Post by Dave on Aug 21, 2010 9:35:49 GMT
While I would never regret setting up the TFF and having to accept the big commitment and responsibility it is and the amount of my spare time it takes up, there are times I wish some things didn’t happen that result in my mind having to spend so much time thinking and looking for answers.
My mind was so deep in thought while I was working this week that yesterday I drove straight past South Molton and had to drive back to it and on Thursday I left Weston-Super-Mare and rejoined the M5 on junction 22 and should have left it on junction 23 for Bridgwater and came of a slip road and as I was going around the roundabout under the motorway discovered I had drove past junction 23 and 24 and came off junction 25 for Taunton and had to go back on the M5 northbound to go and do the calls in Bridgwater.
I have not posted so much on here this week because I wanted to do a study on other forums and how they work and how they are run, I picked 100 proboard forums at random and spent time reading them and the forum rules and how the staff went about just running the forum itself. The main reason for doing this has been for me to learn better how a forum should be run and how it should not be run.
Out of those 100 half were closed to guests, I can fully understand why some forums are as they are made up of a group of enthusiasts discussing their hobby or something they are interested in and simply want to be left alone to get on and do just that. The fact is every single forum is a members club, you have to sign up to join a forum and you then become a member on it and each and every forum will be run differently and have its own set of rules members are expected to keep to as some sort of condition of their membership on that forum.
One thing that was so very clear was that each forum is set up and run by the owner of the forum and it will be his ideas and his expectations and also the type of forum he wants it to be as at the end of the day, most forums are privately run and it always comes down to those who set up the forum how it will run and work.
So Sue Powell was right to say there is a DaveR way and I suppose my values and principles and things I believe in such as people treating others with respect and not trying to rubbish their views etc are bound to form a basis of how I run the TFF,
But in saying that I have always made it clear the forum belongs to its members and each and everyone has a say in how it is run and can post freely on the front of the forum anything they are unhappy about, anything they feel has been done that has not been done as it might have been done and anything they would like or want on the TFF.
Apart from a few other things that have angered me slightly on here recently the idea put in a post that Rob and I are always busy deleting posts and editing them is the one that has made me the angriest. We could simply delete posts and say nothing, we could put in a code that will hid the fact an edit as been done on a post and we could simply ban a member and say nothing and then say later if it became known a member was banned on here “sorry guv it was not me” I’m sure you do not want your forum run that way and it is the forums policy to always be open and honest at all times.
Sue Powell was right on one thing she said that to an outsider it may well look like we edit posts on here due to the fact any post that has been for what ever reasons show on the post who made the edit and the time it was made. All the edits I make are only to correct mistakes the member has made using the quote facility or because they have posted oversized images that stretch out the forum and I feel that is perfectly acceptable and I should be able to do that as it is a pet hate of mine anyway and most members are happy for me to do that as they may have tried to put the post right but was unable to.
To avoid such allegations being made unfairly in the future a footnote will now be added to any post where I have had to do such an edit that will give the full reasons why an edit was done, it’s a shame really there is even a need for it to be done because you all know me well enough by now and I would hope you see me as just an honest chap trying his best to run something that is very difficult at times to run.
If you look at the TUST website you will see it clearly states what the TUST is and what it is all about and his aims and views etc. I now feel there is a real need for the TFF to have a post made and placed with a sticky in the Torquay United Room, laying out just what the TFF is, its views and its aims and just what guidelines it has in place to ensure it remains a quality forum and is never allowed to just degenerate into something that none of us would ever want it to be. There is also a need I feel to include the policy on here about people who join only to cause trouble on the TFF or do all they can to cause as much offence as they can to fellow members.
I will lay out the reasons why such people will never have a place on here and why we would not provide them with a platform to carry out their agendas as at the end of the day my wish is only to make the TFF a great and happy place you enjoy coming to visit and use.
I will work on the post over the next few days and run it by Rob and if he is happy with it and if so I will put it up.
Dave
On to this weeks winner and not a great deal of votes cast this week so please if you do enjoy reading a very good post then give the poster a vote as without your votes we won’t get any winners.
