Nostalgia

Post by **campbell** » Tue Aug 22, 2006 11:23 pm

We got talking on the Campaganza at the weekend about how quiet the original SE YahooGroup list has become, and I planned to try to find some stats on post-levels etc.

Anyway, Yahoo doesn't seem to offer this kind of data to a moderator even, so I resorted to just tooling around and happened upon the very first ever message on 10th June 1999 from none other than our founding father, Fat Bob Fisics...closely followed by Yours Truly in excited fashion with Message #2 on 11th June...

> Friends, colleagues, joyriders and general hangers on,
>
> Murray Motor Company have just confirmed delivery details for my long
> awaited Lotus Elise. I can hardly contain myself. I've been on the
> Waiting List for over 10 months now, although the arrival of this car has
> been nearly three years in the making.
>
> Extreme details as follows:
>
> - Elise number 7001
- New Aluminium bodywork & hardtop; navy blue cloth hood
- Driving lamps, Radio kit, cloth seats, alarm upgrade
> - completes production on Friday 25 June
> - delivered to Murray Lotus, Sighthill, Edinburgh w/c 28 June
> - collection by yours truly on Friday 2 July (just in time for the JCMR
> rally!!)
>
> It ain't over 'til it's over, of course, so a guarantee of delivery in w/c
> 28 June can't actually be made until the car rolls off the line. But
> apparently "the factory information is usually extremely accurate". So my
> dearest dealer tells me.
>
> So, you've all had to put up with my obsessive anticipation. NOW all that
> you have to suffer will be my obsessive enthusiasm for driving, washing,
> tweaking, admiring and discussing the damn thing. Apologies in advance.
>
> Campbell
>
>

Ah, happy days.

I'm getting used to this BBS nonsense now...unlikely to post as much but at least I can watch the threads I'm interested in with email prompts via the "notify when post is made" option. However a fully integrated email digest with selectable thread inclusion would be nice

Campbell
(Dinosaur faction)

PS - Perhaps Tut can do something on SE1 stats, as you keep all the messages in your Outlook archive, don't you?

Sanjøy · Post by **Sanjøy** » Tue Aug 22, 2006 11:32 pm

Could possible look to even takia pst file of all the SE1 post and making them fully searchable.

Post by **simon** » Tue Aug 22, 2006 11:34 pm

I have 15603 Yahoo mails since March 18 2005. That was about the same time as SE2 started (March 9th 2005) and over the same time there have been 35878 posts here. Yahoo and here were pretty level at around 200-250 posts a week until about 6 months ago I reckon when Yahoo suddenly went quiet.

Post by **campbell** » Tue Aug 22, 2006 11:39 pm

useful observations...keep em coming!

Rich H · Post by **Rich H** » Tue Aug 22, 2006 11:44 pm

We do tend to post alot more pish it would seem....

Skyenet · Post by **Skyenet** » Wed Aug 23, 2006 12:16 am

I remember quite a few discussions on Yahoo over the years about what suited people. Many spoke about a Site along the lines of this one as the Yahoo one was not as user friendly for reading online as many sites such as the SIDC one. Luckily somebody mentioned Gmail and I signed up and started to find the Yahoo posts organised into threads reasonably well which made it a little easier to scan through.

Like many people I find I don't have loads of time to read through posts to see what is of interest and to keep up with news. The layout of this site allows me to quickly keep up with whats happening. Pitctures can easily be displayed which adds to the interest of the site. I like how the threads are split into areas and I usually only get time to check out CENERAL CHAT, MEETS and GALLERY. Every now and then I check out the other areas incase I have missed sonthing. I tend to choose to view THREADS depending on the Title of the thread. So I do like a clear Thread title. Sometimes I can miss information if the dicsussion in the thread drifts off the original topic which minght not have interestd me, onto something that does interest me. However folk on the site are good at starting fresh threads rather than hijacking a thread.

Over the summer months I felt there was rarely anything mentioned on the Yahoo Site that wasn't mentioned on this one so gradually cut down checking my GMail to see what had been discussed on the Yahoo Site. In fact I think the last time I checked it was about a month ago (Maybe I have missed something)

I realise that some people like to read mail offline but personally with Broadband I just read everything online and don't download mail (or Viruses) at all and therefore the layout of the site suits me.

At the end of the day I don't have a LOTUS so my opinion dosn't really matter as its what suits you guys and girls that matters.

My 2p worth

Iain

P.S. A big thanks to all the folk that put the effort in to setting up and running both sites.

Post by **campbell** » Wed Aug 23, 2006 12:21 am

Iain,

At the end of the day I don't have a LOTUS so my opinion dosn't really matter as its what suits you guys and girls that matters.

Quite the contrary. You are a long standing and much revered member of this community so your opinion definitely counts!

Thanks for the thoughts. Be sure to contribute to the Poll, here, if you haven't already:

http://www.scottishelises.com/phpbb/vie ... php?t=3293

Campbell

Scottd · Post by **Scottd** » Wed Aug 23, 2006 12:32 am

Sanjoy wrote:Could possible look to even takia pst file of all the SE1 post and making them fully searchable.

that would be v. cool!

mckeann · Post by **mckeann** » Wed Aug 23, 2006 12:42 am

campbell, your car was born on my birthday, 25th of june. It was obviously a very good day all round.

i have added my views to the poll btw

Stu160 · Post by **Stu160** » Wed Aug 23, 2006 1:07 am

Mmm.....how things have changed,its now about 4 1/2 years of ownership,and about 4 years of SE,most of which has been good,some VERY good,and some not so good.

High points....3 skies and a barf run,class
Dukes pass,every time I drive it.
TT 2005,wish I had done them all
Cadwell Park,with Ali and Tim,a fantastic trip

I dont want to mention the low points,as they dont matter.

