Aussie

It was the case when I was on another forum I only wanted to see Merse in one way and one that suited me as it gave me the opportunity to try and get the upper hand and win my one-upmanship battles with him. It became more of a game and a game I sometimes ended up getting hurt in due to remarks fired back at me, due to labels being stuck on me that I felt were unfair and made me look someone that I was not.

To be honest back them it was the nature of many forums and it was just an accepted way of life on them and yes it did become so many times no more than a battle of personalities with some members never ever being prepared to lose even if it meant having to use any powers they had on a forum to become then winner in the end.

As a result bad feelings were generated and in the worst cases members ended up almost hating each other and it almost became the law that you had to have a thick skin as that was the only way you stood any chance of surviving on a forum.

Just over two years a go on a Sunday morning I logged onto a forum I was a member on and wondered why I bothered after reading a number of posts and so I logged back out again and sat down and asked myself was this the only way a forum could be, was it not possible to create something so much better where people could debate as adults and as a result the debates were interesting to read and others would feel happy to join in them safe in the knowledge their views would not be rubbished, they would not end up being stuck in some box with a label stuck on it. A place where the quality of the views being made were the most important thing and a place that slowly became not just a place for debate, but one that became a wonderful reference site for all TUFC fans of today and more importantly our fans of the future.

That was, is and still remains my vision for the TFF and it I had been able to just open shop with a brand new set of customers my task to create the forum of my dreams would have been so very easy, but as this forum was always going to be made up with both ex members of another forum and some who are happy to use both the job was made so much harder.

Learning how to work with codes, learning how to create the look of the TFF with all its different rooms has been the easy part, the biggest learning curve for me has been leaning how to run the TFF and how to get the message across just what sort of forum the TFF needs to be if it really is going to grow and become a site people want to come and read and hopefully enjoy taking and playing an active part in.

Trying to find a balance is so very hard, I must never do anything to kill of the character of any member, I must never do anything to blunt their powers of debate, but I must always find ways to ensure abuse, name calling, one -upmanship, members feeling put down because of the views they hold has no place on the TFF.

I must at all times try to promote a feeling of togetherness, a feeling that the TFF is OUR forum and belongs to us all and a feeling that by becoming a member you become part of a great community where a feeling of being one of the family is the morn and as a result real friendships will grow and prosper.

I must do my best to ensure no member on the TFF ends up having bad and unhealthy feelings toward any other member, or feel the TFF is not a place they would want to be a member on, because if the TFF is to be a very rich forum full of many contrasting viewpoints and great interesting debate, it needs to be a place free from all the things that turn people off forums in the first place.

Back to that word balance and its something that I have to use all the time on here and in Merses case it has always been a balance between the wonderful knowledge he brings into the forum and the way he has been guilty of causing some upset with other members.

I honestly believe that merse has changed a lot on here recently as he has tried to embrace just what the TFF is about and how to make it the quality forum and the real need to lose the old style of posting that we all became used too and many including myself were guilty of doing.

I’m very disappointed we have ended up here today as last night while I knew I would not have the time to do poster of the week, I had gone over in my mind what I wanted to say in my look back on the last week on the TFF remarks I always make.

I had intended to talk about the great posts made this week, how I loved sitting in the middle of Bath and reading all the posts being made that day on the Bath thread.

I know Aussie maybe better than most of you due to the number of times he has come to me when he needed to talk with someone when he has had problems to deal with in his life. He is a good bloke but his problem on here has been he has allowed himself to take things far more personally than they were ever intended and has been guilty so often of getting hold of the wrong end of the stick. He wanted to take Chris Hayes out because he wrongly felt Chris was saying he was gay, until I was able to explain just what Chris was on about with his reference to love story.

I have said it before and I will say it again, the TFF is a different type of forum and has clear ideas what sort of forum it wants to be, the old styles of posting are not really suitable on the TFF and its not asking a lot to ask everyone to play their part in making the TFF the sort of forum it inspires to be.

We can make it great or we can ruin it by our actions and the way we post on the forum, I can only ask and not make demands on here, just give it a thought what the TFF is and what it is before you click the post button.

Dave

It's problem that forum's have, that sometimes the written word, just like emails, have a habit of not being a fair reflection what the writer actually means.

Dave's example of me and Aussie's little misunderstanding over his "love" for Elliot Benyon wasn't intended to class Aussie as a "fruit", but I felt that he needed to have the pi$$ taken out of him for being so defensive about any attack or negative opinion over Elliot's progress. It wasn't my fault he didn't know the film or the music of "Love Story" and it wasn't his fault either. Luckily Dave intervened and told him what I meant before I left Plainmoor wearing a pitchfork

But at the end of the day it's a forum. No one is right or wrong (except me of course!) and everyone's entitled to their own opinion on any matter (apart from when I don't agree with it!). Did I think Australia's defense was shocking against Germany? Yes. Do I think England were even more shocking? You betcha.

Is Merse a pompous prat? No, of course not. Does he have this irritating habit of knowing an awful amount? Yes of course. It doesn't make his posts less interesting does it? I have a feeling that most who take offence with his posts actually don't read them properly or choose only to digest bits and use them as ammunition. I was guilty of doing much the same thing when I was a bit younger and more stupid. I also get annoyed with people who take sides when usually they aren't brave enough to post their personal opinion on matters. It's very brave to snipe from the sides or on different sites isn't it?

All this inter and intra forum pettiness bores me silly. We are adults for the love of god. Do we really need to resort to people accusing others of hijacking a "welcome back thread" made just for them? I'm sorry but I left this behind in my early teens.

Aussie, if you're letting yourself get wound up by a few mild digs then I think that living in the Westcountry has made you lose the robust Aussie humour which should include a "water off a duck's back" approach in dealing with whatever us Poms throw at you.