Keep on doing what you do

Joe Six Pack said:

That was a movie?
he's got a hot hand. They say that for basketball

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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cool_Hand_Luke

I had to work for two years as a clerk in a hardware store.
First my supervisor thought I was the Incredible Hulk.
Then he thought I was Luke.
Then I was gone after I threatened legal action against the insurance/benefits/pension guy who tried to defraud me, and a manager.

My super was right on both counts.



BTW, Game Theory kind of says there is no hot hand.
http://books.google.com/books?id=KKwBZ0PYPXQC&pg=PA9&lpg=PA9&dq="hot+hand"+game+theory+dixit+nalebuff&source=bl&ots=VSCAEeIhyr&sig=KM1kg7IZVFLXMpVitWn65gQTCwQ&hl=en&ei=RKfoTJruFcPflgexqqWeCw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CBMQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q&f=false

I believe in the "hot hand"

I remember one family game with friends, touch football. I was quarterbacking one team, and after a while, it was four scores to none. To even it up, I switched over to the other team. I went four scores to none on that team too. Thus each team was tied, but I was eight scores to none. I was able to call every pass that day, in the huddle I would say who the pass was going to. A couple of years later, my brother Shannon said, "At least you weren't able to go with the receiver you wanted to throw to, we made you change your throw."
Well Shannon, not really. I anticipated all the counter moves in the huddle, a look that way, a double pump that way, but that day it always went to the person that was predetermined in the huddle.
I would call that a hot hand.

A different game, in a flag league, six different people on our team threw an interception to the left corner on the other team. We lost 68-0
Either we all had a cold hand, or that corner was getting red hot.

The following week, even though the other team had an NFL quarterback that was between teams, we only lost four scores to one. Not too bad considering they were a lot better then the team that beat us 68-0

If I have this right,
multiple plaintiffs allege that the defendant

is grandiose
abuses power
is a "dufus"
damages this forum
gives bad advice
is not fair
uses ad hominem tactics
has been widely banned
incites discord
causes confusion
is rude
plays word games
has a conflict of interest

The defendant pleads not guilty.

These posts are just more examples of how determined some people are to control this forum the same way they do many others. Most of these people have been banned several times, under several names, using several email and IP addresses. Many times they will start a post just to cause trouble, or to answer their own question using a different name. These “fake” threads or post are simply intended to provoke controversy, just to discredit or try to get someone they dislike banned.

These same few people will show to be “friends” on many forums. I am sure they also email each other and devise strategies to try and discredit Gary and anyone else who really tries to help people “do it themselves”. Even private messages had to be cut off, because these people were advising new posters to go to a different forum, or at least discrediting the information they received here.

Terry Loves Forum is the best of all, and probably read more than all the other forums combined. Other forums don’t get the amount of traffic that Terry’s forum does, because posters want to hear from people like Gary who has tons of experience, rather than from people who want to confuse the poster into calling a “professional”.

This argument would not be happening now, if these posters were not back again doing the same things that got them banned several times before. The only complaints I see are from these same posters time and time again.

Hey Valveman, perhaps you'se guys should check the IP address for Guest. He was the guy that started this thread, but you already know who guest is don't you? YOU guys opened this can of worms and now that you don't like what you are hearing I suppose it's time to ban everyone again. Might as well go the extra mile and delete the entire thread, but I'd bet there are those that have already copied the contents for further use.

Your post above could not be more wrong if it had to. Nobody is trying to control this forum with the exception of you and Gary and you have done a darn good job thus far of shutting down any dissenting opinions. Fake threads, again why don't you go ahead and run the IP on Guest and then get back to us LOL

Yes, many of us are friends on other forums. So maybe we need to get rid of the friend function because god forbid anyone chat with each other. Are you guys really that paranoid? I guarantee that friends or not, nobody has ever conspired with me to do anything to anybody. Sure, we comment on the shinnanagins here but plotting against you? Get some tin foil and make the hat man. BTW, thanks for admitting the reason why your paranoia is responsible for killing the PM feature. Everybody knew why but now that's in the open.

Again, show me posts on the pump and filter forums that have told the OP to call a professional? I can show you a crap load of them on the plumbers threads and quite a few of them were made by the moderators themselves.

