RootsChat.Com
England (Counties as in 1851-1901) => England => Lancashire => Topic started by: Duck on Monday 27 October 08 20:06 GMT (UK)
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Please could someone explain why nearly every thread on the Lancashire Lookup Offers board has been locked, surely we all didn't infringe the copyright laws ??? ??? ???
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Hi Simon
Its the same on most county boards, its so people start a new thread for the lookups that they want. If they didnt do that people would be posting lookups for different people on the same thread ;)
ricky
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I don't quite understand ???
You go to the Lancashire Lookup Offers board, see a message that meets your requirements and ask a question ???
My PNE Player Career Info thread has been locked, that information isn't copyrighted ???
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Ricky is quite right - threads get somewhat muddled if you have some old requests on there, some new and we prefer it if people's offers are locked and a new thread started for each request ( on the Request Board, naturally).
It's nothing to do with copyright on this occasion.
Kind regards, Arranroots ;)
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It's nothing to do with copyright on this occasion.
Kind regards, Arranroots ;)
That was not what the PM I recieved earlier said..........
Hi Duck
As per my previous PM, I'm afraid that I have had to remove your Lancs offer because of the complaints from CD suppliers.
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You're welcome Simon.
I don't know about the PM earlier, so I can't speculate. I don't think anything I have told you is inaccurate though. PM me if you want to discuss further.
Kind regards, Arranroots ;)
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Oh you've edited in a PM (naughty actually as PMs aren't supposed to be posted on the boards) which must be from a Copyright Ed about offering information from a copyrighted source.
That's a different matter & you must talk to the C Eds about that.
A ;)
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Oh you've edited in a PM (naughty actually as PMs aren't supposed to be posted on the boards) which must be from a Copyright Ed about offering information from a copyrighted source.
That's a different matter & you must talk to the C Eds about that.
A ;)
The only bit I edited was " Hi DucK" and the name of the person who sent it
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I meant that the red bit wasn't there when I replied initially.
Never mind - it seems to be outwith my expertise!
:)
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Can I just add that I don't look here much these days, having been ill but I did get an email yesterday saying that a new post had been made to a topic I had offered help in (it's a pretty obscure one), asking for info / photos of an area I live in but have no genealogical research in. Because of that I was prompted to come into the thread and pick up the request. I received another email today saying the topic has been locked. Should anyone else be looking for Dolphinholme information, I won't know about it unless I happen upon it, which seems a shame really.
I haven't done any research myself for a bit because of work and then ill-health but it doesn't mean I'm not willing to help on the rare occasions when it falls into my field of capabilities. :)
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Hi KBC
sorry to hear you've been unwell - hope you're lots better now?
Actually your situation demonstrates admirably why we like to keep Offers locked!
In the past, we've had situations where people have made an offer, not expecting much "take-up" and have been absolutely swamped with requests, questions and follow-ups. In a situation where the Offerer is unwell or unable to devote much time to helping for whatever reason (sometimes unforeseen) this means that they can choose which requests to answer and they shouldn't at any stage feel under pressure to reply.
Often, if the original poster is unable to fulfil an offer, there are others who can do the job. It isn't often that folk have unique material to offer.
Genealogy is a slow process and if folk have to wait a week or two for a satisfactory reply - well, it's only what we had to do before the internet - and it might well be worth the wait!
Kind regards, Arranroots ;)
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K.B.C
Should anyone else be looking for Dolphinholme information, I won't know about it unless I happen upon it,
I know what you mean ;) I have never seen the point of offering a lookup for one specific thing when it gets locked ??? .By doing that you don't get any request,till as you say, you happen on it.Because you haven't posted to the new request you don't receive the rootschat Topic reply.
I don't see the point of offering a lookup in the first place really.Thats just my honest opinion though ;D
celia
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I wondered why i never had one reply to my thread of offering to lookup service men who died in ww1 &2 privet and cwgc graves. I really do not see the point of my thread been there in this case?
Migky >:(
http://www.rootschat.com/forum/index.php/topic,273156.0.html
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All lookup offers should be locked. For some reason the Lancs lookup offers board did not have a USE OF THIS BOARD message like all the other lookup offers boards. This message should be read before offers are made and it clearly states that offers will be locked by the moderators.