The time has flown in,and I have to say,it is missing something just now,its all got a bit splintered of late,with engine choices etc,but hey,who know,it may come good again.

Stu

( a bit down with life at moment,but hey....sh*t happens)

mckeann · Post by **mckeann** » Wed Aug 23, 2006 1:12 am

get yourself on the zandvoort/ring/spa trip to forget about your worries stu. Its got all the makings of a classic trip with a good mix of the old crowd and the new blood hopefully.

Andy G · Post by **Andy G** » Wed Aug 23, 2006 8:59 am

Agree with McApe on this one!

I'd been really gutted about my car being off the road for 10 weeks, and have had 2 awesome weekends back to back, covering nearly 2.5k in 10 days, a Walshy day and Cadwell Park.

The thing about the Lotus is, the good times are SO good they tend to help you forget the bad ones.........

So gutted I can't make the October trip....it sounds legendary, although the longevity of my license will be helped no-end by not following Mckean for another couple of thousand miles

timmsky · Post by **timmsky** » Wed Aug 23, 2006 9:38 am

Well here goes...

I think Neil has inadvertently hit the nail square on the head - the mainland Europe trips are a hoot, at least from the reports that come back, and there have been a few, with special mentions to the Stelvio trips of course. But these were the rare holiday trips that you had to save all year for. I'm sorry, but £2-3K buys a lot of other things for most of us before blatting round foreign roads for a week or 2, and what the Scottish Elise community (as it was) used to derive most pleasure from was the weekend jaunts, the odd day run here and there, and the track days at KH.

This was always fuelled by the everyday banter on the S_E Yahoo group, which could stretch to 3 figures of posts in a single day... I know, as I was a serial poster

It was more personal, delivering emails to your inbox (sometimes at an alarming rate) through which you could easily sift, or as many did, read them allâ€¦

There are fewer opportunities to â€˜chatâ€™ with a BBS style forum, as not everyone will see every message. At least on the Yahoo style board of individual emails, you will see every thread and you can choose which ones not to read based on the content you see, without having to open a fresh page and view all of the previous messagesâ€¦ I realise as many others do, that the Yahoo style of message delivery can be a blessing in disguise, especially for those who cannot devote much time to reading all the posts - however, I do not believe for a second that any less time would be spent browsing the PHP forum finding the threads you want to read. In fact I would put money on folk spending more time browsing SE2 than hitting the â€˜deleteâ€™ key on SE1.

Many on SE2 now were serial posters on SE1 and there was a good mix of banter, humour, technical info and good advice. Whilst there is still some of that on SE2, from what Iâ€™ve seen itâ€™s bloody difficult to find unless you are involved in a thread from an early stage or someone tells you about it.

I may sound negative about SE2, Iâ€™m not however as I know that forum based â€˜clubsâ€™ are the norm these days and Yahoo style groups are being superseded in this regard. I just find it far easier to read and follow emails than I do a forum. I have found this with all forums I have been on, including the old Lotus BBS famed for its difficulty of use and loss of postings, along with the abuse and flamings of course

As one of the northern contingent, I feel the impact of SE2 more than most and this is simply down to the fact that the runs seem to take place ad-hoc â€œIâ€™ve got a free night tomorrow, anyone up for a run in the borders?....â€

Post by **Shug** » Wed Aug 23, 2006 9:57 am

Iain,

FWIW, there's a lot there that I agree with (TBH, pretty much all of it) It is a shame that we see less of Tut over here... Having said that, I'm not sure his post count wasn't dropping from the legendary levels of a couple of years ago anyway.... Maybe he'll pop up and fill us in.

I know where you're coming from on the 'single thread' point. Unfortunately, I'm sure that it put off more people than it made happy. Before I joined SE, I signed up to Ben Lovejoy's 'Ringers' list and got flooded with emails in 2 days. Hadn't thought about the volume of traffic and I deregistered, as I was using Hotmail at the time and didn't have the time to organise it and keep cleaning it out.

I get the impression that's what happened to a lot of folks on the SE1 list too...

Unfortunately, things change - there's been a few things in my personal life that have brought that home to me recently. I miss some things about Yahoo too, but I think the advantages of the BBS have outweighed them.

I know your experience is quite a unique one, as you are kind of out on a limb - even I now (once quite lonely here on the West coast) have quite a lot of owners within 10 minutes drive.

When you think back, the big SE trips were pretty much organised by Campbell - obviously his life has changed (being blessed with the wee one) and I think those would have stopped happening anyway. Not to say that it may be good for somebody else to take up the torch of Routemeister...

You're right, things do tend to happen at a much quicker pace on the BBS - but it also means that more and more runs & meets are actually happening.

How about organising something that you can definately attend? - I'm sure you'll get a pile of interest in new roads from the newer members. The Campaganza would definately have been better attended if not for SIDC... Doesn't need much - just post about a run, pull out an old route and I'll keep track of the attendees......

So, in short - there's nothing you say that I disagree with, but personally, I've had brilliant times through SE as was and I've also had brilliant times with SE now. As I see it, the complexion has changed, but the point is the same - meet, drive, chat, have fun....

Post by **Shug** » Wed Aug 23, 2006 10:01 am

Oh, and as for commending Simon and I - thanks, but we really just ran with something that we were handed the keys to (by Cal, who was flamed to death for doing it)

My personal thanks go out to both Simons (and especially Mr Ironside for using work time and resources - we're hosted with Simon's work - to help SE for no personal gain) - while I just spend my time gassing and being occasionally officious, they actually did the technical graft behind the scenes, to ensure we're hosted reliably, without advertising and with total control of the site.