This would not have ever happened had the moderators here done their jobs. Had you done you job there would not be these complaints. Had you and Gary not spent so much time on the phone together exchanging your paranoid ideas, none of this would have happened and had you not banned a whole bunch of guys that were RIGHT and been fair, none of this would have happened either.

However to cut this short, thanks for coming out of the closet and showing the membership who is pulling the strings here, though we all knew that anyway. Perhaps you and Gary should start your own forum rather that continue to screw this one to the wall.

So stick the head back into the sand and thanks for banning everyone again but at least it's all out in the open now and maybe, just maybe Terry himself will undo the years of damage you two have done here...... but I doubt it.

And a warning to That Guy, one more supportive comment from you and you can expect to be banned also. You really need to watch your back around here.

The original post was quoted fully from a different web site.
Of course we don't really know who posted it, but it's just one of many rants against me on the Internet from anonymous people that hide behind keyboards.
Terry

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Thatguy,
Cool Hand Luke, I get it now.

Gary Slusser is Cool Hand Luke.

The guards and the "Boss" of the guards is teh businesses that work on softeners and have gotten Cool Hand Luke "Gary" banned from the other web sites.
Everytime Gary escapes and finds a place to post, they run over and shackle him up and bring him back.

Terry is like the government, he owns the prison, but seems far and away and aloof to the problems at eht prison.

So be cause teh guards get to have so much fun beating Cool hand luke, it becomes a game.
I get it.

When i google softener forum, this forum comes up first. Does it for you too?

There are other search engines besides Google..

Besides that,,, Yes master I will take the seat at the back of the bus and keep the mouth shut.

Every one that posts here brings different ideas to the table, but some are not liked.

Joe Six Pack said:

. . .I get it now.

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You're having too much fun. . .

So is the movie a parable or a fable about this forum?

"A parable . . .illustrates a moral or religious lesson.
. . .fables use animals, plants, inanimate objects, and forces of nature as characters, while parables generally feature human characters. It is a type of analogy."

It comes up first in Bing too.
How many others is it coming up first?

I was talking to a friend the other other day about a fuel pump for his boat? Byh the time he got it dionosed and ordredrd and installed, he lost $50,000 for the week, that he didn't get to go 9out in the bo9at.
How carzy is that?

NOt the hot hand for him that week.

A lesson?
Hey, ypure the one that posted it. I thoguh you knew.

"Just a Stalker" mentioned that he wasn't happy that Gary didn't do freebie service calls on mail order items, So Mr Stalker was unhappy. He wanted to remind me of that. Somehow, I'm not feeling it for Stalker on that one.
We like to be paid for our time.
Sorry......
I have plenty of customers myself, and I take care of them, but like many business owners, and I know Gary is one of those too, driving around town doing work for free isn't going to buy many groceries.

when to dis/agree, when to let it slide, when to redirect... decisions, decisions.

Ultimately we all want to find a graceful way out of any situation.
Sometimes we avoid being blunt.
Any one of us.

My readings have given me enough evidence to see that at least one moderator is generally not interested in letting people move on gracefully.
He hammers.

Thank you for participating in the forums and we hope you will take this reminder in the spirit in which it is given!

Users are expected to behave in a friendly manner towards others. Postings that we feel reflect badly on another user (or a class of users) are not allowed. Differences of opinions are fine; post in a neutral manner without sarcastic, condescending or denigrating tones. Statements addressed to or meant for particular users are not allowed in the forums; such messages can be reformulated as neutral statements addressed to the crowd. Any statement we feel is argumentative will be deleted.
If you have a problem with another user, please be gentle in reacting.


Hope this helps.

Here's my take on this:

I agree with the OP that most of the threads in the water softener section turn from a simple question to a multi-page argument on how to size, what to consider, etc. I know that Gary has experience in the area and it is good that he shares it with DIYers, but the mess that the threads turn into do not serve the OP or other users in any helpful way. I've always thought that this section needed better moderation, but needs to be moderated by someone level-headed and fair. It is good if that person knows the subject, but it isn't good if that person takes sides and deletes/edits posts so that only their side is shown.

