Result of your suggestions....

[aguynamedchad]

there should be a members only forum. I was a member of a car club and we had a members only forum, and we also had a for members for sale forum so that paid members had a chance to look at the item first befor the public seen it.

[creeky]

I think lurking is fine. I try to log on every time I visit ... which is 4 times or so now ... in order to make life easy for the great guys who do all the work on this site.
I've stopped in at some of the advertisers sites too. Just to be polite and I learned about some new places I gotta go to. Road trip
But I don't see guys really slagging each other like they used to. So hats off to the excellent work done by the site admins. you guyz rock
(black sabbath guitar solo here)

[creeky]

wait I just saw a post where someone said they'd share their honey holes in a register user only spot ... ohhh dat's for me boss

[HitmanHill]

I can't see the advantage of just being a "lurker" if you want clarification on something or anything: you definitely need to be a mamber to PM someone to clarify what you just read. Unless you can read someone's mind, why would you not register to make sure what you read is what you thought you read?

[HitmanHill]

I can't believe that this post has had over 1200 people look at it and less then 90 people so far has made a vote. . How is this possible with the way I see everyone has their opinon and this nis the time to give it but it just doesn't seem to be happening.

[Mick]

Hitman

i don't think 1200 people have viewed this opinion poll

I think 100 people have continually checked back in on the thread to rewad the goings on

Enjoy your new ride....I was fortunate to fish in that boat a few times last year.....absolutely no truth whatsoever to the rumour that it cannot catch fish

Mick

[beeman]

I think this site should remain open to everyone.

As long as the posts on F-H are preaching conservation fishing, catch and release, and / or respect for the fish populations and the environment, I feel that there is great benefit in being open to the public. This site can show others that there are people that care and hopefully teach them to be respectful as well. If we cut this off, people are less likely to learn the importance of respect to the environment and others. I have personally learned a lot about fishing from this site and feel that it is a great resource for everyone.

If there were a "members only section" would that be the only one used making the rest of the site irrelevant?

Beeman

[Suddsy]

Just a thought for consideration. Allot of people that use the internet today have computers but are not overly computer literate. For people who have grown up with computer or who have been forced to learn them through work requirements have overcome their fear and have some confidence in using a computer. However, there are just as many users who are doing basic functions like accessing a web site and reading what is on it. As well, many of these people have no typing skills so moving beyond lurking or undertaking difficult tasks like typing in messages may be beyond what many people feel their capabilities are. I know that, although I have worked on computers for many years, I often feel a little overwhelmed by the constantly changing technology. I think that this is a consideration in decisions around lurkers access rights as well as members who may not make alot of contributions.

[Bobber]

If I can offer one piece of criticism, I find it difficult to search out specific information in the forums. I find that searching the forum usually returns quite a large number of posts that are unrelated to my search. Does anyone else have this problem? Am I doing something wrong? Maybe this should be a separate topic. If so, I apologize.

Rick
><> ><> ><> ><>
Here fishy fishy fishy...

Hey Rick, you're probably not doing anything wrong. The search engine is based on words that you put into your search criteria. There is a LOT of information here. I have tried over the past couple of years to add category icons to the posts, and have linked those to main menu topics. Those such as Tips, Stories, Reports, etc. This in an effort to better organize the stuff and allow menu clicking. I will admit though, the search engine which is based on key words is not the best in the world, but is part of the phpBB database that runs this site. When upgrades are made available, I try to implement them as soon as I can. Some tips, most information is in the Fishing Talk Forum. Narrow your search to that, include ALL words your searching for by clicking the appropriate button in the search engine, and see if that shortens the list.

[Bobber]

i agree with steve!

everyone should be registered to make it a better board lurkers can visit another board just not steall everything we put as in where we fish!!

i understand it is a bussiness,bit hey i think more then 50%would say same thing,you would have more registered people and now maybe they will say something!i dont type much i am a reader but i will jump in here and there!

and almost go out to any fish meet and meet the guys!

oh ya bobber when will you make a fish-hawk gathering???where waiting!


zort

So again, what I'm hearing is that forcing registration would be like creating a unique club that shares information on where to fish with only one another. There seems to be quite a few people who share this sentiment, and makes a good argument for perhaps a private members only forum for those who wish to keep it within the "family". For those who wish to share with all, then that option is available as well.

As for Fish-Hawk gatherings, we don't have any plans at the moment, other than those that the members such as Rider are putting together.

