It's your turn to play admin. For the most part we all saw what was going on with a thread on tuning but as a quick recap. Two members that have been at each other over many sites even after many discussions, phone calls, PM's and other communiques still went after each other. They earned 2 weeks off. How would have handled it? Me, I thought I was doing the right thing till this post made me think about to much. I look forward to your ideas on the matter.
the whole RMW vs. Hubie/Mynes thing was purposefully contrived. It drums up business by creating drama. The Lynn vs. Jan saga is no different, thought at least when Hubie was involved there was integrity present.
If real debate was going on between them, that was helping the OP and others understand the topic, they would not have been given a time-out. But what seemed to be going on was they were just twisting each others nipples to see who screeched the loudest. Nathan, I feel you did the right thing, and the site is better for it. Mark
I see absolutely no value in the bickering, whining, and trolling that goes on among the dyno/tuner crowd (outside of the drama creation that PGT mentioned). It's like a broken record every single time. In the MINI community when you see a thread about tuning, it's almost guaranteed that it will be filled with immature back-and-forth bickering. Nothing of value ever comes from the threads and the only people who enjoy or find value in the flame wars is the tuner vendors and all the fanboys that rush to back them up. The majority of users find it annoying and childish and it often turns them off from the community/forum. I think the way you handled it was perfect. They have 2 weeks to re-evaluate the way they conduct themselves and hopefully make the required changes finally. Until then, discussion will be able to continue without having to sift through all the insults and petty whining. Besides, Newbs49 is one of the known fanboys/instigators/trolls from the sewing site isn't he? I wouldn't give his complaint much thought. If he finds a forum boring with out all the bickering, I'm sure he knows where to find it.
I like the civilized manner of MA. Sure I wish it had "more action" sometimes -- but I am glad you are "keeping the peace" here. Thanks
I own a car related site called Carnut.us We used to have a politics section, and all that I ever heard there was the same old crap - someone would post something negative about Obama, and then that would get countered with something negative about the other side, next thing you know it's Yo mama, no yo mama and so on......one day I opened the forum to find 16 political threads and one car related thread! I got sick of it and removed the section, and the worst of the instigators. Several people complained that the forum got boring after that and that no one had anything to talk about and in fact .....it did. For a while..... Then slowly some of the folks who had quietly walked away from the place and all the negativism started drifting back, and while it's still a bit quieter than I would like, it's also remarkably adult again! So, I say stick to your guns, Nathan, it will be OK in the long run. Seems like some folks just have to have that drama in their online lives..... Me, I can do without it TYVM.
I do not have the forum history that most of you have, so I do not know all the players that well. I have found that the bickering (missinformation so to speak) is not helpfull and a bit confusing to those of us who are fairly new to the MINI world. I want to trust the information I am being given, but have learned to cross check every thing. Here on MA I have not felt that need, so I thank you for the decission to give them "time out". Jim
The bottom line is there is tons of history here. This situation was not looked at in a vacuum. Both Nate and I have invested a lot of time pleading, mentoring, discussing and sending messages till our fingers bled. Despite all that, the two parties just don't get along. Such is life. I will ask that we do not go around calling anyone names, regarding of the message.
I read the first line of that post and though, oh boy, somebody's playing with matches. The OP never even replied back! I think you've handled this extremely well, Nathan. I think you should assign your time-out tuners some homework: have them each write up a Library article explaining, in extremely generic terms, how the MINI ECU works, what it controls, how a canned tune works, how a custom tune works, and explain a few popular tuning philosopies. If an article is brand-neutral and informative, it gets published in the Library and newb questions get referred there in the future. The carrot is the byline; Nathan's already shown the stick. Nobody's asking for trade secrets, just some informative commentary - which I hope was the intent of the OP and others like him/her in the past. PS- if anybody takes this seriously, I'll even volunteer to copy edit.