I am a mod on another forum, and I find the following works well:

- No attacks on other members allowed (and even more so with moderators)

- Let people post their thoughts/opinions without editing/deleting them unless it is spam, vulgar, or otherwise violates the rules of the site. If the post fits into this area, it gets deleted and the poster gets a warning. They pull it again, they get a vacation.

- Multiple accounts are not allowed. If someone (who is banned) comes back on another account, the new account is banned and the ban on the old account is extended. If the old account is not banned, they get a pm asking why they have more than one account and are asked which they want to keep because all but one are getting banned.

- Perhaps this site has had problems with PMs, but it would be nice to have them back. Often, I may want to ask someone directly a question, but I don't want to start a new thread on the subject. It also becomes useful when reporting an issue. I know that you can report a post, but if you have a more general problem (like how a mod handles something); it would be a good way to report the problem directly to Terry.

- Threads like this one would not stay around. They get killed on the spot. I know that the OP is frustrated and needs to vent, but this isn't the best way to do it. It just stirs things up.

- If a mod is not being fair, then that person needs to be relieved of their duties.

geniescience said:

My readings have given me enough evidence to see that at least one moderator is generally not interested in letting people move on gracefully.
He hammers.

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If you are talking about me, the subject of this thread, I have been a moderator for about the last week. If not me, who are you talking about?

geniescience said:

Thank you for participating in the forums and we hope you will take this reminder in the spirit in which it is given!

Click to expand...

If that is what you are thinking should be told to 'offenders', it has been. It has been for at least 2 years. As we see, it doesn't work or work very well.

geniescience said:

Users are expected to behave in a friendly manner towards others. Postings that we feel reflect badly on another user (or a class of users) are not allowed.

Click to expand...

But they have been allowed for years and I have agreed with that instead of tight control (nukeman) of what and how people interact like many other forums where the moderators wield power based on PC standards (and their power hungry egos) instead of letting guys be guys.

IOWs I have rarely complained to 'management', but others with an agenda that is usually hidden complained about me constantly since 2002. And mainly due to my helping people (since Jan 1997) not to have to call them for service and my selling water treatment on the internet (since 2003), which they say takes food off their table, money out of their wallet etc. etc.. I've been out of business going on 6 months and as we see, they still are unhappy.

The OP in this thread threatened to get me banned here over a year ago. It could be said that I took him up on his challenge and he lost. Now he's a very sore loser, which he was a loser all along but now his ego is hurting. Below I'll paste an email from him that I received last night.

geniescience said:

Differences of opinions are fine; post in a neutral manner without sarcastic, condescending or denigrating tones. Statements addressed to or meant for particular users are not allowed in the forums; such messages can be reformulated as neutral statements addressed to the crowd. Any statement we feel is argumentative will be deleted.

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That feminizing of the American male thing was done this time last year from late spring until March this year and people were banned because they wouldn't abide by it. And IMO some mods were showing favoritism and one or two was really out to get me, but failed.

geniescience said:

If you have a problem with another user, please be gentle in reacting.

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Gentle... sounds like non confrontational fem speak to me. We are well drillers, plumbers, pump and water treatment guys, we don't stick our pinky out when sipping our imported or domestic beer or other adult beverages. When I smack my knuckles because the pipe wrench slipped again, I don't do gentle well, or especially when being attacked in a forum. I give back a bit more than I'm given. And you want me and other knuckle smashers to be gentle with our words... Although I used to, I don't post on that type forum. I was a moderator on one and wasn't strict enough and ended up banned by the admin when I refused to be a mod on another forum there; he accused me of lying, that was his excuse for banning me. That was in early 2005 after being a mod for many months, and 2 of the guys that have posted in this thread had complained about me "typing for dollars" there. Andy Christensen and Steve Silverman; a Kinetico salesman and a customer that was upset with the way I talked to him while he whined about his email address being pasted in my forum as part of a nasty email he sent me. He was going to sue me for that if I didn't delete the address or the thread and then called me to threaten to stop me from posting anywhere he could. Which he has done. He posted here yesterday, over 5 yrs later, in a very long rant and never said a word about the softener he bought from me in Jul 2004 having any problems. He's been doing the same type rant for all those years; here and on all other forums I posted in. Just a lament to get me banned or otherwise curtailed if possible. He was banned again here because of it.

geniescience said:

Hope this helps.

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Who is it supposed to help?

