Ok - I'm not normally one to sit on the fence (as anyone who knows will me will vouch) but recently on Canal World Forum, http://www.canalworld.net/forums/ 2 subjects have been "banned" as topics of discussion - AND any postings which reference them are deleted, locked or heavily moderated.
The decision to do this has been made by the site owner - as is his prerogative.
Unfortunately, this has lead to a lot of folk feeling angry about having the freedom to discuss or reference these things, taken away from them... and I suppose if pushed, I'd say I'm a bit peeved about it too.
NOT that I particularly WANT to talk about the subjects per say, but at the same time, I don't like being told I can't!
We've got friends involved with local politics, and a couple of vicars (1 a friend and the other my nieces father-in-law) and whilst we don't share each others opinions on many issues, we all get along nicely and respect each others views.
As you might expect quite a few of the people who DO feel aggrieved by this, were having a bit of a moan about it on Saturday evening and of course the thread eventually got locked - but NOT before one of them had posted a link to a NEW discussion forum he decided to set up ... where anything goes (well anything NOT illegal/immoral I suppose).
This new forum is called THUNDERBOAT - http://thunderboat.boards.net and I've signed up on there too - NOT in a bid to get away from the original site - it's pretty much universally accepted that Canal World is the number 1 place to to find help and information about just about every aspect of boating... It's been a god send to us in our planning and I suspect it will continue to be the first place I ask for help. THIS is because the people on there genuinely WANT to help and share their vast knowledge. I do hope this continues.
I also however, hope that folk will use BOTH forums rather than choosing one over the other... whilst I totally understand the site owners decision to "keep" the original site BOATING oriented, from a long term boaters point perspective, I can understand them WANTING the freedom to chat about NON-boating related matters, WITH other boaters...
People are complicated aren't they? Let's all try and continue to look around through good eyes and respect each other - whatever our opinions are eh?
Until next time...
No comments:
Post a Comment