The forum was started, and continues to be owned by Colin Simpson, who gave up huge amounts of his personal time when working a particular FRS (for which I have always forgiven him). Such was the admiration I had for his selfless efforts, when the site became too large and he needed a server I personally bought it for him.
However in those days it was used by fire safety professionals who would discuss points of interpretation , alert each other to developments, etc. Unfortunately, it subsequently went downhill a lot by being used by people who had secured consultancy projects on the basis of their alleged competence but then had to get advice as to what the solutions would be from others, and then charge the client a fee. Worse still, the advice received is generally from anonymous people, the competence of whom the enquirer has no knowledge. I have said many times, it is tantamount to going to see a supposed medical specialist, who bases his advice on a brief discussion with a few friends down the pub and then sends you a bill.
The end for me was when an organisation of supposed national standing won a contract to report on fire legislation across many countries. They got the contract rather than us because they said they had the contacts across the world to do this. Within days, their consultant was asking people on Firenet to give him the information- so much for international contacts. A friend sent him an IM and it was clear from the response that he was hoping to get the consultancy project solved in part by the good people of Firenet. In fairness to the organisation, on investigation, it transpired that various other consultancy advice the chap had needed to give was plastered all over Firenet in great detail, hoping to get the answers; they had all his posts removed.
I see advice given here that is factually incorrect by well-meaning people and tbh I cannot be bothered to correct it half the time. I restrict myself to a modicum of help to the good and the great like Suppers, Silver, Wullie and the like, who clearly know what they are doing but might benefit from the odd bit of insight that I might have over some detail that they might not have come across, or people who are trying to do good for the world, rather than sell services on the back of advice from goodness knows who on Firenet.