It looked a one horse race and then yesterday this poster made a post that surprised us all and nothing like the posts he has made on here before, well you must have loved his new style of posting, I know I did and I thank him for making the effort to cut out from his posts the personal attacks that none of us every want to be reading here on the TTF
This week’s winner is Aussie
The post that won it for him
On one hand we have the post above where it clearly states the H/E are talking unresearched bollocks and here under this you will see a very different opinion of the person who wrote the article for the H/E!
Dave, whilst many hundreds of people know the one and only Dave Thomas, DT himself knows hundreds of people and they all want to say hello to him when they see him..................never forget that!
I have known Dave many, many years and was a schoolmate of his younger brother Phil at NAGS in the sixties whilst Dave himself was educated at TBGS.
They moved to Bovey Tracey from Norwich at a young age when their father took a stipend there in the Church of England, which is why Dave is ever ready to don his Norwich City scarf and render a verse of that awful dirge "On The Ball City" when he's relaxed a little in the Cider Bar in Newton Abbot!
..................O.K. O.K. there's a little bit of poetic license thrown in there BUT he does love his cider and he certainly loves the Canaries!
In line with his great knowledge of professional football in general and Torquay United in particular, I find his match analysis on BBC Devon to be excellent and certainly worth listening to; but I feel his undoubted eye for detail and unique insight to have been somewhat devalued by the terrible decline in standards of the Herald Express in recent years ~ but hey, that's not his fault for he remains as precise and erudite as ever.
Not many people know this, but Dave was once actually allowed to "manage" Torquay United when Bruce Rioch either mischievously or through some genius of motivation to some jaded players; put him in charge of a Friday night game up at York City towards the end of one season and I think I am correct in reporting that Dave began and ended his managerial career with a goalless draw at Bootham (and certainly not Kit Kat) Crescent!
Although I have had some frustrations with Dave myself during the "Roberts Era" (his insight was accurate, mine was not!) it was certainly yet another instance when Dave knew a lot more than he was prepared to let on until the time was right and in that sense the guy is uncannily accurate.
I would say he is without rival as the most respected "Club Correspondent" in the Football League press corps and certainly the doyen of League 2 and the Westcountry.
How long has he "been at it"? Well I do know, but as he is somewhat reluctant to blow his own trumpet I'll follow his lead this time and keep my counsel.
David Thomas....................ex Grammar School Boy, Son of the Manse, Cider Drinker , Bee Keeper extraordinaire and First Class Journalist ~ Respect!
A bit of a contrast don`t you think?
My mind was so deep in thought while I was working this week that yesterday I drove straight past South Molton and had to drive back to it and on Thursday I left Weston-Super-Mare and rejoined the M5 on junction 22 and should have left it on junction 23 for Bridgwater and came of a slip road and as I was going around the roundabout under the motorway discovered I had drove past junction 23 and 24 and came off junction 25 for Taunton and had to go back on the M5 northbound to go and do the calls in Bridgwater.
I have not posted so much on here this week because I wanted to do a study on other forums and how they work and how they are run, I picked 100 proboard forums at random and spent time reading them and the forum rules and how the staff went about just running the forum itself. The main reason for doing this has been for me to learn better how a forum should be run and how it should not be run.
Out of those 100 half were closed to guests, I can fully understand why some forums are as they are made up of a group of enthusiasts discussing their hobby or something they are interested in and simply want to be left alone to get on and do just that. The fact is every single forum is a members club, you have to sign up to join a forum and you then become a member on it and each and every forum will be run differently and have its own set of rules members are expected to keep to as some sort of condition of their membership on that forum.
One thing that was so very clear was that each forum is set up and run by the owner of the forum and it will be his ideas and his expectations and also the type of forum he wants it to be as at the end of the day, most forums are privately run and it always comes down to those who set up the forum how it will run and work.
So Sue Powell was right to say there is a DaveR way and I suppose my values and principles and things I believe in such as people treating others with respect and not trying to rubbish their views etc are bound to form a basis of how I run the TFF,
But in saying that I have always made it clear the forum belongs to its members and each and everyone has a say in how it is run and can post freely on the front of the forum anything they are unhappy about, anything they feel has been done that has not been done as it might have been done and anything they would like or want on the TFF.
Apart from a few other things that have angered me slightly on here recently the idea put in a post that Rob and I are always busy deleting posts and editing them is the one that has made me the angriest. We could simply delete posts and say nothing, we could put in a code that will hid the fact an edit as been done on a post and we could simply ban a member and say nothing and then say later if it became known a member was banned on here “sorry guv it was not me” I’m sure you do not want your forum run that way and it is the forums policy to always be open and honest at all times.
