North Korean Daggers

Discuss all matters related to Dagenham and Redbridge
admin
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I think it's about time for me as the admin to say my piece in regards to recent events at the club and recent comments in regards to the team running the forum. I'll do this in chronological order.

The Barrow Thread - this is the only thread I personally stopped. I did this as I felt there were inaccuracies in the story posted on here, I blame the Barrow fans for the incident and felt our supporters were well behaved and removed the thread as I felt it was unfair on the Dagenham fans to be publicly slammed on here. Remember the power of the internet. Some people didn't agree with decision including one of the moderators and that's ok, I respect all opinions.

Eastleigh - Was initially going to remove it and the person who wrote the thread spoke to me in person and explained to me why I shouldn't, therefore I allowed it to run. I said in that thread I wish to say nothing regarding it (which I was slammed for) and I stick to my guns there.

Other locked or removed threads - these were not done by me but done by the moderators who work hard to assist me, I chose not to undermine there decisions. One of the threads started by one of the moderators was locked by the same person, any user can pull their own thread, there's nothing special about that. Also I feel that the moderators only blocked things in the best interest in the club (rightly or wrongly) and to protect themselves and me I appreciate that.

Comments in regards to Steve Thompson - I can only speak for myself here but I'll do that. The flags, disappointing if that e-mail was sent but I have no evidence of that one way or another, end of the day, they are silly jokes and I go to games to watch football not stare at flags. The commercial manager, don't know, don't care, none of my business.

As a consequence I have had some people compare be to Kim Jung Un (bit of an overreaction I run a football forum for a non-league) and I've also had people contact me saying, they no longer want to use the forum (which is sad but it's up to people what they want to do, I can't make people do anything they don't want to).

My moderators are both supporters that have done a lot for the club and been around the club for a long time, a lot longer than myself, I hold them in high regard. I have asked them both to allow my threads to run to allow fans their voice. However please remember with all of us, we do work hard on this site and only out of love of the club, not for any form of gain.

Going forward - As a team, we want to allow fans to have more of a voice and have their voice heard. So we will allow more threads to run and be less strict. However in regards to that please remember you are responsible for your posts and opinions not the team, we won't take responsibility for the posts of others. I would also ask users, if they could use the correct sub forum please, this is based on feedback given and looking at other teams forums. Also any feedback given to us will be greatly appreciated as we will use that to alter our future actions.

As a final note, I think the whole thing has got out of hand, remember on the pitch things are looking pretty good, we shouldn't be too downbeat.

Thanks

Matt Hardy - Admin
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ARNU
Posts: 3746
Joined: Fri Oct 18, 2013 4:43 pm

You have a bit of an issue in that it's a discussion forum not your own personal one. You may own it or pay for it but it's set up as a discussion arena not a personal blog of your own. You do have moderators with strong opinions and therefore cannot remain unbiased. The fact they use this supposed power to force issues and possibly put up potentially libellous threads themselves is a bit worrying. I'm not having a dig, running a site is both time consuming and costly . Your moderators should be unbiased and looking out for offensive language etc not using the position to further their own agenda. I also wonder why you feel you have to keep justifying yourself. If we don't like it we'll go elsewhere. You can't win whatever you do. I have some sympathy for you.
Bollix to Shampoo, it's real poo we want !
The Romford Dagger
Posts: 1156
Joined: Fri Aug 08, 2014 1:15 am

admin wrote:I think it's about time for me as the admin to say my piece in regards to recent events at the club and recent comments in regards to the team running the forum. I'll do this in chronological order.

The Barrow Thread - this is the only thread I personally stopped. I did this as I felt there were inaccuracies in the story posted on here, I blame the Barrow fans for the incident and felt our supporters were well behaved and removed the thread as I felt it was unfair on the Dagenham fans to be publicly slammed on here. Remember the power of the internet. Some people didn't agree with decision including one of the moderators and that's ok, I respect all opinions.

Eastleigh - Was initially going to remove it and the person who wrote the thread spoke to me in person and explained to me why I shouldn't, therefore I allowed it to run. I said in that thread I wish to say nothing regarding it (which I was slammed for) and I stick to my guns there.

Other locked or removed threads - these were not done by me but done by the moderators who work hard to assist me, I chose not to undermine there decisions. One of the threads started by one of the moderators was locked by the same person, any user can pull their own thread, there's nothing special about that. Also I feel that the moderators only blocked things in the best interest in the club (rightly or wrongly) and to protect themselves and me I appreciate that.