HOW TO OFFER LOOKUPS
If you have census information or other information that you are willing to carry out lookups for then please state in your subject line the name and details of your lookup resources. In the body of the message you should then enter details of the lookup material that you have and any requirements for performing a lookup, eg, 'address needed'. Please include the following line at the very end of your message:
"For a look up request please start a new topic in the CENSUS and RESOURCE LOOKUP REQUEST board for this county"
We will ask the moderators to "lock" each "LOOKUP OFFER" as soon as possible after it has been posted so that people cannot reply to it directly.
If you then go to the Request Board for the county and click the large NOTIFY button, you will receive a notification when a new request is posted in the relevent county.
Please do not offer to do any lookups where this would breach any copyright restrictions.
Apologies for the omission.
copyright_editor
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Any chance you could remove my offer of a look up then.
Ta
Migky ;)
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We will ask the moderators to "lock" each "LOOKUP OFFER" as soon as possible after it has been posted so that people cannot reply to it directly.
why not expand that to include the logic behind the statement - obviously people are confused ?
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Only one of the Scottish County Boards (Aberdeenshire) has a 'Look up Offers' child board:
http://www.rootschat.com/forum/index.php/board,84.0.html
so I'm not quite clear how the Offers on the other Scottish boards differ from the Eng & Wales County boards.
Gadget
PS - I know this doesn't apply to Lancashire but the topic seems to have become more general
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I agree with Celia, it does seem a bit pointless to make the offer if you then have to hunt around for the people you are offering to help!
Keenbutconfused and Migky - why not just place new offers on the regular Lancashire board? Then they will stay open, people can post a reply direct and you will get notified.
And nosy parkers like me can still butt in if we want to ;D
Barbara
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it does seem a bit pointless to make the offer if you then have to hunt around for the people you are offering to help!
But surely if you do as suggested and click the 'notify' button (see quote below) you won't have to hunt around for them?
We will ask the moderators to "lock" each "LOOKUP OFFER" as soon as possible after it has been posted so that people cannot reply to it directly.
If you then go to the Request Board for the county and click the large NOTIFY button, you will receive a notification when a new request is posted in the relevent county.
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trouble with that is that you'd get notified of all threads for that county ....... probably not a lot if you login every day, but could be humongous if you leave it for a while .... :)
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I agree with Celia, it does seem a bit pointless to make the offer if you then have to hunt around for the people you are offering to help!
Keenbutconfused and Migky - why not just place new offers on the regular Lancashire board? Then they will stay open, people can post a reply direct and you will get notified.
And nosy parkers like me can still butt in if we want to ;D
Barbara
I have had mine removed Barbara now. I would have done this but i had a thread started by my self called " whats free on the net " for some reason after it had been running for well over a year some one asked for it to be removed from where it was and put on useful links. this berlin bob did with out prier contact with me and to make it worst i could not post to the thread at all. After a long discussion with berlin bob Iwas told that it should remain there but the new thread somebody els had started up was ok to stay where it was????
But in the mean time to my frustration after trying to unlock the thread i hit the delete thread and lost the whole thread. Now all the great free web links have gone. It has not been a great day for me on here and will hold back from further posting for now. Need a clear head to play with word i think.
Migky
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Sorry I didn't read the notice on the Sussex Lookup offers board when I posted there recently and just used my common sense and offered to do some lookups ::) which some people took up.
I just thought I'm offering a service rather than asking a request so it should go on the look up board. ::) ::)
Kerry
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trouble with that is that you'd get notified of all threads for that county
I was about to say that ;D
why not just place new offers on the regular Lancashire board
Then you can call it lookup offer for ??? & ??? Graves only. ;)
Celia
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trouble with that is that you'd get notified of all threads for that county
I was about to say that ;D
I agree with you entirely, I was just making an observation on the 'having to hunt around for them' message.
Jennifer
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Keenbutconfused and Migky - why not just place new offers on the regular Lancashire board? Then they will stay open, people can post a reply direct and you will get notified.
Most unhelpful Barbara - this would just mean that the Mods would have to spend their time moving them!
Try looking at some of the longer "Offer" threads that do exist on the boards of Rootschat and see if you can make out who is replying to whom.
The resultant mess also causes people to receive notifications of topics to which they have contributed for months and years after they have lost interest - did anyone ever contribute to the Corkcutters thread and live to regret it? Or ask for Pilots Look-up and find that they still get notifications even if nothing was found - 30-odd pages later?
The Moderators try to keep things simple and neat - but that will never suit everyone. Please try to stick to the few basic rules and we will try to help people as best we can.
Thanks.
