An open letter to the 68kMLA community...

[wgoodf]

so really then, we have a bunch of oldies ( i generalize) who understand the community aspect and a bunch of newbies who 'dont get it'

?

would that be a better way of framing it??

and (as basic is that is) from that, would a solution be easier forth coming from that perspective?

 

[Strimkind]

Simple solutions:

Lounge: Lets wipe the current Lounge and start fresh and forget all this crap.

Software: Archive and start fresh (some of that info is useful).

 

[JDW]

I am an "oldie" here and yet I have a hard time digesting the new-fangled, Twitterific-style "community / socialization." Yet, if one wishes to define "community on this site" as something that centers on classic Macs and related topics of an extremely interesting nature (e.g., discussions on Macs you won't find elsewhere, such as: schematics, deyellowing, truly rare EBAY finds which stimulate technical discussion, classic Mac software, doing things on old Macs that no one thought possible, upgrades, recapping logic boards, showing how old machines can still be useful today, fabulous mods, etc.), then I am all for "community" and "socializing." It's all in how one defines terms on this site.

If I lose my job, lose a loved one, or otherwise have a major issue (good or bad) in my life, I can go to another site/forum to seek counseling on that. I feel no need to do that here, on a vintage Macintosh site for goodness sake. This site is for geeky vintage Mac people. I am sorry, but "geeky" is indeed the proper term. To say otherwise would be to indirectly defend a stance that we should change our name from the "68000 Macintosh Liberation Army" to something more trendy, non-geeky and politically-correct like, "The Vintage Computing and Socialite Club." In such a case we can announce how open minded and inclusive we really are... IBM PC talk? No problem. Twitter-style "I'm wearing pink pijamas" posts? You bet!

ACK! 8-o

Thank you ~tl for providing this site. And thank you for at least thinking about keeping it linked to its main reason for existence. But please keep up on those site backups, and thank you for continuing to exercise patience toward those among us who sometimes talk about happenings on EBAY (which really is the lifeblood of the vintage computing experience).

 

[Unknown_K]

I think you people are missing the point, what keeps the 68kmla going is the people who have knowledge of 68k and early ppc macs who come to talk about them, and then maybe some other somewhat related stuff. There is no other viable 68k mac forum that I know of, this is it. Branching off into OSX and X86 mac was not a good idea.
If you want to shoot the breeze then go to the IRC channels.

I humbly submit that you are the one missing the point. Unless the great crash has artificially trimmed the term of your enlistment, you were not here for the many, sometimes heated, discussions in the lounge and certainly not for those in the war room which led up to some of the forum additions/deletions.

Please try not to be so cavalier in banishing "shooting the breeze" to the IRC channels, or whatever newfangled timesink has replaced "chat" from back in the day. Some of us are uncomfortable about even exploring such nonsense.

IMHO, if someone is ONLY interested in ANY kind of computer, in this case older Macs, they are not the types of people that I would care to bother wasting my own time to post an answer to whatever question they might have, or the kind of person with whom I would wish to associate, much less help, IRL.

Time is each of our's most valuable possession, it's only available in some unknown, finite quantity and should be spent wisely. IMHO, if this place EVER EVEN CONSIDERS becoming merely a techno-geek info source and inhibits in any way the social aspects of the MUG environment many of us remember and love . . . my ( | ) is outta here so fast geeky little heads will spin and I KNOW, that I'd be missed by the community here.

Any of you Macs discussion only types, please put yourself in your comrades shoes and ask yourselves if YOU would be missed.

'nuff said, I'm outta this negative vibe ridden thread,

jt

Unknown_K Full Member 602 posts 06 Mar 2003 USA <== A simple search in the archive will show when I joined (and I have been active since that date unlike others who come and go because of lack of interest).

