The TSA tried an online forum several years ago.....and Texas Cavers did not use or support it.
Sent from my iPhone On May 22, 2011, at 10:56 AM, R D Milhollin <[email protected]> wrote: > Why reinvent the wheel? > > www.forums.caves.org/ > > --- On Sun, 5/22/11, Brandon Cook <[email protected]> wrote: > > From: Brandon Cook <[email protected]> > Subject: Re: [Texascavers] Re: Texascavers and Facebook registration > To: > Cc: "TexasCavers" <[email protected]> > Date: Sunday, May 22, 2011, 1:09 AM > > It's a shame there is not an online forum for caving... why is that? IMHO a > forum solves these issues that many are bickering about, without the privacy > issues. > > I personally think the list-serve is very lame and an out of date method of > communication. I've canceled once, only to reluctantly came back because that > seemed like the only way to get the info. I also think trying to replace it > with Facebook is a bad idea for the many reasons mentioned. > > Forums allow anonymity if desired, can be setup to forward to email all or > only interested "subscribed" threads or sub-forums, can be used to post news, > events, pictures, videos, etc. There can be private threads if needed as > well. Users may create their own threads which can be easily ignored without > all the inbox spam. > > Best of all, the wealth of information provided by the contributors is > cataloged and easily searchable for future reference. There is occasionally > some really interesting stuff ya'll put out there on CaveTex, but mostly just > fills my inbox with more garbage like this email (sorry). > > Take a look at http://www.cavediver.net/ if you need a good example. If it's > know-how that's needed, I can put you in touch with a local, and very > successful creator of many forums for direction. > > Just my $0.02 > > Best of luck sorting this out ;-) > > Brandon > > --- On Sun, 5/22/11, Rod Goke <[email protected]> wrote: > > From: Rod Goke <[email protected]> > Subject: [Texascavers] Re: Texascavers and Facebook registration > To: "Charles Goldsmith" <[email protected]>, "Katherine Arens" > <[email protected]> > Cc: "TexasCavers" <[email protected]> > Date: Sunday, May 22, 2011, 12:10 AM > > > Katie and Charles both made good points on this issue. I agree with Charles > that making Texascavers a member of Facebook would be likely to generate too > much unwanted traffic and drive more people away, but what if it were done > with a separate FB (Facebook) list, similar to the existing OT list, to which > cavers could subscribe if they were interested? > > Regardless of whether or not this is done, I agree with Jim and others that > announcements of general interest to cavers should be copied to the main > Texascavers list even if they are posted to Facebook. The main reason for a > separate FB list would be to give the Facebook enthusiasts a convenient way > to copy messages to their caver friends who are not registered with Facebook, > even when those messages are not sufficiently "on topic" to post on > Texascavers. > > This might help somewhat to alleviate the split that has been growing > recently within the caving community between those who want to use Facebook > and those who do not. On one side, we have Facebook enthusiasts who are > increasingly using Facebook to communicate with their caver friends and > announce caving related events. They apparently either don't know or don't > care much about the potential privacy pitfalls of Facebook and tend to assume > that anyone who hasn't signed up for it has simply failed to do so out of > ignorance about its benefits. On the other side, we have people (like myself) > who have been resisting pressure to sign up for Facebook, because of concern > about some of Facebook's privacy related policies and practices. In some > cases, people may be reluctant to sign up strictly out of concern for their > own privacy, and in other cases, people also may be concerned about the > broader long range social implications of these policies and practices. After > all, Facebook now has significantly more users than the entire population of > the United States, so whatever it does can have major consequences, both > nationally and internationally. > > Facebook hardly allows you to do anything until you "sign up", or register, > with them, and this registration procedure demands your real name, email > address, sex, and date of birth. Most troubling is the demand for your date > of birth, since giving this information in combination with your name is > technically similar to providing your social security number, in that, for > most people, it forms a unique identifier which can be used to link whatever > data Facebook has about you together with data about you in other databases. > This information, like your social security number, has significant potential > for misuse, either by identity thieves gaining unauthorized access to the > data or by corporate and/or government entities using the database in ways > you never anticipated. Consequently, it is information that should be given > to a company only on a legitimate "need to know" basis, not just to any > company that thinks it can generate more money from its database by including > your date of birth. Facebook's sign up page claims that they require "all > users to provide their real date of birth to encourage authenticity and > provide only age-appropriate access to content," but, in my opinion, this > hardly constitutes a legitimate "need to know." How does it "encourage > authenticity" when people can just as easily lie about their date of birth as > they can anything else? If they truly want the information to provide only > age-appropriate access to content, then they could just as well ask whether > your age falls within certain relevant ranges, without requiring your precise > date of birth. > > A mechanism similar to what Katie suggested, but perhaps with a separate list > to overcome the problem Charles mentioned, might help to bridge the gap > between the users and the nonusers of Facebook within the caving community. > Cavers concerned about Facebook's privacy issues might prefer to use this > mechanism, just as people concerned about Google's privacy issues often > prefer to use startpage.com or startingpage.com instead of google.com for > their Google searches (something worth trying if you're not already familiar > with it). I'm not sure whether or not the suggested mechanism would actually > work out, but it's something for the cavers to consider if Charles is willing > to look into it. > > Rod > [email protected] > > -----Original Message----- > From: Charles Goldsmith > Sent: May 19, 2011 11:41 AM > To: Katherine Arens > Cc: [email protected], Mark Minton > Subject: Re: [Texascavers] TSA-ANL, Facebook, and caving > > Katie, it COULD, but I won't do it, I'm sorry, facebook just doesn't have > any proper filters in place, and it would just spam the list, driving more > people away. > > Nice idea though. > > On Thu, May 19, 2011 at 11:10 AM, Katherine Arens > wrote: > > > Radical suggestion: could "[email protected]" become a member > > of facebook? If so, then what "it" posts could be forwarded to the list . . > > . > > katie > > > > > > Elegantly stated, Jim. I think David must spend more time on > >> Facebook than most anyone I know, and I doubt he is representative of > >> cavers > >> in general. If people insist on using Facebook or any other social medium > >> for caving announcements, at the very least they should cc Texascavers > >> (CaveTex) with the message. That takes no extra time, and insures that the > >> wider audience of Texas cavers gets the message. > >> > >> Mark Minton > >> > >> At 10:42 AM 5/19/2011, Jim Kennedy wrote: > >> > >> David, > >>> > >>> You are missing the forest for the trees. There already IS something out > >>> there like you describe, and it works. It's called CaveTex. Look at it > >>> this way, you have to have email to be on Facebook. If you have email, and > >>> you are a caver, you SHOULD already be on CaveTex. > >>> > >> > >> Please reply to [email protected] > >> Permanent email address is [email protected] > >> > >> --------------------------------------------------------------------- > >> Visit our website: http://texascavers.com > >> To unsubscribe, e-mail: [email protected] > >> For additional commands, e-mail: [email protected] > >> > > > > > > -- > > ************************ > > Katherine Arens Office Phones: (512) 232-6363 > > [email protected] Dept. Phone: (512) 471-4123 > > Dept. of Germanic Studies FAX (512) 471-4025 > > 1 University Station C3300 Bldg.Location: Burdine 336 > > University of Texas at Austin Office: Burdine 320 > > Austin, TX 78712-0304 > > > > -. .- > > _..-'( )`-.._ > > ./'. '||\\. (\_/) .//||` .`\. > > ./'.|'.'||||\\|.. )O O( ..|//||||`.`|.`\. > > ./'..|'.|| |||||\`````` '`" '` ''''''/||||| ||.`|..`\. > > ./'.||'.|||| ||||||||||||. . |||||||||||| ||||.`||.`\. > > /'|||'.|||||| ||||||||||||{ }|||||||||||| ||||||.`|||`\ > > '.|||'.||||||| ||||||||||||{ }|||||||||||| |||||||.`|||.` > > '.||| ||||||||| |/' ``\||`` ''||/'' `\| ||||||||| |||.` > > |/' \./' `\./ \!|\ /|!/ \./' `\./ `\| > > V V V }' `\ /' `{ V V V > > ` ` ` V ' ' ' > > > > > > > > --------------------------------------------------------------------- > > Visit our website: http://texascavers.com > > To unsubscribe, e-mail: [email protected] > > For additional commands, e-mail: [email protected] > > > > --------------------------------------------------------------------- Visit > > our website: http://texascavers.com To unsubscribe, e-mail: > > [email protected] For additional commands, e-mail: > > [email protected]