Comments in regards to Steve Thompson - I can only speak for myself here but I'll do that. The flags, disappointing if that e-mail was sent but I have no evidence of that one way or another, end of the day, they are silly jokes and I go to games to watch football not stare at flags. The commercial manager, don't know, don't care, none of my business.

As a consequence I have had some people compare be to Kim Jung Un (bit of an overreaction I run a football forum for a non-league) and I've also had people contact me saying, they no longer want to use the forum (which is sad but it's up to people what they want to do, I can't make people do anything they don't want to).

My moderators are both supporters that have done a lot for the club and been around the club for a long time, a lot longer than myself, I hold them in high regard. I have asked them both to allow my threads to run to allow fans their voice. However please remember with all of us, we do work hard on this site and only out of love of the club, not for any form of gain.

Going forward - As a team, we want to allow fans to have more of a voice and have their voice heard. So we will allow more threads to run and be less strict. However in regards to that please remember you are responsible for your posts and opinions not the team, we won't take responsibility for the posts of others. I would also ask users, if they could use the correct sub forum please, this is based on feedback given and looking at other teams forums. Also any feedback given to us will be greatly appreciated as we will use that to alter our future actions.

As a final note, I think the whole thing has got out of hand, remember on the pitch things are looking pretty good, we shouldn't be too downbeat.

Thanks

Matt Hardy - Admin

Firstly, fair play for doing a thread to explain yourself. You didn't have to do that.

I do agree with a lot of what Arnu says though. His point about the other moderators using their powers on certain threads and even threats of banning being used on occasion unfairly, is a valid and good one.
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Auntie Merge
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Joined: Fri Oct 18, 2013 3:43 pm

@Romford Dagger. The threat to ban someone was a joke. J O K E. Some people on here seem to have a sense of humour bypass.

As a moderator I have never posted anything 'potentially libellous'. Everything I post has had truth behind it. I do seem to have some posters insisting I 'provide evidence' or name my sources, yet they don't seem to be that aggressive to other people who make statements or comment.

I''m the moderator who doesn't hide behind an anonymous username and therefore it might be easy to pair me up with my 'strong opinions'. But for every negative comment here I've had at least four people message me and thank me for doing a good job. Sometimes I feel people have a go at me because they can and not because I've actually done anything wrong.

Personally I wouldn't have locked some of the recent threads. I locked the one thread about the emails being sent after i'd had a long chat with Glyn Hopkin. I can quite easily open it again if people want but at the time I thought the best thing was to lock it.

I'm not sure about other people on here, but I'm a regular user of other message boards, some which have 20,000+ regular users and there are things I would do differently to encourage more posts. I've been a moderator on at least two other forums which were somewhere in between those and here.

Separating out the topics might work well on a busy forum but on here I would recommend that others don't police the 'it's in the wrong place' because it discourages people from writing inane drivel and sometimes the inane drivel is needed in order to build the online community. When does anyone on here every share any good/bad news that might be going on in their life? Ask questions about things not football related? Talk about tv/films/music? Comment on news that is not a political agenda? And talk about their favourite flavour crisps or biscuits? All of these used to make up the original daggers forum and need to be encouraged. I'm sure there are a few posters on here that remember the times when the players used to post.

And people need to stop posting 'why are you still going on about this' in threads that they have no interest in. If you have no interest in a thread then don't comment in it. I feel half inclined to moderate and delete thread killer posts more than anything.

I have a whole load of fab emojis that were on bifmag which I'm happy to let admin have or will upload for him if need be, as I've had a lot of experience on the back end of forum software. One thing that does have to happen though is that new posters need to be approved on the day that they register. We rarely get opposition fans posting any more,and that is missed. I'm happy to help admin out with that if need be.

But overall it's a forum. Have a look at other forums and see how they work. They help build the football community on and offline and that's partly what we should all be doing here.
The Romford Dagger
Posts: 1156
Joined: Fri Aug 08, 2014 1:15 am

Auntie Merge wrote:@Romford Dagger. The threat to ban someone was a joke. J O K E. Some people on here seem to have a sense of humour bypass.

As a moderator I have never posted anything 'potentially libellous'. Everything I post has had truth behind it. I do seem to have some posters insisting I 'provide evidence' or name my sources, yet they don't seem to be that aggressive to other people who make statements or comment.