So if you are comfortable posting your laundry in the lounge the rest of the members should be happy about that? You came back to the forum with little interest in 68K mac just to be a mod and tell the people who do care about 68k mac what to do? You just stated you don't have time to waste on people who come here to be ON TOPPIC, what kind of bullshit is that? Everyone has other interests, I share that with people I like in the appropriate places.

 

[Dog Cow]

It's nice to have a topic like this put "decline" at the front of everyone's mind. :-/

 

[Scott Baret]

I've waited to post my response to this discussion until now only so I could get a feel of how other members felt about the "state of the 68MLA". I will address each issue one at a time.

1. THE LOUNGE. Every forum needs to have some sort of "general/off-topic" discussion area. I am a member of several Macintosh forums as well as one dedicated to Volvo cars and one dealing with woodworking. All of these forums have such an area mostly because it builds community within the forum. As some have pointed out, this would be like going to a classic car show and talking only about the engine under the hood of your 1966 Oldsmobile Toronado or what brand of brake pads were used in a 1972 Buick Skylark. If you've ever been to a show such as this you are probably aware that there is a lot more that these enthusiasts talk about besides cars. Our forums are the same way.

2. LANGUAGE RESTRICTIONS. "Keep it civil" is one of our mottos around here. I am offended by vulgar language and wish to see an end to it on here. We need to keep this a "family friendly" forum because we do have some young members on here (I seem to recall someone saying they were 13 at one time) and probably have other people who think along my lines. "Darn", "dang", and "shoot" are fine by me but nothing else, please!

3. PRIVILEGES AND INDEXING. I feel we should restrict the lounge forums to members only and utilize the robots.txt file so that search engines cannot index the lounge. There have been posts in there about sensitive topics (relationships, unemployment, illness, etc) from various members and I do not feel as though the internet public should have access to it from either browsing or a search engine.

4. SOFTWARE FORUM. The software forum, in my mind, should be used for troubleshooting and general questions about software. Here are a few questions I would find appropriate for the forum:

A. Does MS Word 5.1 run on a Mac Classic with 2MB RAM?

B. Carmen USA crashes whenever I run it on a IIci with System 7.1. What is going on?

C. Is there a translator available for ClarisWorks 4 that will read MacDraw II files?

D. Does System 6.0.8L work on a Color Classic?

E. What is the difference between System 6.0.4 and 6.0.5?

The requests have been atrocious and I am glad to see action has been taken to curtail them and to lock threads relating to illegal software. As I have said many times, piracy is piracy no matter the age of the software. If you want to see copyright law change, I suggest you talk to your government figures (in the USA, this usually means a congressman). It may or may not get you somewhere, but at least you can say you made an effort. Also, the excuse that "everyone does it and nobody gets caught" cannot apply either. Abandonware websites have received threats from corporations in the past. Plus, if you've ever said the above phrase about speeding, keep in mind that someone is eventually going to get a speeding ticket and that you could very well be the one the police officer pulls over. We are all familiar with the KISS principle, but I also subscribe to the KILL principle. It stands for "keep it legal, loser" because if you commit a crime, you are a loser in more ways than one (it shows disrespect for the law plus you lose some money/your reputation/perhaps some time if you wind up in jail). The word "kill" may have a negative connotation, but it certainly fits the bill when looking for a word that describes large lawsuits.

5. EDUCATE, EDUCATE, EDUCATE!!! I am a future educator and feel that education is the best medicine for anything. In reference to the above topic, I think we need to have a stickied thread about why we need to keep our software legal. I would be more than willing to write this thread not only because I have studied IP law (which I did extensively as I was planning my personal website to know what my rights and the rights of my visitors are and can be) but because I am aware that the topic is not taught in many schools. I never got to see the "Disk Protector" sing "Don't Copy that Floppy" in my 13 years of K-12 education and I'm sure only a handful of us actually have received copyright lectures. Many of our younger members probably think copyright refers only to the year in which something was made and I could honestly say many of us could benefit from a refresher on that topic.

