Posts: 32,638
Threads: 383
Joined: Feb 2002
Reputation:
33
At the suggestion of IYAAYAS611, we have decide to get your opinion about deleting all post on BFT, starting in 2002 and going to 2007, see thread:
http://www.bigfishtackle.com/cgi-bin/gfo...ead#unread
We decided to do a poll to see what you think. If you want to reply to this thread please do so but if not, please at least vote in the poll, thanks.
PS, no decision will be made right now but in a month after PM's have been deleted, there will be a need to make the call, if there is not enough space freed up. So for you members that value the old history of this site and want to keep it, deleting your old PM is the only options at this point.
[signature]
Posts: 165
Threads: 2
Joined: Feb 2015
Reputation:
0
I understand the issue with all these post being stored and that costs are associated with that. I have not searched any history myself mostly
because I am computer challenge. IMO the majority of posts that I see would not have much historical value to most members. However, there are a handful of members that have posted (on a regular basis) information with tremendous value and that would be a shame to loose.
I am not a marketing expert but I would think that showing how much this board gets used here in Utah would have a marketing value and the history would be a big part of that.
[signature]
Posts: 931
Threads: 6
Joined: May 2012
Reputation:
0
When I post, looking for information, I've most often first used our excellent search features and might even reply to an old post or link the most related posts. For example, I also like bicycling and I have posts on that after searching all of the posts on the subject. That information is valuable! I make no value distinction between the older posts on combining bicycling and fishing. Great thought inspiring ideas in all of them!
People took their time to write those posts in a giving way and getting nothing in return except the pleasure of sharing what they enjoy for others to enjoy it, too. An older date (I only date much younger  makes it no less valuable. When I search bicycling to see the recent posts, I would get much less information than currently available with all of them. I'd hate to lose that!
Now that I have a vehicle with superior off road capabilities, aside from fishing gear, I'm going to put my bicycle in back and go to some extraordinary destinations for combining bicycling with fishing. Those older posts are just as valuable to inspire selecting a fishing and bicycling destination.
That's just one example. Suppose I find a way to archive those old ones that might be eliminated, then I still have them for bicycling.
But, what will I be interested in next? Using a traditional bow for bow fishing? Maybe!
It would be a loss for it to be gone and whoever posted it might want to link to the older post, but it would be gone. Would they, could they, even post it again from memory what they did so many years ago? I don't remember what I ate for lunch just yesterday.
Before, I ruled out destinations that would be too challenging to two wheel drive and didn't have the slightest clue that I would ever have better. But, now I'm looking for the most terrain challanging locations just for the fun of it.
[signature]
Posts: 877
Threads: 1
Joined: Dec 2005
Reputation:
0
I go for deleting all posts on the Main Forum. But I would like to keep those in the Fishing Forums. These are a treasure trough of knowledge for the newbies as well as the seasoned angler. TubeDude has made his efforts and a lifelong source of fishing knowledge that I would like to see preserved.
[signature]
Posts: 4,630
Threads: 2
Joined: Feb 2005
Reputation:
0
It's funny that this has even come up. I was doing some research on a body of water and Google found one of my old posts from 2007. That information led me to the information I was looking for.
I am a little (a lot) biased but I think Utah is one of the most active boards on the site so it would be a shame to lose all of that information.
I haven't made my vote yet.
[signature]
Posts: 931
Threads: 6
Joined: May 2012
Reputation:
0
Vote for keeping it all! Even if you don't use it, you will appreciate that our BFT has huge following among fishermen.
Besides, we all enjoy the posts of many of us who are giving at the expense of their time that I'm sure they can use for other things.
TubeDude is an excellent example of contributing great information for us. I sure appreciate it.
I wonder if knowing our posts will disappear and have limited life that might later be made even shorter might cause the writer to wonder if as much time should be spent to write it. Society already has a trend to communicate less and that is at a cost to society. Look at how divided we are politically.
