An Open Letter

May 18, 2020

On 5/16/2020 at 8:20 PM, Guest Overdosed Yourself said:

The Straits Times is not gay, and Channel News Asia is not gay, so I don't care what they do. This is a very important discussion, so I hope it can be conducted with civility, and without flaming. We all need to face the fact that over the past 1½-to-2-years, the discourse on this website has gotten worse and worse, with no end in sight. Most members and most guests behave themselves, most of the time, and help this website serve a positive role. But there are a few who don't and this has been a problem for quite some time. In fact, my guest screen name for this post is a tribute to another guest, who tried in an unfortunately misguided way to bring attention to these issues last year. Something needs to change.

Of course there will be certain guests who demand unfiltered access with no changes since that benefits them. But that might no longer benefit the website in general and this is what needs to be determined. To be honest, I think the suggestions on changing the order of the forums mulled above by Larry, Hazily Instructor, and Caught Telling Lies make a lot of sense, even if it's a bit of work for the moderators to rename forums and move existing threads from one forum to another. Once that initial work is done, however, my guess is that Blowing Wind would continue to be just fine. And for those worrying about access, guests would still have full access to the Guest Room and the Flaming Room, so no problem.

Thanks for your tribute.

I m glad for others having the same view as I had.

Yes, I tried to bring changes to Blowing Wind in the positive sense and in fact aimed at pointing at annoying facts and weaknesses.

I was not at all misguided but simply did not receive any support from the Moderators as they had not seen any requirement to change their attitude and in the end I was just as a "pain in their ass" because they needed to focus more on doing their job and unjustifiedly labelled as a "troll".

However, what they failed to see was that I was simply reacting to a problem and pointing to a problem instead of being the problem or causing the problems.

For sure I did not want to be "any Robin Hood" of Blowing Wind.

On 5/16/2020 at 8:27 PM, Guest Guest said:

Hahahahaha ... so funny to see Guest Disclosed Yourself trying to rally for support here .... almost like some kiddo trying to get people to elect him into Student Council ..

Guest Disclosed Yourself has not posted anything earlier at this thread. Therefore, above is just meant to cause confusion and irritation.

This is the first post of Disclosed Yourself at this thread.

I don't need to rally for any support because I can see many having same views on required changes to Blowing Wind to keep up with time.

Just to make you once again aware about the unlimited means by Guest posts, who can impersonate and exploit the purpose of these Guest "appearances".

upshot · May 18, 2020

7 hours ago, Guest Disclosed Yourself said:

I don't need to rally for any support because I can see many having same views on required changes to Blowing Wind to keep up with time.

Just to make you once again aware about the unlimited means by Guest posts, who can impersonate and exploit the purpose of these Guest "appearances".

SO bro.. how about you registering a proper ID so you are identifiable with a a NICK so each time you come in to write something we can relate to you UNIQUELY and not being impersonated and mis-quoted? heheh.....

Larry · May 19, 2020

4 hours ago, upshot said:

SO bro.. how about you registering a proper ID so you are identifiable with a a NICK so each time you come in to write something we can relate to you UNIQUELY and not being impersonated and mis-quoted? heheh.....

Fully agree. Following was his statement, hopefully he recognizes what he had written.

Just to make you once again aware about the unlimited means by Guest posts, who can impersonate and exploit the purpose of these Guest "appearances".

Larry · May 19, 2020

13 hours ago, Guest Disclosed Yourself said:

Guest Disclosed Yourself has not posted anything earlier at this thread. Therefore, above is just meant to cause confusion and irritation.

This is the first post of Disclosed Yourself at this thread.

Just to make you once again aware about the unlimited means by Guest posts, who can impersonate and exploit the purpose of these Guest "appearances".

Yes, you are correct. I did a backtracking & found this:

On last Saturday 827 PM our great great greatest Guest quoted a post by guest Caught Telling Lies on the same day 625 PM as following:

For members who have expressed a desire to get rid of guests, or been targeted by trolls in the past, such as @upshot, @singalion, @Garyl, @fab, @doncoin, and so on, now is your time to speak up.

And read carefully on his (Guest) reply:

Hahahahaha ... so funny to see Guest Disclosed Yourself trying to rally for support here .... almost like some kiddo trying to get people to elect him into Student Council ..

Alamak, Disclosed Yourself versus Caught Telling Lies, how & where the name Disclosed Yourself coming from? Name just on the immediate top line also can write wrongly.

"Tulis secara membuta tuli", hahahaha..........

Edited May 19, 2020 by Larry

singalion · May 19, 2020

For sure I am interested in this topic. I did not check in to BW the last days, but here are my points to the discussion.

First, I will come from two different directions on this topic:

1) Newbies.

Newbies are those BW users who just discovered it, have not yet registered as a member and are reviewing a potential Membership.

I come to this point because, it was always said, the aim for allowing Guest posts is to enable shy, young inexperienced gays to post freely at BW.

If newbies can register a grindr account or a Facebook account, entering some personal data during the registration process, then where is the problem for newbies to register a Member account with BW?

2) Anonymity of Member accounts:

I don't think BW needs any Guest "accounts" or Guest posts at all.

For 90% of all members, I don't know who is behind them. The profiles don't have any photo, the date of birth is either not mentioned or probably fake etc etc. There is no data to reveal who is behind this member account. That means, there is an option to remain quite anonymous at BW. At the moment nobody forces you to disclose anything about you.

3) Overall observations:

I would support anything to reduce the disturbance of any Guests who simply aim to disrupt, troll, insult, provoke or to come up with the same politically laced posts at every second corner.

One point to consider is the following:

Bickering and fights often start when one inappropriate post has been made and just one person needs to quote it, respond to it, rebut it or just state his shock on what he read and pointing to the inappropriateness. Other people will jump in to support or point to the inappropriateness and here the fight goes on, because the initial Guest will continue spreading his inappropriate posts.

Often, I had the feeling, such trolling Guests were just waiting for someone (even a member) to post something critical to jump in and dirty the thread with their nasty ugly disgusting posts.

The Moderators repeatedly tell us: “Don’t give the trolls a forum, don’t fight with Guest trolls, don't respond to trolls, don't feed the trolls”.

This is easier said than done. First, it lies in the nature of persons to defend themselves, second some of the inappropriate posts are not deleted or moved away expeditiously, persons will just act to it and respond or highlight the inappropriateness. And don’t forget, some of the Guest trolls set traps for you to fall into and give them a new chance to add on to the nastiness of their initial post.

We would not need all this, if no Guests can post, as there would be a punishment to ban any ill behaving Member, if only Members would be able to post on BW.

As long as BW does not have any method to restrict or punish Guests from indefinite posting after a breach or warning, the same issues will arise again and again.

Why does BW intend to be a forum to permit anyone to repeatedly post inappropriate, racially insensitive, political etc etc things at all?

Why does BW currently permit (certain/repeated) trolls to exploit this Forum for their own nasty agenda and give them a Forum to continue spreading disgusting things???

Disallowing Guest posts would heavily reduce the interference and cleaning tasks for the Moderators.

4) Unfairness on punishment measures

There is a huge discrepancy between the measures to punish Members and Guests at Blowing Wind.

Members can be barred from posting, receive warnings, bans or even lifetime bans if they act inappropriately or disrespect the rules.

Guests are never barred from posting.

Guests do not receive any punishment for bad behaviour, repeated racist posts or insults to others can be posted by (same) Guests over and over. BW doesn’t manage to bar any “critical” Guests from posting.

Can any such discrepancy on punishment measures seriously be? How to justify this?

Members seem to be second class posters at BW compared to Guests at the current situation. BW has no tool or measure to indefinitely ban any nasty Guests.

This is a clear contradiction and displays unfairness to the Members, who bravely registered with BW.

I don't think there is any online forum out there (even for gays) that treats registered members worse than Guest posters (if they still allow Guests to post anonymously at all.)

I don't understand the rationale behind this different treatment of guests and Members and the heavier punishments towards members at BW. Such unfair discrepancy should not be.

Some people have previously pointed out: Some would not confess anything personal if they had posted under their Member profiles. They prefer to post as Guest for not being identified but still manage to add something onto the discussion or share their personal experience.

My response to this is: So what?

Either you have a Member account and can't be identified anyway, because it is a blank profile or you register a second Member account for this purpose and post your “private confessions” under a neutral Member account which does not disclose who you are, has no picture, personal details. (This would work as long as BW permits to have more than one Member account).

5) My overall observation:

Please note those who strongly push for Guests still being allowed to post on BW, are Guests themselves. Because, BW makes it easy for trolls to post inappropriate posts and to exploit the “system” as there is no definite exclusion of any such nasty Guests. These nasty Guests can go on and on.

Does BW intend to support this? Enable repeated Guest trolls to act with no measure of exclusion? For what purpose?

6) Flaming Room

Personally, I never understood why “highly” inappropriate posts are (mostly) only moved to the Flaming Room.

This just serves to perpetuate inappropriate posts. Let's take a racist post. It will end up in the Flaming Room for everyone to read it at any time forever. It will continue to be shown publicly.

Naturally, in my opinion any racist post should be deleted away and not just moved to the Flaming Room.

Any inappropriate post to a higher degree (racial, religion, political, truly untruth etc etc) in my opinion should be deleted out of BW and not just moved to the Flaming Room.

7) Conclusion:

The only solution in my opinion to get rid of trolling Guests who simply post inappropriate things, repeated racial slurs and other nastiness on BW is to completely disallow Guest posts at all.

As an interim step, I have no issues if there is a new degraded guest posting system as proposed above. However, in the long term I predict, this Forum will end up with same issues sooner or later, because some Guests have repeatedly shown, they are not willing to observe any manners or respect the rules set out by BW.

I would hope BW Moderators could consider the proposals.

😎 Summary (for the lazy BW readers):

a) BW can avoid much trolling disruption by abolishing Guest posts for once and all.

b) Currently, punishment measures for violations between Members and Guests are not equal or balanced as Guests can’t be punished on the same level as members.

c) Highly inappropriate posts should be deleted away and not just moved to the Flaming Room.

d) Privacy can be achieved by anonymous Member accounts not displaying any personal details or pictures of them. BW can permit for one person to have two Member accounts. Due to this, BW doesn’t actually need Guest postings.

Edited May 19, 2020 by singalion
l/

Larry · May 19, 2020

19 hours ago, Guest Disclosed Yourself said:

Guest Disclosed Yourself has not posted anything earlier at this thread. Therefore, above is just meant to cause confusion and irritation.

This is the first post of Disclosed Yourself at this thread... Just to make you once again aware about the unlimited means by Guest posts, who can impersonate and exploit the purpose of these Guest "appearances".

There is a common saying / Chinese proverb: 唯小人难养也 only a villain is hard to raise. And I ought to comply with my last reply to our great great greatest Guest, "I would not be bother to waste my time with you. I shan't further response with you. Therefore I choose to communicate with you but not that great great greatest Guest, or the villain,

I need your honest reply with respect to his following posting, i.e. do you have another nick 'Caught Telling Lies'?

5 hours ago, Guest Guest said:

How you know Caught Telling Lies is not Disclosed Yourself?? Isn't that the very reason why he doesn't want to use his member's name???? He has already been caught multiple times using multiple guests nicks already lah!!!!

Edited May 19, 2020 by Larry

May 19, 2020

32 minutes ago, Larry said:

There is a common saying / Chinese proverb: 唯小人难养也 only a villain is hard to raise. And I ought to comply with my last reply to our great great greatest Guest, "I would not be bother to waste my time with you. I shan't further response with you. Therefore I choose to communicate with you but not that great great greatest Guest, or the villain,

I need your honest reply with respect to his following posting, i.e. do you have another nick 'Caught Telling Lies'?

Yes, I do.

May 19, 2020

39 minutes ago, Larry said:

There is a common saying / Chinese proverb: 唯小人难养也 only a villain is hard to raise. And I ought to comply with my last reply to our great great greatest Guest, "I would not be bother to waste my time with you. I shan't further response with you. Therefore I choose to communicate with you but not that great great greatest Guest, or the villain,

I need your honest reply with respect to his following posting, i.e. do you have another nick 'Caught Telling Lies'?

5 minutes ago, Guest Guest said:

Yes, I do.

I am all Disclosed Yourself, Caught Telling Lies and Guest Guest.

May 19, 2020

55 minutes ago, Guest Disclosed Yourself said:

I am all Disclosed Yourself, Caught Telling Lies and Guest Guest.

The above quoted post is the usual sabotaging by the known Guest troll and impersonating Guest nicks (as usual).

Don't get fooled by this Guest troll.

For the record:

The real person behind Disclosed Yourself is not the same as Caught Telling Lies.

These are two different persons.

Just look at the difference in English and writing styles.

Another hint: Disclosed Yourself uses British English and would never write "reorganizing" but reorganising

Verb: reorganise Usage: Brit (N. Amer: reorganize).

On 5/16/2020 at 6:25 PM, Guest Caught Telling Lies said:

Guest Hazily Instructor is correct that perhaps reorganizing the order and content of the forums might help turn Blowing Wind into a better place, and even moreso after @Larry was targeted by a disgusting troll last weekend.

I cannot say whether Guest Guest and Caught Telling Lies are the same, but I don't think so, because Caught Telling Lies doesn't seem to insult or use strong words like "hypocrite" . Language of this Caught Telling Lies is much different to the usual language of the troll Guest Guest.

The moderators know it, who is who.

Larry · May 19, 2020

12 hours ago, Guest Disclosed Yourself said:

The above quoted post is the usual sabotaging by the known Guest troll and impersonating Guest nicks (as usual).

Don't get fooled by this Guest troll.

For the record:

The real person behind Disclosed Yourself is not the same as Caught Telling Lies. These are two different persons.

I cannot say whether Guest Guest and Caught Telling Lies are the same, but I don't think so, because Caught Telling Lies doesn't seem to insult or use strong words like "hypocrite" . Language of this Caught Telling Lies is much different to the usual language of the troll Guest Guest.

The moderators know it, who is who.

Wows, this is super dramatic, there are two guests claiming the same nick, i.e. 'Disclosed Yourself'. Anyway I choose to believe you more.

13 hours ago, Guest Guest said:

Yes, I do.

"Will you take Susan as your lawful wife?" "Yes, I do." Do what? Dear Guest, is this your standard? Don't make my toes laugh, please.

13 hours ago, Guest Disclosed Yourself said:

I am all Disclosed Yourself, Caught Telling Lies and Guest Guest.

Real screw-up English, not even primary one standard. Probably Chinese-helicopter, ha-ha-ha... Please don't disclose yourself, what's a shame.

As an ex-tutor, both above messages can never pass the PSLE English Composition, fitting the remarks of: 不成器 good-for-nothing, 不学无术 ignorant & incompetent, 破铜烂铁 useless, junk etc. & etc.

My decision is not to participate & response with all guests except guest 'Hazily Instructor', hopefully no one abuse his nick.

Edited May 19, 2020 by Larry

May 19, 2020

41 minutes ago, Larry said:

My decision is not to participate & response with all guests except guest 'Hazily Instructor', hopefully no one abuse his nick.

I also make good posts. Don't leave me out. In all seriousness, please everyone be careful not to get pulled into the infamous troll's accusations of various guests being other guests (such as I highly doubt Caught Telling Lies and Disclosed Yourself are the same guest, since they mildly argued with each other in certain threads last year, assuming neither of them was being impersonated by the infamous troll).

Anyway there have been a lot of good points made, and I believe a thread like this helps people see that we are responsible for the content as well as decorum of the forum, so we all need to behave like mature adults and not degenerate into insulting, mudslinging, and so-called boboshooting. Stick to the topic, keep the good suggestions coming, and hopefully the moderators might implement the best changes.

Larry · May 19, 2020

1 minute ago, Guest Overdosed Yourself said:

I also make good posts. Don't leave me out. .

Okay, add in your name. But why don't to be our member?

May 19, 2020

I promise to post as a member when the moderators implement some of the changes we all have suggested to free the forum away from trolling guests.

May 19, 2020

What shall be the opportunity cost for BW should the forum is only for registered members to post?

Will Only-Members'-Forum stay afloat? Will it reduce participation and readership?

What could be the possible reason why BW needs guests?

May 19, 2020

2 hours ago, Larry said:

Wows, this is super dramatic, there are two guests claiming the same nick, i.e. 'Disclosed Yourself'. Anyway I choose to believe you more.

"Will you take Susan as your lawful wife?" "Yes, I do."

Real screw-up English, not even primary one standard. Probably Chinese-helicopter, ha-ha-ha...

As an ex-tutor, both above messages can never pass the PSLE English Composition, fitting the remarks of: 不成器 good-for-nothing, 不学无术 ignorant & incompetent, 破铜烂铁 useless, junk etc. & etc.

My decision is not to participate & response with all guests except guest 'Hazily Instructor', hopefully no one abuse his nick.

Thank you so much for liking my posts. I'd try to participate more using this name and that using Guest Overdosed Yourself as well. Since you do not seem to believe that Guest Guest, Guest Disclosed Yourself and Guest Caught Telling Lies are all the same person, who is me, I will refrain from using those names to post in the future.

May 19, 2020

4 hours ago, Guest Hazily Instructor said:

Thank you so much for liking my posts. I'd try to participate more using this name and that using Guest Overdosed Yourself as well. Since you do not seem to believe that Guest Guest, Guest Disclosed Yourself and Guest Caught Telling Lies are all the same person, who is me, I will refrain from using those names to post in the future.

Just as warned, and right on cue, the above post is the troll "stealing my screen name" and trying to cause confusion. Such egregious and disrespectful shenanigans fullly reiterate one of the major reasons the guest function needs to be overhauled, as well as an example of why some members want all guests banned, since one can't control his negativity.

Rather than get into an argument that would eventually lead to this intelligent and introspective thread being thrown into the Flaming Room, which is what the ignorant troll wants, I will again call for making a Members Only forum first on the list, putting a Guests and Newcomers forum second, and depriving the loser of the attention he desperately craves.

May 19, 2020

1 hour ago, Guest REAL Hazily Instructor said:

Just as warned, and right on cue, the above post is the troll "stealing my screen name" and trying to cause confusion. Such egregious and disrespectful shenanigans fullly reiterate one of the major reasons the guest function needs to be overhauled, as well as an example of why some members want all guests banned, since one can't control his negativity.

Rather than get into an argument that would eventually lead to this intelligent and introspective thread being thrown into the Flaming Room, which is what the ignorant troll wants, I will again call for making a Members Only forum first on the list, putting a Guests and Newcomers forum second, and depriving the loser of the attention he desperately craves.

Oh my! I didn't realize that my screen name would be stolen and used. But I guess I only have myself to blame for not signing in as a member myself, isn't it? Screen names are not anybody's trademarks and they are not the specific property of anybody, right? So I guess I cannot really blame anyone else except myself, for using a screen name that don't even belong to me at all in the first place. Besides, I am just as guilty Guests since I frequently start start boring threads using different screen names too, am I not? So who exactly am I to go demand anything to be changed on this forum? It's not as if my hands are that clean myself too, are they? It's not as if I started and own this forum in the first place, did I? Maybe as what some Guests have said in the past, I am as huge a hypocrite as anyone possibly can be. I should reflect on myself to see if I am the same attention-seeking loser as who I claimed others to be. I think I should go back and do what I do best now, that is to be the busybody that I am and do all the Trump-bashing all over the forum, just so that I can get all the attention that I so rightfully deserve!

doncoin · May 19, 2020

Hi @Larry,

I agree with many of your points. and I do think that the trolling etc. to many registered users here are uncalled for. However, since the majority of these "guests" have demonstrated a lack of human decency and courtesy, perhaps a workaround would be to limit the number of posts they can make as a guest. Granted, this measure will not stop them entirely, but making it challenging and needing to spend extra effort each time to make a post, should hopefully deter them and encourage them to just get registered and not post as a guest.

As I had posted earlier, while I have been targeted by some "guest" I don't really take what they say too personally. For one, they do have the right to disagree, and express their points of view; and if I feel strongly about it, I will respond. If not, I will disengage from the discussion and move on. These guests don't know me, and I don't know them in real life. Their thoughts and opinions don't really affect me in my life. The only people's opinion who should really matter are the ones you respect and the ones you love. Since pretty much 99.9% of the postings and response here by guests don't fall into that category for me, I don't really give a fuck.

They choose to be guests, and that is their choice. It is always easier to just criticize and say something negative from the shadows than to be in the open. That way they don't have to be responsible for their words or actions if applicable. While we all have our personal opinions about such people, it is their choice to be so, and at some level, we have to respect that. If someone chooses to be a nasty cunt, let that person stink like an un-douched pussy. We can choose not to sit close by and avoid inhaling the stench.

Steve5380 · May 19, 2020

19 hours ago, Guest Guest said:

I really wanted to keep all my post till a later date but I cannot resist coming in to laugh at stupid people like you! How you know Caught Telling Lies is not Disclosed Yourself?? Isn't that the very reason why he doesn't want to use his member's name???? He has already been caught multiple times using multiple guests nicks already lah!!!! You really stuuuupid lor!!!

Interesting.

And what is YOUR very reason why you don't want to use your member's name?

May 19, 2020

1 hour ago, Guest Hazily Instructor said:

Oh my! I didn't realize that my screen name would be stolen and used. But I guess I only have myself to blame for not signing in as a member myself, isn't it? Screen names are not anybody's trademarks and they are not the specific property of anybody, right? So I guess I cannot really blame anyone else except myself, for using a screen name that don't even belong to me at all in the first place. Besides, I am just as guilty Guests since I frequently start start boring threads using different screen names too, am I not? So who exactly am I to go demand anything to be changed on this forum? It's not as if my hands are that clean myself too, are they? It's not as if I started and own this forum in the first place, did I? Maybe as what some Guests have said in the past, I am as huge a hypocrite as anyone possibly can be. I should reflect on myself to see if I am the same attention-seeking loser as who I claimed others to be. I think I should go back and do what I do best now, that is to be the busybody that I am and do all the Trump-bashing all over the forum, just so that I can get all the attention that I so rightfully deserve!

You just don't get it. If somebody else takes the time to come up with a unique guest screen name that means something to them personally, and absolutely nothing to you, leave it alone. Even if they are posting as a guest, they actually thought of a name that is more unique than Guest Guest, or Guest 123, or whatever other laziness the troublemakers of this site put the minimal effort into typing, so leave it alone and think of your own screen name.

The fact that you keep impersonating other guests and trying to make them "look bad" shows malicious intent on your part. It proves that you don't want to contribute to Blowing Wind in a positive manner. On the flip side, you want to sow confusion and discord, which are not things a good person would do. Those actions, and many others, now have multiple members lobbying the moderators to ban all guests and it will be your fault if that happens.

Steve5380 · May 19, 2020

13 hours ago, singalion said:

For sure I am interested in this topic. I did not check in to BW the last days, but here are my points to the discussion.

😎 Summary (for the lazy BW readers):

a) BW can avoid much trolling disruption by abolishing Guest posts for once and all.

b) Currently, punishment measures for violations between Members and Guests are not equal or balanced as Guests can’t be punished on the same level as members.

c) Highly inappropriate posts should be deleted away and not just moved to the Flaming Room.

d) Privacy can be achieved by anonymous Member accounts not displaying any personal details or pictures of them. BW can permit for one person to have two Member accounts. Due to this, BW doesn’t actually need Guest postings.

You wrote a good dissertation and summary. I partially agree and disagree with your points.

First, I have been posting here for 8 years, and since the beginning there were "guests" who wrote nasty posts and disrupted serious discussions. I don't notice any dramatic decline of the forum. I have learned to accept it as it is. Can it be improved? Everything can be improved. From the beginning I have found as very peculiar the system of letting anonymous "guests" post nearly indiscriminately. I don't know of any other forum that allows this. And I think that this makes BW more "interesting", "exotic", for whatever this means.

10 hours ago, Nightingale said:

But then it's like different ninjas all wearing the same mask. The average reader will not be able to penetrate the language structure and play guess work at differentiating who is who, as this is quite taxing. Also, the troll can create more confusion by saying, "Haha, boboshooter. I am not the same guest as the other guest." On the other hand, with a registered member name, your nick can never be hijacked, so you have one thing fewer to be vexed.

You are very right, Nightingale, that it is borderline comical the way some characters in this forum impersonate themselves like in a pantomime. Can we see this with some humor? WHO REALLY CARES if Guest Disclosed Yourself and Guest Caught Telling Lies are the same person, if they willingly put themselves in a position where they can be falsely impersonated? Aren't they free adults? What if we contemplate this farce... with a smile, and chuckle at the originality of some guest's names?

And about what they write !!!!... does this need to damage our monitor, or make a dent in our self esteem? You have been particularly attacked ferociously and in abominable ways by the "Dirty Auntie", yet you seem to come out unscratched by all that.

So this is why I don't see an urgency to change BW, although there can be some attempts at improving it, and good ideas abound here. Maybe changes can be tried, and if they don't seem successful they can be reversed. I already am welcoming the recent deletion of the "downrate" of posts option, making the forum more friendly, and I don't see that it is missed.

I conclude by adding some 5 cents of suggestions: - Limiting the starting of threads to members, - Giving the TS the option to allow guests to post in his thread (default) or not.

Steve5380 · May 19, 2020

Is this thread being locked?

upshot · May 19, 2020

9 hours ago, Guest The Future said:

What shall be the opportunity cost for BW should the forum is only for registered members to post?

Will Only-Members'-Forum stay afloat? Will it reduce participation and readership?

What could be the possible reason why BW needs guests?

Let me play devil advocate as someone familiar with online marketing and selling at website.

How could there be "opportunity' cost? I mean really substantial ones. If you think BW has any motive for setting up a member registration. So that argument or excuse is mute. Which marketer or business model can they attract to pay for potential email listing, ad spaces or promote products in BW? Right now, I am sure they are only able to get minimum cash return to advertise or monetize the website. I see more people come in here and use the forum to sell their own product like. You think if they sold anything, BW will get a cut? To sell things base on commission and bought linking to Blowing Wind, you think that is happened? Seriously, would BW make a lot of sale or be linked to some sale to BW? When BW suffer a brown out, they have to tell us to bear with them as they try with their own money repair the problem or buy new equipment. Does things like that sound like BW is making tons of money?

Even if everyone signs up as a member, how much REAL INFORMATION is there in BW worth selling for with demographic details being mainly made up or too general for marketer to make dollar sense from? There is nothing worth selling your email address for. And being a gay forum which lets you talk about so many taboo and saucy subjects, you think BIG WELL KNOWN COMPANIES will dare to advertise here???

THIS SITE if you still have not realized all these years of existence is more a LABOUR OF LOVE than something to make money for the owners. Moderators are not paid by the way if anything. If this site were ever to make money like other gay sites, your guest option will be out the window very quickly replace by something more comprehensive and moderating will be a bitch more stricter.

Can anyone appreciate it enough to use GUEST mode with courtesy and camaraderie? Yes there are those, I met many but we also have those who use it as means to get a kick out of stirring, to distract, spread hate and bullying. I akin this a more mental or attitude problem on their part than anything else. They use GUEST MODE to an art form to spread what negativity they have boiling inside them.

To add, I am certain some 'guest-moder' are likely members who want to keep their IDs squeaky-clean and polished but use guest mode when they have something nasty or questionable to comment on. I get that part too. For why, they do it, we can only speculate. And I also fear some GUEST could be rather young too so I guess the usual mischief nature is also there.

I am simply laying all the cards on the table to discuss as I have soft spot for this site after all these years. So I put a spotlight on the issues we faced. But I am not one to demand changes for my sake but I will take what measures the owners of BW are willing or not. I mentioned many times, I take what I like and throw away those I don't with what I read here now (even more so of late as I tired and have other outlets for my time). Some folk PM me directly, so advice on the side instead. I just step back. I use to come in here and get all horny from stuff I read but now more times reading the hate comments brings my libido down to cold fish level. WTF. heh.

I am not speaking for all, but we all have lives to live. Time's precious. Why these people so free and full of angst to want to keep doing this 24-7-time-wasting-hateful-bias-negative-existence I have no idea their motivation and what goals they hope to gain doing this year in year out. But I have my precious time which I want to use positively and productively (and sexually). That's the solution for me.

And why BW need GUEST mode? I guess you can say that was likely the default type setting for Forum building software .. over time, like many things else, it just is a part of it. Why fix when it is not broken I guess heh. But looks to me like some fixing might be in order possibly.

GUEST more makes sense if you are new and sure if you want to commit your time here for a period. But once you are, being a member with a constant ID seem the best of all worlds. You want to be counted as someone with an individual representation. Not just some ambiguous non entity call GUEST.

Edited May 19, 2020 by upshot
typo and erro.. sorry typing too fast so waste less time and go watch porn heheh

Steve5380 · May 20, 2020

45 minutes ago, upshot said:

Let me play devil advocate as someone familiar with online marketing and selling at website.

How could there be "opportunity' cost? I mean really substantial ones. If you think BW has any motive for setting up a member registration. So that argument or excuse is mute.

It is not clear that online marketing and selling at website has anything to do with BW. If someone mentioned "opportunity cost", this could have referred to the opportunity to attract the right kind of public, mostly young gays who can find guidance and an outlet for their issues here. One sees this also in other gay websites elsewhere, who have a social motivation instead of a commercial one. And conversely, some gay websites that started social became ghost towns once they turned more commercial, like trevvy.

45 minutes ago, upshot said:

Can anyone appreciate it enough to use GUEST mode with courtesy and camaraderie? Yes there are those, I met many but we also have those who use it as means to get a kick out of stirring, to distract, spread hate and bullying. I akin this a more mental or attitude problem on their part than anything else. They use GUEST MODE to an art form to spread what negativity they have boiling inside them.

To add, I am certain some 'guest-moder' are likely members who want to keep their IDs squeaky-clean and polished but use guest mode when they have something nasty or questionable to comment on. I get that part too. For why, they do it, we can only speculate. And I also fear some GUEST could be rather young too so I guess the usual mischief nature is also there.

I have noticed that most guests are civil and do good posting free of malice. In fact, these disturbing trolls could be counted with the fingers of one hand, or less. The most obvious I find is "Guest Guest", maybe aka "Dirty Auntie", and even his attacks are so repetitive and predictive that they lose most of their bite. I can live perfectly well with them, and I even ask myself if I don't engage them too much in zest, to the inconvenience of other members.

45 minutes ago, upshot said:

I am simply laying all the cards on the table to discuss as I have soft spot for this site after all these years. So I put a spotlight on the issues we faced. But I am not one to demand changes for my sake but I will take what measures the owners of BW are willing or not. I mentioned many times, I take what I like and throw away those I don't with what I read here now (even more so of late as I tired and have other outlets for my time). Some folk PM me directly, so advice on the side instead. I just step back. I use to come in here and get all horny from stuff I read but now more times reading the hate comments brings my libido down to cold fish. heh.

I am not speaking for all, but we all have lives to live. Time's precious. Why these people so free and full of angst to want to keep doing this 24-7-time-wasting-hateful-bias-negative-existence I have no idea their motivation and what goals they hope to gain doing this year in year out. But I have my precious time which I want to use positively and productively. That's the solution for me.

It is not always wise to lay all the cards on the table. Some cards can be predominantly negative.

You SHOULD ask for changes for your sake. There is nothing wrong with this. You already take what you like and throw away what you don't. Very practical. I am a little different in that I evaluate more before throwing away (I open all the letters I get, even the ones I know are junk mail, if they took the trouble to send them to me, they deserve at least that I open them). But we are all different.

If you don't get horny from stuff as much as you did before, it could be also the fact that you are a little older. I am already a grandfather, yet I still get horny here.

Your precious time is for you to use to your highest convenience. This goes without saying.

.

Edited May 20, 2020 by Steve5380

May 20, 2020

You can see that this forum is dying literally, how many guests and members come here and discuss stuff? It's a shame that many things are not allowed: no exciting pic, no troll, no bickering, no repetition topic as the next moment it will be merged to a 10yr ago topic which nobody cares. So stupid to merge new topic with old one because things happened in 1999 and 2020 are no longer the same anymore. But this forum insistently merge, thinking same wad. Example, simple things like circumcision. Wtf so old old technology in the past yet moderator still merged with new topics about people asking the latest info. You see also laugh. Where got people so free to read through 30pages of old topics before contributing?

I'm totally fine if we don't touch on politics matters. Au contraire, lgbt itself is a sensitive topic that leads to serious criminal offence under 377A. So it's double standard to discuss lgbt topics, isn't it? I also don't like political topics but I feel this is the only time when mod should come in to stop if it goes overboard.

Trolls are expected in forums, why care? Some are funny tbh than seeing members posting unoriginal scripted boring replies. The same as bickering, why huan lo they quarrel? Let them quarrel until the end of times one day they will auto stop - you think they need you to help stop them? This is an adult forum, not primary school forum.

Steve5380 · May 20, 2020

44 minutes ago, Nightingale said:

Unscathed? That was only on the surface. But I recovered fast. What did not kill you made you stronger. But how many can recover that fast, if they recover at all? What hurts inside you psychologically (and emotionally) can be more permanent – like that British gentleman who got so mercilessly trolled that he failed to recover and disappeared forever from BW.

Indeed, psychological, emotional hurts can be more -nearly- permanent. After enough time, one learns to handle these too. Childhood can be a time when psychological damage can last the whole life. But if one lives long enough, one can realize that "it is never too late to remake our early life". This is a gift to us gays who had problems growing up. And so, most psychological damage can be neutralized. We should live a happy present.

54 minutes ago, Nightingale said:

That explains why no one dares to retort that mentally deranged super troll. Moderators think that trolls work this way. Negative comment ---> retort ---> more negative comments plus trolling ----> retorts ---> troll until no more retort ---> trolling stops.

HOWEVER IN REALITY, trolls work like a vicious cycle. No retort ---> emboldened ---> post more negative comments ---> still no retort ---> post more till you get retorts ---> feel bored and start new threads to troll ---> no more retort ---> post more comments to get attention & repeat till the cows come home.

And here is my strategy to cope with trolls:

“Have you ever been too nice and ended up in a situation that could’ve been avoided if you just would’ve been an asshole?”

“My life became easier and satisfying once I learnt how to act like a heartless asshole.”

And this is my message to trolls:

“If you have to hurt others in order to feel powerful, you are an extremely weak individual” – Bobby J Mattingly

I like your interpretation. A good troll will notice when people are forcing themselves to ignore him, and this means success, encouragement to keep doing it. It is different when the troll is ignored because he has become ineffective. Then he is ignored naturally, because of lack of interest, and he will get some answers that don't reflect anger but only pity. This should be the biggest defeat for a troll...

To "not go down to his level" may not even be a moral necessity. More effective is to go down to his level to kick his ass, then return to civility.

May 20, 2020

Larry, you need to seek a psychologist , your postings show you are in a deep psychological trauma in need of a fix. You need to get out of this rut. Go seek help.

Steve5380 · May 20, 2020

7 minutes ago, Guest you need to seek help said:

Larry, you need to seek a psychologist , your postings show you are in a deep psychological trauma in need of a fix. You need to get out of this rut. Go seek help.

"Psychological Trauma" ?? You would rather NOT have this thread?

Here we can see how much interesting discussion can surge because BW IS NOT PERFECT!

If there were no "guests", no "trolls", no "bickering", topics like politics, religion, not allowed. What would the conversations be about?

The latest fashions in men's clothing, the latest shows on TV, the top songs in the charts, etc. etc.

singalion · May 20, 2020

6 hours ago, Steve5380 said:

You wrote a good dissertation and summary. I partially agree and disagree with your points.

First, I have been posting here for 8 years, and since the beginning there were "guests" who wrote nasty posts and disrupted serious discussions. I don't notice any dramatic decline of the forum. I have learned to accept it as it is. Can it be improved? Everything can be improved. From the beginning I have found as very peculiar the system of letting anonymous "guests" post nearly indiscriminately. I don't know of any other forum that allows this. And I think that this makes BW more "interesting", "exotic", for whatever this means.

You are very right, Nightingale, that it is borderline comical the way some characters in this forum impersonate themselves like in a pantomime. Can we see this with some humor? WHO REALLY CARES if Guest Disclosed Yourself and Guest Caught Telling Lies are the same person, if they willingly put themselves in a position where they can be falsely impersonated? Aren't they free adults? What if we contemplate this farce... with a smile, and chuckle at the originality of some guest's names?

And about what they write !!!!... does this need to damage our monitor, or make a dent in our self esteem? You have been particularly attacked ferociously and in abominable ways by the "Dirty Auntie", yet you seem to come out unscratched by all that.

So this is why I don't see an urgency to change BW, although there can be some attempts at improving it, and good ideas abound here. Maybe changes can be tried, and if they don't seem successful they can be reversed. I already am welcoming the recent deletion of the "downrate" of posts option, making the forum more friendly, and I don't see that it is missed.

I conclude by adding some 5 cents of suggestions: - Limiting the starting of threads to members, - Giving the TS the option to allow guests to post in his thread (default) or not.

Sorry to say that I found your response counterproductive. Often it is advised to keep silent instead of writing something.

It does not serve to improve Blowing Wind what you wrote.

I understand it is your personal point of not being affected by the silly trolls and you don't see it critical.

But if you just look two years back, you acted quite sharp on the attempts of some trolls to silence you and to try to ban you from BW.

It is just recently, that you changed somehow on your reaction (through learning experience), but still it comes to times where you act similar to before:

However, you can get easily into brawls, even the past weeks and mostly it is caused by Guests and you react sharp and defend yourself in details (as others do too).

6 hours ago, Steve5380 said:

You are very right, Nightingale, that it is borderline comical the way some characters in this forum impersonate themselves like in a pantomime. Can we see this with some humor? WHO REALLY CARES if Guest Disclosed Yourself and Guest Caught Telling Lies are the same person, if they willingly put themselves in a position where they can be falsely impersonated? Aren't they free adults? What if we contemplate this farce... with a smile, and chuckle at the originality of some guest's names?

And about what they write !!!!... does this need to damage our monitor, or make a dent in our self esteem? You have been particularly attacked ferociously and in abominable ways by the "Dirty Auntie", yet you seem to come out unscratched by all that.

So this is why I don't see an urgency to change BW, although there can be some attempts at improving it, and good ideas abound here. Maybe changes can be tried, and if they don't seem successful they can be reversed. I already am welcoming the recent deletion of the "downrate" of posts option, making the forum more friendly, and I don't see that it is missed.

Second point:

You personally might have a big ego and can handle such attacks.

Probably, it was something different for Nightingale too. (Nightingale will pardon me), but he is already an "old fart" (as someone nasty named him here before), he might have learnt to handle such situations because he was bullied earlier and gained experience on how to overcome such situations.

However, Steve5380, you forgot one thing, there are some very young chaps here, maybe some who just discovered being gay and doing their first steps. Maybe they put up a picture into their profile at BW because they are proud being out to the gay community, other people might know them personally.

I m not sure, if such young people will take any such attacks and defamations lightly (similar to what Nightingale had experienced). From the US, you should know guys committed suicide following such attacks. I m sure in Singapore are such cases too, even if they won't be described on the background of death in detail in the news.

Don't conclude from your own ego to others. There are weaker guys, more insecure guys out there. Not everyone will take it as a lesson to increase their self-esteem. And you should not promote for others here to use trolling as a method to increase personal self-esteem and awareness on how to handle such bullying.

Potential consequences on life have been made known to you.

Bullying, trolling, insulting, nasty attacks against any other should not take place at all at a forum like this and Moderators should act and delete out any such inappropriate behaviour/posts immediately. If there are only Members who can post, any repeated culprits can be easily identified and banned. With Guests this just doesn't work as we have seen as there is no tool to ban them.

singalion · May 20, 2020

6 hours ago, upshot said:

Let me play devil advocate as someone familiar with online marketing and selling at website.

How could there be "opportunity' cost? I mean really substantial ones. If you think BW has any motive for setting up a member registration. So that argument or excuse is mute. Which marketer or business model can they attract to pay for potential email listing, ad spaces or promote products in BW? Right now, I am sure they are only able to get minimum cash return to advertise or monetize the website. I see more people come in here and use the forum to sell their own product like. You think if they sold anything, BW will get a cut? To sell things base on commission and bought linking to Blowing Wind, you think that is happened? Seriously, would BW make a lot of sale or be linked to some sale to BW? When BW suffer a brown out, they have to tell us to bear with them as they try with their own money repair the problem or buy new equipment. Does things like that sound like BW is making tons of money?

Even if everyone signs up as a member, how much REAL INFORMATION is there in BW worth selling for with demographic details being mainly made up or too general for marketer to make dollar sense from? There is nothing worth selling your email address for. And being a gay forum which lets you talk about so many taboo and saucy subjects, you think BIG WELL KNOWN COMPANIES will dare to advertise here???

THIS SITE if you still have not realized all these years of existence is more a LABOUR OF LOVE than something to make money for the owners. Moderators are not paid by the way if anything. If this site were ever to make money like other gay sites, your guest option will be out the window very quickly replace by something more comprehensive and moderating will be a bitch more stricter.

Can anyone appreciate it enough to use GUEST mode with courtesy and camaraderie? Yes there are those, I met many but we also have those who use it as means to get a kick out of stirring, to distract, spread hate and bullying. I akin this a more mental or attitude problem on their part than anything else. They use GUEST MODE to an art form to spread what negativity they have boiling inside them.

To add, I am certain some 'guest-moder' are likely members who want to keep their IDs squeaky-clean and polished but use guest mode when they have something nasty or questionable to comment on. I get that part too. For why, they do it, we can only speculate. And I also fear some GUEST could be rather young too so I guess the usual mischief nature is also there.

I am not speaking for all, but we all have lives to live. Time's precious. Why these people so free and full of angst to want to keep doing this 24-7-time-wasting-hateful-bias-negative-existence I have no idea their motivation and what goals they hope to gain doing this year in year out. But I have my precious time which I want to use positively and productively (and sexually). That's the solution for me.

And why BW need GUEST mode? I guess you can say that was likely the default type setting for Forum building software .. over time, like many things else, it just is a part of it. Why fix when it is not broken I guess heh. But looks to me like some fixing might be in order possibly.

GUEST more makes sense if you are new and sure if you want to commit your time here for a period. But once you are, being a member with a constant ID seem the best of all worlds. You want to be counted as someone with an individual representation. Not just some ambiguous non entity call GUEST.

Seriously, I think you are looking at this whole issue from the wrong angle. It is ok if you ask, what is the purpose of Guest being permitted to post freely at BW and out of what economic angle BW Moderators are allowing it, but you are looking at BW too materialistic. I don’t think BW was ever set up as a commercial venture. If, we would be spammed by ads all over for long already. BW is more like a charity, running on low costs. Maybe, even on too low costs, as more revenue could have led to notable technical improvements much earlier.

I beg to rebut on gay advertising: There are companies out there who market into the gay community. Even big MNCs. There was just one MNC employer in Singapore recently who “came out” to market for creative people from the gay community to work in their enterprise.

Whether other advertisers would place commercials here, has probably never been tested. (But this is sort of deviating a bit from the topic).

But anyhow, thanks for highlighting some technical points.

You are right on the critical Guests (those coming in just to insult and troll) and you are pointing to some probably correct explanations for this type of Guests.

My point is: If there is a problem, isn’t it time to get it fixed somehow? Aren’t BW readers fed up by constant trolling from the same person(s) day in day out?

Do you increase readership, contribution if people are fed up and turn their head away?

Even in your materialistic terms, any website forum would want to get rid of such Guests as they chase away readers (and potential ad viewers).

Wouldn’t even a charity sit down and do a think thank session to see what they can do to get rid of the issue (if their website is attacked by trolls or their open forum “spammed” by troll posts)?

If you can’t upgrade to exclude any permanent trolling Guests, wouldn’t a switch to a member only interface be a good way?

The other point I wish to raise is: compared to trevvy and Fridae, they never had the outreach on diverse topics such as Blowing Wind and was never that sort of discussion forum (and for sure not that media for cruising hot spots, ha ha).

Blowing Wind having survived trevvy and Fridae, doesn’t it show, there is some “value” in Blowing Wind.

However, it shows: There are gay guys who are keen to discuss diverse topics and who are not using BW just to chase another guy. Isn’t that a good thing for Blowing Wind?

Yes, sure you can divide the BW users into three main groups:

1) Those interested in the discussion topics (or some word games/ riddles)

2) Those who are just here to connect with other guys (for various purposes) and never really participate at the discussion topics, and

3) Those who fall into group 1) and 2).

With your technical expertise, you could do BW a favour and assist them to implement some technical upgrading and change the “default” setting. In my personal view, the Moderators seem to be technical “Don’t know how(s)” and would need assistance on such improvements.

Maybe you can consult them.

You could do us all a favour here!

Edited May 20, 2020 by singalion
spacing

Larry · May 20, 2020

2 hours ago, Steve5380 said:

"Psychological Trauma" ?? You would rather NOT have this thread?

Here we can see how much interesting discussion can surge because BW IS NOT PERFECT!

If there were no "guests", no "trolls", no "bickering", topics like politics, religion, not allowed. What would the conversations be about?

The latest fashions in men's clothing, the latest shows on TV, the top songs in the charts, etc. etc.

Thank you on your rebuttal as I had promised not to response.

"Psychological Trauma"???? Goodness, where he got this terminology & how clear he understand it? How could he justify I need a fix based on my postings?

This is the kind of 江湖医生 quack (mountebank) we hate to talk about, damn... Ha-ha-ha... purely talk cock & sing song.

* A suggestion to him: please standby a dictionary by his side if he happen to read my reply to you.

With Best Regards,

upshot · May 20, 2020

3 hours ago, singalion said:

Seriously, I think you are looking at this whole issue from the wrong angle. It is ok if you ask, what is the purpose of Guest being permitted to post freely at BW and out of what economic angle BW Moderators are allowing it, but you are looking at BW too materialistic. I don’t think BW was ever set up as a commercial venture. If, we would be spammed by ads all over for long already. BW is more like a charity, running on low costs. Maybe, even on too low costs, as more revenue could have led to notable technical improvements much earlier.

How did you read my comment as I am looking at it from a materialistic angle? I was making a point why this is NOT A MATERIALISTIC driven forum nor can it be. You do know I was replying to someone's remark here to explain. LOL.

I only give my point-of-view and not looking to throw my work experience like a proposition offering my services to BW as some expert, it was just validating in generally my I am familiarity with web business and marketing. Which to me are so entry level these days anyone can do it. heheh. I am just saying I can see the general outline of the situation enough to make my person point of view. If it is not right or need to be correct, I welcome further information to correct my perspective with civility. I don't have a dog in this fight nor the time. So long as we offer fair feedback and some possible solution, I am sure the owners and moderators will know what to do with what they read here to. Too many cooks as the say....

singalion · May 20, 2020

3 minutes ago, upshot said:

How did you read my comment as I am looking at it from a materialistic angle? I was making a point why this is NOT A MATERIALISTIC driven forum nor can it be. You do know I was replying to someone's remark here to explain. LOL.

I only give my point-of-view and not looking to throw my work experience like a proposition offering my services to BW as some expert, it was just validating in generally my I am familiarity with web business and marketing. Which to me are so entry level these days anyone can do it. heheh. I am just saying I can see the general outline of the situation enough to make my person point of view. If it is not right or need to be correct, I welcome further information to correct my perspective with civility. I don't have a dog in this fight nor the time. So long as we offer fair feedback and some possible solution, I am sure the owners and moderators will know what to do with what they read here to. Too many cooks as the say....

My reaction shows: Your post was able to be misunderstood! And people take different conclusions from what you wrote. Seems it was not sufficient clear on the commercial reference you made at the start of your response. It sounded to me as if you wanted more commercial relevance for BW.

And to be fair, I approved to plenty of your comments on other parts.

Don't get me wrong, I m certainly not here to attack any people or start any fights. I was just responding to your post. In case, I spot some untruths posted here I might rebut and "fight the issue out" to show the public why any post was wrong or posting untruths, but that has surely not been the case with your post.

I actually still don't see too many cooks here discussing this topic.

The question remains if the Moderators are open to any changes. So far there has been no reaction from their point of view.

upshot · May 20, 2020

3 hours ago, singalion said:

The other point I wish to raise is: compared to trevvy and Fridae, they never had the outreach on diverse topics such as Blowing Wind and was never that sort of discussion forum (and for sure not that media for cruising hot spots, ha ha).

Blowing Wind having survived trevvy and Fridae, doesn’t it show, there is some “value” in Blowing Wind.

However, it shows: There are gay guys who are keen to discuss diverse topics and who are not using BW just to chase another guy. Isn’t that a good thing for Blowing Wind?

Hehehe I think you are rather young in age compare at least to me. And you mention some site that I was not willing to say earlier when I mentioned when some sites turn profiteer focus, and they have stricter rules and more tougher moderators. Well since you brought them up, you GOT it wrong. Fridae for example was a site I am still a member and back in the day.. Fridae was a cowboy town like BW. You can say what you like, post what you like and bitch what you like. I was there more often then I come into BW and Fridae was around a little longer. But when Fridae decided to joint the Pink group for gays and want more authority recognition as a clean not sexuality promoting site, they very quickly jettison off all naughty and porn linking theme threads. They do this and up their membership registration ruling to a higher level and started do a lot more other activities to focus on safe topics and gay lifestyle not relating to sex. Now they do that because the owner has a different direction for their site.

Doing so, Fridae lost a lot of their regulars and GUESTs. But in doing so, the changes they had to make on what's allow to take place in the site/forum, forced them to find other means to survive and make a profit given their expansion direction and be a legit gay site with a rigid sense of morals, practice and ideology. Something expected by govt and big brand corporations. If BW want to go that way, very easily to kill the GUEST problem here.. stop all sexually naughty talking and posting and you see what happen. GUEST visitors will drop like a stone. Do you understand what I am trying to say? heheh

BW is uniquely positioned to be what it wants base on what the owners want. Who are we to tell them what to do. I can voice my opinion as others do but it is not my place to say that it must make changes. I respect what they want (and expect of me to behave and do when I come in.. so long I like to come in, I follow the rules) They at last once have ask and listen, did a poll and decided to keep or not, the guest mode. And they did and wehave a member area only register ID can post if I am not wrong.This is something that crops up every now and again.You are more adamant about what you want BW to do than to just offer suggestion. heheh

Remember one thing my fellow visitors to this site, this is a FREE site and you always welcome to come in or not. Beggars can't be chooser. If BW is fine with the GUEST mode and can tolerate them, we can do no less and find our own solution if we get too irritable with the guest making noise. It's a suggestion now... not a demand. heheheh

Edited May 20, 2020 by upshot
typo and clarity

singalion · May 20, 2020

As to my memory Fridae was always a log in based website, in that sense on "Membership" basis.

To be honest, I don't remember any Guest posts or any big gay related discussions on Fridae. Trevvy had some but the topics were limited and more of that "where do I buy my fancy underwear" sort of talks. But I think Guests were not able to post anything on Trevvy.

The new thing on Fridae, when it started, was it being one of the first websites in Asia covering gay topics like a newspaper openly and putting a strong voice to combat discrimination. In the same time it was a gay dating "app".

Both to me had been more some dating websites with regular news articles about gay things happening in Singapore, Asia and the world. But I haven't seen or remember Fridae or Trevvy talking about gay "bread and butter" issues or "cock and bull" stories...

But I can be wrong on that. I haven't logged into both for years already, just noted today on a check, both are still existing.

Blowing Wind started earlier but was always a bit sort of gay online discussion forum on a broad range of topics.

I must admit, I never used the chat function with BW, I did some years ago, but I found it technically not thrilling.

Like every user in all media: Some use this, some use that. There are newspaper buyers or readers who just read the Soccer news and nothing else.

I guess you meant to say I m a bit "demanding" (adamant should be the wrong word in your last post).

I am fully aware I can't impose anything on the people running BW. I can just propose.

But I can have an opinion and I can make public what other people voice to me on their views on BW or why they don't use it or started using it less than previously.

Less readership doesn't serve BW, this is why I take initiative or effort in summarising my personal views.

The repeated touching of this issue on disturbing trolls and surrounding topics is bumping up more often recently. Isn't that a sign that things are not right with BW?

Even a charity would look into such issues to overcome it.

Actually, I m not sure what the owners of BW want.

The thing I am sure, is: You can't stick on old ways to do things in nowadays world.... means from time to time you need to check to stay afloat and relevant.

The "from time to time" is recurring more and more often nowadays too.

Steve5380 · May 20, 2020

8 hours ago, singalion said:

The other point I wish to raise is: compared to trevvy and Fridae, they never had the outreach on diverse topics such as Blowing Wind and was never that sort of discussion forum (and for sure not that media for cruising hot spots, ha ha).

Blowing Wind having survived trevvy and Fridae, doesn’t it show, there is some “value” in Blowing Wind.

However, it shows: There are gay guys who are keen to discuss diverse topics and who are not using BW just to chase another guy. Isn’t that a good thing for Blowing Wind?

Oh! You are so far off! There was plenty of value in trevvy.

It was the first gay forum I was attracted to when I joined the gay scene, and I participated in this forum for many years.

I was so disappointed when it collapsed and became a ghost place (like the last scenes in the movie Titanic...)

There were many topics there of good cultural content, many discussions of value, many members to be proud to interact with.

I remember the discussions of society with "sexton", "nixorn", "kennioh", "superflawless"...

the discussions about gay scene, politics, religion with "Integrity", "ecity"....

the friendly budding with the late "Sailor",

the heated discussions with "ecity", "Integrity",

the nice exchanges about classical music with "brents",

the fights with "jetzguy" (the character equivalent to our Guest Guest)...

and... some mild heads banging with the Moderator "SAS".

I feel fortunate that the site remains open, with many of the old postings still accessible.

Very rarely I still log in there, to read the old posts and reminisce with tears in my eyes,

remembering my transition to being a gay man, simply one of us.

Walter · May 20, 2020

On 5/18/2020 at 7:43 AM, Nightingale said:

Isn't this back to square one where guests are allowed complete freedom to troll?

Is there typo error? Do you mean if they DON"T have so much time (to set up an account)?

Anyway, their oft-used excuse of not having time to do so is very lame.

Wow so much discussion.

1. That's why I suggested the point system. For members who want their topic free from guest comments, the only way is to limit participation from guests by using the point system. The point system is one that is used by taiwanese forum tt1069 for a really long time.

An example below:

For those who can't read Chinese:

The first post can be viewed by any guests.

The second post however, reflects a restricted viewing with a statement [Viewing points required: 2 point]

Only members with 2 points (gained by number of member posts) could view. This means none of the guests could enter the thread to view it.

Also, for tt1069 forum, guest are not able to browse all the categories in the forum. For example, porn videos are only visible to members. This creates incentives for people to create a membership account.

I think some people might not turn to member accounts because there are no visible benefits of doing so. Why make a guest account when you could browse everything AND you can post whatever you want without receiving the same punishment as members? (As someone above pointed out) Instead of seemingly punish guests, why not make it such that it is rewarding for members instead?

2. There is no typo error. This is based on the point system I mentioned. With the point system, if someone is still willing to go through the hassle to make a member account in order troll the poster, then it's too bad for the poster. But at least there's one more layer to protect the poster.

Edited May 20, 2020 by Walter

May 20, 2020

10 hours ago, Nightingale said:

Wrong, trolling will remain very much alive (just look at this thread alone) though "not allowed" but do trolls care about rules? As long as Guests are allowed to comment, trolling won't go away. It's a freedom without punishment. Trolls can also create new Guest nicks to continue trolling to make it look as if they have other supporters.

1. But don't you think many topics remain unchanged? For example, whether in 1999 or 1960 or next year, discrimination, persecution and bullying of gays remain the ugly truth in our society, such that even our Courts, which are supposed to uphold social and legal justice, pass the buck to the Parliament and refuse to speak against such injustice from their conscience. So may I ask - Where is the difference?

2. Merging topics prevents repetition. Imagine having separate threads for

"Ways to Stay Trim",

"How to Deal with Obesity",

"Dealing with Overweight Problems",

"Fatty Issues",

"I am Heavy. How to Solve My Predicament?"

where past contributors have to repeat the same old rants over and again. Readers only need to see past comments and avoid repetition.

3. By merging threads on the same topic, readers can go through history. As you have mentioned, how circumcision techniques have changed over the years. Isn't it value added knowledge to gain insight into how technology has improved over the decades for example? If you are impatient, then skip the first page and go right to the last couple of pages.

Forum should allow diff opinions, discussion and that includes trolls. You still want punishment for wad? So serious until you see bw is like a ghost town. Don't believe me you can see in a few years later nobody will come in anymore.

All topics old and new merged then what's there to discuss? Nobody wants to read old stuff and discuss old topics. Is that so difficult to understand? Go see the old topics for yourself, WHO the hell will still dig out a 2009 thread and continue? It's a dead end. What is value adding? Old tech and stuff just archive and end it liao pls. New year new resolution but BW every yr still same resolution. People's thinking also change over time. Repeat just let it repeat, better than a ghost forum where the moment you start a thread, some silly dumb mod will try so hard to merge. New members also dare not raise opinions. Pink dot also every year do same thing and you see no value adding already. Like that what's to talk since everything merged and been discussed before?

It's not about being impatient, it's about being relevant in today's Internet age. You open a page, see the same thing and leave the site in <1sec. Bc no value adding! Who will still click to the last few pages of a 2009 thread omg...

Even if topic is on losing weight, everyone is diff. One may have knee injury, the other might have back prob, some maybe only 2days to train while others can gym 5days. How can you lump all these diff scenario as one? Even army also help focus on diff group of people having weakness in diff ippt stations too. Everything in life is a repetition whether you like it or not.

Anyway, you all happy can already. I don't get paid for all these feedbacks. You all see me as troll or whatever is fine too. Probably I'm just stupid to waste time here..

Steve5380 · May 20, 2020

2 hours ago, Guest Six said:

All topics old and new merged then what's there to discuss? Nobody wants to read old stuff and discuss old topics. Is that so difficult to understand? Go see the old topics for yourself, WHO the hell will still dig out a 2009 thread and continue? It's a dead end. What is value adding? Old tech and stuff just archive and end it liao pls. New year new resolution but BW every yr still same resolution. People's thinking also change over time. Repeat just let it repeat, better than a ghost forum where the moment you start a thread, some silly dumb mod will try so hard to merge. New members also dare not raise opinions. Pink dot also every year do same thing and you see no value adding already. Like that what's to talk since everything merged and been discussed before?

It's not about being impatient, it's about being relevant in today's Internet age. You open a page, see the same thing and leave the site in <1sec. Bc no value adding! Who will still click to the last few pages of a 2009 thread omg...

LOL! You must be one of those newbies who think that the world started with you!

"Today's internet age"... The Internet has been around since the beginning of the 90s. Nearly 30 years!

If you open a page, see the same thing and leave the site in <1sec, you either have a photographic vision or.. you are incapacitated.

You didn't even care to look at the threads here. @Nightingale already gave you an example with the thread "A Joke a Day" (too bad it is closed already).

IN THE FIRST PAGE OF THE MAIN FORUM you see some threads:

"Be Happy :)" from 2005, 8295 replies, 119,525 views

"Gay/Queer Themed Movie...etc.", from 2005, 5485 replies, 990,525 views.

"All About Peeping/ Voyeurism", from 2005, 396 replies, 108,879 views.

"Penis / Cock Piercing...", from 2007, 182 replies, 36,234 views

"Loose Anus & Tight Anus Discussion", from 2009, 199 replies, 33,270 views

"Mediacorp Artists - News ... etc." from 2007, 30,787 replies, 2,576,744 views.

This last thread was viewed over two million times! Most of these threads are "complied", meaning that the moderators have done some good work with them. We should be thankful to them instead of bitching about. All these threads in the first page are among the most recently accessed ones. So they are popular. So people like them. So your "theory" is disproved.

.

Edited May 20, 2020 by Steve5380

May 20, 2020

I felt dizzy reading all the comments here. So, what is the conclusion? Please give short to the point and easy to read answer.

May 20, 2020

53 minutes ago, Guest Snipper said:

I felt dizzy reading all the comments here. So, what is the conclusion? Please give short to the point and easy to read answer.

BW will eventually died off like trevvy. Hardly any traffic, go ask your gay friends how many come here now.

90% of threads here are old, stale, big turn off but members insist they're gold while guests are trolls.

Just as you say dizzy reading at ONLY page2, while old threads hoard until 50-100pages of useless info you got read them?

Ps. Larry you got your answer. Members here wanted #1, 暮气沉沉 lifeless: overlook, coldly or equivocal replies such as ‘fine, no comment’. Unfortunately, they don't know how to make a forum livelier nor able to give good suggestions too. So they shoot down whosoever guests as trolls. Well done people, you just hit another nail into BW's coffin! Continue doing this :clap:

May 20, 2020

4 minutes ago, Guest Six said:

BW will eventually died off like trevvy. Hardly any traffic, go ask your gay friends how many come here now.

90% of threads here are old, stale, big turn off but members insist they're gold while guests are trolls.

Just as you say dizzy reading at ONLY page2, while old threads hoard until 50-100pages of useless info you got read them?

Ps. Larry you got your answer. Members here wanted #1, 暮气沉沉 lifeless: overlook, coldly or equivocal replies such as ‘fine, no comment’. Unfortunately, they don't know how to make a forum livelier nor able to give good suggestions too. So they shoot down whosoever guests as trolls. Well done people, you just hit another nail into BW's coffin! Continue doing this

I really wanted to sit back and have fun looking at the various posts here and reserve all my comments to a much later date. But this is one post which I really fell in love with and I must comment now. Come.sweetheart, let me give you a cyberkiss!

Steve5380 · May 20, 2020

3 hours ago, Guest Six said:

BW will eventually died off like trevvy. Hardly any traffic, go ask your gay friends how many come here now.

90% of threads here are old, stale, big turn off but members insist they're gold while guests are trolls.

Just as you say dizzy reading at ONLY page2, while old threads hoard until 50-100pages of useless info you got read them?

Ps. Larry you got your answer. Members here wanted #1, 暮气沉沉 lifeless: overlook, coldly or equivocal replies such as ‘fine, no comment’. Unfortunately, they don't know how to make a forum livelier nor able to give good suggestions too. So they shoot down whosoever guests as trolls. Well done people, you just hit another nail into BW's coffin! Continue doing this

Members are right that they are gold. But guests are not only trolls. YOU, a guest, are trash.

You didn't get hit hard enough when you were proven SO WRONG in your opinion that "Nobody wants to read old stuff and discuss old topics." and "WHO the hell will still dig out a 2009 thread and continue? It's a dead end.". You were shown how popular some "old threads" are!

BW is just the opposite of "dead", especially when the website crawls so slow due to the heavy traffic it must handle.

But you keep bashing BW with all sort of inaccuracies and fantasies, while we members enjoy our postings. Your comments can wash away like trash, and we will be happy to totally ignore you .

P.D. Please look at the Main Forum, and realize that in the last 24 hours, one or more posts were made to about 36 threads. This should be the typical daily activity in BW, without counting what gets posted in its other forums. It does not seem that BW is "dying off", haha.

.

Edited May 20, 2020 by Steve5380

May 20, 2020

Since this thread is now on page three, I want to remind everyone of my proposed solutions, which make for the best compromise.

