Posted by Ken Kurtis on July 24, 2002 at 10:17:26:
In Reply to: BBS user poll posted by Chris on July 23, 2002 at 18:25:21:
My thoughts:
<< Rule i.) Your post must be related to California Scuba Diving. If you post a completely unrelated message, it will be deleted.
Pperhaps a bit too stringent. No question the focus is CA but can't we also learn from discussing, say, an accident in Hawaii?
However, I think stuff like the Nazi thread, gay-bashing, personal attacks, etc., should be deleted without question.
<< Should any posts be related to diving be allowed and will that make this BBS look like the rest of the diving BBSs on the net?
Other than rooten grammatical syntax in your question . . . I don't see any big deal with allowing non-California threads (like Roatan). If we're not interested, we won't respond.
<< Is the California only nature of the BBS a plus or a minus?
I think it has merits but it can be TOO limited a focus.
<< Are dive trips to other locations by California divers part of the California diving experience and hence should be included as part of the ongoing California scuba diving discussion?
I think they should be included. Personally, I know I post my trip reports after each of my foreign ventures (Bomnaire being the most recent, and you'll get Yap/Palau in a month). I've gotten good responses from them and I think people enjoy reading these kinds of things so I feel they have value.
Also, don't assume that everyone who reads this necessarily reads all the other boards. I glance at scubadivernet.com once or twice a day (but don't post too often over there), I check rec.scuba maybe once a week (where I used to post quite frequently) and I rarely if ever check out Rodales.
So even if you have posts that had appeared in all of those other forums, it doesn't mean they were exposed to your audience. So I think they have value.
Also, if you want to continue to have "Free and Open" plastered across the top of the page, then I think that's what you've got to be. To me, "Free" impleis not "without charge," but "unfettered" (with some common sense exceptions) and "Open" means (relating to scuba) that anything goes.
Free speech is a b**ch at times (and I don't mean "beach" - but it rhymes) but it makes for a livlier discussion. And - the previously departed posters notwithstanding - I think it's pretty clear that the sense of the users of this board is that they abhor censorship and would like to be left to make up their own minds.
Ken Kurtis
NAUI Instr. #5936
Co-owner, Reef Seekers Dive Co.
Beverly Hills, CA