Could this entire topic soon become a moot point? We've had phenomenal advances in technology. Not seemingly that long ago, I replaced a 500 megabit hard drive, which not much earlier was considered huge, with a 30 gigabit hard drive for $130 dollars. No one I knew had more than of a small fraction of that. I was so proud. Yet that is nothing compared to what we have now. How much longer before it's commonplace for all of us to have a copy of the entirety of the Library of Congress on our keychains. But, by then the kids will ask: "What's a keychain?
It's common to hear people extrapolate what it will be like in the next ten years based upon the last ten. Mine will surprise you. I believe the advanced technology among the survivors will be the ability to make a fire using sticks!
Until then, let's have fun fishing though for me it's valuable preparedness skills!
[signature]
Posts: 14,097
Threads: 168
Joined: Jan 2011
Reputation:
14
Curt, there's a lot of knowledge out there and like it or not someday we won't have some of the masters with us any longer, but with these posts we can still gleen from their knowledge. I say keep them all and make room somewhere else. I know there are a lot of things I'd liked to have learned from my grandpas that as a kid I wasn't into, but now I'd love to know how he grafted fruit trees and his building tricks. Anyway just my thoughts but I think there is a wonderful knowledge base out there and it would be a shame to lose it. Later Jeff
[signature]
Posts: 32,638
Threads: 383
Joined: Feb 2002
Reputation:
33
This could all be avoided if all members deleted their old PM's, the worst of them are the ones with attachments but the problem is, not all members will even read these two threads. As I said, we have a month, after that a decision will have to be made.
We will likely have to implement that old rule, that limits the size of attachments, it will limit pics to no larger than 2MP. [  ] That will be a big pain for everyone, it means most pics will have to be resized or not posted at all.
[signature]
Posts: 3,884
Threads: 50
Joined: Sep 2007
Reputation:
22
[font "Times New Roman"] [/font]
[font "Comic Sans MS"][#800000]Curt,[/#800000][/font]
[font "Comic Sans MS"][#800000] [/#800000][/font]
[font "Comic Sans MS"][#800000]I don’t have a clue how this could be implemented, but I would like to see ALL purely fishing reports (I went to X spot, used Y lure, and caught Z fish) deleted after about 3 years or so. I deem them as of little or no value that far after the fact but can understand that not everybody will agree with me. How to threads such as Tube Dudes treatises on specific waters and possible my plans for planer boards are a whole different can of worms and probably should be preserved without limit.[/#800000][/font]
[font "Comic Sans MS"][#800000] [/#800000][/font]
[font "Comic Sans MS"][#800000]A good place to start such a program would be for moderators to start cataloging threads into categories to save or not save on a daily basis. As I understand it, all posts are being read by a moderator somewhere on a daily basis anyway and they could set a check box for each thread to indicate needed action. This would take care of any future postings but would leave the hundreds of thousands of past posts to deal with. A daunting task to be sure.[/#800000][/font]
[font "Comic Sans MS"][#800000] [/#800000][/font]
[font "Comic Sans MS"][#800000]I can count on one hand the number of times I have done an historical search of the BFT website, so obviously deleting old posts would not be a big problem for me. In about 99.9% of all search cases, I would guess that information on a specific item is also available from some other source besides BFT.[/#800000][/font]
[font "Comic Sans MS"][#800000] [/#800000][/font]
[font "Comic Sans MS"][#800000]I certainly will NOT lose any sleep over any decision BFT makes in this regard.[/#800000][/font]
[font "Times New Roman"] [/font]
[signature]
Bob Hicks, from Utah
I'm 81 years young and going as hard as I can for as long as I can.
"Free men do not ask permission to bear arms."
Posts: 931
Threads: 6
Joined: May 2012
Reputation:
0
Great point! Yes, those who have cared to spend their time to be helpful to us as we are helpful to each other should have their work continue to help others. My concern regarding this is not just loss of what's old, but loss of inspiration of contributors of excellent information resulting in giving less of their valuable for us in drafting their posts, so the change wouldn't just drop old posts which don't matter to some voting that way because they don't use them, but it would degrade future posts with people giving less of their time to write them.
But, back to my earlier point of asking if the trend of ever increasing data storage at lower and lower prices might be the solution for the future. Is that the case?
An example is I've never deleted an email and Yahoo features that advantage. Addressing the situation we have now, I suspect this is a cost saving move.