Sue Powell was right on one thing she said that to an outsider it may well look like we edit posts on here due to the fact any post that has been for what ever reasons show on the post who made the edit and the time it was made. All the edits I make are only to correct mistakes the member has made using the quote facility or because they have posted oversized images that stretch out the forum and I feel that is perfectly acceptable and I should be able to do that as it is a pet hate of mine anyway and most members are happy for me to do that as they may have tried to put the post right but was unable to.
To avoid such allegations being made unfairly in the future a footnote will now be added to any post where I have had to do such an edit that will give the full reasons why an edit was done, it’s a shame really there is even a need for it to be done because you all know me well enough by now and I would hope you see me as just an honest chap trying his best to run something that is very difficult at times to run.
If you look at the TUST website you will see it clearly states what the TUST is and what it is all about and his aims and views etc. I now feel there is a real need for the TFF to have a post made and placed with a sticky in the Torquay United Room, laying out just what the TFF is, its views and its aims and just what guidelines it has in place to ensure it remains a quality forum and is never allowed to just degenerate into something that none of us would ever want it to be. There is also a need I feel to include the policy on here about people who join only to cause trouble on the TFF or do all they can to cause as much offence as they can to fellow members.
I will lay out the reasons why such people will never have a place on here and why we would not provide them with a platform to carry out their agendas as at the end of the day my wish is only to make the TFF a great and happy place you enjoy coming to visit and use.
I will work on the post over the next few days and run it by Rob and if he is happy with it and if so I will put it up.
Dave
On to this weeks winner and not a great deal of votes cast this week so please if you do enjoy reading a very good post then give the poster a vote as without your votes we won’t get any winners.
It looked a one horse race and then yesterday this poster made a post that surprised us all and nothing like the posts he has made on here before, well you must have loved his new style of posting, I know I did and I thank him for making the effort to cut out from his posts the personal attacks that none of us every want to be reading here on the TTF
This week’s winner is Aussie
The post that won it for him
On one hand we have the post above where it clearly states the H/E are talking unresearched bollocks and here under this you will see a very different opinion of the person who wrote the article for the H/E!
Dave, whilst many hundreds of people know the one and only Dave Thomas, DT himself knows hundreds of people and they all want to say hello to him when they see him..................never forget that!
I have known Dave many, many years and was a schoolmate of his younger brother Phil at NAGS in the sixties whilst Dave himself was educated at TBGS.
They moved to Bovey Tracey from Norwich at a young age when their father took a stipend there in the Church of England, which is why Dave is ever ready to don his Norwich City scarf and render a verse of that awful dirge "On The Ball City" when he's relaxed a little in the Cider Bar in Newton Abbot!
..................O.K. O.K. there's a little bit of poetic license thrown in there BUT he does love his cider and he certainly loves the Canaries!In line with his great knowledge of professional football in general and Torquay United in particular, I find his match analysis on BBC Devon to be excellent and certainly worth listening to; but I feel his undoubted eye for detail and unique insight to have been somewhat devalued by the terrible decline in standards of the Herald Express in recent years ~ but hey, that's not his fault for he remains as precise and erudite as ever.
Not many people know this, but Dave was once actually allowed to "manage" Torquay United when Bruce Rioch either mischievously or through some genius of motivation to some jaded players; put him in charge of a Friday night game up at York City towards the end of one season and I think I am correct in reporting that Dave began and ended his managerial career with a goalless draw at Bootham (and certainly not Kit Kat) Crescent!
Although I have had some frustrations with Dave myself during the "Roberts Era" (his insight was accurate, mine was not!) it was certainly yet another instance when Dave knew a lot more than he was prepared to let on until the time was right and in that sense the guy is uncannily accurate.
I would say he is without rival as the most respected "Club Correspondent" in the Football League press corps and certainly the doyen of League 2 and the Westcountry.
How long has he "been at it"? Well I do know, but as he is somewhat reluctant to blow his own trumpet I'll follow his lead this time and keep my counsel.
David Thomas....................ex Grammar School Boy, Son of the Manse, Cider Drinker , Bee Keeper extraordinaire and First Class Journalist ~ Respect!
A bit of a contrast don`t you think?
