Hi All Have read many replys I do not find it easier to either post or have any kind of dialogue. Ones that are (meaningful) seem to span days before responsse come in and by then I am losing interest.... And I work for living like you all, ...so I am tired by days end,.... So I don't bother much. Another factor for me and no doubt many others is that I manage more and more e-mail and at some point enough is enough. So...Throw in the more difficult and less satisfying format and I don't care that much for the hassle. The tragedy for me is that I have learned so much from so many and now the extra time to wade thru more clicks and lists and e-frustrations puts me over my E-patience limit. I know some see the "new system" as the next best thing to sliced bread and shoe strings in a package but I'm not one of those. Please write me any time. I think I'll see whats on the tele. Best regards to the best of you Dale S. Erwin www.Erwinspiano.com 209-577-8397 209-985-0990 Ronsen hammers/prep Sitka Sound boards Belly packages -----Original Message----- From: Encore Pianos <encorepianos at metrocast.net> To: pianotech at ptg.org Sent: Tue, Jun 28, 2011 4:34 pm Subject: [pianotech] Really, really irritated with the New forum system I was trying to reply to Alan McCoy’s query about soundboard hotboxes and had written a fair amount of text within the thumbnail sized box given to us to use in the new system to write our replies (surrounded by LOTS of empty unused white space). I wanted to look something up, so I minimized the page to look somewhere else. (I did not delete it) So I come back, or tried to, and it was gone. Disappeared, along with about half an hour of writing. Arrgghhh!!!! It’s not the first time it has happened either. In the past I have also sent completed replies to the new site, using the protocol given. Not only does it sometimes never show up, but, unlike Outlook, it does not allow me to save a copy on my computer. Which I would have re-sent if it had not disappeared altogether. If I try to reply to a message on the new forum by hitting Reply within Outlook, the message will be sent, Outlook keeps a copy, but it never gets to the new forum. So I am sending this message by the old method in the hopes that it will get to the forum for others to read. Of course, they will soon enough eliminate this, which actually works reliably, simply, and consistently. They dumped this poor cousin into our laps a few months ago. I can’t see that anything further has been done to make it any less buggy or easier to use. We’re going to be stuck with it anyway, so why bother? I have to question how much value those who were responsible for setting up this system place on the forum, or they would have payed a lot more attention to how it was actually being used by us. And especially worked to fix the problems as needed, of which there is little indication that such has been done. No one is willing to say how much this thing cost – did we get this program out of the $5 bin at Walmart? There are some interesting statistics regarding the pattern of usage: I went into the Archives (yes, they do still exist, somewhere….) and did a count on usage for each month, January 2011 – 1872 February 2011 – 1480 March 2011 – 1139 April 2011 – 345 May 2011 – 235 As you can see, once the new system was implemented, visits fell off a cliff, from March to April a 70% drop in usage, and a further drop still in May. May is a mere 12.5% of the numbers in January. I think March’s figures are artificially high because so many people were bitching or asking how to use it (You certainly couldn’t find out how on the web site). Is it fair to say that a lot of people said to themselves, if it is going to be this much of a pain, I don’t want to bother? I think that the Forum had become one of the very best resources for a great many Guild members. A year ago, it was lively and vital. Not so much now. Have they killed the goose that laid the golden egg? Do they even care? Yes, this is an irritable and grumpy reply. Probably it will offend some. I haven’t heard anyone who had something to do with implementing this system talk about the problems and performance of the new system for a very long time. So if anyone of you are listening, please feel free to call me (insert your derogatory term of choice), but at least acknowledge the problems that exist and tell us what is being done about them. I will not be going to the National, but it is my earnest hope that the problems with the new system will be discussed in depth, and meaningful solutions sought. What we have now is mediocre, and underserves the Guild and participants of Pianotech. Do we really have to live with this thing? 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