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From The Fortean Times To Forteana: Our 10th & 20th Anniversaries

I hear ya, db.
You slippery fool. Wanna dance with me Pendejo?! I'll Slice you a new hole and stand on your skull, Strronzo! What? You can kiss my arse, punchy. I'ma string you up, cunt. You don't even know you own daddy, fuckmunchkin.
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etc etc etc

Other-languagy insults were my forte. Got me banned with the best of ém.

All in a good humour here, OC.
 
drbastard said:
I'd say in my experience this messageboard is pretty rock solid, well moderated in the style of a teacher who doesn't have to say much but keeps things in line with quiet respect.
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Thank you - I think we have the balance about right. It's taken roughly 15 years with some spectacular cock-ups along the way (some, but not all of them mine), mind..
 
stuneville said:
with some spectacular cock-ups along the way (some, but not all of them mine), mind..
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There's a thread in that. Who's game?
modern-reticles-002.jpg
 
Nah - it's all water under the bridge now, or as the Sweeney would put it "blood under the lamp-post". We are where we are because of it, though.
 
Nobody move a muscle: there are actually three moderators online simultaneously at the present.
 
drbastard said:
I'd say in my experience this messageboard is pretty rock solid, well moderated in the style of a teacher who doesn't have to say much but keeps things in line with quiet respect.
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I'd agree. It seems to be pretty much self-modding, which I like. That's the sign of a good board.

When people start acting like cocks you got problems- mods or grunts, doesn't make a difference.

This place seems like everyone treats others with decency and courtesy preferring to say nothing if they have nothing nice to say. Which is a good thing. In fairness I often think I'm the only dickhead here...everyone else seems sensible and pleasant.

:rolleyes:
 
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Yithian said:
a) Is the FTMB small, large, or very large in terms of total threads/posts/membership?
b) Is the FTMB ancient, old, middle-aged or relatively young in terms of average lifespan?
c) Is the FTMB typical or atypical in the extent of its moderation?
d) Are message boards as communities still a thing, or are we some kind of vestige?
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i would say having been a member of a fair few boards (various cars, various bands, fathers rights etc) over the years ftmb has shown remarkable stability and ... authenticity ... it slowed down a bit a couple of years ago but im frequently surprised when i hit the recent threads link, not because it seldom works for me, but due to the volume and quality of the content which is constantly pouring in ... even factoring out the bickering, joshing and easy targets, and with a lot of the noise on ignore, i find its pretty busy with the good shit, and has been for a fair while

i would say it is a community, and i think thats rare ... technology and other abstractions, thinking here particularly about social media, often serve to undermine authenticity, so a simple board mechanism such as we have, enables a true community spirit

my one gripe, lose the likes, what are we 14 ?
 
henry said:
my one gripe, lose the likes, what are we 14 ?
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Only if they can be replaced by Nectar Points, or Green Shield Stamps!!

Or perhaps Hail Marys, yes, if we could generate redemption for our sins (both real and imagined) via, say, upvotes... no, let's see if we can generate Bitcoin balances.

The "Likes" are mildly Facebookish, but, there are worse things on earth (and possibly also in heaven)
 
skinny said:
There's a thread in that. Who's game?
modern-reticles-002.jpg
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That's a really bad shot BTW. The bullet will miss all vital organs and pass under the spine. That animal will run and run until it bleeds to death. 200 to 250 yds indicated would be a much better bet. Just sayin.

Back on topic, I'm under 40. I think there are more of us here than you'd imagine. We're just biding our time...waiting.
 
I'm on a couple of other forums - MR2 Owner's Club, Scirocco Register are both lively and helpful but they are not really about opinions or anything controversial. More "has anybody got a half-inch wangler bolt?" and "Look at my new wheels!".

Now, the CAMRA forum on the other hand....literally three posts on the last twelve months. All too pissed I guess.
 
Yithian said:
You mean this:
http://i.imgur.com/I0UryGT.gifv
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Good grief, the Risk Assessments for that must've been horrendous. They'll have to include...
  • Potential upper limb and back injuries through overstretching or missing-out the warmup
  • Tickle risk from foam pipe insulation
  • Cardiac risks increased due to chance of unexpected balloon detonation
  • Static electricity from balloons rubbing together could ignite gas leaks (or any carelessly-deposited dynamite)
  • Danger of inhaling balloon fragments in the event of detonation
  • Risk of head injury (no hard-hats being worn)
  • General risks from increased excitement (continence/cardiac)
  • Increased requirement for exercise-generated tea-drinking may contribute to hyperhydration. And less tea left for non-players
  • Non-Olympic sport (currently) with no national recognition or funding.
 
