Welcome to the Austin Seven Friends web site and forum

As announced earlier, this forum with it's respective web address will go offline within the next days!
Please follow the link to our new forum

http://www.austinsevenfriends.co.uk/forum

and make sure, you readjust your link button to the new address!

Welcome Austin seven Friends
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Re: Posting limit exceeded...

Is There any way we can put in a Donation as we all have the benefit of this Forum.
just a suggestion

Re: Posting limit exceeded...

I agree that running a forum is very hard work- the Club website which I look after had a forum that 'fell over'- I have tried for 12 months to get a new Club forum running without success.

I do hope that the management can get a new system up and running and wonder if possibly some payment arrangement could be set up, much as Austin or Wikipedia have in place, to help in the change.

I couldn't access the forum for the last three hours - was this part of the problem ?

Tony.

Re: Posting limit exceeded...

As I understand the situation the Forum has been at least partly paid for by The Cherished Suppliers in the past.
However I cannot remember the last time I was asked to contribute.
An invoice for the next tranche to me will be met with a speedy and grateful response

Location: Wessex

Re: Posting limit exceeded...

I will be only too happy to make a contribution to the upkeep of the forum.

Richard M.

Location: Just North of Hadrians Wall.

Re: Posting limit exceeded...

Would it not be possible for "Admin" to set up a paypal account in the forum name to which we could all contribute to ? With all the members and forum contributors paying in just a small sum it would benefit us all. The Sunbeam Alpine Owners Club of America run a system of contribution which might be worth adapting for our use. View here:-
http://www.sunbeamalpine.org/index.php?categoryid=77

Location: Piddle Valley

Re: Posting limit exceeded...

This is all very good to read.

As a number of you have emailed about the Forum, particularly it's running, funding and history it would seem easier to answer here and inform as many as possible.

The "Forum" in this guise was set up around 1999 or so, by Mac and Jason - they ran it as an off-shoot of the London Owners Club initially but decided at some point to go it alone. The Forum has never been affiliated to any Club or organisation since.

It really took off when Bruce White's A7 Motoring Pages ceased in 2003 - there being no other "open" forum to ask questions, share stories and talk A7 talk.

Mac continued to play an active role in the background being the main moderator and spam eliminator, eventually he asked for the help of Austin who helped him for a number of years alongside an gradually increasing team put together largely in an attempt to protect the information contained in the pages. The team got some way to getting a working copy of the Forum so that we could move away from Bravenet - who informed us at the time that they would not export any of the data they held to us and that if we failed to re-subscribe the Forum would be deleted and lost forever. At this time Jason, who had been paying for the service, subscription, domain and hosting fees out of his own pocket since inception, decided that he wanted to work on the site with an acquaintance alone and the group disbanded.

Jason's acquaintance, Ewe, is the current Admin and, as mentioned earlier, German currently living in Germany.

For my part, I was involved in the 'legacy planning' team before it was disbanded but now only play a simple role of SPAM deleter!

Funding was an issue and Jason approached the Cherished Suppliers who advertised on the main website page, they paid a sum, as and when it was necessary, to have their adverts on the site. Jason last contacted them nearly three years ago.

Uwe has successfully copied the forum in it's current state, I have seen it and can confirm it works, he has also developed a new Forum that has many features that will help us run the Forum considerably more easily and, most importantly, allow us to take charge of backing up the data and moving it to another platform if we wish.

The set up of this new site and system has cost implications and Jason and I were discussing how best to be able to do this only last night night when Bravenet locked us out for the 3rd time in as many years because they wanted more money.

Imagine how delighted we are to read about people wanting to donate and help, very good news indeed.

Jason would be very pleased to hear your ideas about how he can best set up a facility to obtain donations - the Sunbeam Club information from Peter above looks very promising, thanks for sharing that Peter - if anyone else has any experience in this area please do share your thoughts.

Re: Posting limit exceeded...


I fully support all that has been said, this forum has been one of the best things that has happened in the A7 world since I have been involved. I also have a question or two. When the new forum is set up would it be possible to; A, improve the search facility, and B, allow us to access the information posted in the early years. That is assuming it is still there, I have never been able to find much.

Location: Auckland NZ

Re: Posting limit exceeded...

I guess it would be good to know what sort of figure it actually costs per annum. Perhaps with an additional amount that could be considered an honorarium for someone doing the necessary hard work ensuring it can stay pleasurable for others. Then that starts to suggest whether people are asked to consider contributing £2 or £5 or whatever, every so often.

The objectivity and freedom of having something completely away from the cherished suppliers is probably good. I certainly notice that the words 'cherished suppliers' are added a lot in strings of messages, and I too have suggested to new posters looking to their list before, thinking that they were tapped for cash, so to speak, regularly. It's not that we won't recommend them anyway, but absolute freedom from any feeling of obligation is perhaps a powerful thing that will make information flow most freely?

One point - extrapolate potential costs for data storage becoming far greater if the forum becomes more user friendly. People will post more material more often if they are registered users not needing to go through the current posting rigmarole.

But it will be great if there is some possibility of forum threads being sorted into subject areas, although I can also see the advantages of keeping things as they are... if people were more considered about the thread titles, or if they could be amended.

Re: Posting limit exceeded...

Please correct me if I'm wrong but are you suggesting that some financial support given freely to this Forum may be for questionable purposes?

Location: Wessex

Re: Posting limit exceeded...

no, of course not, Ian. And I probably haven't interpreted Ruairidh's note very well re. what started as advertising or something like that. Or for that matter written something terribly well considered...

I just mean that things that have no advertising whatsoever do exist quite nicely, don't they, funded by a good cross section of user/returners? We presently all have different visions of how the thing is set up, as we all have come in to the forum at different times. I gain considerable benefit from the information and exchange on here and I would be quite a happy to put in a fiver every now and again.

Re: Posting limit exceeded...


I would also happily contribute to the costs of keeping such a valuable forum going. When I first thought about getting a seven and doing research into them I came across this forum and started at the last page and read and read. The amount I have learnt from all the contributors is immeasurable and would like to support, in any way I can, the most helpful forum I have ever come across.

Tom.

Location: Eye on the Norfolk / Suffolk border

Re: Posting limit exceeded...

OK Jon E.
Thanks for your perfectly reasonable reply.
My apologies for misunderstanding of your previous post.
I'm looking forward to seeing the new Forum and learning even more from it in due course.

Location: Wessex

Re: Posting limit exceeded...

Here's a "Thank you" from me, to the website people.

I avoid such admin things since I know what hard work they are and how much time they can consume.

I much prefer to contribute my manual labour and the use of my van to social things I get involved in - it is much easier.

I would be very pleased to show my appreciation of the information and the fun I get from the Forum by making a financial contribution.

Simon

Re: Posting limit exceeded...

That terrible word "Advertising" has been mentioned . I do hope that it could be kept off the forum.Whilst I do appreciate that businesses are on the current site and do contribute to a fully rounded forum, I would hate to come to a group that had logo's and pop ups constantly annoying me. The amount of "cheeky" promotion is perfect as it is and is most welcome.

Location: Piddle Valley

Re: Posting limit exceeded...

It's good to hear that something is going to be done to move the forum away from Bravenet.

Having done this sort of work several times for work I know how tedious and time consuming it can be, anything I can do to help just ask...

My offer still stands on server space, no charge. Just ask!

Location: Buxted