Here's the email. He figgered wrong, again. And I couldn't care less who Guest is, he posts just like nmhmaster, walley hayes, peter griffin, another voice, dano6401 etc. and says the same things using the same words and style. Same IP#s too. I'm thinking he's just another Steve.

On 11/21/2010 5:46 PM, don juan <djuan9976@gmail.com> wrote:

methinks the woman doth protest too much.


Terry: your moderator just did it again: a lot of words, a confrontational tone, lots of 'you'. And non-graceful blasting: he named names to sully people. Do we all see the picture the same way? As nukeman said it too. How can anyone respond happily to this? ("Have an unpleasant read"?)

Hope this helps.

The original post was quoted fully from a different web site.
Of course we don't really know who posted it, but it's just one of many rants against me on the Internet from anonymous people that hide behind keyboards.
I prefer that the plumbers posting here use their real names, it helps keep things civil. The Internet would be a kinder place to be sure if they all did that Geniescience and Nukeman.
You will note the Gary and Cary have their websites and contacts listed on their sites.
The person that posted the complaint? I'm sure I know who that is, but then no, I don't know who it is, that poster has used so many fake names and locations that it's silly to even guess who he is or what the true agenda is. But everywhere that poster has gone, forums just dry up. Since this forum is now number one for softeners, I'm not letting it dry up like the rest.
Seems simple to me. You do realize that I've been asked by plumbers and manufactures to quit doing the forums. As much as some of you enjoy reading and going to the forums, not everybody is happy about it.
In the city that I live in, the mayor is getting rid of our public forum television station. I'm not going to allow this forum to bite the dust like the other forums out there.

Terry,

You make value happen. Wherever you go.

B/ Monetizing it is a challenge: how to make a yield, significant and directly caused by the forums, since you are providing value to many people. Many good ways to do this. (Not just advertising).
C/ In these forums, knowledge is dumped and organized. The more people click here the more it costs: bandwidth and servers are one cost, and another cost is the hassle that happens when people interact. You are now their Dad. Let's face it. Get a handle on it. As your site grows, your hassle-management time grows. Every minute has demands on it. A day will come when you can't handle the (maintenance, overhead, hassles, decisions). If I were in your shoes, I would under-react as one way to save my energy. You do this. But I would also feel free to direct a moderator to become more under-reactive instead of acting as he normally does. It discredits you seriously when he slides down to scummy behavioral levels.
D/ Worldwide, in every culture today and throughout history, the biggest reason for money to change hands is something like: (gifting, donating, giving to young people or to old people or to peers who need support, scholarships, charity, helping people out, supporting good actions, donating to reward good deeds, etc). Your vision has to be shared, by talking about it with contributors who you work well with, and who agree to work well together. If you take a step forward without sharing a vision, you achieve a fraction of what that step could have achieved. Some contributors will be confused as to where you are going, at every small change. You can receive voluntarily decided upon amounts of money given by both anonymous donators and by signed-in participants. Implementing this will work best when done within the framework of a large long term vision that you share with others. It will produce the largest amount of money, with the most love and admiration attached, with the fastest acceptance. It can be structured as part of the stability equation. Moderators and operators need some reward at some point in time. A moderator selling his services is a known quantity and a known conflict, so the situation can be managed.
- The way the world works these days, it makes no sense to give $ to a grown man who is already able to take care of himself and who acts independent. To grow the forums beyond the current state, you need a plan and an implementation. A plan to professionalize this business of channeling knowledge and participants.
E/ Choosing who to (favor, encourage, foster, promote, help out, bring forward, pull along with you, etc) and then "directing" them has always been anyone's challenge, anywhere. It's your judgment, every second. You are good at this, generally speaking. As a part of your vision, plan to have newer roles and responsibilities farmed out to more and more people.

On forums, I've read somewhere that 10 views for each reply is a normal ratio.
The "Caroma Dual Flush watersense toilet review" has 1000 for each reply, the highest ratio I've ever seen.

As the ratio for this thread increases it becomes increasingly important how this thread goes. It's attracting attention.

Yeah, like slowing down to see a car wreck.

Greetins all. Terry... Thank you, Everybody else have a happy and very safe Thanks Giving and I wish you and your loved ones all the best.