Thanks guys - but I have done all I can do.

[TheCollector]

Hi guys

Thank you for all your PMs and emails over the past few weeks. I certainly understand how you feel, and sorry for not being able to answer you all individually. :neutral:

The reason I have been away from this forum recently was mainly to try to illustrate the problems that Fanmail.biz is having, and has been having for some time. Unfortunately I do not have the time to be on here 24/7 - few of us do. Certainly none of our globals or moderators should feel personally threatened, as has been the case in recent weeks.

I, like many of you have my own career (or schooling), and I get on here as and when I can. I have raised your comments and concerns to Admin now more times than I can explain, and for the most part I have been overruled. I just don't get understood - like I am speaking a different language - or at least that is how it appears at present.

If I was asked what to do with the forum, I would like to put some more substantial rules in place. I came up with the original moderator/veterans/globals and the trainees ranks. They might not have been ideal, but at least in some way they began to get a basic structure to this site. I would improve on this, but I feel I would not be backed up. Therefore I am leaving the decision to you all.

If you feel you want me to be involved any more, then please tell me and copy Admin. Or if you are happy with how things are going then please remain silent.

I will not be on the boards again as an admin or moderator until I hear from a majority of the team. The likelihood is that I will lose my account now anyway

It makes me really sad as I have known some of you for a very long time. I am one of the few members who actually works in the industry and has been on here pretty-much from the start - so I know what makes actors and celebs tick! I currently feel this forum has let both itself and its members down, and until I hear otherwise I do not wish to associate either my help or my professional name to this board.

Of course if the Admin wants to contact me then I will be only too happy to hear from him, but I sadly feel that my time with Fanmail.biz has come to a sad and sorry end. The "Fanmail.biz" idea had such a long way to go, but not if it is being lead by a narrow-minded leadership. I desperately hope for better things for this board, but if I don't hear back from you all then I will quietly disappear. . . .

I so wish this forum was similar to the one I always wanted to log onto back in 2004/5/6, and not such a place of argument or confrontation as it seems to be now. Maybe if our new members felt like they could come on here and learn something without being disrespected, or feeling the forum leaders/members had the right to disrespect them, mainly by point of fact of the board being devoid of sensible rules, then maybe we wouldn't have so many unanswered posts, and the members wouldn't want to continually fight with one another?

Maybe we would have moderators who wanted to be on here to help others out, rather than just for the title. Maybe we would have leaders with experience they wanted to share, and coach younger members in the hobby?

I'll let you be the judges . . . . Admin you know how to reach me if you are at all bothered . . .

In the meantime goodbye to you all, I have enjoyed my time with you, and sincerely wish you the best of luck . . . .

I think you are going to need it

Ian :neutral:

email: iancashmore@googlemail.com
Internet Movie Database: http://www.imdb.com/name/nm1960375/
Google: http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=ian+cashmore
Official website: http://www.iancashmore.net

[lutherjw]

I honestly don't understand how anyone could be "happy with how things are going." I know I haven't been around as much as I would like to, but it's clear that the forum is going down the tubes.

With all due respect to admin, it seems like he is not willing to take other's suggestions into account when making decisions. Personally, I don't understand why people are chosen as global moderators/admins if their opinions are not taken into account.

For what it's worth, I highly wish that you would stay active. You're one of the few voices of reason left, and have been a great friend through the years...

Joel

[cernan]

I for one agree with everything that Ian has said. When I joined in September of 2005, this site was a wonderful resource for collectors. Now it is barely recognizable. The Moderator-wannabees are in it simply for the rank and title, and that is a fact that has become obvious. When we bring things up again and again, it is ignored...

When every single Global Moderator and virtually every single Moderator on this site is calling for the abolishment of the TM System, it still stands... Countless threads have been created in response to the spammers that are threatening and frightening many young members, yet the chatbox, a tool of these individuals that enable them to evade bans, still stands. People are receiving DEATH THREATS, not pornographic pictures. This isn't something that you can ignore...

There is probably a good reason why many of the Moderators aren't active anymore... How can we continue to do our jobs on a site when our opinions are disregarded and the Administrator goes on believing that everything is normal when in reality it is anything but normal. I have had enough of this... When I joined two and a half years ago as an Autograph Expert, I thought that this site was a friendly place for discussion and sharing collecting stories... This isn't the same place anymore... Just look at the chatbox now... Even as I am typing this, we have two members arguing...

Ian, you do still take other people's opinions into account and can see that the forum is going to collapse soon if things aren't done immediately. You see reality, not a garbled version of it... Like Joel said, you are one of the few left...

[ozzman]

Ian, I really wish you wouldnt leave. Just like everyone else said you are one of the few voices of reason left! I wish the forums would go back to the way it was when I first joined, no bickering and everyone was there to help each other out. I hope and wish you would decide to stay but if not I know I for one and probably everyone else will understand.