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Risk assessment is for wussholes. I bought 'The World's Toughest Shredder' from Staples and the guy at the checkout offered to sell me a care pack. Hmmmmmm. World's Toughest Shredder needs no lube!
 
Crikey, so, in approximately a year's time the board (in its various forms) will reach 20 Years of Strangeness...

Perhaps a change of title for the thread and plans for some kind of extravaganza...? :boozing:

EDIT: I've also figured out that it is more or less 25 years since I first bought FT. I bought it in Kings Cross Station for the summer holidays rail journey to Aberdeen. That was always the last week of July/first week of August that we would head back up north so would have been roughly 25 years ago this week.
 
McAvennie said:
Crikey, so, in approximately a year's time the board (in its various forms) will reach 20 Years of Strangeness...

Perhaps a change of title for the thread and plans for some kind of extravaganza...? :boozing:

EDIT: I've also figured out that it is more or less 25 years since I first bought FT. I bought it in Kings Cross Station for the summer holidays rail journey to Aberdeen. That was always the last week of July/first week of August that we would head back up north so would have been roughly 25 years ago this week.
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That will also mean the number of potential trophy points will increase by 20 as there is a 20 years a member category. So the theoretical maximum will be 329. I am not at the mystical ascended master level of 309 and I can see that when I get to 5 000 likes and 5 000 posts I will be at 285, 25 short. That 25 is
All The Rage
That sweatshop full of Thai click-bots has finally justified your Bitcoin investment: your LIKE to POST ratio is now sufficient to justify more virtual bling.

I'm not sure what the ratio is but because I have not got it at a lower level I suspect it might be quite difficult for me to get. First world problems.
 
McAvennie said:
Crikey, so, in approximately a year's time the board (in its various forms) will reach 20 Years of Strangeness...

Perhaps a change of title for the thread and plans for some kind of extravaganza...? :boozing:

EDIT: I've also figured out that it is more or less 25 years since I first bought FT. I bought it in Kings Cross Station for the summer holidays rail journey to Aberdeen. That was always the last week of July/first week of August that we would head back up north so would have been roughly 25 years ago this week.
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Thread title amended.
 
If we take the mathematics from earlier in the thread into account it would seem that our 20 year anniversary could be set to occur at the start of August 2021.

Gives us a year to think of how to mark it. Plenty of memories, debate and discussion, faces come gone and come again.

Where have Fortean topics gone in those 20 years? The landscape of what we were looking at has changed significantly. I'd say we were all less sceptical, most of our focus was probably on the classics of JFK, Bigfoot, UFOs, ghosts and assorted other themes that drew us in.

9/11 had not happened, Malaysian Airlines didn't strike fear into anyone's heart, a Portuguese holiday resort had yet to become such a focus of interest...

The classics have jumped forward two decades with no real evidence to speak of, while most new areas of interest have been more mysteries of what happened not being known rather than events that defy belief.

With one constant. FTMB.
 
McAvennie said:
Crikey, so, in approximately a year's time the board (in its various forms) will reach 20 Years of Strangeness...
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IMHO the most defensible "birth date" for the forum is the date of the first actual posting.

We have surviving members whose registrations date back as far as 27 July 2001, but the member register indicates there were over 100 registrations prior to that date which have spun off into oblivion. As such, I respectfully submit registration date is not a sound indicator of the forum's birth.

The most authoritative evidence for the earliest post is the post registry. According to this index of all postings the very first post was entered by person X (now blended into the collective "Anonymous") on 29 June 2001. It's the opening post in the Loch Ness Monster thread:

https://forums.forteana.org/index.php?threads/the-loch-ness-monster.57/post-1

Mark your calendars for 29 June 2021 ...
 
For those interested in these sorts of things, here are our 'statistics' for the past five years.

As always, each dot is a monthly data-point, but ignore the last dot in each line (furthest right) as the current month is incomplete.

Screenshot 2021-05-16 at 6.26.45 PM.png
 
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