6. A SEPARATE FORUM FOR PC-RELATED DISCUSSIONS. While a lot of us are Mac-only on this forum, there are a good number of us who have DOS or Windows computers, either current or historical. If we can allow discussions of *NIX and Apple IIs (which are not technically Macs or Mac OS), why not include a forum for older PC hardware? If we wanted to stick with the theme of this forum, we should stick to pre-Pentium systems running DOS or a version of Windows prior to 95.

7. EDITABLE POSTS. Since our switch to the new forum software there has been a one-hour limit on post editing. I have said many times that I am against this since our old system was working fine. There are times when a post needs to be changed to make it more up-to-date or to correct an error (especially true of posts such as my compact Mac CRT guide, which I have edited on occasion whenever I find out something new). Keep in mind some people tend to say things too quickly and may want to later edit or delete their posts later plus inaccurate information is searchable. I feel we all have the right to control our own speech and don't need a middleman whenever we want to edit our posts. To me, locking posts after one hour is something that should not happen on a forum (none of the other forums I am on are like this to my knowledge) and is something we are not told about at all in the rules or when we register. Nobody told us of the change either, which I feel is absolutely wrong. I know this was discussed some time ago, but I feel that since we are addressing board issues I will bring it up again because I know others feel the same way and would like things put back to the way they were before the unexplained rule change.

8. EBAY LINKS. I feel we should not post eBay links at all since it often leads to discussions about the seller and even it doesn't, it will often lead to something negative about what they are selling.

I know this is a lot, but I feel this needs to be posted so it can be discussed.

 

[JDW]

it will often lead to something negative ...

Since Scott felt this "needs to be discussed," I guess I will add further thoughts. If we disallow posting because some consider the content "negative," we will have to exclude quite a lot. Some people think negatively on taking time to replace the capacitors in their logic boards. So it is important to define terms. Some people think negatively about EBAY discussions, but I am very positive on it (simply because it promotes the very ideals that this site stands for, and how else do we acquire vintage Mac equipment -- I cannot go to yard sales here in Japan, since we don't have them).

As to the "PC Forum" suggestion, I had to chuckle at that because that is precisely what I put in my previous post as the "new, politically correct version" of this site. But I never thought that someone would seriously want that! (As you may expect, I detest the "politically correct" way of life.) But again, if you want it that badly, you really would have to change the name and domain of this site. For I do not see how one can harmonize a separate forum on PCs on a site named "68000 Macintosh Liberation Army" (which is what 68kMLA stands for, folks). This is precisely why some, even our own ~tl, feel that The Lounge is a bit out of place.

 

[macgeek417]

I agree with everything Scott said except for the copyright stuff. Scott is on the far end of "Downloading that system 0.85 boot disk would be illegal", but most of us don't care as long as its old-ish.

13,256,278,887,989,457,651,018,865,901,401,704,640!

 

[Mike Richardson]

To those of you who would support The Lounge being removed, would you support a Mac swap meet where discussing something other than Macs is banned?

 

[LCGuy]

I agree with everything Scott said except for the copyright stuff. Scott is on the far end of "Downloading that system 0.85 boot disk would be illegal", but most of us don't care as long as its old-ish.
13,256,278,887,989,457,651,018,865,901,401,704,640!

Well he does have a point - if it hasn't been released by the copyright owner, it is still their property, and if they don't want their software being passed around for free, they can take legal action. It might be 20 year old software that they don't stand a chance to make money from, but at the end of the day, illegal is illegal. I don't like it, and I don't agree with it, but thats just the law. I also don't agree with the fact that I can't drive our V6 Holden Berlina at 150 km/h on the highway, but thats also the law, and I have to put up with it.

 

[Unknown_K]

Some of my other interests and places I joined to talk about them:

Old 486/P1 thinkpads, discussed in a Thinkpad forum

DOS gaming, DOSgames forum

Amigas, English Amiga Forum, Lemon Amiga forum

Atatri ST's, Atari Forum

C64, Lemon C64 forum

Vintage machines in general, classic computer email list, Vintage computer forum.