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The Moderators try to keep things simple and neat - but that will never suit everyone. Please try to stick to the few basic rules and we will try to help people as best we can.
So, if the Lookup Offers are to be locked, why not make it the clearly stated policy [in large red letters at the top of each lookup offer board]that lookup requests should be made by PM to the person making the offer. This would permit eliminating the Lookup Request boards entirely, thereby streamlining Rootschat a bit.
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I refer you to the post by the Copyright Editor above - each board has a How to Use this Board thread, which clearly states that Look-ups should be posted on the L-U board and then locked.
It helps if those requesting info mark their thread "For the Attention of" or otherwise refer to the Offer in question - otherwise it's not too much of a hardship to keep an eye open for things that interest you, surely?
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Just to throw my tuppence in to the discussion .... I agree with Arranroots.
Some threads to which I have contributed after an initial look up offer by someone who for whatever reason was unable to respond become extremely difficult to follow. A simple request with a very clear subject heading referring to the original lookup offer would keep things clear & simple.
As to the look up board on Aberdeenshire - this I believe was part of the original set up when the Scottish Counties were to be set up in the same manner as their English Counterparts with child boards etc. The only Scottish board which actually justifies the traffic involved is the Lanarkshire board and the former moderator of that board was trying to have a look up board set up but left before Trystan had a look at the request.
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I think a few of us were just a bit thrown by the locking of posts that had previously been open, that's all.
I mostly surf the Lancashire and Lanarkshire boards, so had not picked up on the way Offers work for the other counties. As the Editor pointed out, Lancashire Offers did not have a 'How To Use' post at the top, but now it does so thats all settled.
Arranroots - apologies for the unhelpful comment earlier, it was not meant that way. I was coming at this from the posters' point of view, not the mods - sorry.
:) Barbara
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There is clearly a problem, or at least a concern, here.
Please note (I feel I must state this in the light of recent actions by Mods - including deletions of my posts, and PMs misinterpreting my motives) that there is NO criticism of Mods or RC implied or intended in this post - it's just that there is obviously a problem/concern being discussed and it is up to all of us who feel we might be able to contribute ideas to enter into the dialogue.
It's surely not beyond our combined wits - Mods & humble RootsChatters - to manage to work together to solve this current problem/concern in a way which will help everybody.
If a RootsChatter very kindly makes a Lookup Offer (especially if it is from an arcane source of which not many RootsChatters will wish to avail themselves), it doesn't seem helpful if the kind RootsChatter making the offer has to spend his/her time searching to find out whether anyone wants his/her help (as described by keenbutconfused)!
On the other hand, the problems arising from lengthy threads developing from multiple lookup requests following on from popular Lookup Offers are a major concern (as described by Arranroots and others).
Barbara, why apologise for coming at the problem from the posters' point of view - after all, you are a poster!
Newf's suggestion that the logic behind locking Offer threads should be explained on the Offer board is a very good one.
Erato's proposed solution is also good - though I think it is helpful for genealogical correspondence to take place on the boards rather than by PM.
Perhaps some combination of Newf's and Erato's suggestions might be workable e.g. the Lookup Offers and/or the Lookup Requests boards might say at the top (stickied?) that the person who has made the Offer (because he/she has not posted on the specific Request thread) will not be notified of a Request and thus might not see it - therefore it would be useful if the person making the new Request were to send a PM alerting the person who made the Offer to the new Request. Just a thought.
Incidentally, I am not active on the Lancashire board but I agree with Gadget that this is a problem of general application. And I should point out that I do keep my eye on Unread Posts in Lancashire because my My Gggfather, James HACKING b Liverpool (son of William b Liverpool, son of James m Liverpool), his wife (Elizabeth BAYES and her father William) and James's & Elizabeth's children all born Liverpool (including Ggfather George HACKING aged 5) left Liverpool in 1850 for Australia.
Regards,
JAP
PS:Arranroots, I'm puzzled by your strictures to Duck re quoting a reason which had been given why Duck's Offer was deleted. It didn't mention the author though it did seem to be from one of the Copyright-Editors. The C-Es (citing insufficient time) don't give specific reasons for edits or deletions (just the rather intimidating, bold and colourful standard replacement text) BUT they have, on specific copyright threads, invited RootsChatters to contact them by PM if they have specific queries about the reasons. Surely, therefore, there can be nothing secret or private about the reason(s) provided by a C-E in response to such a query? What would you suggest? Should the RootsChatter ask the C-E whether the response/reason can be quoted - surely C-E's answer would have to be yes? Should the RootsChatter post saying that the PM request has been made and that the response will be posted unless the C-E refuses permission?
