Thought it might be worth a mention

[Midland Retty]

Firenet, as far as Im concerned , is an excellent resource, and there are people behind the scenes who devote their time in administering and maintaining the site. They dont have to do that, and dont get paid for doing that. Perhaps we should bear that in mind.

[BLEVE]

To be fair I don't think anyone criticised any one running firenet , one or two made comment based on our experience with some on the forum.

It was postulated that certain perception may be one factor in diminished use of the forum.

[Wiz]

Bleve, I applaud your attempts to increase the use of Firenet.

I think the increase can only be achieved by encouraging new members to use it. I don't know how it can be achieved but surely everybody's ideas are welcome.

I've just checked the forum statistics and note that a number of the top ten posters no longer post as much as they used to. I believe Graeme now mostly posts where the fire alarm engineers are most happy, Benzerari has obviously returned to whatever far-flung planet he originates from (shame, he was always coming up with some fun and crazy ideas)! and I'm sure C.T. will still post if he thinks anything is worthwhile enough to comment on. But others in the top ten still post regularly. I suspect that most of the people who only post a few times are not that interested in having a say on any of the current subjects.

I can't believe that anyone is being scared away from Firenet by the other members or by its content. I honestly think that not enough people know about the forum or don't think it is relevant enough to them.

With respect to the personality of the forum I beleive that any forum will take on the personality of it's members. There is no way that you can alter the current personality unless you get rid of it's current member's. If a single member wants to change the personality of the forum he'll never be able to do it by himself. But if he can encourage enough new like-minded people to use it, the forum's personality will automatically change to include the personalities of those new members.

In any forum people need to stand up and make themselves heard. I encourage all members to join in on posts if they have anything to add. Embrace argument as a prerequisite of any forum. Don't be afraid of ridicule, I believe other members will never allow such ridicule to get out of hand. Don't be afraid of abuse, I believe the moderators know how to adequately deal with that.

So everybody who has any sort of interest in the subjects should just join in and see where it takes them. They might even stamp their personality on the Forum and take it in the direction they would like to see it take.

And if anyone can't stand those idiots who frequent the Banter Bar, my advice is just to ignore them and focus on the serious stuff. I personally believe the Banter Bar has a useful purpose.; it is somewhere that the people who can't find any otherposts to get involved in have somewhere to keep in touch with each other. I personally have not had a fire alarm post to get involved with on Firenet for weeks and if it wasn't for the Banter Bar I think I would lose total interest in Firenet (even though Kurnal is my hero)

[BLEVE]

I can see the wisdom in having the banter threa, I just cant seem tofollow the banter ship and other posts on it, hardly the goonies or monty pythonesque.

[BLEVE]

Maybe there should be a new member thread where new members can introduce themselves and get used to the more established members.

I say this on noticing there were 94 new members during the month of July and 89 during June yet very few are known, this is a pity because they must have some interest in the area of fire and fire safety but we have not managed to interest them in posting either by way of question or answer.

[nearlythere]

I can see the wisdom in having the banter threa, I just cant seem tofollow the banter ship and other posts on it, hardly the goonies or monty pythonesque.

It's banter Bleve, banter.
Do you mean the Goons?

[CivvyFSO]

I can see the wisdom in having the banter threa, I just cant seem tofollow the banter ship and other posts on it, hardly the goonies or monty pythonesque.

The banter thread was put there in an effort to keep any 'banter' out of the threads. It has, since its inception, steadily become a haven for the mentally disturbed. You know the banter thread is 100% drivel, so don't click on it.

[Wiz]

I can see the wisdom in having the banter threa, I just cant seem tofollow the banter ship and other posts on it, hardly the goonies or monty pythonesque.

Bleve, I agree it appears so to a new visitor. The Banter Thread is not only full of off-the-wall humour it is also full of references to earlier discussions. Of course, this makes it difficult for a new visitor to understand (actually all threads can be like this), but everyone is welcome to join in. Either read it for a while, get in the swing of the current ramblings, and join in when you are ready. Or just jump straight in. If you say anything worthwhile it will be picked up by the other very friendly posters, if not, they won't throw you out, but just assume you are another resident of this home of the terminally bewildered who is rambling incoherently due to Matron's medication!

I agree it is not Pythonesque. As a person old enough to say they watched every episode of Monty Python when it was originally screened I can confirm that it is often better than Python. (there were many poor Python sketches!)

Most importantly, The Banter Thread, is a very small part of Firenet. If you can't see the point of it, just avoid it.

I would personally say that the appearance of so many Banter Thread ramblings in the 'Latest Post' list is annoying to those who are looking for serious discussion. It is a shame that the site owner couldn't arrange for these to be listed seperately.