Maybe a general article about the basics of how the OEM ECU works and why the manufacturers tune them the way they do could reveal why some changes to it do what it does without giving up any trade secrets? Sent from my Droid using Tapatalk
where does one start? Both Jan and Lynn are very different in person than on the boards. But those that have never met them would never know that.... As far as stuff for the library, nice idea but I doubt it will happen. You want some very basic stuff, I've got an old article on the MINI ECU and on modding it (from long ago, it's mostly dated material now) on my web site. Shift Light | Automotive Modules | OBD-II Products | FES-Auto. Click on the free stuff tab and you'll find it. But dispite being on the internet a lot, I do very little learning via the internet forums and the like. The reason why is that only a very small percentage of what is written is written by those with a deep understanding, and even less is edited for readability. When there is something new for me to learn, I read books. E-gad! I said BOOKS! Why? Because they focus on topics without dilution. They are easily digestable, and they last. Want to learn about Bosch fuel injection? There are books on it! Now, they don't explain every byte of the MINI ECU, but they do explain the evolution of the types of control systems that have been used, and are in use. Want to know about more current trends in ECU design and control? SAE (Society of Automotive Engineers) is a GREAT source, but you have to pay for thier articles or join up. If subjects are new to you, the LAST place you want to do your learning is where one can't distinguish between the echo-chamber of opinion and what is really knowledge.... In fact, there are many a many a time that the conventional wisdom that is written by most of who post isn't really fact at all! More of a reason to dust off the credit card and go to AMAZON... Matt
Both Jan and Lynn are very knowledgeable people. It would be a shame to loose them from the site. The two week cool down was justified. I'm glad you stepped in as soon as you did to maintain site decorum. It sounds like all the efforts that were made with phone calls etc. to defuse this were not heeded. You made the right call to pull the plug when you did. When the two weeks are over, I hope they both come back and we see constructive input from them.
Between setting up for MTTS (all 5 launch parties + Denver), building race cars and developing more performance parts for the MINI Spec series, Hubie has no time left to be visiting forums... One of the main reasons why Mynes joined and later became a sponsor of MA is the lack of bickering and BS... we've been holding out some stuff hoping that the site will remain true to form... until a few weeks ago when MA was invaded by the three-letter company. If we have the Moderators' (there are two of you guys, correct?) word that they will keep the peace and remove posts that we 'report' as off topic, then we will be more willing to write more technical stuff. Until we get that assurance, then we will keep those posts to our forum. We don't care what camp you're in, we are not here for a popularity contest. We can provide some factual postings backing them up with our data and findings and share our knowledge. If you disagree, fine, no problem. Just be prepare to offer your own data (and by data, dyno graphs don't count unless they are from the same car and done on the same dyno). If you post just to put a smiley or whine about some silly stuff, then that post should be 'wacked' asap... Do i have any takers?
less moderation is better than more moderation, in general. That said, you have to send a headshot to the troublemakers quickly.
Sounds like you did what you could to get them to stop. They didn't and got a timeout for their troubles. How could you have been any more fair?
I sent a PM to Nate offering my support on how he handled this, let me do it again here. Well done I know you cannot be monitoring 24/7 but I would put a very short leash on this type of behavior It sounds like some clear boundaries have been communicated and those were broke. I'd give em' one more shot. Personally I know who I won't be doing business with, not sure who/if Lynn/Nitromini's works for. I don't have time nor will support childish non professorial bickering which just seems to follow these guys
Yes, there are two of us. To give anyone our "word" that we will remove reported posts would open up an Pandora's box and if effect would make MA beholden to our sponsors. I think everyone will agree that that direction would result in diminished credibility of the site, the message and the messenger. What we can promise is that every reported post is looked at (and some that are not reported) and is evaluated based on a multiple criteria. Both of us have been around for a long time and we think we know most of the players and agendas. Our philosophy is not to do any moderating unless we have to. It is sad that it has come to the point where we had to. Jerry
Well Nate I have to admit you did what you had to do. I was kind of shocked that right after you gave them the warning that they both proceeded to keep it up. I tried to PM Lynn to "step away from the computor" but it was to late......:lol: It would be a shame if they both get a permanent ban though.
I have to offer an apology and correct myself. There is actually four of us moderator types on here. No disrespect was intended. The other two members of the team are Lotsie (Mark) and Steve (Steve).
