To the Administrator and the TrackTalk.net Community

[uevets]

To the Administrator and the TrackTalk.net Community

I’ve been pondering all day on how to say this and all I can think is to be straightforward, simple and honest. As most of you know, we’ve started our DyeStat TrackTalk on vBulletin this week, and I would like to invite the Administrator (forgive me for not being certain of your name) and the community here to rejoin us. I would like you to consider this invitation and if you are unwilling to consider it now, I ask you to consider it in a day, a week or a month. We want as many of you back as possible. It’s that simple.

I wish all of you could have been in the shoes of myself, John Dye, Dave Devine and the rest of us in this past year, because I often feel like it’s hard for most to really “get” how it’s all gone down and the position we’ve been in relative to things we’ve had to do. But we’re also grateful for what’s transpired in the last few months that has led to our management at ESPN RISE reconsidering allowing us to use vBulletin again and keep all of your old registrations, etc. We can wish all we want that it all never happened the way it did, but we can’t turn the clock back. All we can do is to make it the best we can now.

I know I will get the full range of responses from this note. Some will come back, some will think about it, some will curse me and DyeStat and say forget it and never again. And there will be all sorts of responses in-between. I hope that if some consider the historical picture, of what John Dye created back in the late 1990s and that he’s never had anything but the best intentions for this community, they will consider coming back.

I could go on and on, and maybe for some of you I will, if you need to hear more. But at the same time, I realize we also have to focus on the new folks who come into the sport every year, too, and the few who stayed with us on RISE. What you have here certainly represents a lot of what DyeStat has been, but not all of it and certainly not all of the future, which grows with every season.

Obviously, just as it was distressful for you to lose the message boards in the way we did last year, it was also very distressing for us to see this Tracktalk.net created. You can’t imagine. At the same time, we understood why and can see how, in many ways, it was done very well here. You took what we had, and you also made some of your own improvements.

Our posting standards now are obviously a little different, but if some of you do decide you want to come back – including the Administrator – and wish to be moderators on our boards or have some other role, we are open to that. I’m not completely sure who does what on your site, but we’re open to things and you can contact me at steve@dyestat.com on that.

Again, there’s nothing easy in this process. You might be indignant that I would come on here and ask for you to rejoin us. But of course I am going to do it; how could I not? And of course I know some will dismiss the idea without a second thought. All I can hope for is open minds and to reach as many as possible. We realize rebuilding our TrackTalk is going to take time and it will never be “the same” as before. My goal is to find a way to make it better.

I hope to hear from the Administrator and many of the rest of you. I hope this will not be deleted. I posted it in two places, but if that’s one too many, I understand. Thanks for reading.

SteveU

[therunner12]

This reminds me of Conan.

[Donkeykongrunner]

The boards need some real improvement before I think about coming back. They look really really really bad.

EDIT: I'd tell you how to improve them but it looks like Phrisbee made a thread about it already.

[the stogs]

but...but...the new boards arent really that much better...

[uevets]

Yes, we're going to keep tinkering with the vBulletin tools for skins, etc. Obviously, it won't quite look like these boards do, modeled after that earlier version of vB, but we realize some fine tuning is needed.

Originally Posted by Donkeykongrunner

The boards need some real improvement before I think about coming back. They look really really really bad.

EDIT: I'd tell you how to improve them but it looks like Phrisbee made a thread about it already.

[inyoface]

It took me a second but I totally got your username.

I've actually also been interested in seeing who heads back to EPSNRisestat and who stays here. I rarely post so most likely my posting will die here.

I would like to add that moderating is something that I'd like to do but I'm sure my offer will be declined like it was on the old Dyestat.

[Donkeykongrunner]

Originally Posted by uevets

Yes, we're going to keep tinkering with the vBulletin tools for skins, etc. Obviously, it won't quite look like these boards do, modeled after that earlier version of vB, but we realize some fine tuning is needed.

Seeing as how I haven't taken any PHP or HTML class in about 6 years, how hard would it be to make the skin like this or dyestat pre-ESPN rise?


How seriously would you consider linking the forums to this cite and taking over admin to it? (Not saying the admins here would be ok with that.)


It's fairly obvious this structure forum is what the community wants. Replicate/copy/do what's needed to put a forum like this over there and everyone will come back. But what you have now still isn't anywhere close to this.

[Milesofsmiles15]

Originally Posted by uevets

As most of you know, we’ve started our DyeStat TrackTalk on vBulletin this week

I would still like to know what the problem was with integrating vbulletin. I have asked quite a few times and been ignored.

Also, Ben Sylvan has been fired right? That's what I heard and I think it's absolutely awesome.

[rehler]

I agree with Donkeykongrunner, a marriage between this site and DyeRise (if I can call it that) would be ideal. Obviously this place would have to tighten up it's moderating a bit but that wouldn't be necessarily a bad thing. I loved the old Dyestat boards and I love these boards but I don't really want to switch to yet another board. Plus, would we really want to make the Legends move all over again?

[Crystazul]

I get a strong feeling that "TrackTalk-RISE" under the new Disney/ESPN umbrella will in no way be as much fun as the old Dyestat or even this one in term of shenanigans and such...