...is he gone for good....

The site is only as good as its posters. Good members have come and gone over the years for various reasons, kinda sad. Run the good posters off and you are left with a bunch of prepubescent motor burners repeating crap they have only read about from the very posters that took off. It seems like everything that was good in life just a few short years ago has changed for the worse, this place is no exception.

I'm uninstalling the app. MAYBE I'll be back in a week or so...sick of the negativity here and two-bit lawyering about the rules is not helping matters.

It's ironic, as there ARE some other members here who post crap for the sake of being mean and nasty. They apparently GET OFF on it. But that's not Thirsty.

- George Gassaway

Ok, I'm Ok with a short ban, the rules are there...

I can't pick on any of the potential candidates' because I truly don't like any on either side. It's bad this time, man or woman. I keep hoping someone worthy comes along but I'm not holding my breath....

dave carver said:

I keep hoping someone worthy comes along but I'm not holding my breath....

Click to expand...

I keep hoping fresh horse poop doesn't smell.

Adrian

nute said:

Well I'm glad he'll be back. It was always great to read his posts. That said, I have to say that in my opinion the comments were a bit overboard. Oh well, I'll await his arrival. How Will we go a week without his puns??

Nate

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Here there is no reword
We all are being punished for the sake of pundits.

You do realize that with all the mud slinging these politicians throw at each other and the facade of their platforms which is simply designed to give the voting public (sheep) something to sink their teeth into, that they likely all belong to the same private golf club and play poker together

Meanwhile we get all cranked up and divisive even though we were brought together under our common interest of "Rocketry". So if you're finding yourself getting a bit hot under the collar over some words written on the computer screen then take your hands off the keyboard for the night to try to put some perspective on it. The thread will likely still be there in the morning and if it's not then someone did you a favour by locking it

I don't know about the rest of you but I am here to keep it lite and break from all the petty stuff I have to deal with in life.

On the topic of Thirsty, personally I appreciated his humour. I found it a lot of things, but serious and mean-spirited were not two labels I would apply, so lighten up Francis. :wink:

Out of respect for my friend, the Thirsty Barbarian, I shall make no further posts until his triumphant return. And you can take that to the bank from a man who was recently labeled as a Basement Bomber! :rofl:

The thing I don't get:

If something or some thread, irritates you or you find obnoxious, why not just ignore it.Why do folks have to pour fuel on the fire Or react expressing their views, full knowing it's going to be useless. Kinda like poking a sleeping bear with a stick....sooner or later you will get bit.

Why such fascination with expounding on useless or forbidden subject?
My theory is this: Human nature is ........just jump in with out thinking. Why do we have to be so reactive?

Years ago I did a test: We were painting a large shopping mall & just before lunch I placed 8 "Wet Paint do not touch" signs on black wrought iron railings prominently placed, decrative only , not needed to prevent falling. They had NOT been painted, it was a ruse.

Then we sat back ate our lunch and laughed our butts off , generally every other passer by, reached out with a finger to see if the paint was still wet!

Why? Just because they were forbidden to do so. Guess it's part of the "herd" mentality...LOL

If you ignore it, .......it will go away.....OR the paint will dry! [ if it's really wet]

Just run an ad blocker. I can't believe there aren't ad blockers for Android and iPhone.
If everyone ran ad blockers, that would get the attention of the site owners. :eyeroll:

Rocketjunkie said:

Just run an ad blocker. I can't believe there aren't ad blockers for Android and iPhone.
If everyone ran ad blockers, that would get the attention of the site owners. :eyeroll:

Click to expand...

You can run AdBlock and Firefox on Android phones.

If anyone is keeping score, we ALL pay for bandwidth. My $425 a month for cable/internet/voip/cellphone/data is all the proof I need. No one rides for free.

Not really sure what the wailing and gnashing of teeth is about (concerning the adverts, not talking about Thirsty). I rarely even notice the ads unless someone says something about them and I glance at them. More often than not, I forget they are even there. In other words, I don't really find them that intrusive, unlike the ads on many other websites. I mean, at least they aren't popunders or pop up ads that always seem to get past the pop up blocker (like used to appear on Snopes every time you'd go there). It seems a bit better out there lately - at one point, you couldn't surf the web for ten minutes without having at least a half dozen windows waiting under the window you were reading!

As far as Thirsty goes, I don't really consider reposting the content of an ad that is already on TRF to be a violation of the no politics policy. However, we are all (mostly) adults here. And changing the name of any politician is NOT cleverly, but it's merely schoolyard taunts - we should be above that. And that is all I'll say about that.

cwbullet said:

You need to understand that the ads are random and we do not get the choose which ads come up. Many of them are determined by the cookies in your browser.

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Chuck, that is the issue right there. The site has to be paid for somehow, and the methods available are advertising and subscription.

When I was a Mod/Admin on RP we debated this amongst ourselves. There were rocketry related adds that vendors paid for. We did not have the random stuff though. It is a choice by the site owner/admins.

It boils down to how they view the site- as a service to the rocket community or as a profit generating business. I suspect the later. You can do both, but random add stuff just irritates people. Conversely, if you limit it to paid rocketry related adds you may limit you revenue. If the best method is a pay for access type of model, with adds that are rocket related. The random adds can likely be stopped and replaced with rocket related adds with some admin work.

Then the trick is to set the subscription price low enough that you do not drive away the base, but high enough that some money is made.

Banning folks is a choice. I have made it before as well. It is not fun, and there is typically a lot that happens before the ban hammer is dropped. You should consider a sand box forum that is largely hands off mod wise except for pornography and such crap.

