It's the deal with sharing a dog's life with yours....you outlive them. Losing my Pointer was the hardest thing I've ever had to go through - she was only just 8 and diagnosed with an inoperable sarcoma - within a week she was gone. I was totally devastated and completely heartbroken. My Springer was lost without her too. I had a very profound experience with her as she was departing, which showed me something that I had always wanted to believe in, but was never convinced until then. Amazing in the truest sense of the word. For all the heartache of losing her, I wouldn't have swapped that for not having shared her life with mine. It just reminded me to count your blessings and give thanks for the good things in your life. In the end, it's all temporary
The other dog thread has gone to the dogs! Two Scotties, both rescues, a (still sprightly) 13yr old dog that doesn't listen to a word I say, and a 7 yr old bitch that likes burying cordless phones in flower beds and pots...everyone thinks I'm never in!
She's an ex breeding bitch that was kept in a single pen for 5yrs. consequently she has quirks, food must have been scarce, she eats the most unimaginable things preferably the more rotten the better! , so I expect she'll like the apple stuff!
TMT was apparently TMT. http://www.not606.com/showthread.php/26260-What-was-your-606-name?p=232584&viewfull=1#post232584 Makes sense!
Ah, it was just in a comment earlier in this thread, he seemed to allude to the fact that he was G&S, but I must have read it wrong. Would be good to get him on here though, especially given that we seem to have moved beyond some of the old nonsense and that there's a good vibe between the boards and posters (obvious exceptions notwithstanding of course). There are a couple of old Gooners that we're trying to track down. Da Stu Dawg, Holloway Afro, Highbury RIP. I think the addition of these chaps would greatly improve our board. I think not606 is maturing into something quite special. It's ironic that the comparative lack of moderation (compared to BBC) has actually allowed this site and it's members to move beyond the parameters of BBC606's idea's about what constituted 'on topic' debate and into a territory that Aunty would never even have dared to entertain.
It's the nature of the moderation and the natural flow of a forum conversation, Piskie. Comments and even the WUMs that post them can be invisibly removed, which allows articles to continue undisrupted. Inversely, the mods are highly visible and can be addressed directly, which allows people that feel that have been harshly treated an avenue of appeal. Even if they only get an explanation of what they've done wrong, it's still far better than an anonymous, vague email. Threads will invariably go off-topic and it's often not a bad thing. As long as the majority of the posts are about the board topic, then it shouldn't be a problem. If an article starts off about the Olympic Stadium situation, but then flows onto something else that's still to do with football, standing areas in grounds for instance, then I think that's fine.
We can always talk about dogs Ensil As a moderator on the Arsenal board, I try to let as much flow as possible and if there is persistent wumming or abusive posting, I'll send a polite PM and try to appeal to that person's better nature. But even then I still get a torrent of abuse, which, naturally I let go over my head - and it usually fizzles out. I'm not opposed to 'off topic' conversations at all, but deliberately hijacking a thread can warrant a nudge back in the right direction. I'm firmly of the opinion though that this site is starting to become more than the BBC could have ever imagined - and I think it's down to the open nature of content on here, which appears to be nurturing a mutual respect between the decent posters.
As you seem to be taking this forum pretty seriously Piskie, I'd recommend that something should be done to fill out some of the boards. While some of them are pretty lively, the likes of the Everton and West Ham boards are absolutely lifeless.
I think it's Mick's idea to generate news stories on every board (the not606 news team, whilst pretty vacuous at the moment, is planned to actually carry some substance in the future) that are linked into newsnow.com and so that they carry links to this site. A bit like how a story on BBC football used to have a link to 606. He feels that it will attract numbers to those boards which currently lack numbers.
Agree PISKIE Because we are not hide bound by finicky moderation, and our own mods police the site. If people are treated like children they respond so, here people are treated like adults hence the response. There are always a few idiots of course but the nature of the site does not enable WUMS as the old 606 did by always putting the latest article to the top and not allowing decent articles to gather pace. This is why I decided on not606 in the first place and so far I am very happy with my decision.
Mick and Syd's ethos for this site's moderation, is definitely along the lines of less is more, self regulation and use of the ignore function. If you want something more controversial, there's general chat, it's not moderated. The teams boards and threads are for football and banter, they don't want heavy handed moderation, so it's up to the users to self regulate to make it work. The wums who try to disrupt it, are rightly chastised in my opinion.