I''m the moderator who doesn't hide behind an anonymous username and therefore it might be easy to pair me up with my 'strong opinions'. But for every negative comment here I've had at least four people message me and thank me for doing a good job. Sometimes I feel people have a go at me because they can and not because I've actually done anything wrong.

Personally I wouldn't have locked some of the recent threads. I locked the one thread about the emails being sent after i'd had a long chat with Glyn Hopkin. I can quite easily open it again if people want but at the time I thought the best thing was to lock it.

I'm not sure about other people on here, but I'm a regular user of other message boards, some which have 20,000+ regular users and there are things I would do differently to encourage more posts. I've been a moderator on at least two other forums which were somewhere in between those and here.

Separating out the topics might work well on a busy forum but on here I would recommend that others don't police the 'it's in the wrong place' because it discourages people from writing inane drivel and sometimes the inane drivel is needed in order to build the online community. When does anyone on here every share any good/bad news that might be going on in their life? Ask questions about things not football related? Talk about tv/films/music? Comment on news that is not a political agenda? And talk about their favourite flavour crisps or biscuits? All of these used to make up the original daggers forum and need to be encouraged. I'm sure there are a few posters on here that remember the times when the players used to post.

And people need to stop posting 'why are you still going on about this' in threads that they have no interest in. If you have no interest in a thread then don't comment in it. I feel half inclined to moderate and delete thread killer posts more than anything.

I have a whole load of fab emojis that were on bifmag which I'm happy to let admin have or will upload for him if need be, as I've had a lot of experience on the back end of forum software. One thing that does have to happen though is that new posters need to be approved on the day that they register. We rarely get opposition fans posting any more,and that is missed. I'm happy to help admin out with that if need be.

But overall it's a forum. Have a look at other forums and see how they work. They help build the football community on and offline and that's partly what we should all be doing here.

That may have been a joke but other comments from mods read far more sinister.

You can't hope for more people to post and lots of discussion whilst also simultaneously locking threads that people DO want to talk about.

That's my opinion. I'm out.
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While we are all opening out kimono's on this, here is my take.

As a moderator, I'm here to help Matt keep an eye on the forum since he now doesn't have a lot of time because he asked for help. I have kept my "moderator" presence separate from my board name deliberately and tried hard not to let my personal opinions on subjects discussed influence what I do as a moderator. Personally I think that is better for the forum that way, but Auntie Merge doesn't. Life is about opinions.

If you look back at my actions since I took this on, I have posted 6 times prior to today and locked two threads. 4 of those posts have been to try to calm it when personal insults are flying around, a 5th was to lock a thread when the warning wasn't taken any notice of (the "Thank you Glyn Hopkin" thread that ran to over 30 posts but had turned into an unconstructive bickering match), and the last to lock the discussion on the Commercial Manager thread.

To explain that, the lady has left and the reasons for that are not fully known whatever people think they know. The speculation either way on whether she was hounded out, bullied, or was not actually doing a good job is borderline when there is potential that the matter could yet be taken further.

Quite apart from that, the personal stuff against certain members of the board is out of order frankly. I thought some of it on that thread was approaching being libellous, and asked someone who works in the law for a view on that, and they said it could be, and with this in mind, plus the potential of further action on the matter, I pulled the thread.

As Matt says in his post, it is up to people posting to take responsibility for what they write, but letting things continue unchecked could be the board owners issue, hence the lock.

It is early days but is looking like it could be a vintage season on the field of play, lets talk about that more and moan less!
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Auntie Merge
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Surely as a moderator it is better to prune individual posts - either edit them or delete them rather than kill the whole discussion by locking a thread?
The Glyn Hopkin thread is a key example of this.

The board is not without criticism so to mention that people on here are not allowed to criticism is North Korea and also demonstrates your personal friendships and connections are influencing moderation decisions.
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Dagger83
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Auntie Merge wrote: As a moderator I have never posted anything 'potentially libellous'. Everything I post has had truth behind it. I do seem to have some posters insisting I 'provide evidence' or name my sources, yet they don't seem to be that aggressive to other people who make statements or comment.
I'm no lawyer but isn't the burden on the person making the potentially libellous statement to prove it to be true?

