A Lounge sub-forum?

I noticed too, but rather than blaming the newer posters who are still feeling the way into the forum, I blame the lack of participation of many key members. I know they're on the water and I know they're taking sweet pics, where are the posts???

Mike, you are correct about the latter lack of participation, but isn't it a chicken or the egg scenario? Did lack of participation allow the void to be fillwed with chatter, or did the chatter cause the lack of participation? I made a concerted effort to substantially decrease my participation, including moderator status (but I just noticed I still have it in two subforums?) because I was not enjoying native fish or the association. I spent my entire time getting worked up over a few bad apples and dealing with them, potentially being in conflict of interest due to my employment with a Natural Resource agency depending upon the wording of things on the board attributed to me, seeing some lax ethics, and people asking for the world but not willing to contribute an hour or two of their week unless it got them some diret, and somewhat selfish, benefit. On top of that, my work load has increased 50% while the staff I work with has decreased, along a general and literal sense of having to justify your job on a weekly basis while cuts to a department that makes up like 1% of a state budget continue. So yeah, I don't post much anymore, and now half of what I see has poor titles making it a crap shoot whether or not to read or little to do with native fish and more to do with basic aquarium care that can be answered in any basic book if someone took the time to find out the answer for themselves. If I had any shred of time, I could be feeing AC with an article an issue about natives in Maryland.

On a more cheery note, our group (Maryland Department of Natural Resources - Monitoring and Non-tidal Assessment) has undergone a major website change, including some (basic) interactive maps about stream condition and life, fact sheets, reports, posters, news, and many more things about the fish that can be found in mid-Atlantic streams.

Mike, you are correct about the latter lack of participation, but isn't it a chicken or the egg scenario? Did lack of participation allow the void to be fillwed with chatter, or did the chatter cause the lack of participation? I made a concerted effort to substantially decrease my participation, including moderator status (but I just noticed I still have it in two subforums?) because I was not enjoying native fish or the association. I spent my entire time getting worked up over a few bad apples and dealing with them, potentially being in conflict of interest due to my employment with a Natural Resource agency depending upon the wording of things on the board attributed to me, seeing some lax ethics, and people asking for the world but not willing to contribute an hour or two of their week unless it got them some diret, and somewhat selfish, benefit.

You are in a difficult position because of your professional considerations. In an open public forum you will always be conflicted between two masters.
Frankly, I suspect the two are mutually exclusive. You may have to choose; either an open public forum and accept the downside or stick to academic venues only.
FWIW,I give you credit for attempting to find balance between the two but I have sensed your discomfort and conflict long before this thread.

Not to try and re-rail this thread but I wanted to mention that in the NANFA mission statement is is said an objective of NANFA is "to provide a forum for fellowship and camaraderie among individuals who share a common interest in the diversity, biology, captive husbandry, and conservation of North America's native fishes"

This forum in it's current state isn't quite ready to do this even though I feel it's the perfect vehicle. I'll keep poking at this issue from time to time as I feel obligated to fulfill this someday.

Not to try and re-rail this thread but I wanted to mention that in the NANFA mission statement is is said an objective of NANFA is "to provide a forum for fellowship and camaraderie among individuals who share a common interest in the diversity, biology, captive husbandry, and conservation of North America's native fishes"

Don't assume that the NANFA Forum is the officially approved avenue for camaraderie.

Maybe a second forum can be set up for chat.

Maybe members, strike that, forum participants can write better topic sentences
and learn to use the Search.

The Wiki idea still has a heartbeat.

Don't assume that the NANFA Forum is the officially approved avenue for camaraderie.


Maybe members, strike that, forum participants can write better topic sentences
and learn to use the Search.

The Wiki idea still has a heartbeat.

One thing I'd like to weigh in on is using or not using search. This is often a prickly issue in topical forums. Mods and users bust on folks who ask questions asked before.

Well, my experience w/long term participation in these forums is that new people join, ideas change, technical data goes obsolete. I'm not all that interested in what was discussed two years ago by members who no longer participate. I want to know who's been looking at the issue lately and what they may have to add or subtract from old threads.
I know I've answered questions in more detail and with revised details than I had put in my own old posts. I wouldn't suggest anyone go by what I had to say two years ago.

Don't assume that the NANFA Forum is the officially approved avenue for camaraderie.

Maybe a second forum can be set up for chat.

Maybe members, strike that, forum participants can write better topic sentences
and learn to use the Search.

The Wiki idea still has a heartbeat.

I don't assume this forum is officially approved for camaraderie but I am saying it is the perfect vehicle.
A second forum for camaraderie? Bah...
Phil, I also want the membership to provide accurate topic titles, and refrain from flooding the forum with silly topics of little to no value. If I had my way, I'd simply dump those topics but then I get the "free speech" gang breathing down my neck. Either you trust the mods here or you don't and I think most folks don't like the mods "doing stuff" so here we are, a forum with inaccurate topic titles and many topics of little to no value.
FYI---The off topic area was proposed for NANFA membership only.

If I had my way, I'd simply dump those topics but then I get the "free speech" gang breathing down my neck.

People seem to think that the right to free speech means that they can say whatever they want anywhere they want with no consequences. That's not true. All it means is that the government can't pass any laws against free speech. If anyone doesn't like the rules on this forum, they are free to start their own forum and make their own rules.

