• Quick note - the problem with Youtube videos not embedding on the forum appears to have been fixed, thanks to ZiprHead. If you do still see problems let me know.

Future of the Forum

Aepervius said:
Personally i do not care whether icerat do MLM or believe in bigfoot or whatever.

What i object to is that the data I gave to JREF is now being sent to a third party en-masse. If I want to go to the new forum, I will register there and decide what I give in as info.
Click to expand...

Wouldn't that be the exact same info ?
 
Aepervius said:
What i object to is that the data I gave to JREF is now being sent to a third party en-masse.
Click to expand...
As has been repeated several times, posts and personal info are being handled differently.

As for the posts, you gave the JREF license to republish your posts. And the JREF will republish them on the new forum, because they have your permission. You can't object to that now; that ship sailed when you accepted the registration agreement.

As for the personal info, your personal info won't be transferred without your explicit consent. The question and the transfer will both be handled by a bot. Or that's what I've understood from what we've been explained so far.
 
The only thing I asked icerat for was a real name (I learned that somewhere here), which was provided. I'm not bothered about knowing anything else. If there is a replacement forum and it's good, I shall probably be there.
 
jhunter1163 said:
I'll defend icerat all the way. He's stepped up when we, as a forum, needed someone to step up. Like his opinions or not, he's the only game in town as far as continuing the forum, and it seems to me from what I've seen that he has the chops to handle the transition without turning the place into the IREF (IceRat Educational Forum).
Click to expand...

To be fair we don't know that, the JREF apparently extended the deadline for people to come forward with options and there could be many being proposed to the JREF that we (members) are not aware of.

What I do know is that the only person who has provided a solution to not only the technical issues but the on going future of the forum who has reached out to me is icerat. From when this plopped out of the JREF he was willing to engage with me and then anyone else who seemed to want to have input. And he was willing to change his plans to accommodate new ideas and new personalities.

He has at all times stressed he wants me on board and is not planning on any drastic changes in the near future*. I have no evidence that he is not sincere about this, the evidence I do have indicates he is sincere.

That to me seems to be a good way to begin to build trust and bodes well for the future process in building something new.

As far as I am aware icerat's proposal is the only one that involves the entire current moderation team, if folks think that will help the new place succeed than I would suggest it is the proposal to back.




*(don't read into the "near future" anything bar what it means doesn't mean that he is or I am suspecting he has drastic changes up his sleeve it's just we can only talk about the near future at the moment).
 
Aepervius said:
Personally i do not care whether icerat do MLM or believe in bigfoot or whatever.

What i object to is that the data I gave to JREF is now being sent to a third party en-masse. If I want to go to the new forum, I will register there and decide what I give in as info.
Click to expand...

That is not the plan.
 
Darat said:
To be fair we don't know that, the JREF apparently extended the deadline for people to come forward with options and there could be many being proposed to the JREF that we (members) are not aware of.
Click to expand...

There's a new deadline? When is it, and has there been any statement from our JREFian overlords about when they'll let us know their decision?
 
This coming Wednesday, August 13th for submissions - then I suppose it may take them some time to come to a decision.


:scared:
 
Last edited:
lionking said:
Why are you, someone who is largely unknown to the forum, involved in these discussions? Apart from putting your hand up first that is.
Click to expand...

I don't know if he was the first one to put up his hand, but I know he wasn't the only one, so there was some level of judgement on the JREFs part.

And given the JREFs most recent update they still haven't made any kind of final decision at all, they are still calling for proposals until August 13th.

So at the very least wait until they've made a final decision as to what they are going to do.

lionking said:
You are making judgements and seem to be part of the decision making process. Who are you? What do you stand for? Why are you doing this? Why should member's faith be put in you?
Click to expand...

It doesn't sound like he's part of the JREF's decision making process as a decision maker, it sounds like he's providing technical help, and information about what his plans are and how they would work if the JREF decides to go with his proposal. A lot of the discussion is about what would happen if, but the if hasn't happened yet.

And the other questions other than the last one (which is one only you can answer for yourself) have been answered.

lionking said:
You came into this whole thing with the offer to stabilise the forum and speed it up. This seems to have happened. Why not just dip your lid and let other, well known and respected people (like the mod team and Jeff) take over?
Click to expand...

But he hasn't done anything, the server hasn't moved, the only thing he's done afaik is provide technical advice/assistance. He isn't an admin, he isn't a mod, he's just a guy with a proposal. He's said repeatedly that he wants the mod team and/or Jeff to be involved, he's the one (or one of the ones) that reached out the Jeff, he's said he doesn't want to create "icreat's forum".

lionking said:
The fact they have provided information to someone who simply said he could help on the technical side, and gave him virtual control of the forum is quite telling.
Click to expand...

Are you sure he has virtual control of the forum?!? Where has that been said anywhere?? Lisa is the only former admin that's still has some admin powers AFAIK.

icerat, do you currently have virtual control of the forum?

Unless I'm completely wrong about the current state of affairs, you really seem to be assuming a lot incorrectly.

lionking said:
I would rather Jeff Wagg. He's willing, from his posts. He's well known. He's respected.
Click to expand...