I run AdBlock but I used to have it turned off for this site because I like seeing ads from rocketry vendors. Once all the irrelevant ads started showing up I turned it on. I'm no longer bothered by the crap but I miss the rocketry ads. I'm sure there are many others who have done the same so, in reality, the ads are being seen by fewer people. I wonder if they pay a fixed rate based on visits to TRF or for click throughs.

jd2cylman said:

I keep hoping fresh horse poop doesn't smell.

Adrian

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...ahhhh, so we're both eternal optimists

Zeus-cat said:

He did quite a bit more than repost an ad. He was very, very rude in his comments about Ted Cruz. However, I do believe it is hypocritical to post political ads on the forum and not allow people to post political comments..

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I have not read Eric's post, and I have never spoken to him about politics in real life. When I meet Eric at launches, I like to talk rockets with him.

This said, people where I live (San Francisco Bay Area) tend to lose perspective on just how extreme their politics are. It's like we live in a California commune, cut off from the rest of the world. On rare occasions when we hear rumors that in other parts of the country people exist who vote differently from us or practice different religions from ours, we take it as a crime against humanity that we must rectify here and now.

I've lived here over a decade, and I find this self-righteousness obnoxious. Eric, I'm looking forward to more of your posts about your rockets. An "Occupy TRF" movement? Not so much.

Ari.

[video=youtube;vIUIoopMmxg]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vIUIoopMmxg[/video]

Guys,

I take being a moderator/admin seriously even though I am not paid to do it. I do not mean to offend. I think of you all as a family (dysfunctional, but a family).

I too look forward to welcoming Eric back. Although a permanent ban is possible, that is not something I would do unless you post porn or spam.

This site should be a non-hostile learning environment. Rules are there to avoid hot topics that end in unprofessional exchanges. I do not make them. I just enforce them.

+oo (infinity) to what Ari said.

You all seem to take it for granted that he will return after his exile. He could just say screw it and stop contributing. That's the problem with the heavy hand. He was trying to point something out but instead of listening to what he was saying, you got caught up in his words.

Look at it this way, ads are very different than content posted by other message board users. You're not having a discussion with the ads, and you're not going to hit reply and create a progressively nastier and nastier exchange.

grouch said:

You all seem to take it for granted that he will return after his exile. He could just say screw it and stop contributing. That's the problem with the heavy hand. He was trying to point something out but instead of listening to what he was saying, you got caught up in his words.

Click to expand...

+1. I realize that this is the owner's sandbox and we're just playing in it, and that you need to sell ad space to keep the lights on around here, and that the mods are just concerned volunteers trying to maintain some order. But it still doesn't make sense that advertisers get a pass on rules that are aggressively enforced on contributors. And I get that Google or whomever controls ad content and pays the bills, but if you don't do right by the contributors then you will eventually have no ad audience.

Chuck's in the proverbial Rock-and-Hardplace position, having to do what he gotta.

At least Thirsty hasn't been SPAM-banned. Besides, Even they are back many, many, times a week....

iter said:

This said, people where I live (San Francisco Bay Area) tend to lose perspective on just how extreme their politics are. It's like we live in a California commune, cut off from the rest of the world. On rare occasions when we hear rumors that in other parts of the country people exist who vote differently from us or practice different religions from ours, we take it as a crime against humanity that we must rectify here and now.

Click to expand...

The irony here is that Google, whose AdChoices effectively govern the content of the ads being displayed, is also a product of that Bay Area culture. I wonder if Google is too lasseiz-faire, and dare I say capitalist, for the rest of the Bay Area?

mrichhcirm said:

The irony here is that Google, whose AdChoices effectively govern the content of the ads being displayed, is also a product of that Bay Area culture. I wonder if Google is too lasseiz-faire, and dare I say capitalist, for the rest of the Bay Area?

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Oakland awaits

dave carver said:

Oakland awaits

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Occupy Google?

Ari.

cwbullet said:

You need to understand that the ads are random and we do not get the choose which ads come up. Many of them are determined by the cookies in your browser.

Click to expand...

Ahhhhh, So that's why I didn't get it. I don't see any ads since financial support was given. Yeah, I can see the admins point if the comments are caustic, demeaning or threatening, really serves no purpose even if it's in the watering hole.
Have him say 10 Our Fathers, 5 Hail Marys an Act of Contrition and promise to "Sin no more" and can let 'em back. Not enough for permanent excommunication in my opinion. Kurt

mrichhcirm said:

+1. I realize that this is the owner's sandbox and we're just playing in it, and that you need to sell ad space to keep the lights on around here, and that the mods are just concerned volunteers trying to maintain some order. But it still doesn't make sense that advertisers get a pass on rules that are aggressively enforced on contributors. And I get that Google or whomever controls ad content and pays the bills, but if you don't do right by the contributors then you will eventually have no ad audience.

Click to expand...

Ahem, You can pays 'em some monies to support the place directly and not have to put up with the ads. For awhile, I still saw rocketry related ads scroll at the top (which was ok and welcomed by myself) but the interspersed ads were gone.
Due to a change in the system, the rocketry related ads are gone now too so all's I get is the un-interrupted erudite information that you-all post without diversions. Kurt

ksaves2 said:

Have him say 10 Our Fathers, 5 Hail Marys an Act of Contrition and promise to "Sin no more" and can let 'em back. Not enough for permanent excommunication in my opinion. Kurt

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Hey he went religious....someone nail him to a cross!

DizWolf said:

Hey he went religious....someone nail him to a cross!

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...do we stone him before or after? :duck: