The site is going down the pan. As a previous poster said instead of reporting local information it is now becomming a mouthpiece for one political party. Time for an investagation into what is happening here. I see that the Village Hall is mentioned as a link on the site. I hope that the great Village Hall family does not support the political direction that the site now appears to be taken. Leave politics to the ballott box and keep it off this site. Perhaps it is time for someone to set up a propper Spooner Row site where they publish events in the Village etc.
(This is an independent website managed by volunteers. It is not connected to any group or organisation featured on this site, nor affiliated to any political party. Webstation)
-- Edited by webstation on Saturday 26th of September 2015 06:48:34 PM
This site is excellent in my opinion and discusses a whole range of things. You just don't like it that Spooner Row residents finally have a vehicle to express opinions that you don't happen to agree with. If people wish to discuss political issues that affect their local environment, they are perfectly justified in doing so. As far as I can see people of all political persuasion express themselves on here. If you want an investigation I suggest you contact Columbo.
I don't think it is a mouthpiece for a particular political party, i think it is unlikely that Labour or Conservative comments are blocked. It is true that there is a disproportionate number of posts from a representative of the Liberal Democrats but it would seem that is because he is the only one who bothers to take an interest in the board and bothers to post under his own name. Other political parties are very welcome so post something, if they have anything at all to add, I for one would be very happy to hear from them.
There does seem to be a limited number of posters who seem intent on stirring up controversy at every opportunity, it makes me wonder how brave people would be if they were forced to identify themselves when they post, we will now go back into the loop of arguing the virtues of allowing or blocking anonymous posting.
I don't tend to bother posting very often because if any subject is raised, and a reply is sent someone jumps down your throat and starts posting loads of aggressive nonsense, the one last week where someone posted a useful comment about their success of installing Windows 10 and within a couple of replies it ended up ranting on about new housing development and people being encouraged to leave the village. I mean honestly, HOW THE HELL do those things get linked together?? I would love to see you lot at a dinner party or in the pub, is that how you speak to each other in real life? (PLEASE don't take this as an opportunity to pounce on the housing debate here, yes we all know it is very important to some, but please, if you must, start a new thread)
I would like to see some form of accountability to the postings, it does not have to be in your own name, i dont want funny looks in the playground, but posting by user name would be better. People could set up their own nicknames which are backed up by validated e-mail addresses which only the administrators have access to. This would mean posters could comment without fear of identification if that is desired, but abuse, bullying and inappropriate comments could be blocked/followed up by the administrators who would be able to contact the owner of the username by use of the registered e-mail address. This is how most other forums work ( this is the only anonymous forum board I know of ). I would also prefer immediate posting of comments, having identified users would facilitate this move from proactive moderation to reactive moderation.
The efforts of the volunteer moderators are appreciated, this is not a dig at them, but something has to be done to improve the flow of information.
This must be the worst site around. It should be called the doom and gloom site. Close it down and start a fresh with as the poster suggests accountability by those who run the site.
I look at this site often and it's great - both amusing and interesting. Why are you using the site if you don't like it? How about setting up your own site rather than moaning about this one?
As there has been some discussion about this message forum, I thought users might be interested to see that Spooner Row Message Board has received 9,243 views for September, which is extraordinary for our tiny village. There is obviously a lot of interest in this site.
It is not the views that are the issue. It is the missleading content that someone allows to be posted that is of concern. It is all about stop this stop that etc. Bring it back to where it was a site to promote events.
To the web team keep up the good work,without people like yourselves people would not get important news and views of village life from people who live in the village and to residents who have left but like to keep up what is happening at home.
It is not the views that are the issue. It is the missleading content that someone allows to be posted that is of concern. It is all about stop this stop that etc. Bring it back to where it was a site to promote events.
There is no misleading content. You seem to want to suppress what people are concerned about. You appear to sound like a representative from the council? Residents in Spooner Row no longer believe in the "Tugging of the Forelock". You need to get in the real world of social media. Have you ever looked on Twitter!
The Spooner Row website is an excellent site and we must value the web station organisers for all their work. They are not biased in their views, and merely put forward the comments of the village. Where else can we air these views ? It is a terrific medium for discussion and long may it last; we cannot close our eyes to what is happening in local politics at the moment.
The only one ranting here is you. You dont like people in the village having their say on anything. Why are you visiting this popular site if you dont like it? Instead of moaning, go and create your own site, Silfield needs an on-line forum, so go and do one for them.
Looking at the activeboard.com master page it seems to imply that there is a hosting charge for this site. Is someone paying for the Spoonerrow.activeboard.com site or is it advertising funded?
(The host site provides free forum hosting. No funding is made from advertising or other. The site is run by volunteers for the local community. Webstation)
-- Edited by webstation on Thursday 8th of October 2015 11:25:03 AM
Does the person who moans and gripes realise the message board is run by volunteers for free,they dont get paid for doing all this work.They should not get grief from the odd person or two who does not want a free information board letting people know what is happening locally.
We should be grateful there are not banner adverts on this site advertising what or whatever things the volunteers want.
All the time I have been reading this village info page I have never once seen the volunteers ask for help or cash in any form.
Dont knock someone who loves their village and is willing to spend their own time and experience setting up this site free to all and believes each person who puts a comment should be allowed to so without threat or malice.
I however think all messages should have a name attached to them such as "lost in translate" for example.
Can we have a vote for the end of Anonymous posting and the introduction of instant posting ( I.e reactive moderation rather than pro active moderation) please ( probably 2 votes needed not 1).
I would be very happy if people were forced to take responsibility for their comments and to enable the flow of conversation rather than constant bitching and moaning and personal agendas.
(Sorry, no. This message board is moderated to stop Spam postings which occurred before it was moderated. The Anonymous feature is there because some people feel uncomfortable to comment on sensitive issues. Please see disclaimer regarding taking responsibility for postings: http://www.spoonerrow.f2s.com/message_board.htm Users have the choice to write their own name, a user or other name or to remain anonymous. Webstation)
-- Edited by webstation on Friday 9th of October 2015 02:38:59 PM
Can we have a vote for the end of Anonymous posting and the introduction of instant posting ( I.e reactive moderation rather than pro active moderation) please ( probably 2 votes needed not 1).
I would be very happy if people were forced to take responsibility for their comments and to enable the flow of conversation rather than constant bitching and moaning and personal agendas
Is this post not a tinsy bit paranoid? Who or what has a "personal agenda"? It looks to me like a group of local people just chatting on all sorts of things. Local politics with the over-development of the village seems to be a lively subject for both those against it and those who support it. To call people chatting as "bitching and moaning" about expressing their opinions is not nice and a bit moany on your behalf.
Sorry that some do not like their profit making and selfish schemes being openly discussed but this is what true democracy is about .
Admin do a fantastic job , free of charge by the way !! but I always try to keep the information I provide as just that , whether it be a Planning application, the Tour of Britain or an eclipse of the Moon.
Well done Admin. My apologies to all if I get a little political at times, but I do try and moderate it to the less extreme and Admin quite rightly calls me to task at times.
Viewings for this message board have continued to increase. Since October 2016, viewings have been in five figures including 13,758 for February, which is the highest monthly total to date. Not bad for a small village!
The site statistics for this message board gave a whopping 15,056 viewings for the month of June 2017. The topics must be striking the right note. This is the highest figure to date.
Good to see but I must warn a note of caution. I know from experience South Norfolk monitor this site , the planners more especially as far as I am concerned and we get a lot of interest from Wymondham and out of county developers looking to build in the village.
I have to say that some of that interest is malevolent but it is good that people are reading it, even if they don't like it but this site is a force and we must remember there are those , not so far away who have never heard of it such as in Wattlefield and Suton so spread the word and that there are those who don't do computers and never will
It annoys me intensely that South Norfolk and the Govt think we all have them and all use them, at 0.4 of a Meg on a good day !!
Admin do a superb very unsung hero job of this. Thank you
Really? South Norfolk monitors this site? Then it must be monitoring other community sites too? If this is so, then it would be part of someone's job description. Is this costed for and on whose authority remit is this being done? South Norfolk planners should be monitoring what is being said on their own site with planning applications instead. We need to see some details on this. Is our District Councillor back on the scene yet, to look at what is going on? Is monitoring community websites a wise and responsible way in which to spend precious council resources when there are so many cutbacks?
Really? South Norfolk monitors this site? Then it must be monitoring other community sites too? If this is so, then it would be part of someone's job description. Is this costed for and on whose authority remit is this being done? South Norfolk planners should be monitoring what is being said on their own site with planning applications instead. We need to see some details on this. Is our District Councillor back on the scene yet, to look at what is going on? Is monitoring community websites a wise and responsible way in which to spend precious council resources when there are so many cutbacks?
Yes, it's quite Common. Will come unde the role of UX/CX or social / digital media management. Most organisations will do this. It will be the same people who are responsible for the Facebook and Twitter/Instagram feeds for the council and will be justified as consumer engagement. It is perfectly valid. If this is totally alien to you it is probably because you are not the target demographic for this type of interaction, but that doesn't make it wrong.
I can understand the council being responsible for monitoring its own Facebook and Twitter feeds for UX/CX, but I thought this forum was independent of the council. It seems strange the planners are monitoring this site, according to a previous posting. Why would they be concerning themselves with monitoring customer engagement and experience on here, unless they are providing it?
(This website is independent and not affiliated with any Council or other body. Webstation)
-- Edited by webstation on Monday 3rd of July 2017 02:46:25 PM
I would say it is actually a good thing. If it is monitored, it would be logical to think that comments are noted and reported on to someone for review or action as would happen with other social channels. The whole point of a open notice board is to project your thoughts to others, why would it be a bad thing if the focal point of the majority of the comments is listening?
Many organisations harvest significant amounts of information from all sorts of data sources and perform sophisticated analytics against the information gained. It also might not be a 'person' sitting in an office reviewing notice board pages on an individual basis, but may be an automated process which performs sentiment analysis or keyword tracking across a range of sites which have been selected by various organisations. SNDC might employ a company to see how likely an imminent mutiny is.
As to why would they monitor it if they don't provide it, the answer to that is easy, someone else is doing the legwork for them, free customer/resident research.
That's good then, they can monitor and record how dissatisfied we are and use that as an opportunity to improve their service and performance and increase customer satisfaction. Question is, with all this readily available information, why have things not already improved at the council?
okay I will be very frank and open about this , which I know is not the norm for Polticians.
I am a terrible cynic and have been very rude about Planners in the past who are probably just doing their job which is to comply with the will of their political masters at South Norfolk and higher Goverment who all think we live in a rural community, have buses and trains at our finger tips with superb street lighting and drainage and shops next door, with loads of school places etc. Of course we do not have these and planning permissions should be guided by these factors, or more importantly the absence of them, but let us be kind and say, some we do not want.
Unfortunately Policy from on high is build more houses and sod the local objections and lack of infrastructure , hence our max permitted numbers of houses are ignored and sharp suited planning consultants , usually the better head hunted planners from Local Authorities run rings around those planners who are left and weak willed councillors desperate to please central Govt because in some cases they see a career in politics.
Being a vocal critic has resulted in my being gently 'carpetted' by my own party suitably armed with pages of print outs from this site produced for them, obviously by South Norfolk.
I did not take it lying down but I did tone down my critiscisms and now always base them upon proven facts and policies. Unfortunately there are are so many policies the sharp suits cherry pick them to order and sometimes one suspects they are some background influences at play. No word search engine, people on the ground trying to get us to bend to their will or conveniently forgetting to tell us things until they know it is all to late and you were consulted , and noting those who do not bend!!
From Douglas Adams and hitchikers guide the the Galaxy , the Earth was destroyed to make way for a new pan galactic highway ( which was never built) all because no one had objected to the plans based in the planning office at Alpha Centauri.
I feel like that sometimes as far as Planning is concerned
Yes I was, but no apology was offered by me for doing my job to represent the electorate and telling South Norfolk and others that Planning is quite fundmentally flawed.
It does not go down well and I am seen as a loose cannon which many do not like both in-house and outside it.
The last time I looked, freedom of speech was still allowed in this country. You are doing a good job speaking out about planning issues that are just not right and even unlawful at times. Keep up the good work. You are also entitled to express your opinion and by others trying to stifle you, does make us wonder as to what is it they are afraid of and trying to hide from the public.
For anyone interested, the viewings on the Spooner Row Message Board have continued to increase with the highest number of 15,557 recorded in February 2018.
The total number of viewings to date is over 700,000. Looking forward to hitting the million mark.
