Changes are coming to the Discussion Group

[Brock Peyer]

I am a bit concerned that I may be "voted off the island" because I am typically not too witty, I  certainly don't have a wealth of knowledge and I am not really opinionated.  I just love this site so that I can soak up information from people who are as crazed by this way of life as I am.

[Sky King]

Brock Peyer writes:
I am a bit concerned that I may be "voted off the island" because I am typically not too witty

Not to worry Mr. Peyer. Wit might get you center stage at the hungry i, but here at GCA it ain’t all that.

Ran Morrissett writes:
they're gone, as are posters more obsessed with proving how witty they are rather than focusing on the subject at hand: golf course architecture.

Sky King

Speaking of minimalists:

When I roomed with Simon Hobday in South Africa, he designated Monday as washday. That meant filling a bath with water, pouring in a liberal amount of detergent, emptying in the entire contents of his suitcase and then proceeding to stir the lot with a putter. When he felt the clothes had been stirred sufficiently, they were thrown out on the balcony to dry.
 --Roddy Carr

[Jeff Fortson]

It will be interesting to see if this will make this site better.  I hope so.  I have always been skeptical of seeing this site become exclusionary as I can see the same voices becoming stagnant after a while.  However, I welcome the change and look forward to seeing its results.


Jeff F.

[Carlyle Rood]

I have always been skeptical of seeing this site become exclusionary as I can see the same voices becoming stagnant after a while.

No one is being excluded.  Everyone can participate.  You just have to introduce yourself and behave responsibly.

[Dan Herrmann]

Great changes..

I know that the other board I frequent, www.dbsforums.com (covering DirecTV technology like TiVo) made the same change last year, and the civility significantly improved.

[John_Conley]

Dan H.:

I'm afraid to ask, but here goes... what kind of arguments could people get into over TiVo?

[Kelly Blake Moran]

I hope the elite 1000 that get to post here are placed in some sort of ranking, maybe in groups of say one hundred!  That should be great fun!

Furthermore, I am fearful some one like Rich Goodale or Brian Phillips or Darren told Ran I threw a club at Brora.  If that gets me banned then so be it.  That little tirade clensed my soul and allowed me to open a can of whoop ass at Dornoch to the favor of the USA team!

[Paul Carey]

Excellent changes.  I have not been an active poster because of the flames.  One post on LaCosta I made from experience of paying the course was drilled by a member who had never set foot on the property.  Good work.

[John Nixon]

OK - name changed. "Nixer" no more

[ForkaB]

Kelly

Even if you did throw a club at Brora (don't know, didn't ask, didn't tell) you are forgiven.  For one thing, I didn't comp you (and wouldn't have even if I could have!).  For another, Brora is a GREAT place to throw clubs, if you are so inclined.  No highly manicured fairways to blemish, no chance at all for them to get stuck in trees, lots of cows and sheep to aim at, etc., etc........

[Mindy]

I can see why some may want to post under "screen names", I posted only a couple of times under my real name and I stated my opinion about my club and its fate and my "posts" did get me into hot water with the "heads of state" at my club. I have learned again that sometimes we have to agree that we disagree and move on. However, John Moore's idea of creating two discussion groups may be a good solution.

Until then I thank you for having been thoroughly entertained by your threads. I have learned more about golf architecture than I started out to learn 4 months ago and will continue to read them each morning in hopes of learning more.

[A_Clay_Man]

Mindy- Just curious, Did the stifeling of discourse change your opinion of the club?

[Mindy]

Adam,

I'm not sure what you mean by "stifeling of discourse". Could you explain please.

[A_Clay_Man]

I guess I just assumed that the hot water you "got into", was stifeling the open discourse Bobby Jones felt was imperative to further golf's spirit.

[Patrick_Mucci]

Adam Clayman,

If I read on or between the lines, what Mindy means is that she was taken to task by her club and/or club members for voicing her opinions on GCA.com.

It's an unfortunate by-product of honest discussions.

Mindy,

There's a reason for Sunshine Laws.
Hang in there, and with us.