A bit puzzling. Especially as only a day or so ago I received a response from a Mod to a PM of mine - that response, which quoted my PM, was copied by the Mod to another RootsChatter (pretty "naughty actually", to use your words eh :)).
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Jap - I have no idea what you're saying, lol! ::) ;D
Is it in English?
To everyone else - of course there are two sides to this story - and I'm a user too, so I sympathise with both.
The fact remains that sometimes there are things about Rootschat that we can't easily change. There are faults with the system but to a certain extent we have to live with them. This isn't because we don't want to - often we think the changes are a good idea - just that for whatever reason they are impractical.
I can only apologise that this won't suit everyone.
Enjoy the site, everyone - life really is too short for all this tension!
:D :D
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Jap - I have no idea what you're saying, lol! ::) ;D
Is it in English?
I'm afraid that I find that quite unnecessarily impolite.
My understanding is that "lol" means Lots of Laughter; I'd like to know why you use that expression.
As for asking whether I am writing in English - that's not pleasant.
And I suspect that most or all RootsChatters would have no trouble at all in recognising my English and in understanding what I am saying.
Please let's all try to be polite and helpful and considerate to each other.
I'd certainly like to know why you have no idea what I'm saying.
My suggestions are surely very clear.
I am a very serious person and I am happy to do everything I possibly can to explain what I mean if anything I've posted puzzles you or anyone else and/or is not clear.
... The fact remains that sometimes there are things about Rootschat that we can't easily change. There are faults with the system but to a certain extent we have to live with them. This isn't because we don't want to - often we think the changes are a good idea - just that for whatever reason they are impractical.
Of course. And I have been told all too many times by PMs from Mods/Admin that RootsChat is as it is so just put up with it!
But what I suggested above (stickied explanatory posts at the top of a board) is a terribly simple solution to an existing problem ... isn't it?
... Enjoy the site, everyone - life really is too short for all this tension! ...
So true - so let's avoid unnecessary tension and let's all work together to find happy solutions to problems which have been identified.
All the very best to everybody including you Arranroots,
JAP (not Jap - JAP are my initials, namely Judith Ann Philip).
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I was teasing, sigh.
No, not easy to sticky topics - this has been discussed soooo many times. We try to keep stickies to a minimum as it affects performance. If there were an easy solution - don't you think we'd have done it by now?
Best idea so far - post on the Request board in response to an offer and PM the offer-maker to alert them (thanks Newf)
I think we've been all around this now?
::)
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Morning
How come a little request turns into a full bloodied argument on here. Rootschats has rules, we all know what they are, yet we get threads about trying to change them, nearly everyday on here ??? ???.
Its seems to me that this thread has gone from what Duck asked, now its about PMs, and into a slanging match again. Why dont we all behave like adults for a change, and get on with what we do best, and that is helping other rootschatters look for their rellies
ricky ;)
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Best idea so far - post on the Request board in response to an offer and PM the offer-maker to alert them (thanks Newf)
This one would get my vote if it counted for anything and is also the most practical solution to the whole situation.
If anyone needs an example of how a lookup offer thread can become extremely tangled - take a look at
http://www.rootschat.com/forum/index.php/topic,227346.0.html
This has even been marked COMPLETED but people are still attaching requests. I take my hat off to revmother2 for her forebearance and tenacity in dealing with that.
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Great - a consensus?
I'll lock this to prevent further agony!
:)
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But what I suggested above (stickied explanatory posts at the top of a board) is a terribly simple solution to an existing problem ... isn't it?
We already have MANY stickied explanatory posts at the top of most boards.
The more stickied explanatory posts we have, the less likely it is, that they are going to be read.
At times it is easy to get the impression that people don't read the stickied explanatory posts that are already there - how is putting even more such posts on the board going to help ?
Much of what happens on RootsChat has grown with time and in general, it works.
We are always looking for ways to improve RootsChat but some of the suggestions that we (moderators and members) may make sound simple but are not easy to implement.
Please be assured that all suggestions are discussed, and, here and there, we do make such changes as are possible.
Bob.
ps, from a stickied explanatory topic on RootsChat:
We have a section called Look up Offered, here you can post your offered help and then we “lock” the subject with a padlock. People if interested would then reply in Look up requested which makes it easier to reply to each one in order in case you prove very popular.