Why is nobody posting?

[rob_k]

bernie:
with regards to this thread, i took robk’s post as tongue in cheek

Hurray

The penny’s finally dropped.

I’m sure Rikki is well accustomed to my posting ‘style’ as he’s seen enough of them to know I don’t hold grudges against anyone (except the plod, …maybe… ), he included. The original post wasn’t specifically directed at the director/owner either if you look.

I think I need to look at this ‘shareholder’ jobbie. At a minimum charge of £75/month per banner ad multiplied by approx 10 different banner ads = £750 clear profit for doing pretty much [zb] all.

Now I understand why we must click the banner ads to help fill Rikki’s beer tin oops sorry, read ‘keep the site free’ as at those rates one is on to a good thing

Just out of interest, how many ‘clicks’ from here must an advertiser receive for them to continue advertising and at what point can you up the money

Cheers.

[rikki-uk]

Rikki-UK
Site Administrator
Posts: 1355
From:Middlesborough
Registered: Apr 2001
posted 20 May 2001 21:53

As the forums are starting to gain members (32 as of today)…I felt it was time to take stock of who we are and to give and get an Idea of where we want to go in the future
Firstly TruckNet UK is part of www.truck.net the worlds largest web site on trucking

Not Now it isnt, 2 years ago we formed a company to bring the UK forums into UK ownership, so that these forums destiny was controlled by UK drivers, Forming a company and taking the franchise for Europe for the TruckNet concept was NOT free, I paid for it out of my wages as a driver

We do not (as yet) have a UK TruckNet web site like the USA site but hopefully it will not be long until we are www.TruckNetUK in our own right…always part of the TruckNet Community but with our own distinct UK site

Now we DO have a complete UK website, This did not build itself… programmers and designers time costs MONEY, money that the new company did not have, so I paid for it

As a matter of policy TruckNet UK will not charge Drivers for the use of these forums.

and that has NOT changed

(At present the full cost of these forums are borne by TruckNet USA) however it is hoped the UK industry will assist us in maintaining these forums for drivers and UK companies.

and that is what they are starting to do

Why do you have a problem with this site being a commercial enterprise??

I am not asking for your hard earned pennies
I have invested £1000’s of my own money, and 1000’s of hours to get this site up, running and to ensure its continued success. Why am I not entitled to hope that one day the industry may pay this COMPANY enough to allow to me to concentrate on it full time as a job??

There are many companies who wish to advertise to drivers and to get drivers accustomed to their products, why shouldnt I take advantage of that fact, It is not taking money from your pocket

Initiatives such as the upcoming competition to the USA cost money, but may give a member here the opportunity to travel to the USA and experience the American way of trucking that they may never get anywhere else, that costs MONEY… Not your money, money from the advertisers that we could keep within the company, but we decided to use some of the income to the company to benefit a member, I suppose thats wrong also

[dafman]

Well said Rikki, it does not cost any of us anything to click on a banner, but if we don’t it may cost us the site.

[rob_k]

Rikki-UK:
I have invested £1000’s of my own money to get this site up, running and to ensure its continued success

WHY?. Do you not agree that that was largely a dim move? At such an early time in the life of this website you wouldn’t have been able to say for sure that the site would take hold and grow to the proportions it is at today, thus meaning you could have just thrown away thousands of quid.

You are lucky that the site has become what it is today and that you can now say to potential sponsors, ‘hey, look - we’ve got 100,000 hits per month; wanna show us the colour of your money?’. That hasn’t happened purely from your own leg-work though. I would say that primarily it is the key message posters that have made this site expand to what it is today.

Before I joined in I’d never seen any advertisement for the site anywhere and even after seeing a link to the main page in a copy of T & D I didn’t see anything that interested me and quickly disregarded it.

For some reason the phrase ‘DRIVERS ROUND TABLE’ just doesn’t ring any bells with me that there’s a huge driver forum behind it and those thoughts still stand today. I think that a simple phrase like ‘UK DRIVERS FORUM’ would do the job better and perhaps bring in more drivers that just happened to be searching the web and stumbled across the site’s main page.

