Sadly, i fear the consequences of talking about NAM like this

 

Easy way to avoid 'do a search' responses is to start off "I tried a search, but..."

I see it more as 'teaching a man to fish' than 'jumping down his throat'. (ok, so it's more like 'tell a man to fish' :smile

I see it as no different than a child asking a parent a question and getting a 'go look it up' response. The first few times you answer, but at some point (IMO) they have to do a bit more work than just asking.

"I have a question - go do some research for me and tell me the answer."
Good for you if you can get someone else to do the work, but when looking for FACTS vs. OPINION, it seems appropriate for the seeker to do some of the work required to get the knowledge.
Maybe I'm just and old fart lashing back at the immediate gratification phenom, but that's the way I feel.

 

Interesting topic. I too have taken a little sebatical from this site with a little help from the IT **** at work . I have had an entire thread vaporized and followed it by the following :

https://www.northamericanmotoring.co...ree+speech+NAM

I too have noticed that I seem to have less in common with what seems to be going on here. The joe dentist's and el diablito's of this site kept us honest and in my opinion, kept it interesting.I may not have agreed with everything they had to say, but I'll defend to death their right to say it. This is a forum that's in the public domain and as such is subject to the ammendment governing free speech. but not really, huh? It's topics like this one that are thought provoking and new and fresh that keep me coming back. If I see another "what sex is your MINI?" or "what's your MINI'S name ?" thread pop up, you probably won't see a lot more of me.

Jock

 

Here we go again.
Actually, it's NOT in the public domain. It's a private site on a private server. You get to say whatever you want in the town square, but the site owner gets to decide what you get to say here (and reasonably so.) I'd rather the moderation were a bit more lax (RIP OTP) but it's still the best around (for me.)

 

Solution: www.mini2.com

 

Let me play devil's advocate here. If people are really interested in participating in a public forum why would it be impossible for them to interact without being offensive/crude/rude or whatever that puts them over the line and into banning territory? I've seen it on other 'car guy' forums, those that can voice their opinions, joke, argue and skirt the line between acceptable and unacceptable behavior and those that just like to be obnoxious or explicit and ultimately get banned. It often separates the men from the boys, as it were, since the people who really are interested in the forum and other members can and do manage to keep within what is deemed acceptable, and those who do not care choose to put out whatever they want with no consideration. I don't see that most moderation eliminates useful information or even disagreements, its the people who don't care enought to control themselves that bring it on. Its really too bad that it results in full threads being removed though, that is a lot of lost info.

I will add that I hate it when forums become completely dominated by sponsors though. When it gets to the point that real people cannot discuss whatever brand/product/store they honestly like, dislike, or get deals at without being censored or displaced by vendor sponsors. I'm not saying that is happening here, I've just seen that really detract from the usefulness of message boards before and hope it never comes to that on NAM.

 

Those would be by the 'quirky' people I mentioned

 

Hey, who you calling quirky??

I should bump those threads, they classic.

 

Well, there's the emergence of overly wordy guys like me..... And the fact that the time of real rapid discovery and product introduction has passed and really "new" stuff comes by much less frequently (M7 being the exception, after they passed the AGS blockage, they've been pushing a bunch of stuff out the door!). But stuff is trickling out as opposed to coming in a flood.

Also, widespread acceptance has diluted the fervent preaching of the early adoptors. God forbid, a bunch of Minis may have been bought just becoause they are "cute" cars!!!!!!

I too have seen a huge decrease in waves and comraderie, but that could also be due to the fact that I live in the SF Bay Area, where everyone is too busy to care by definition.....

I too think the moderation has been heavy handed. The amount of content that was deleted in the MTH thread was just HUGE!!!!!! And now, everyone still can read about MTH, find the web site, and have the help, but talk about recreation of tons of information. Makes me depressed to post there, as most of what I write I already wrote. El and others getting spanked, well, some of the rehtoric was getting pretty pointless (search on AGS for examples) but also, we seem to be pretty good at self correcting here too. If I could vote, I'd vote for more tolerance (hay look! The grass over there looks very green indeed).

I stopped by a Honda site, and it's post were like deadwood, without the plot or mutidimensional charecters. Tons of contentless profanity. Can't stand that, now, profanity with content, that's another matter!

I'm just looking for more vendors who get sloppy with physics so I can rip em a new one

Matt

 

I feel the same way. Back in late 02 when i first got my MCS, everyone with a mini would wave or wave back. Now I am batting about 1 in 3. Where is the love? I guess minis are too mainstream now. Though I don't miss the "what is that" question.

 

Does anybody remember 2KOOL4SCHOOL ?....NOW THAT WAS A CRAZY GUY.....

 

I remember him. And there was another one, in college in California, total post wh_re......can't remember his name. He did get annoying with all the threads he started, but I just ignored them.

 

Was it red mcs or something like that? He was a law student in berkeley and he had lots of cars and was buying a vintage mini. He had a red mcs with hamman wheels?

 

Yep, that's the one.

 

Things get boring when you censor everything. Nam is now experiencing what happens when you over censor. People stop posting and stop visiting the site. Hurts the vendors who pay for it.

 

If you think NAM's forums are bad, you should try the Edmunds.com forums. Their moderating style can be better described as "Gestapo" style and the cocky and rude moderators spent countless hours dissecting every post word by word. I stopped posting there years ago.

NAM is heading in that general direction. Edmunds.com had very little sponsorship, say 5-6 years ago. As soon as they started accepting revenue from sponsors, the site began to morph into something else. Gone were the days of relative free expression and occassional topic deviation. If you type the wrong word, you'll receive a nasty reminder from the forum moderators to stick to the rules, or "else".

I would like to see what Mr. Mark Ferguson, the creator of this site, has to say to all this feedback.

Also, I don't perceive any longer as a "hobby" type of enthusiast website. It has become a business and an enterprise and at such now it sees the need to protect its "interests" by enforcing more censorship, specially when it comes to criticism aimed at vendors and thier products.

Ask yourself, why would any one "bite" the hand that feeds them?

 

He was on clublexus before and had a sc300. He wrote he bought it cheap and made money selling it. Depending on his contacts, that might have been true. But then he went on and on about himself.

At least that's my impression of him.

 

Solution(s):
www.cooperspeed.com
www.michiganmini.com
www.teammightyminiz.com
www.dynamicminicollective.com
The DC based group...sorry guys, im forgetting the name


these are just a small list of great forums that are a lot of fun, informative, and seem to be a bit more relaxed. There are lots of options out there...and they seem to be gaining a lot of popularity within small crowds.

money and politics do weird things...sometimes with disappointing outcomes

 

right on d money!!!!!!

 

Amen!

Can I get a hallelujah!

 

Do a search - I'm sure you can find one out there. :smile:

 

But one problem... the layout fonts are too small!

 

Sad... but true down here too.

I always flash my lights or wave... rarely do they acknowledge it.

 

Where's the number?:smile:

 

hey.... if you guys want me to give you a link to a funny *** forum let me know.... i'm sure those of you who feel "bored" right now might appreciate it. It was a forum I was a part of, got banned 4/4 quick time by the admin. Available only on special request... it's some of the funniest sh*t you ever read, if I must say so myself.