There are many other forums I read daily but have no joined because I have nothing special to say.

As many on the IRC channel know I have interests other then computer which I freely discuss, I just don't bring them up here. If somebody does bring up a offtopic thread here and I have views on it I will reply, but I don't start them.

I don't want the 68kmla to be a one stop forum for everbodies interests, it just kills whats special about the forum and that is 68k and early ppc discussion. There are better places to discuss cars and other topics like life in general.

 

[macgeek417]

BTW, that number I posted was illegal...

}

:lol:

 

[Unknown_K]

To those of you who would support The Lounge being removed, would you support a Mac swap meet where discussing something other than Macs is banned?

I don't want it removed, just not indexed to the rest of the world, and threads that have run their course deleted, plus limiting discussion to something even remotely related to the hobby (preservation, links to equipment and services, etc). If a thread does have some valuable content then it can be saved. Just keep personal issues off the forum.

 

[Trash80toHP_Mini]

Unknown_K Full Member 602 posts 06 Mar 2003 USA <== A simple search in the archive will show when I joined (and I have been active since that date unlike others who come and go because of lack of interest).

People come and go for many reasons, i rather doubt "lack of interest" is one of them in very many cases. As for spending time searching the archive for your enlistment date . . . get real. :

So if you are comfortable posting your laundry in the lounge the rest of the members should be happy about that?

I've voiced my thanks to the members who've been supportive and encouraging, if you don't like it, go about your business here and don't open my threads.

You came back to the forum with little interest in 68K mac just to be a mod and tell the people who do care about 68k mac what to do?

If you've read any appreciable percentage of my posts since my return, you should realize that you are in error. You have no idea what kinds of projects I'm currently developing and what hacks I may post in the near future,

Also, if you recall, I was invited to return to the fold because several members and mods missed my input on matters of 68k technical interest.

You just stated you don't have time to waste on people who come here to be ON TOPIC, what kind of bullshit is that?

Being unrelentingly "ON TOPIC" (68kWise) in a vibrant community sharing info on many varied interests, like the recent photography thread, the van threads etc. makes for a very boring comrade, IMHO. Apparently quite a boorish one in your case as well, considering the totally inappropriate tone and vocabulary choices in your last post. Do NOT attempt to cross swords with me!

I may choose not to share whatever 68k info i might possess with whomever I wish, just as you are free not to visit the lounge as you may wish. However, I do wish that we can put all this bickering behind us and get on with it, whatever "it" might be, but rest assured, "it" will include a lot more than merely 68k info exchange, as has ALWAYS been the case here at the barracks.

Everyone has other interests, I share that with people I like in the appropriate places.

Granted, but who are you to judge what is appropriate for these fora? If you've decided not to like me that's fine with me, but who do you think you are in trying to change something that has existed, and thrived upon I might add, for something on the order of three years (?) before you enlisted.

IMHO, of course,

jt :b&w:

 

[Mike Richardson]

I would support Lounge threads being removed after a long period, such as 3 months without a post, unless the thread has some kind of significance.

However, it is impractical to join a different forum for every little off-topic thing you may want to discuss. Often, it is impossible.

In reality though I think most Lounge topics actually relate to computers or technology somehow. Consider this search which lists the last 25 Lounge topics I've personally created: search.php?keywords=&terms=all&author=Mike+Richardson&fid%5B%5D=2&sc=1&sf=titleonly&sk=t&sd=d&sr=posts&st=0&ch=300&t=0&submit=Search

Threads about the van:

Van Spark Plugs

Van is leaking ATF maybe.

Completely dead speakers in Van?

Van™

Failure with the van transmission

Success with the van A/C

Threads that have something to do with computers, software, the industry, technology, etc:

LEM Dan won't add my iBooks to LEM Deals

The Death of Yahoo!