GUEST CTL’S PROPOSED SOLUTIONS

Convert the current Members Lounge into a Members Only Main Forum.
Convert the current Main Forum into a Newcomers & Guests Lounge.
Move the new Members Only Main Forum to first on the menu and the new Newcomers & Guests Lounge to second on the menu.
Move all currently existing threads which have reached at least two pages into the new Members Only Main Forum.

Doing it this way allows the guests to stay and have their own room, while giving priority to the members, as it truthfully should be.

upshot · May 20, 2020

heheh much flip flopping here I can see. Its no longer about making things better but to see how can score more points or get more silly taking things out of context.

It's very easy boys... You like you stay. You don't like and think this place is dying, FINE, go find a better place to hang that let you post NSFW photos, chat up guys, find a fuck, talk dirty or show off your bitchiness. All I can say is, GOOD LUCK finding such a place locally. If this place fades away or be like Fridae, the GUEST mode abusers will be the first to cry. So for those who wish this place to disappear, you better pray it does not and mind your Ps & Qs.

If after all this back and forth, the owners decides.... Status quo REMAINS. So be it. Yes? No use saying more. Stay or leave.

I guess guys with IDs, will have to be more blind-eye to the white noise that persist to appear. If the threads has something good, join the conversation, if not, like me stay out it and let it die off. GUEST mode do have its use for people afraid to reveal much, just want to use it once to write something or just happen to come along with something too shy to ask and worry BW's harmless registration might set off some tracking thus want to remain a GUEST. For still wanting to use GUEST mode to be negative, bully and just plain be a pain-in-the-ass, let them be.

I was never in favour of a members restricted space. Appreciate it but not necessary I feel. Do away with it, is fine with me. Think it came about partly due to abuse of GUEST mode discussion the last time around. Being negative or argumentative for the sake of stirring problem is what I call NOT A LIVELY THREAD and there are many topics started by GUEST mode which are of the right kind of 'LIVELY' topics. I don't think members with IDs deem all threads bad. Lively topics qualify to be called that when they pertain to current affair, cultural discussion, sharing of info, appeal for advice and opinion, open civil discussing/debate which does not start off or follow-up by name-calling, insult or reply with a negative or irrelevant remarks or shadow stalking individuals.

Even a hotly debated conversation delivered with no malice but passionate rhetoric is welcome. As it is not personal but about getting to the truth where it matters more than who is right or wrong more. Not about just winning an argument.

We are not little kids and can't differentiate between threads that are 'boh liao', nonsensical or setup as clickbait aim to infuriate and press people's button. Sorry to have to write much again. I really think this topic has been debated to death (over the years) and I fear the same conclusion will come about. This will be my last rant I promise lah. I want to go back to my gaming since buying so many new games for this CB lockdown. heheheh

And to the suggestion by "Guest Caught Telling Lies". .. As I said, I feel they can do away with member's area ideas. I sense, it' more, a sarcastic pandering intent than a serious suggestion. heheheh But instead how about this, all GUEST only allowed to post 2-5 times every 24 hours like we only get 'compliment likes' 5 times per day. That should make sure if they want to use comment, they best use it very constructively or dis-destructively. LOL. After which they have to log out and come back in again to make a new GUEST mode ID. And make them jump thru more inconvenience hoops for setting up another GUEST account ID. Also, not use the same GUEST ID in the next 6 hours interval. Let's see how devoted to their pranking activities then heheh... nah just kidding. Lucky for you guest whores this might not be possible with the kind of forum software they use to setup BW. If not... wah. Should quiet the noise here a little LOL.

Read and don't reply. I think I say more than I need to. Am sure my stalkers will have something shitty to say about me being long winded. But I have to. As the famous Einstein said, “The world is a dangerous place, not because of those who do evil, but because of those who look on and do nothing.”

Steve5380 · May 20, 2020

26 minutes ago, upshot said:

heheh much flip flopping here I can see. Its no longer about making things better but to see how can score more points or get more silly taking things out of context.

------

We are not little kids and can't differentiate between threads that are 'boh liao', nonsensical or setup as clickbait aim to infuriate and press people's button. Sorry to have to write much again. I really think this topic has been debated to death (over the years) and I fear the same conclusion will come about. This will be my last rant I promise lah. I want to go back to my gaming since buying so many new games for this CB lockdown. heheheh

-----

Read and don't reply. I think I say more than I need to. Am sure my stalkers will have something shitty to say about me being long winded. But I have to. As the famous Einstein said, “The world is a dangerous place, not because of those who do evil, but because of those who look on and do nothing.”

Thank you for giving us something to read with your flip flopping.

Enjoy your computer games during the lockdown. I spend some time doing exercises at home, making music (play the piano), and using my collection of old electronic test equipment. Ah... and not to forget, I spend a little more time at BW. It's good for my spirit.

I agree with Einstein. I am not passive, and I don't mind replying to your post

May 21, 2020

9 hours ago, Guest Guest said:

I really wanted to sit back and have fun looking at the various posts here and reserve all my comments to a much later date. But this is one post which I really fell in love with and I must comment now. Come.sweetheart, let me give you a cyberkiss!

Thanks, I hope you're handsome to receive the kiss. :redface: Anyway, I don't care already. You can see evidently that members here can't take criticism and worse, can't offer any good solutions either. What good are they really?

I'm just surprised nobody sees this forum as slow moving, boring and dead. Well, guests' comments aren't appreciated. So be it, this shall be my last post.

singalion · May 21, 2020

On 5/20/2020 at 10:58 AM, Guest Six said:

You can see that this forum is dying literally, how many guests and members come here and discuss stuff? It's a shame that many things are not allowed: no exciting pic, no troll, no bickering, no repetition topic as the next moment it will be merged to a 10yr ago topic which nobody cares. So stupid to merge new topic with old one because things happened in 1999 and 2020 are no longer the same anymore. But this forum insistently merge, thinking same wad. Example, simple things like circumcision. Wtf so old old technology in the past yet moderator still merged with new topics about people asking the latest info. You see also laugh. Where got people so free to read through 30pages of old topics before contributing?

I'm totally fine if we don't touch on politics matters. Au contraire, lgbt itself is a sensitive topic that leads to serious criminal offence under 377A. So it's double standard to discuss lgbt topics, isn't it? I also don't like political topics but I feel this is the only time when mod should come in to stop if it goes overboard.

Trolls are expected in forums, why care? Some are funny tbh than seeing members posting unoriginal scripted boring replies. The same as bickering, why huan lo they quarrel? Let them quarrel until the end of times one day they will auto stop - you think they need you to help stop them? This is an adult forum, not primary school forum.

2 hours ago, Guest Six said:

Anyway, I don't care already. You can see evidently that members here can't take criticism and worse, can't offer any good solutions either. What good are they really?

I'm just surprised nobody sees this forum as slow moving, boring and dead. Well, guests' comments aren't appreciated. So be it, this shall be my last post.

After digesting your different posts I have three questions to you:

a) If the Main Forum at BW is literally dying as you claim, then why are you still here and looking into this Forum and even contribute to it???

b) If the Main Forum at BW is slow moving, boring and dead, why do you browse it and look into it?

c) What is the reason why you don't register as a member to BW?

You don't seem persuasive or convincing in my view, because you wouldn't come to the Main Forum (and this is not the only thread at the Main Forum you contributed in the past months) if the Main Forum is dead and boring.

I don't think the people here who responded to you, even if you are only a Guest, read your posts and gave their opinion or rebuttals, how can you say they can't take criticism. It looks more like you can't take the rebuttals from the persons who made an effort to take your posts serious and responded to them.

My main comment to your posts is: You criticise others who give suggestions for improvements but you don't give any good solution yourself at all. What is your proposal? What is your solution?

There is a common name for people the sort you are.

Show us that I am wrong on my assumption.

Edited May 21, 2020 by singalion
.

May 21, 2020

11 hours ago, Guest Caught Telling Lies said:

Since this thread is now on page three, I want to remind everyone of my proposed solutions, which make for the best compromise.

GUEST CTL’S PROPOSED SOLUTIONS

Convert the current Members Lounge into a Members Only Main Forum.

Convert the current Main Forum into a Newcomers & Guests Lounge.

Move the new Members Only Main Forum to first on the menu and the new Newcomers & Guests Lounge to second on the menu.

Move all currently existing threads which have reached at least two pages into the new Members Only Main Forum.

Doing it this way allows the guests to stay and have their own room, while giving priority to the members, as it truthfully should be.

You got to be kidding. The fact that it has reached at least 2 pages, was due "guests" regular contributions and certain Elder's members extremely "lengthy comment". Moving it to the Members Only Main Forum is akin to putting a hyperactive beast to sleep, which is also against LARRY Auntie's wish.

Larry · May 21, 2020

2 hours ago, singalion said:

After digesting your different posts I have three questions to you:

a) If the Main Forum at BW is literally dying as you claim, then why are you still here and looking into this Forum and even contribute to it???

b) If the Main Forum at BW is slow moving, boring and dead, why do you browse it and look into it?

c) What is the reason why you don't register as a member to BW?

I don't think he will respond if he keeps to what he had said, just like I had stated that I will not correspond or communicate to all guests starting Tuesday 19th 723 pm.

4 hours ago, Guest Six said:

So be it, this shall be my last post.

Edited May 21, 2020 by Larry

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