Happy New Year and forum posting advisory

[CBlair]

I hope everyone had a very Merry Christmas and are looking forward to an exciting New Year.

Some things I wanted to touch upon as we get started, looking back at last year and now looking forward to this new one.

There is one carry over from last year we all could do without, this is the rivalry and negative conduct of two individuals who are regulars on this forum. Now I do believe you punish in private and praise in public. So I will not be naming any names today, but both individuals are starting the New Year with an involuntary 30 day break from posting.

How did it get to where we are today? I will start by saying that as moderator I have no power or authority to offer any kind of punishment. I have written or talked to both parties several times this year and it seemed for a while that it was working. But not long enough, in order to offer others who post here a helping hand I would like to cover a couple of points that are important for all of us to remember when posting on any form of social media or even when speaking to anyone publicly.

Charles

 

[CBlair]

Continued from first post:

1: When posting on this forum remember that while your viewpoint is important to you none of us is preeminent. No matter how much experience you have or degrees you have achieved we all have a message we want to share and no one person has the right to say who can or cannot speak about a particular subject. Your opinion may be right,your technique may be the best one available. But your experience does not make any other person who wishes to share their opinion wrong or stupid just because you think so. Like it or not this forum is public and we will sometimes find that people have differing opinions and we all have to tolerate that.

2: You do not have to prove you are right. When two people have different opinions it is not necessary for one of those two to be proven right or more right. Those of us who read and participate in the discussions are perfectly capable of deciding for ourselves if someone has a better idea or if one of the other is full of cr... It is not necessary for you to defend your point to the death. Just make your opinion known and let it go at that.

3: If you have nothing good to say, say nothing at all. Before you hit the send button, re-read what you have written. If the only content of your post is to put someone else down, put them in their place or ridicule an idea or make someone feel stupid for the idea then stop. Delete what you have written and sit on your hands for 5 minutes. There is nothing wrong with disagreeing with someone or even thinking their idea is stupid. What is wrong is trying to humiliate someone because of what you think.

Offer a different opinion or a reason for why you disagree and leave it at that. Putting down someone elses credentials or intelligence is no different than putting someone down for the color of their skin or the country they were born in. This kind of behavior is just wrong and if I find it I will try to delete it if possible.

4: Let things roll like water off a ducks back. If you are an adult, act like it and grow some skin. It is not necessary in life to get offended or to go to war over every slight. We will all make mistakes and say the wrong things sometimes. Sometimes on purpose and others without realizing it. But you cannot be so sensitive that you have to blow up at every criticism. We will all feel insulted or denigrated from time to time in our lives. Just because you are an invisible untouchable entity on the computer doesnt make it ok for you to lash out at everyone just because you didnt like the way they talked to you.

This is a hard one to go over because we all feel like we should be treated with respect. And you are right to think so but at the same time you cant expect perfect behavior from everyone all the time. If you question someones motives, respond but not with anger or insults but with a question. They might not realize that what they wrote offended you. They might even offer an apology. If not then sometimes it is best to just ignore it and move on.

I hope people dont think I am preaching too much on these things. But if you want to avoid having your forum privileges removed please try to remember these things I have posted here. These are not necessarily rules but they will give you an idea if the kind of things that I look for when moderating posts and trying to resolve conflicts. If you wont take my advice on these issues then you will find yourself being punished.

Charles Blair
Moderator

 

[ostie01]

3: If you have nothing good to say, say nothing at all

That's the best part

 

[Gordon Heaton]

Extremely well articulated. Thank you Mr. Blair.

 

[PDW]

I've basically stopped reading this sub-forum because I'm totally over dealing with Rich King's overweening ego and need to denigrate everyone else's posts if they don't pay sufficient homage to his genius and acknowledge him as the source of all wisdom.

I will be forever grateful that I never ever did his class or watched any of his videos, else he'd claim that everything I did that he approved of was due to his instruction. Of course, by *not* learning from the only living master of the craft, anything I do will be clearly wrong and inferior. Fortunately I can cope with that and my Monarch CY compound & cross slide don't seem any the worse either.

I also do not and will not post any of my projects here for the same reason.

Phil (machtool) and his friend taught me what I know about scraping, as he did RC99 and a bunch of other Aussies. You don't see Phil claiming to be the font of all wisdom. I've a lot of respect for Phil and God knows we've had the odd disagreement over the years.

As for thermite - pfft. Verbiage run riot. I've yet to see anything he's actually *done* with a metallic object. He has rich man collector syndrome, thinking that buying 'stuff' equates to expertise. We all know how that works out in practice.

And now I think I'm gone back to the antiques forum where I belong.

PDW

 

[rj1939]

Yeah, I had thought about posting a project on here, but have decided against it. I check here from time to time, but that will be about it. I can get better information other places.