[SPDB]

Mindy,
The clubs reaction may have been to the irrational responses your questions on gca.com elicited and not to the questions themselves. Either way, you shouldn't be held responsible for something so innocent, or for the opinions of others which are beyond your control.

I recall that you and another from your club came on here with some questions/opinions about restoration/redesign work at your club. In return, and with no knowledge about the club (beyond its original arch.), or its plans, the club was indicted as irresponsible by some of our local ideologues. You comments weren't inflammatory, only the responses.

A club's activities are entirely its own matter, and not the subject of public debate by non-members who have only a narrow self-serving agenda. However, an innocent inquiry to a knowledge base as deep as GCA.com can't be faulted, particularly if a member feels that the club is being misled by an overzealous green committee. Hopefully, in the future, such inquiries will be met with more responsible insight.  

Echoing Pat's advice, and in the words of Louis Brandeis, "sunlight is the best disinfectant."

[Jeff_McDowell]

Man, I'm never going to make it into the 1,000. After my outburst at Brora, and then taking Rich and Darren's money as a cripple. Stick a fork in me, I'm done.

TTK

[George Pazin]

Sean -

That's one take on it.

I prefer to lean on that sage old wisdom of "The only thing needed for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing."

It is a shame that Mindy's membership is not open to debate, heated or not.

Jeff -

Don't worry, Bobby Jones was a club thrower at one time, too. Maybe Ran's just laying down a warning for the future....

[Eric_Ginter]

I like the idea of the listed changes.  The downside of screen names potentially being allowed is that the other hundreds of "outed" people on GCA will know that that screen name person is a "maja playa" and it could lead to less than optimum discussion because of numerous factors surrounding the issue.  For instance:

"Why does that person get a screen name and I don't?"
"They must be a bigshot, let's find out who it is."
"Hey did you know that XYZ is really Jack Squat, etc."
and on and on...

Unfortunately this issue is a double edged sword.  I think the way I would handle it is to post a public notice to the maja playas (they know who they are) and ask that they write to me personally and, in the interest of brevity, discuss the merit of a full "fake" name alias for themselves.  That way there is not any suspicion about who "Big Bertha" might be.  People will really think that the dude is named "Pete Mitchell" or whatever and who knows, he could be Hootie or Tiger for all we know....just my humble .02

Thanks...

[Dan Kelly]

Jeff -

Don't worry, Bobby Jones was a club thrower at one time, too. Maybe Ran's just laying down a warning for the future....

George --

You misunderstand.

Jeff (T[he] T[hread] K[iller]) McDowell did not throw any clubs.

As I've been told, by one guy in Fife and another guy here in Minnesota: Mr. McDowell left a putt at Brora woefully short -- and, raising his arms to the heavens, howled a blood-curdling Scandinavian imprecation: "Uuuuuuffffff-da!"

Mr. Goodale has not been the same since. Can't speak for Darren.

[Danny Goss]

I too like the proposed changes. I only hope I dont get kicked out because I am not a "regular" poster although I check the site most days. As an Aussie I tend to comment more on the Australian threads but in any case I have been very broadly educated by most of the discussions on this site.

[Dan Herrmann]

Dan H.:

I'm afraid to ask, but here goes... what kind of arguments could people get into over TiVo?

You'd be amazed...  Most are Dish (Echostar) vs. DirecTV vs. Cable, but there are TiVo dictractors too.  Pretty foolish in my opinion, but c'est la vie!

[Dan Herrmann]

I hope the elite 1000 that get to post here are placed in some sort of ranking, maybe in groups of say one hundred!  That should be great fun!

no, no, no!  We should be rated in deciles  

[SPDB]

Georgie -
In the current (and past current) context, your sage wisdom requires assumptions over what is good and what is evil that I am uncomfortable making. Unfortunately, we don't deal in objective facts here (despite the browbeating lessons from PatM to the contrary), which denudes your Burkeian ( ) premise of its logical force.

[John_Conley]

Dan:

That depends.  Are we trying to rank the best of the best, or are we just trying to separate the best from the good from the average from the bad from the worst?

Deciling might work if you absolutely MUST know if someone is around #750 or #950 out of the thousand.

Most importantly, however, is that ranking each participant cannot be done until we know each criterion.

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