let off because of past form, whereas a problem kid won't get that 2nd chance. It's human nature, and a huge part of why it's so bl**dy difficult to be completely consistent on a forum where we can only go by posts people make. If you want to continue the disagreement I suggest it stays on PM's from this point.

 

Hi Admin, what can I do but thank you so much for that in-depth answer. All those remarks will be copied over personally to our mods, that's the first time we've ever had helping words, and I'd like each of them to mull over those words. And we are genuinely impressed by your forum, right for the good reasons.

And please feel sure in knowing you've always got space on our own forum 'Royals Rendezvous' - for articles, match previews, or comments - in the "Rivals, but Friends" section anyone can post - and of course, after the simple registration any new member could post anywhere ... or if any of you post anything to me personally I'll see it gets up too.
Here's to a good game Saturday, just need attractive football without friction from the officials, nuff said!

Finally, we've included WFC Forums on our forum 'friends' listing:
http://royalsrendezvous.co.uk/topic/9220869/1

 

I am saddened to find that people haven't been taking me seriously.

 

PS. Moose has it spot on. The repetitive spamming of transfer threads is a reaction to the repetitive drivel posted by serious posters with no imaginatior intelligence. Unsurprisingly it's they who largely shout the loudest against it, before continuing to spark up with spurious threads about players we've got no link with, or commenting on other threads with uninspired comments about costs, budgets or remuneration.

Never will everything everyone posts be enjoyed by everyone else. There are certain posters on here who should be banned simply because they are moronic and make the WUMS and trolls on here seem like welcome relief from the same old blokey chat bollox. Let's face it, how much genuinely interesting content is there to be wrung out of one pissy little football club?

Comedy is subjective. I don't care that 90% of people don't find me funny. I make myself laugh and sometimes I think I'm brilliant. If I'm in a minority of 1, then that's all that matters as the person whose opinion I most value is mine.

As for IRM and JB, I think they brighten the forum and are capable of genuine moments of genius. For all the haters out there, you're not all Shakespeares yourselves.

As a final thought, a few have made it clear that I am on their ignore list and a couple of posters are on mine. This facility should allow all of us to read the content we want without being offended by those on here we personally can't stand and should prevent the need for draconian rules to create a homogenised space for the same old chat by the same old people. Not saying that's what this is, by the way.

 

wages ?