 

[M.B. Naegle]

I hope that with or without Richard and Thermite, we can keep this forum civil and informative. I've learned a ton on here and made some good friends and acquaintances. And I've got plenty of projects to take up screen space, so long as there isn't extra fighting, red-hearing posts, and other nonsense in between.

 

[m-lud]

Continued from first post:

1: When posting on this forum remember that while your viewpoint is important to you none of us is preeminent. No matter how much experience you have or degrees you have achieved we all have a message we want to share and no one person has the right to say who can or cannot speak about a particular subject. Your opinion may be right,your technique may be the best one available. But your experience does not make any other person who wishes to share their opinion wrong or stupid just because you think so. Like it or not this forum is public and we will sometimes find that people have differing opinions and we all have to tolerate that.

2: You do not have to prove you are right. When two people have different opinions it is not necessary for one of those two to be proven right or more right. Those of us who read and participate in the discussions are perfectly capable of deciding for ourselves if someone has a better idea or if one of the other is full of cr... It is not necessary for you to defend your point to the death. Just make your opinion known and let it go at that.

3: If you have nothing good to say, say nothing at all. Before you hit the send button, re-read what you have written. If the only content of your post is to put someone else down, put them in their place or ridicule an idea or make someone feel stupid for the idea then stop. Delete what you have written and sit on your hands for 5 minutes. There is nothing wrong with disagreeing with someone or even thinking their idea is stupid. What is wrong is trying to humiliate someone because of what you think.

Offer a different opinion or a reason for why you disagree and leave it at that. Putting down someone elses credentials or intelligence is no different than putting someone down for the color of their skin or the country they were born in. This kind of behavior is just wrong and if I find it I will try to delete it if possible.

4: Let things roll like water off a ducks back. If you are an adult, act like it and grow some skin. It is not necessary in life to get offended or to go to war over every slight. We will all make mistakes and say the wrong things sometimes. Sometimes on purpose and others without realizing it. But you cannot be so sensitive that you have to blow up at every criticism. We will all feel insulted or denigrated from time to time in our lives. Just because you are an invisible untouchable entity on the computer doesnt make it ok for you to lash out at everyone just because you didnt like the way they talked to you.

This is a hard one to go over because we all feel like we should be treated with respect. And you are right to think so but at the same time you cant expect perfect behavior from everyone all the time. If you question someones motives, respond but not with anger or insults but with a question. They might not realize that what they wrote offended you. They might even offer an apology. If not then sometimes it is best to just ignore it and move on.

I hope people dont think I am preaching too much on these things. But if you want to avoid having your forum privileges removed please try to remember these things I have posted here. These are not necessarily rules but they will give you an idea if the kind of things that I look for when moderating posts and trying to resolve conflicts. If you wont take my advice on these issues then you will find yourself being punished.

Charles Blair
Moderator

This post should be a sticky on all subforums. Well said Charles

 

[Tyrone Shoelaces]

It's a shame it's come to this Charles but I agree you had no option.
People, and I include myself in this, have found the wrangling on the site has made it not worth the trouble of posting.

Regards Tyrone.

 

[Milland]

Yeah, I had thought about posting a project on here, but have decided against it. I check here from time to time, but that will be about it. I can get better information other places.

You've piqued my interest - any links to good sites?

 

[CBlair]

It's a shame it's come to this Charles but I agree you had no option.
People, and I include myself in this, have found the wrangling on the site has made it not worth the trouble of posting.

Regards Tyrone.

Yea Tyrone, I have to say it hast quite gone as I had hoped. Of course I am partly to blame, I have several projects that I wanted to post about but life, business, family seem to conspire to keep me from getting them done. And when I do I am in such a hurry I dont take the time to document it. Perhaps I will find the time to post some work this year?

Hope you have a great year in 2019.

Charles

 

[Paolo_MD]

You've piqued my interest - any links to good sites?

Perhaps, I'm an obtuse optimist, but I think that this forum could still resurrect to a very good source of information, especially if fires are extinguished when they're still small.
I don't think that that other forums could be much better, given that the same people could join them.

One of the most important rules to keep in mind in any professional environment is that disagreements are fairly common and, most of the times, each of the parties has good reasons. The only way to deal with it is for everyone to express politely the technical reasons why one approach is better than the other, what is weak or potentially wrong, and what does not actually matter.

I completely understand that it is rather frustrating and painful for somebody expert in a field to put up with a lot of nonsense, but it must be done.
In any professional environment, when something is argued over, both parties need to bring technical references to support their position and, more importantly, they need to leave their anger and frustration out of the door.

The best way to deal with "general consultants" is to ask them to bring to the table technical references supporting their point.

Paolo

 

[CBlair]

I am going to lock this thread here, it has served its purpose for information but doesnt add anything additional to the purpose of this forum. Thanks to all who contribute and lets find a way to have a great new year on the forum.

Charles