Neat picture of Apple Company Store in 1990s

PayPal fee changes

CompuServe Classic shuts down tomorrow

Inland PRO PCI USB2.0 / PS2 Card

Price a PC laptop absolutely as close as possible to an MBP

Films with old Macs

Analog shutdowns begin in 1 hour

SilverCreator

How many people here actually use Mac OS X?

New in box LC 580s from Shreve Systems?

Imaging Tiger installation

47 HP Vectra PIII Systems

Microsoft gives $4.5 million grant to Houston Public Library

FutureBASIC II is now freeware

Completely off topic threads:

Shirley's Wellness Cafe: WTF?

Hopefully a more rational Swine Flu topic

Prosecutor dismisses charges

The van threads could have been confined to just one thread. I apologize for making so many of those threads. However, purchasing and successfully performing that much work on the van myself was a big accomplishment for me. The thread about "Shirley's Wellness Cafe" was an over-reaction to a website I read; I wouldn't care if it were deleted right now.

I think I suggested this before, but what if we split the Lounge into two forums: One for the general catch-all discussion of "computing, software, the Internet, technology, related industries, etc.", and another one for the completely off-topic discussion that some of you seem to loathe so much? (which, in reality, does not comprise much of the Lounge at all).

 

[Unknown_K]

Unknown_K Full Member 602 posts 06 Mar 2003 USA <== A simple search in the archive will show when I joined (and I have been active since that date unlike others who come and go because of lack of interest).

People come and go for many reasons, i rather doubt "lack of interest" is one of them in very many cases. As for spending time searching the archive for your enlistment date . . . get real. :

So if you are comfortable posting your laundry in the lounge the rest of the members should be happy about that?

I've voiced my thanks to the members who've been supportive and encouraging, if you don't like it, go about your business here and don't open my threads.

You came back to the forum with little interest in 68K mac just to be a mod and tell the people who do care about 68k mac what to do?

If you've read any appreciable percentage of my posts since my return, you should realize that you are in error. You have no idea what kinds of projects I'm currently developing and what hacks I may post in the near future,

Also, if you recall, I was invited to return to the fold because several members and mods missed my input on matters of 68k technical interest.

You just stated you don't have time to waste on people who come here to be ON TOPIC, what kind of bullshit is that?

Being unrelentingly "ON TOPIC" (68kWise) in a vibrant community sharing info on many varied interests, like the recent photography thread, the van threads etc. makes for a very boring comrade, IMHO. Apparently quite a boorish one in your case as well, considering the totally inappropriate tone and vocabulary choices in your last post. Do NOT attempt to cross swords with me!

I may choose not to share whatever 68k info i might possess with whomever I wish, just as you are free not to visit the lounge as you may wish. However, I do wish that we can put all this bickering behind us and get on with it, whatever "it" might be, but rest assured, "it" will include a lot more than merely 68k info exchange, as has ALWAYS been the case here at the barracks.

Everyone has other interests, I share that with people I like in the appropriate places.

Granted, but who are you to judge what is appropriate for these fora? If you've decided not to like me that's fine with me, but who do you think you are in trying to change something that has existed, and thrived upon I might add, for something on the order of three years (?) before you enlisted.

IMHO, of course,

jt :b&w:

You wont take 2 seconds to see when I joined but asumed I am new here, yet expect me to read all your posts to see if you contributed anything ontopic. If talking about something personal to a total stranger in real life makes then uneasy (cars and photography will not) then don't do it on the forum.

 

[JDW]

I am certainly not into acronyms (above and beyond CIA, FBI, SCSI, and a few others), but I am aware that the "H" in "IMHO" means Humble, and I shall attempt to exhibit some of that in my final post in this thread.

Who is "to judge"? We all have our own opinions (no one can debate that after reading this thread), but the ultimate judge is our very own ~tl, Sys-Ops Commander. ~tl is the man who created this thread. And in light of the direction this thread is now taking, perhaps it would be a breath of fresh air to review some key points of ~tl most excellent opening post...

