A few months ago there was a poll that someone posted - a bit snide i thought - and I was wondering whatever happened with it? There was a list serve function before which seemed to me to generate more discussion, any further thoughts on that etc. Just wondering

About the Poll and the list serve capabilities:

Well, "that poll." Sigh... I deleted it months ago. And, yes, I was worried that it was a bit snide, and that the approach to it was all wrong.

It was posted by a member in October, about a month after you joined us, Dado. And how it might appear to new members like you and also to potential new members that worried me. And I'm a little sensitive about one of my babies, Gayfatherhood.com, to be exact.

Looking back at it now, I think that while there probably was annoyance on the part of the member who posted the poll, maybe I over reacted in my response to it. He had actually donated quite a lot of money to keep the site going, and I deeply appreciated that. But that post felt like derision towards my, admittedly, lack of effort as a webmaster at the time. I think in his way he was trying to get the group talking again during a period when we were all very busy and it seemed interest in this site overall was way down. His intentions were likely good.

Still, it didn't feel good. It felt like an attack, and I took it too personally. I try not to be that much of a protective bulldog, but a positive approach to improvement on GF is always going to get farther, especially with the three managers, Vince, Smokey, and I. We have become very close because of our connections, online, by phone and many times in person. Not only that, we each have met others from GF over time. Ask Smokey about his road trip with BillN sometime! And ask me sometime about Luvindad, and how I got to spend a few moments with him on his last day on earth in a hospital just 30 miles from here. And all because of this site. So to us, GF is not simply a website or email group. There is no division for us between the proverbial online world and real life, because we've met each other as others here have too. It's been truly life changing...

But this last year has seen us drag a bit with our efforts and participation in GF and that's sad. In a way, it's good that we all got talking about it again.

The dig was something like, "How useful do you think GayFatherhood.com is?" I dunno, how would you feel if someone posted doubts about the usefulness of a site you created and had met literally some of your very best friends in the world on?

It was down in attendance, membership and discussions on the message boards. But I would have responded better and appreciated a positive approach to boosting the site rather than what felt like a negative jab too close to the heart. And yeah, it hit a nerve, so maybe he made his point.

Maybe that bridge can be rebuilt, but my reaction was angry and biting enough that I've probably killed any chance of that. My apologies for all who were a part or witnesses of it.

Again, big sigh... The List-serve Capabilities:

We certainly do have that ability and I'll tell you how easily you can switch it to receive posts in your email. First indulge me for just a second as I give some background...

We had that ability on MSN, but it often didn't work for some of us. Some it worked every time, every post came in an email on time. For others, it was sporadic. Some emails never came, some came days or weeks after the post was made.

But unfortunately, some of our members I know we lost because of the move from MSN to Groupee. It was hard to move to some new place when they were so comfortable with the old one. But a few of us wanted to upgrade to something that was more useful to everyone involved. And face it, MSN had LOTS of technical problems and scheduled and unscheduled downtimes due to server mantainance.

A few of us were also concerned that perhaps we were not showing up high ranking enough in Google and Yahoo searches, but chiefly in MSN. We hoped that if we moved to our own site we could not only ditch the unwanted advertisements, but also boost our visibility to dads everywhere throughout the internet. As for that, we still need some work, but we are getting there, and receiving a few new members every week.

Anywho, to get all that we decided to pay the price of thirty nine dollars a month and get our own place here on GF and use the boards from Groupee. After the switch, MSN ditched ALL of their chat rooms too, btw, and while we are not using it much these days, there is great potential here for that. More on that later!

How to receive posts or updates in your email:

It's so easy and you might have missed the chance to select it in your options when you joined. But it's easy to go back and change your notification preferences.

See that "Go" button on the top left of the forum boxes? It has that little blue star (or snowflake?) by it.

Okay, 1. click on "Go."
2. From the drop down menu click on "Personal Zone."
3. From the next dropdown menu click on "Notifications." This will take you to a page where you can select exactly what you want in your email.
4. Under "Forums" you can click edit and select A "Daily Email Digest," A "Weekly Email Digest" or what I chose, "Immediate Notification in Email," and "Include Replies." This way I get an message in my personal Email inbox every time a new topic or reply appears on Gay Fatherhood.

Like I said, we were all given those options when we joined, but often we miss them. It's easy to get back to it though, and as with any new thing, just click around this site and see what all is there. It has so many capabilities and we are only scratching the surface of what we can do for our 39 bucks a month. :)

For more help and to ask questions about such things see our Website Help section of the forums.

Okay, long rambling message over for today. Stay tuned for more updates and news!

Love ya and thanks, Dado1 for bringing these important matters up.

cheers!

Done, thanks.

LOL, you are very welcome. And thanks for putting up with my rambling GF history.