Whatever goes on ‘behind the scenes’ and the work involved in running the site is of no interest to the mainstream readers and message contributors to the site. However, we are all aware that the site doesn’t run itself and naturally requires feeding with beers so that it doesn’t throw it’s dummy out and take itself offline (think the servers need stronger beer as they’re still having regular ‘go-slow’ tantrums). In view of that and speaking personally, I am very grateful for the site as it’s a good place to chat and relax with a couple of tins and have some good (and not so good) discussions . I’ve slung some large clumps of mud at you recently (some justified, some not ) but I mean no harm so feel free so sling it back if you want .

Cheers.

[runaroundtel]

I just wondered… are yous lot trying to scare us all away?

This is not appearing as a ‘professional’ website… I won’t be back… I can’t be arsed. Where did the Alphabet games go?? I liked them! When you start ‘in fighting’ Nah… there are too many other places to look at online!

I think that what you all forget is that, if the site turns into a select bunch of ‘luvvies’ all competing for attention… no one will bother in case they outshine the ‘stars’

I used to like looking in on this site

[margatemafia]

what the hell is going on with this place i have not really been on alot recently and have not seen all this in house fightin goin on…why is everyone turning on each other■■? thought we all stood together…there are enough people out there that want to slag off lorry drivers without us doing it to ourselves

[Lucy]

We always have phases like this, Margate…they come predictably round at the same times of every year (just look back, and check out the archives of the old Forums… )…and settle down again with just the same reliability…

It’s autumn. The nights are drawing in. The kids are spending more time in the house, everyone’s feeling low 'cos summer’s over and they have already had niggles with the other half by the time they give up and hit the PC…happened last year…and the year before…and no doubt will continue in a comfortingly familiar pattern every year going forwards. Once we all get over the shock and get our night-heaters fixed it’ll die down again, trust me.

A prediction for you. Same thing will happen in the New Year when we all get the bills from Xmas and realise that we have nothing but overtime to look forward to until spring…then again when the weather gets hot, and we all forget how much harder the booze hits us in the sun…and then we’ll be back to October again…

Thing is, as the site grows, the “niggly periods” are more widespread - for no other reason than because there are more of us - a victim of our own success, see!

Once the clocks go back, the kids rediscover their playstations, and the other halves remember that “This winter, you’ll be mostly seeing the back of the chair by the PC…” and give up trying to tempt us away, things’ll be just fine.

[truckyboy]

I dont agree with what rob k is saying for one moment…how can anyone blame rikki for putting in his own money to start this site…and if the sponsors are rewarding him for that then good luck…for its not the drivers that are responsible for making this site a success…they contribute a lot…i agree…but how many other truckers sites are there even remotely like this one…none…so its all down to rikki and co hard work…and whats wrong with drivers round table it makes sense…i think that the problem is there are people who would love to change an original idea just to suit themselves…and personally…i think you love an argument…or a dissagreement…for most of your posts seem to contain content that heads that way…and that is not the basis for discussion.it is a sensible solution to find the answers…
have a nice day

[marcustandy]

truckyboy:
I dont agree with what rob k is saying for one moment…

I don’t think it matters now anyway (see below). I reckon this thread should be just allowed to ‘grow old and dissapear into the background’.

Rob K
posting rights suspended

[denis_f]

marcustandy:
I don’t think it matters now anyway (see below). I reckon this thread should be just allowed to ‘grow old and dissapear into the background’.

]

I thought it had

[marcustandy]

Denis F:
I thought it had

Don’t blame me!! I think it was just Truckyboy blowing some dust of the archives!!

[brit_pete]

Why is it where ever any one has put effort,hard work , capital out of

his or hers pocket. and then makes a dream come into reality.

That some one, because of certain developments becomes so upset

by this that he develops a complexe and trys to justify his childish

attitude. please try to grow up , You all ways reap what you sow

And yes , can we not let this item die away into the disposal bin

never to return again.