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WHAT IS GOING ON WITH
THE FORUM...
We apologize, to the majority of our visitors, for
having had to suddenly close the Forum without much explanation... we did so
because totally inappropriate posts started to appear on the board at a time
when we had other commitments which prevented us from focusing on the Forum
problem, and our only feasible solution at the time was to temporarily
freeze the Forum. Even though our "free time" remains limited,
we have given this matter much consideration. The two main
problems our message board is currently faced with are:
- BASHING and
PERSONAL ACCUSATIONS:
Personal accusations against several different named
individuals were repeatedly posted on this message board. Such
posts were made in complete disregard to our posted Forum Rules, which ALL our
registered users have agreed to abide by! The
posts in question were deleted and the posters' usernames deactivated, but one
of the transgressors quickly re-registered under another username, and had we
left the Forum operational we would not have been able to prevent abusers from
coming back and continuing their reprehensible bashing.
We consider any kind of personal bashing of anyone (including those who happen to be in "public office" or "running for public
office") totally inappropriate and unacceptable for our Forum. We
would like to point out that we do not object to civilized and
well-intentioned discussions about "public actions" taken by
"public individuals" (or of anyone running for public office),
HOWEVER, we will NOT allow our Forum to be used for personal
accusations or defamatory comments of ANY KIND, regardless of whether or not some people
think it is their "right to free speech"!
- MULTIPLE HANDLES
and BANNED POSTERS:
Another problem that our Forum is also being plagued with, relates
to multiple identities and previously banned posters... A few
months ago, certain individuals had been repeatedly breaking our Forum Rules
and were a constant source of complaints, animosity and petty bickering in the Forum. We
attempted to contact those individuals via email, to resolve the
situation privately, but our efforts failed and we banned them from
posting. After a brief absence from the Forum, some of the banned
posters managed to "resurrect" themselves with different identities and post again. After a while we stopped trying to prevent
them from doing so. We hoped that, at that point, they would comply with our rules. -- No such luck!!! Some "resurrected" users had
gone through great lengths to try to "mask" their identity in order to regain
access to the Forum, and we have very strong reasons to believe that one of
them in particular (perhaps believing to be posting from a successfully
camouflaged "point of origin"), started also posting under different
"usernames", giving Forum readers the FALSE impression that "their"
views on a controversial community issue reflect "general public opinion".
We consider the use
of "multiple handles" to be DECEITFUL, and we believe that
fraudulent manipulation of public opinion is a totally unacceptable use of our
Forum.
WHAT IS OUR SOLUTION TO THE FORUM PROBLEMS?
Quite honestly, having the Forum closed has been very "relaxing"
and convenient for us, aside from the fact that, like everyone else, we have not been able to
check the Forum to find out the latest "local buzz". From the number of Forum-related emails
we have received this past week (not counting the ones from some of the very individuals on
our "black list") we have concluded that quite a few people around here sorely
miss the Forum and hope to have it back for legitimate reasons! In an effort to accommodate
most of our readers we will
tentatively reopen the Forum very soon, under certain conditions:
We ask the people who have been
persistently breaking our rules to PLEASE STOP! While most of the people who
read and post in our Forum are reasonable and well-intentioned,
a few -- very few -- persistent individuals seem to have a lot of
time on their hands and appear determined to carry out their misguided
motives... However, as much as we feel that this Forum can be an asset to our community we
are not willing to sacrifice other areas of our lives in order to
voluntarily "baby-sit" this place! If we cannot count on everyone's
full cooperation we may be forced to take further drastic measures regarding
this Forum...
One of the steps we will be taking immediately requires
the deactivation of EVERY username that has been in any way "flagged" by our
server in the last few months as having a connection to another username --
everyone should know that, in all likelihood, this will inadvertently
affect some of our users who may have nothing to do with the specific problems
we are trying to address, but there are a few thousand registered users in our
Forum and, at the moment, it is not feasible for us to do this any other way. - If anyone tries to login and finds that their username is no longer active,
please DO NOT RE-REGISTER under a different username! For the time being
all new usernames, even after being "activated" by the user, will
not be able to post until we manually "enable" them. (New users
and "deactivated" users who email us to try to clarify their particular
situation should understand that we already receive a large number of emails
every day, and in most cases we will have no way of quickly verifying that someone is indeed who
they claim to be). We hope to be able to count on everyone's patience
and cooperation. If not, we reserve the right to make this a permanently CLOSED Forum and we will, at our
convenience, fully screen all potential Forum users before granting them
posting privileges -- obviously, this would be a very long process,
and many people could unfairly be denied the ability to post! Unfortunately,
at the moment, we do not have any other "quick fix" for the existing problem.
While many may feel disappointment right
now, we should all "thank" some of the same old "pot-stirrers" for the
current Forum situation... without their "hard work and dedication"
this would still be a place where everyone in Farmingdale could exchange
opinions and ideas in a mature, responsible and respectful way!
:-(
Fran and Darlene
March 9, 2004
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