[Wiz]

Maybe there should be a new member thread where new members can introduce themselves and get used to the more established members.
 

Bleve, Maybe the site puppet-masters will pick up on this and provide such a facility.

I personally can't see the point of it. I couldn't imagine what I would want to say as a new member without it sounding insignificant and uninteresting (if being humble) or pompous (normal mode). I believe new members should just keep adding their posts on any subject that interests them. If anyone else is also interested they will get response and the new member will soon be in the swing of it and probably join in on the banter ramblings, as well.

I'm also disappointed in the low number of posts these days, and specifically in my areas of particular interest; Fire Alarms and BS5839. I love answering questions on something I have 30 years experience of and especially if I can pass on something I consider to be worthwhile. Haven't had a good question for months. Maybe no-one is installing fire alarms anymore!

[nearlythere]

Maybe there should be a new member thread where new members can introduce themselves and get used to the more established members.
 

Maybe no-one is installing fire alarms anymore!

I think that's the problem in the current economic climate Wiz.
I was expecting an increase in people asking for advice on how thay could avoid or reduce the level of FA systems and still satisfy the demands of the EA.

[Chris Houston]

Ladies and Gents,

Thanks for the suggestions.  You'll hopefully have noticed that we did respond to the very important complaint about the lack of link from firenet.org.uk and have also taken action to address some of the issues raised immediately by adding more sub sections.

I would suggest that we'll never please all the people all of the time, but the feedback is certainly welcome.  I for one have a pretty unreliable connection to the internet and it is only when people give us this feedback that we can start to plan solutions.

Please continue to let us know if things can be improved.  Colin is the boss, Kurnal and myself do have some input.

And of course new members are welcome, I hope we are as welcoming as possible.  Most forums seem cliquey at first to outsiders.  Many are very chaotic and full of abuse and flaming.  Firenet is mostly self moderating and frequented by ladies and gents of the highest caliber but where very occasionally necessary, I try to keep the standards just a little bit higher than your average forum.

Thanks Retty for pointing out the voluntary nature of our input.  But don't fret too much, with the recent software upgrade enabling us to view posters via your laptop webcams, we are rewarded handsomely via amusement at the fashion choices of FireNetters.

All feedback is welcome.

[kurnal]

Wow. I have been on holiday for two weeks and its taken me three days to read the posts.

Thanks for this thread. It is brilliant and most informative of your needs and wishes. And has brought out the best of the forum in my view.

I have recently been asked to join the team as one of the administrators just because I spend a lot of time on here and have a history of winging to Colin over its recent decline. I think Colin asked me to join on the basis of if you cant beat them join them.

I am glad to see ABs suggestion taken forward so quickly- it was a fairly common concern that we appeared to be wholly fire service orientated from the layout of the menu but nothing was further from the truth.

Looking at site statistics things are moving forwards again- 60 applications for membership over this weekend- though many of these are spammers and robots.

Being completely frank my reasons for posting here are not entirely altruistic. Firenet has brought me many customers- just on the basis of being seen to offer free advice in a consistent  and I hope sensible and reliable manner. Many of these customers have also become friends because of the ongoing contact, in a way that just does not happen with the normal business relationship. In addition through the forum I have met other like minded spcialists in other related fields- fire engineers and alarm engineers for example- whom I now recommend to my clients and whom I use  on a sub contractor basis. 

For this reason I am keener than most of you to keep bringing the forum to a wider audience and am constantly asking Colin to do what he can to re-instate our former success on the major search engines.

[Davo]

Just to back BLEVE, there are just over 51,084 postings, and 4898 members.
Believe it or not one third (17,247) of those postings are generated by just TEN members.

I bet if you look,less than 100 members have posted in the last year


davo

[Tom W]

Just to back BLEVE, there are just over 51,084 postings, and 4898 members.
Believe it or not one third (17,247) of those postings are generated by just TEN members.

I bet if you look,less than 100 members have posted in the last year


davo

Hahaha 

[Nearlybaldandgrey]

there are just over 51,084 postings, and 4898 members.
Believe it or not one third (17,247) of those postings are generated by just TEN members.

Then they should get on with some work!! (Just kidding  )

I've been on and off this site for a while now and have to say that it's interesting as a Fire & Rescue Service person to get the opinion/views/thoughts of those assisting responsible persons to meet the requirements of the law, particularly as I was one of those enforcing it!

I've never found the site cliquey, and have contributed to various topics which I have wanted to. I've always had it at the back of my mind that as an enforcing officer, it ws good to talk to those 'the other side of the fence'. There is a wealth of knowledge and expertise here, some of which is mis-used or not used.

The banter thread, which does ramble and aimlessly drift along is just that ... a non-sensical and random topic.

I will continue to look and post here, even though I have returned to an operational post.