The one thing we learned is that large gatherings for a weekend of fishing is a lot of work for one or two people to organize. We also found that you lose a lot of the personalable stuff since there are so many people around the table. Not everyone interacts with everyone else, and I myself don't have enough time to talk to everyone. We have gone with more of a smaller model and less time intensive to organize for us, allow the gathering to be a little more social. There is of course the whole legal liability component, which we did not take into consideration in the past, were lucky that nothing happened, and were advised to change the way we do things. This is the major reason we are not doing the large gatherings anymore.

In exchange for this, I will support any gatherings that the members of this site wish to put together, such that we are doing for Rider. I will even be establishing a special place for such gatherings, and will endevour to be part of them where I can. If the members are so inclined, feel free to set stuff up, let me know about it, and we'll give you the resources you need to pull it off.

[Bobber]

Like a big ol' fat Muskie, i'm always lurking in the weeds.......waiting to pounce on tid-bits of useless information

Seriously...look how many registered users there are and a huge number of those users don't post anything at all Then there are the unregistered lurkers who do nothing but lurk anyways.....so whats the diff? I say make em' register and if they don't give some sort of participation per amount of time logged then....deactivate their account.

Now can i please get back to my lurking

Oh......and i would like to see the signature feature reinstated as well. I don't think it should only be for pro anglers, tackle shop owners and outdoor writers......they are not the only ones with plenty of knowledge around here ya know!

Grant.

Of course they are not the only ones with plenty of knowledge, but they are people who have committed to me to submit articles of interest for everyone to take advantage of. Normally I would have to pay for these articles, as many of them are submitted to magazines and other publications, however through the Information partner program, I provide them with an Internet presence, some promotional exposure, and they provide information to you all, sometimes even before they hit paper.

In any case, it appears signature lines is something that people really want back, so I'll consider it, however will most likely put some restrictions in place to avoid large graphics and non-supporting promotional messages. These slow down the loading time, and cause me to have to send notes to people who abuse the non-promotional nature of our board. I hate doing this.

[Bobber]

As I type this I look at the top of the page and I read this,"These forums have been created for you to share information, make new friends, and improve your angling abilities. Please respect others and make every participant welcome." So let's make others feel welcome and not worry about who is fishing where.

That's a good point. It's exactly what I want to encourage. It seems however that people want more sharing and more contribution. I get the impression that we are saying there is more taking than giving in the community. Is that a bad thing? I'm not sure if I'm convinced yet. Does every participant include lurkers? I suppose it does.

[Bobber]

First, I'd like to thank everyone for contributing to this question, voting in the poll, and helping me make a decision on what we'll do here moving forward.

We've tried many things over the years, some work and others do not work as well as we had originally thought. We try to keep all the information as compacted as possible so that in order to see everyday information, there is only a few places to go. This is the purpose of the Fishing Talk Forum primarily....a one stop shop for Fishing Information. It also makes moderating easier for me, as I have one spot to really keep tabs on. Most of the other forums are for specific information pertaining to specific stuff, for those people who may be looking for something specific. Some of these forums have menu items themselves and are designed for archiving of information and content. At least that's the model we try to implement. Not sure if we are 100% successful, but that's what we try to accomplish.

Making a single forum for Registered Members only may work, and is something to consider, however I need to think about how that may impact the position of the model we use, and the administration of it.

So with that said, let's look at some of the information gathered.....

- 1500 views, 82 replies, and 92 votes. Those who opt for registration to see what's going on is 55. Those who don't think registration is required, is 37. Interesting indeed and not at all what I expected. These numbers of course do not take into consideration the non-registered users who could not vote, and the people who came back to see what new discussion was entered on the topic.

The arguments within the threads, which I really appreciate and read all of them are summarized below with my comments on them....

- Adding real names to registered users.
In the non-Interent world, this may work, however in cyberland, it is a concept that would just open the door to additional moderation to ensure that names entered are real. I don't believe anything would be gained by this.

- Complete registration required for all users.
While the poll indicates this as a preference for 20% of the votes, and yes it is free and does not take long to do, I'm still not sure I see the advantage of having a registered users only board. Many of our visitors are non-registered members, who register when they feel comfortable with the content, the people, and themselves posting. I firmly believe I would be closing the door on many potential future content providers. This includes those at all levels, novice, amature, professional, and other media who would like to see if there is any opportunity to contribute and be part of this community. I don't think we'd have people like Big Jim, Karl Kalonka, David Chong, and Bill McCue, to name only a few.... supporting the site if they did not have an opportunity to see what was going on. Having a members only forum is a different concept with a different goal. Some other sites do it, but I'm not convinced it's the way to go here. The solution to this is to post your information with enough detail to get your story across, not mentioning places or locations, but sticking to the point of the message that you are writing. It is totally up to the registered community who contributes to "convince" non-registered users that this is a great place to be, and allow them to make their own decision on whether or not they'd like to be part of it in a contributing manner.

