Marker,

First, please note that it wasn't me that did anything. We have moderators - helping out for free, giving freely of their own time to help make this a better place for all. They know the basic rules, and follow them as best they can.

The basics, just so we're all clear:

We have NO problem with someone offering anything for FREE. We're very pleased when someone offers free accommodation or mechanical assistance or whatever for travellers - and we hope that the giver would also receive help when on the road if needed too. WE - that is you me and all motorcycle travellers - help each other out and WE make it a better world to travel in for us all.

When someone MAKES MONEY by posting on HU, we don't feel that it's fair if we don't receive a part of that.

TedMagnum is right - sort of tongue in cheek - to an extent it IS all about the money on this subject.

Where there is NO money involved, NO problem.
Where there IS money involved, it needs to be FAIR.

Just so everyone understands: HU has been MY FULL TIME job for 11 years now. Susan has been part time all of that time. We have a couple of part timers to pay. A website the size of HU is incredibly expensive to host.

It all adds up to a LOT of money invested. And we have YET to make a decent wage out of it. If I had NOT started HU back in 1998, I'd be comfortably retired now with the money I could have earned. Now, it's going to be many years before I can retire.

So when it comes down to it, WHY should we work for nothing? WHY should we allow someone else to MAKE MONEY off our work, and we should get nothing in return?

We continue to run it because we believe in what we're doing, and we have many thousands of people who would be very upset if we closed the site down. BUT - just like every single person out there - we like to eat, we'd really like to be able to afford a nice house, a vacation every year, and one day soon "retire" and work a little less hard - 10 hours a day 7 days a week gets to be too much sometimes. And our last vacation was 4 years ago.

We'd like to do it all for free - but the plumber that came today wants to get paid, so we can't work for nothing either.

So FAIR is important - not only to all the users of HU, but to us too.

Having said all that - if indeed you, Marker, make NO money from hosting travellers, then let me know that, and you're welcome to post your signature again.

If you do make money, please remember FAIR.

__________________
Grant Johnson
Seek, and ye shall find.
------------------------
Inspiring, Informing and Connecting travellers since 1997!
www.HorizonsUnlimited.com

As one who has no financial interest, or even a signature line, permit me the following observations:

First, Grant is right by definition. It's his website, his labor of love, his money at stake. He gets to make the rules in whatever form he thinks suitable, reaping the rewards (such as they are) and paying the consequences.

Second, we all benefit greatly by the resources made available to us here. Without investing greatly, we get to log on at will and extract value from the site. It is therefore in our best interests to behave in whatever way makes the continued functioning of this site possible.

Third, being a moderator is difficult and the rewards are scant. Although they may seem unredeemably arbitrary and cold-hearted at times, they're presumably doing their best in what are sometimes impossible situations. In this, I speak from experience gained elsewhere on the web.

Last, the manner of enforcing what was apparently a long-standing but dis-honored "rule" has led to no small amount of resentment, much of it off-list, and the absence of certain valued voices here. It seems to me that this might have been accomplished more diplomatically than it appears to have been.

In my mine, when the written rules say one thing but common practice is contradictory, the lack of enforcement is a form of communication which states very clearly "Pay no attention to those rules. We don't really mean it." A decision to revert to the written rules is therefore a change of the real rules, and should therefore be pursued gently. However, see my first point above: Grant gets to do as he pleases.

I don't know what kind of terms are being offered to those who want to insert commercial messages in their signature lines, but it does seem to me that there is no god-given right to tout businesses for free wherever you want all over the internet. Grant has offered to work with people who hope to gain financially by their postings here. He seems a man of his word, and I hope mutually beneficial relationships can be forged.

Grant, I do think that a less strident tone might better convey what I take to be your intent. In print you sound (to me) angry and blaming. This is not necessarily a bad thing if you are in fact intending to communicate anger and blame. However, it might not be the best way to maintain and enrich the Hubb.

Disclaimer: What the hell do I know, really? If my comments are useful to anyone reading here, I'm glad. If not, please discard them without a second glance.

Safe journeys all!

Mark

Great commentary Mark, thanks.

My apologies if I seem strident and blaming - I'm not trying to, quite the contrary, I'm trying to appeal to everyones sense of fair play.

We are definitely not blaming anyone specifically - most of our users are wonderful people whom we count as friends. Those who take advantage of us just need to be shown the light And I'm sure when they understand the way it all works they'll understand - well some of them will anyway!

Strident - I will confess that I sometimes feel that way after a problem - hey, I'm human. I get tired and bitchy like everyone else.

What is missing / invisible to everyone here is the years of us TRYING to enforce the rules. I don't see all the posts - I don't come close to having the time to read them all - so I miss a lot - so therefore it SEEMS that the rules aren't enforced - but they are AS BEST WE CAN.

When I or a moderator sees a post or sig that doesn't comply, we talk to the poster. We try to work something out that will work to both our benefits. Sadly the most common reaction is basically they think they should be able to do it for free and go off in a huff when they can't. Just because they've broken the rules for who knows how long, doesn't mean they should be able to continue to. It sometimes seems like dealing with a kid - he's naughty again and again, then gets caught - and he's angry! Even though he knows he shouldn't have done it.

I have had a number of people comment that they're GLAD we are cracking down - they agree with us!

We have a couple of moderators now with more time and willingness to enforce the rules, so we're seen as being mean and nasty. Sorry, but we are only trying to survive, and give good returns to our advertisers, and first and foremost to the users. You'll notice we only accept mororcycle travel related ads - we could make a LOT of money if we just stuck google adwords in everywhere and had ads for everything under the sun. But it wouldn't be us, and it wouldn't be doing our readers a service. It would suck.

Could we do it better - of course - marketing and pr geniuses we ain't. If I come across as strident, sorry, it IS probably a certain amount of frustration! We DO try to be fair to all, and we hope that those who have been with us for a long time will agree.

So what do ALL OF YOU think we should do? Are we on the right track? Or not?

__________________
Grant Johnson
Seek, and ye shall find.
------------------------
Inspiring, Informing and Connecting travellers since 1997!
www.HorizonsUnlimited.com

Hi Grant!

As said before we absolutely charge nothing to bike and caroverlanders, there is no HUBBER who has ever paid here! But you may leave the signature out, no problem,IMO the one who loses here is the traveller but I also do not want to raise the suspect I ám doing this to make money! The reason I posted this topic is that it stroke me that for some years I only try to share my bit of travel experience with other travelllers on the HUBB ánd offer shelter for free to bike and caroverlanders and than am asked to pay for the signature. OK, I understand the initial thought that it seemed like advertising for free and I agree that that would not be fair. But after I tried to explain the situation to the administrator in a few mails I always got a ´rules are rules´ like answer. I don´t know why but I always get the creeps when I hear someone say this..
I did not post this topic because I do have to have my signature back, it was more out of dissapointment by realizing that overlanders not only face bureaucracy at embassies and borders etc but even at ´our very own site ´ too.
Regards,

Marcel