There's a load of people who seem to hate certain people associated with the club. I have no idea whether there's truth behind any of the statements or not but posting things and backing it up with "I've seen proof" is playing with fire.
There are only 10 types of people in the world, those who understand binary and those who don't.
Alan
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Auntie Merge wrote:Surely as a moderator it is better to prune individual posts - either edit them or delete them rather than kill the whole discussion by locking a thread?
The Glyn Hopkin thread is a key example of this.

The board is not without criticism so to mention that people on here are not allowed to criticism is North Korea and also demonstrates your personal friendships and connections are influencing moderation decisions.
Come along now Merge, you started a thread which you later locked to prevent further discussion. Furthermore, the promised proof of the truth or retraction in the absence of proof of what you posted has still to materialise.

In that thread you stated that Thommo should be curtailed and severely reprimanded (sic) if he took the action on his own rather than it being a board decision, but as it seems it was Glyn Hopkin who told him to take the action, for some reason you have not answered the simple question as to whether you think Mr Hopkin should be "curtailed and severely reprimanded". I don't understand why one board member merits a whole post and rant for taking action, but another doesn't, unless it is because of your own friendships/connections.
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ARNU
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While Merge has a lot to offer I can't really take her Thomson posts too seriously as she detests the man He may well be everything she says but it's a vendetta innit.
Seems alright to me .
Bollix to Shampoo, it's real poo we want !
Diggerthedog
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Alan wrote:
Auntie Merge wrote:Surely as a moderator it is better to prune individual posts - either edit them or delete them rather than kill the whole discussion by locking a thread?
The Glyn Hopkin thread is a key example of this.

The board is not without criticism so to mention that people on here are not allowed to criticism is North Korea and also demonstrates your personal friendships and connections are influencing moderation decisions.
Come along now Merge, you started a thread which you later locked to prevent further discussion. Furthermore, the promised proof of the truth or retraction in the absence of proof of what you posted has still to materialise.

In that thread you stated that Thommo should be curtailed and severely reprimanded (sic) if he took the action on his own rather than it being a board decision, but as it seems it was Glyn Hopkin who told him to take the action, for some reason you have not answered the simple question as to whether you think Mr Hopkin should be "curtailed and severely reprimanded". I don't understand why one board member merits a whole post and rant for taking action, but another doesn't, unless it is because of your own friendships/connections.
Everything in that original post from Merge was factually correct. This is not me sticking up for her I actually know it was. It was frozen as Merge said due to her discussion with Glyn who is very approachable and will always listen to anyone's concerns and deal with it accordingly. He is now in control and in my view will make changes for the better.
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Mike the Dagger
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Diggerthedog wrote:
Everything in that original post from Merge was factually correct. This is not me sticking up for her I actually know it was. It was frozen as Merge said due to her discussion with Glyn who is very approachable and will always listen to anyone's concerns and deal with it accordingly. He is now in control and in my view will make changes for the better.
Simmo said this about that post:
The first post in this thread contains many untruths, it's potentially" libellous and is causing unnecessary friction and unrest between supporters

Therefore an apology and retraction would be appreciated.
And yet that post was factually correct? Maybe we should be asking that Simmo gets "curtailed and severely reprimanded"?

You know for a fact that Steve Thompson sent an email to 21 clubs, and what is more that he took this action single handedly?
Alan
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So Diggerthedog, how do you know that he sent an email to all 21 clubs?

To be fair Mike, Merge said she wanted to know IF Thommo took the decision singlehandedly rather than it being a board decision and that if he did he should be "curtailed and severely reprimanded", not that Thommo actually did it singlehandedly. Bennett says Hopkin took the decision, which I've not seen anyone dispute.
Alan
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[quote="Auntie Merge"

As a moderator I have never posted anything 'potentially libellous'. Everything I post has had truth behind it. I do seem to have some posters insisting I 'provide evidence' or name my sources, yet they don't seem to be that aggressive to other people who make statements or comment.[/quote]

Auntie Merge wrote:
I am currently awaiting proof that my statement was correct. If it finds out I am wrong (a rare occurrence btw) then I will accept I am wrong and amend things accordingly. But my sources tell me I am not wrong.
An excellent attempt to deflect attention, but as can be seen above, it was you that said you'd be getting proof and that if you are wrong, accepting and amending things. You are just being reminded of that undertaking. Have you got the proof yet? If not, instead of criticising others, it's time you accepted you were wrong and retracted what you said.
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Auntie Merge
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I am not wrong. Stop pressing it Alan.
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