Though there will likely be much more data storage available at a lower cost in the future, I propose no changes be made with the cost of data being met by a few who significantly value the data like myself making voluntary contributions to maintain what we have.
I'd much rather contribute that money than spend money outside of my qualifications to even know how to archive and store data myself.
[signature]
Posts: 32,638
Threads: 383
Joined: Feb 2002
Reputation:
33
Nothing will be done for a while Ronald. A member posted and sent me a PM with some info about compressing those old threads that could be the answer to this whole issue. This will be researched before anything happens. Right now the biggest issue is members, all members, deleting their old PM's both received and sent. That alone could solve this whole issue.
Yesterday I went back to those post made in 2002, when the site or at least the Utah portion started. I was looking for attachments because that is where most of the MB's are but I found none. Granted there were a fraction of post made during those early days compared to today but I'm starting to think this storage issue wasn't a problem until much later. I'm going to continue to research this until I find out when we stated having this problem but my best guess is it started about 5 or 6 years ago. IMO, there will be no need to delete the text portion of threads but the attachment portion, mainly pics, might be what is targeted, if anything has to be deleted.
[signature]
Posts: 931
Threads: 6
Joined: May 2012
Reputation:
0
Thanks, Curt! I'm glad there are some among us who have computer knowledge to know that.
Regarding: "... mainly pics, might be what is targeted, if anything has to be deleted."
I wonder if an automated program can be utilized to archive those photographs on the web (cloud services)? Many are free to a point and after that additional memory is very inexpensive and a link can be left in the place of a picture.
It just seemed odd to me that in our time of computer power rapidly only getting better and lower cost that we would be looking to delete anything.
Here at work (I do welding, electronic control, mechanical automation, machinist work) there are many who are paid to do paperwork that mostly is unseen and stored for ten years as mandated by government and then we shred tons of it mostly each year. We also pay for the handling, security and storage space. It sure seems to be a waste forced by regulations to be costs passed onto industry and military and ultimately being paid by taxpayers and consumers.
But, those people doing that paperwork are paid.
In contrast, our fine members going to trouble and taking their time to share what they enjoy with the rest of us who are here because we appreciate it and doing the same in return would seem to me to be disheartened to see their work thrown away like trash.
It just doesn't seem to be the right thing to do regardless of a count of how many never take the time to use this resource that exists at the cost of perhaps a million freely given man hours mixed with a lot of frindship and caring.
[signature]
Posts: 698
Threads: 0
Joined: Jan 2003
Reputation:
0
It's interesting to me to see how many BFT posts show up in just a regular Google search about Utah fishing. that may be something else to consider. Thanks for the opportunity to voice.[  ]
[signature]
Posts: 698
Threads: 0
Joined: Jan 2003
Reputation:
0
How about an automatic PM delete after say a year or two?
[signature]
Posts: 32,638
Threads: 383
Joined: Feb 2002
Reputation:
33
The problem is the cost, so far everything that's been suggested cost more than the returns. If it's not a simple fix, I'm afraid it's going to be in that hands of the members, as to what happens on this one. Members deleting their PM's is the cheapest way to fix this problem.
[signature]
Posts: 931
Threads: 6
Joined: May 2012
Reputation:
0
Regarding:
[quote wiperhunter2]The problem is the cost, so far everything that's been suggested cost more than the returns. If it's not a simple fix, I'm afraid it's going to be in that hands of the members, as to what happens on this one. Members deleting their PM's is the cheapest way to fix this problem.[/quote]
It's odd that this comes from me being the worst at trying to get computers to do what I want them to do. But, the math doesn't seem to add up. All that's in our messages is text and likely just a little though useful like names and phone numbers and a little logistics from fishing trips that would likely be very useful to plan again. Just one megabit is a HUGE amount of text, but often not even one picture. Are there pictures in private messages? I have just text in all of mine.
[signature]
Posts: 11,123
Threads: 4
Joined: Mar 2006
Reputation:
0
Yes Ron pics are sent via PM. I've received a bunch as well as sent a few. We all need to clean up our PM's. If there is something someone wants to keep better download it to your computer.
[signature]
|