- A members only forum
Now this is something that was brought up many times. I see this as an area where members would be able to post things that only other members could see. The issue here though, is what information would be put in here? From what I've read, the only stuff that would really matter in a forum like this is specific locations of catching fish, and secret tips that people have spent a lot of time exploring and being successful with. Those people would only like to share that information with other users who participate on the site and also contribute some of this information. I suppose that's fair, but I'm not convinced it's required. I think we all realize now that sharing specific locations is not the way to go, no matter who you are. This is a sport, that's pretty much it. We need to educate ourselves to write in a manner that tell the story, but does not reveil information to give away all the hard work we've done to find these spots or thse techniques that work. I for one don't have any problem at all sharing techniques and baits that work for me. It's not about the baits in my oppinion, it's about the skill, experience, and knowledge that one uses to work those baits. Location of good fishing spots, structure, humps, and environment is something that is found out by getting out there and fishing.

Again, I recommend to write your message accordingly, keep your secret spots to yourself, and share only with those close people whom you trust to also keep them secret via PM or e-mail. The rest of us should respect that, continue to build relationships, fish with others, and learn for ourselves these spots and these techniques. The best way to do this is to register, participate, meet new people with different experience levels, and get into the loop. Adding a members only forum would also mean additional administration, and yet another place to watch for information.

- Lurker Trial Time
This is not possible. The technology will not allow it.

- User selected permissions
Now this has some merit that is by far the best suggestion I've seen as far as members only. It would keep all information within the same forums we have already established, and allow the user to decide who they would like to share the information with. I will be looking into this concept further, as the code to make this happen does not currently exist, but this concept has good potential as a solution.

- Re-instatement of signature lines
OK, I can do this. However I will need to put in place some restrictions so that we don't clutter up the information with graphics and non-supporting promotional stuff, just text.

- Forum Access by number of posts
This is possible, however again it would require a new forum to be created, administered, and I really don't see the advantage to doing it.

- Issues / Debate Forum
We did try this before and it was not accepted well. Seems there are a lot of people who enjoy the site because it is kept relatively clean and respectful of others. Issues and debate are OK, as long as we as registered users respect one anothers oppinions, and keep it at just that. The problems occur when users are "called out" so to speak, or are told they don't know what they are talking about. The reality of the situation is that controvery sells, and people want to read it. It's a fact of life. I like controversy, but when it gets out of control, that's when moderation is required.

- Impact of Lurkers vs. Registered users
Well, this whole thing got started when we began to talk about the impact of providing information to just anyone who comes to the site. There were suggestions that providing this information may be dangerous and may implicate some security vulnerabilities. I have not been convinced however that this indeed has these vunerabilities that were spoken about. Whether or not registration is required, people who just want to read will continue to read, and people who want to say something will do so, just as we do today. People can register, and then never post, just keep on coming to see what's going on. I don't think it is going to convince people to participate more, and may even cause the opposite to happen. We'll lose people who may be potential contributors in the future. The only advantage I can see to this is to boost the number of registered users reported to the site, and while it is a good stat for the site, it really doesn't mean anything as we are just creating registered lurkers, as someone earlier mentioned.

Convincing people to register lies entirely in the hands of the current participating body of registered users. If people feel comfortable in participating on the site, and know they will be welcomed into the community no matter what level of experience they have, then they will surely take the next step, and begin posting more. The primary reason that I have heard as to why people don't register and participate, is because they don't like all the negativity and disrespect that happens on occasion, or they don't want to share reports on good fishing places becuase after that, the places get pounded. Unfortunately, this is the world we live in and the nature of the beast. It is inevitable and it's going to happen. The more of us who can control this and show by example, the better the site will be and the more registrations we'll get, because people will know this is a great place to be, and want to be part of it. As far as posting reports, choose your words appropriately, don't give away anything you want to keep secret, and show us how well you did.

Once again, thanks everyone for your comments, suggestions, and ideas. I will continue to explore ways to add "incentive" for people to register and participate more. Nothing would make me happier than to have more registered participation than non-registered readers. That just increases the content of the site, makes it more active, and says something about the community we have here. For now, we'll leave it status quo, and welcome readers to the site, encouraging them to register and become part of the community in a more active way. I need your help to make this happen though.

Thanks again all,
Cheers,