People seem to think that the right to free speech means that they can say whatever they want anywhere they want with no consequences. That's not true. All it means is that the government can't pass any laws against free speech.

Amen!

Just thought I would suggest that we have a "lounge" sub-forum. This could be a place where people could post things that are going on in their life that are not necessarily native-fish related. I've seen this done on other forums with success. I thought it would be a good idea because native fish are cool, but not everything that happens in a person's life is directly related to native fish. I have become friends with people through this forum, and it would be nice if I could post other things that are happening in my life sometimes to let them know. What do you guys think?

Brian

I think its an excellent idea, this way people who are just showing off their fish or dont have time to do 3 hrs of research on the internet could have areas to go (like a beginners area, new user area, a show off area, a new ideas area etc) this would only add to the NANFA forums and I believe not take away.

It's that what the Photo & Video Gallery is for?

I think we pretty much hashed out the "beginners" issue in this thread (and the accompanying thread about forum tone/content). Beginner questions that are about native fish (e.g. their care, breeding, collecting, transport, laws, genetics, distributions) are certainly welcome, but beginner fishkeeping questions are probably better addresed in one of the many other aquarium forums out there.

Don't assume that the NANFA Forum is the officially approved avenue for camaraderie.

Maybe a second forum can be set up for chat.

Maybe members, strike that, forum participants can write better topic sentences
and learn to use the Search.

The Wiki idea still has a heartbeat.

Then why do you have that as the mission statement? IF Nanfas mission has changed shouldnt you change the statement so that when people join there will be less misunderstandings? I believe the Wiki idea is excellent, when I look up Lepomis in Wikipedia their are some sunfish they have no information on (sub-species of Longear and Bluegill) and some are really lacking in info. I think this would really help fill a void, ( if anyone has the time).

Then why do you have that as the mission statement? IF Nanfas mission has changed shouldnt you change the statement so that when people join there will be less misunderstandings?

That's part of the overarching NANFA mission statement (which long predates the Forum), not the mission statement for the NANFA Forum itself. Yes, NANFA wants to promote camaraderie among like-minded folks, but that doesn't imply that the official NANFA Forum is intended as a place to just socialize.

In the NANFA Mission Statement, "to provide a forum for fellowship and camaraderie among individuals who share a common interest in the diversity, biology, captive husbandry, and conservation of North America's native fishes." "forum" there doesn't mean the NANFA Forum, but rather the broader sense of "forum" as in a venue or opportunity for discussion. I imagine that line of the Mission Statement was written long before Internet forums even existed, but I can see why it's now confusing.

I could even see it making sense replacing "to provide a forum for fellowship..." with "to provide opportunity for fellowship..." to avoid that confusion, but I doubt it's worth changing the mission statement for something so trivial.

Edited by jase, 11 March 2010 - 02:54 PM.

Of course, if no one wants to moderate such a sub-forum, then I guess we don't need one.

Ahem: I would LOVE to moderate such a sub-forum! It would be terrific fun!! Especially if the other moderators could not override my decisions and commentary on other peoples' posts.

Ahem: I would LOVE to moderate such a sub-forum! It would be terrific fun!! Especially if the other moderators could not override my decisions and commentary on other peoples' posts.

Should this ever come to become a reality someday I would volunteer to moderate a lounge forum along side Irate Mormon. I am on the board very often and a lounge forum doesn't take a lot of knowledge and I do have message board moderator experience. Just thought I would throw that out there.

I would volunteer to moderate a lounge forum along side Irate Mormon.

I think you may be missing Irate's evil intentions. Imagine a forum where every thread gets a single reply indicating that fish will die and then gets locked.

I think you may be missing Irate's evil intentions. Imagine a forum where every thread gets a single reply indicating that fish will die and then gets locked.

Ha ha thats pretty funny.....come to think about it that might just be a fun forum to visit, for awhile at least. lozgod if I wasnt working over 50 hrs a week right now I would volunteer also, (its just not possible without severe repercussions from my wife).

Ha ha thats pretty funny.....come to think about it that might just be a fun forum to visit, for awhile at least. lozgod if I wasnt working over 50 hrs a week right now I would volunteer also, (its just not possible without severe repercussions from my wife).

Part of my job description is to hang out on NANFA forums. The job isn't aware of it but as much as I do it, it must be.

I think you may be missing Irate's evil intentions. Imagine a forum where every thread gets a single reply indicating that fish will die and then gets locked.

... and you guys don't even see the stuff we remove!!!

LOL, Yeah lozgod I tried to convince my boss to put in a 250 gallon aquarium in the breakroom to relieve stress and brighten the atmosphere (I actually wanted to do it because my wife wont let me have a 250 gallon aquarium and no my boss didnt fall for it ). Nativeplanter......do you have copy of those posts, just for posterity; I think they would make for a very funny post. Thanks Joe.

Edited by wargreen, 13 March 2010 - 02:13 AM.

Wargreen,
The point is, posts were removed because they were either very off topic or otherwise unsuitable. Haven't we just been discussing this issue?

Nativeplanter......do you have copy of those posts, just for posterity; I think they would make for a very funny post. Thanks Joe.