And icerat was the one who reached out to Jeff. And he's said many times that that'd be desirable. It's not a "Jeff or icerat" situation.

banquetbear said:
For all I know Icerat could take exception to what I have said here and ban me once we hit the new servers. Can you guarantee that that won't happen?
Click to expand...

There's no guarantees, if it does happen you wouldn't want to be on that forum anyway so no loss. If that happened, most if not all of the mods and admins that moved over would quit. Jeff wouldn't want to be involved any longer. The membership would find another home somewhere else.

There are no guarantees, and I think it's fine to wait to see more detail on the actual structure of the future forum (if it's a non-profit or some other kind of organization that would have legal ownership of the domain name and such).
 
Last edited:
I don't care who takes ownership of the forum. I don't care who takes control of the forum. (the two don't necessarily need to be the same thing). I sincerely hope that someone(s) does take ownership and/or control of it, and ports it to a new location/home/whatever you call it.

At such time as that occurs... will someone please post clear and concise directions on what we must do to transfer our membership to the new forum? Preferably with a force-read notice?

Because I just don't have the stamina to make it through 37+ pages of discussion to find it... :D
 
pgimeno said:
As has been repeated several times, posts and personal info are being handled differently.

As for the posts, you gave the JREF license to republish your posts. And the JREF will republish them on the new forum, because they have your permission. You can't object to that now; that ship sailed when you accepted the registration agreement.

As for the personal info, your personal info won't be transferred without your explicit consent. The question and the transfer will both be handled by a bot. Or that's what I've understood from what we've been explained so far.
Click to expand...

Republishing wqas meant only to be able to show other people the psot, aka, simple web publishing.

The agreement was NEVER meant to publish to a third party.
 
Emily's Cat said:
At such time as that occurs... will someone please post clear and concise directions on what we must do to transfer our membership to the new forum?
Click to expand...

Yes.

Or, at least thats what Sharon said (" will make an announcement in conjunction with the party who will take over the Forum").

We'll see. We've gone on here for about 30 pages with zero new information, we're not proud.... or tired...
 
Last edited:
Aepervius said:
Republishing wqas meant only to be able to show other people the psot, aka, simple web publishing.

The agreement was NEVER meant to publish to a third party.
Click to expand...

I can speak with some authority on this as I worked on the copyright/licence clause issue when it was added. It certainly was to allow the JREF to publish the work anywhere, whether that would be on their own site, on another site, used by a book publisher, used in classroom materials and so on. It really does cover the current proposal from icerat.
 
madurobob said:
How long do you think the forums would remain active? We'd all abandon the place in a matter of days.

As for cross promotion of businesses... I'm honestly not worried and for the same reasons. I am confident we will have a board or directors that would approve/reject such advertisers based on a clearly stated set of criteria. That board will have a sincere interest in keeping the forums active and engaging to the members.

I see that as a happy contrast to the current owners...
Click to expand...

You raise another of my concerns, though most members, as far as I can tell, appreciate the rules in the JREF forum and would, I believe, even be happy with some targeted strengthening of those rules, placing a strong emphasis on an interest in keeping discussions "lively," however, hits all sorts of red flags with me. I have participated on some other boards which have minimized moderation and neglected enforcing their own rules of: supporting assertions with evidences and references, eliminating personal attacks and insults, and cyber-stalking/hounding, all in the name of keeping board discussions and members lively and happy/engaged. The fear of losing trolls verbal pyromaniacs, chased off the reasoned and reasonable posters.
 
Trakar said:
You raise another of my concerns, though most members, as far as I can tell, appreciate the rules in the JREF forum and would, I believe, even be happy with some targeted strengthening of those rules, placing a strong emphasis on an interest in keeping discussions "lively," however, hits all sorts of red flags with me. I have participated on some other boards which have minimized moderation and neglected enforcing their own rules of: supporting assertions with evidences and references, eliminating personal attacks and insults, and cyber-stalking/hounding, all in the name of keeping board discussions and members lively and happy/engaged. The fear of losing trolls verbal pyromaniacs, chased off the reasoned and reasonable posters.
Click to expand...
The forums here are relatively unique in that they are so well moderated (stop laughing!). It is that moderation that gives the forums their value. The level of discourse may be silly, snarky and downright mean spirited at times (OK, much of the time), but its a veritable Ph.D. thesis committee compared to most other internet forums. I am confident icerate understands this, and that is why very early in this process he sought to have the entire current admin/mod team and current rule set be part of the new forums should his proposal be accepted.
 
Darat said:
I can speak with some authority on this as I worked on the copyright/licence clause issue when it was added. It certainly was to allow the JREF to publish the work anywhere, whether that would be on their own site, on another site, used by a book publisher, used in classroom materials and so on. It really does cover the current proposal from icerat.
Click to expand...

Maybe, but in the end I do not care much for the post being republished , otherwise I would not post them in the first place.

But the email address, and other data, were not meant to be given to another party. And that's the point of contention for me. I was, at least until last week, using my real name as email address. I did it because I trusted the JREF & was donating. I changed a day ago, but there is no way for me to tell if it is is still not saved somewhere in the forum DB (as in "original email address used for registration" or soem other fields). Otherwise I would have used the crap email addy I am normally using for everybody else.

ETA: heck everything I remove or change I cannot be sure if it is really removed.
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top Bottom