I think everyone here would agree that the atmosphere on the forum (and the Lounge in particular) has been a little sucky of late.
...lets try to remember that this forum is primarily about vintage Macs.

I'm perfectly aware that whenever you have a forum like this, people don't just come here for their vintage Mac fix. I'm fully aware that some people here view other members here as their "friends" and hence feel comfortable sharing every aspect of their personal lives with them. I don't personally share this feeling...

While you may feel comfortable in posting a thread about every little thing that happens in your life, please be aware that some people visit here for the actual technical content, rather than for the community aspect. Try and see it from their point of view.

While we are proud that you view this place as somewhere you can share your troubles, please recognise that there may be better places to do so. A blog, Twitter, Facebook, the IRC channel, or even just a single thread about the latest happenings in your life.

If you have a problem with a member in particular it would be better to take it up with them via a private message rather than openly on the forum. everyone needs to show a bit more respect to the other members of the community or else this place is going to further descend in to pointless arguments and pettiness.

If you don't like the look of a topic then simply ignore it!

It is now time for me to humbly withdraw from this thread and go back to the geeky Compact Mac Technocorner from which I came.

Happy Classic Macing! :b&w:

 

[Gil]

but I am aware that the "H" in "IMHO" means Humble,

Seriously? I though the "H" meant Honest. "In my honest opinion".

 

[Osgeld]

 

[Temetka]

I've been quiet on the matter hoping that it would resolve itself.

However from what I have read, it has not.

First and foremost the 68kMLA should at it's core be about 68k Macintoshes, with a side of PPC Macintoshes as well.

I read through nearly every sub-forum on the board although I may not post post in every topic.

The one thing that I have always loved about this place is that the users here are of a like minded technical perspective, and we have all chosen to come together and discuss one of our passions / hobbies which is 68K Mac's and vintage Mac's.

I do agree with Mike that some banter back and forth is essential to the feeling of belonging to a community. So long as that banter does not delve too deeply into twitter / myspace ramblings about things better left unsaid on this forum.

Having said that, the lounge serves a purpose.

For me it's like going to a convention. In between the presentations and the vendors shows, people meet and talk about whatever it is they talk about before continuing on with the convention. The lounge is just like that. A place to stop by for a few minutes, chit-chat, then get back to why we are actually meeting here.

Most of the problems I have seen with this board can be solely attributed to the lounge mutating from a simple sit back and relax area to something more along the lines of sit back, relax and remove the barrier from the brain-mouth (keyboard) thing that most us have in place. The lounge has swelled in number of topics ranging from Thinkpads, PC's in general, cars, things going on in our lives, discussion of news events, discussion of political events, and so on. While on the surface most people would be thinking "So What?" that's what a lounge is for. True, it is. However if we could fire up the way back machine and take a look at the lounge from even 3 years ago we would discover that it's landscape would be vastly different than the lounge we are accustomed to seeing now.

Great! What is your solution then?

My answer is to keep discussing those things, but like all things in life - do it with moderation. By that I mean keep to the point and try to avoid some of the tangents that our discussions go down. Most of us would agree to eating and drinking (not necessarily alcohol) should be done in moderation, and so should our use of the lounge.

Now all that being said I have 1 more thing to say.

I have been around for about 5 years or so and I have thoroughly enjoyed my time here and look forward to the times to come. If we as a MUG come together and re-acknowledge what the core of the 68kMLA is and honor that, then road ahead will be golden. If we continue in our path of Web 2.0 twitterificness (I know it's not a real word) then all I can say is that it will be a tragic and slow death to someplace I used to be proud to call a thing of beauty.

If we want the board to be better, then it is up to us as the user community to make it a better place. Sure talking about what we would like to do is great. Actually doing it is better.

So let's head back out there and make sure we think to ourselves before hitting the 'Post' button. "Will this post add to betterment of the forum, or is it just fluff?"

Quality far outweighs quantity people.