Is FM a fishing site?

Sorry guys and Gals,

I'm going out on a limb here...........

What happened to the fishing talk? When I first joined FishingMagic it offered loads of friendly fishing advice from some fantastic/brilliant anglers. Where have they gone? Why have they gone? I'm not gonna name names, but I miss their input.

Lately Bait Box rules the forum, sorry dudes, but I'm pi$$ed off with it!

Face Book and MSN and "whatever" are great if you want to have a chat and rip the pi$$........................................do it on there!

Let's talk fishing on FM!!!!

Has Bait Box taken over the FM forum? Have individuals taken over the FM forum?

Slightly angry from Bristol!

Did I get out of the wrong side of the bed today/yesterday???

Steve,

I think you have a fair point there. Several people who do and should know better continue to chat over what should be good open honest debate. My pet hate at the moment is what should be Gallery threads continually appearing on this forum. Several have been moved there but another couple have appeared since. As for birthday greetings...

People do stop contributing for all sorts of reasons; too busythrough work is the most usual one though I suspect that for some people once they've got the bees out of their bonnet they feel they don't need to contribute continuously. Another thing is that many of the beginner's questions repeat time and time again and people get fed up with explaining the same things over and over again, especially when the site's articles contain pretty much everything you would want to know - more so now the excellent search engine is here.

Talking of work, it's time to go.

You are probably right there Steve, I have often been derided for statingthat this fishing forum isn't what it used to be, it has changed significantly over the last four or five years.Threads weremore "how to" and question and answers orientated with a bit of discussion and and a bit of banter thrown in for good measure, now when a question is asked it quickly degenerates into a "see who can be the funniest" or a total change of subject.

I well remember when I first came on here asking about fishing in the Fordingbridge area because I was spending a week there on holiday and hadn't fished down there for quite a few years. I was utterly amazed at the response I received with the most helpful advice freely offered and nary ahint of "don't mention the best places let him find out himself." Being in my mid 60's at the time I remember telling all in sundry how wonderful this fishing site was that I had stumbled on, how it had helpful advice for anyone who was unsure or maybe didn't have a clue. How funny some of the comments were and rarely if ever resorting to foul or abusive language.

Whilst it is still a very informative site and to my mind the best fishing site in the land the quality of debate has deteriorated in my opinion.

I would have to agree with both Mark and Graham, particulalry on these Gallery 'threads' to my mind; pictures belong in the Gallery and not on the Forum.

It is only natural I suppose for newcomers to ask questions that have been asked many times before, and while a degree of frustration from the older hands is sometimes evident, usually the question gets an answer or two, and also a link to the previously asked question.

I do think that the Bait box forum sometimes gets 'overloaded' with some daft threads, but then you don't have to subscribe to them.

I am probably as guilty as most inasmuch as I can be a little flipant at times, and inject humour maybe where it is not quite in place, but then if you cannot have a joke from time to time then is it worth being her in the first place?

The real gem in the FM crown though is not the forums but the wealth of articles written by some very experienced anglers, and long may this continue.

All things considered though, I really would like to see a lot more 'fishing related' topics under discussion than we have experienced in the past couple of months.

LOOK HERE Steve....

i have been on the site a couple of years now and still find it helpful and informative the baitbox is a bit zany sometimes i enjoy reading some of the threads and occasionally posting in them.as to serious fishing threads in other sections of theforum i find when one appears it is well discussed but yes you do get the odd personwith silly remarks which sometimes does distract from a serious issue.overall i still think its the best fishingsite on the web.

what I fail to understand is that we have two thread complaining about none related fishing threads?

The oddhumorous remark is quite in keeping with a friendly forum such as this, but when the humorous remark sparks a whole page of witty repliesand the originalgist of the thread is lost, then itbecomes a farce.

It's allDog Biscuits fault Nick!

He had a bad day at the office I think

haha, lets send him to Liverpool, he wont complain again

Dont talk bollox Steve, this site (and i look at a few) has more good sensible replies than others, take the last couple of days just in General.......................http://www.fishingmagic.com/forum/forummessages/mps/dt/4/UTN/34184/V/1/last/1/SP/#last<a href='http://www.fishingmagic.com/forum/forummessages/mps/dt/4/UTN/34186/V/1/last/1/SP/#last' target='_blank'>[p]
</a>[url='http://www.fishingmagic.com/forum/forummessages/mps/dt/4/UTN/34186/last/1/V/1/SP/']Thats my boy.................
By CAKEY ........

Has the world gone unhooking mat mad?
Do we ALWAYS need unhooking mats?By Mark Wintle (ACA)

Fishing related news
By Ian Cloke

No Record Perch – Just a Big Fine

PB Chub
By Jonny

Barrie Rickards
Politics, Silly Season.By Steve Spiller (ACA)

Swans & Lead Poisoning Update
By Adrian Nicholas

Catch of the month...
March to June.By Paul 'Pikey' Howarth

Lots of Asia - A Little Fishing
By gerry

NFA Bag’ems Up
By CAKEY ........

Fishing Ban in Bewdley
By Barbelian

Caught in action
Neil M fishing the darksideBy Claudia Crowther
By CAKEY

not my luck
she did well thoughBy BigRob

Thats just a few from General, look in the rest and it aint bad really is it!

You been on that funny cider??????? /forum/smilies/party_smiley.gif

He's sulking, now he's realised all his big roach were actually Chub!

/forum/smilies/smile_smiley.gif

Perhaps some of you can imagine how difficult it is to please the majority, let alone everyone.

What we've tried to do is provide a means for everyone to enjoy themselves, with a non-fishing forum section, Bait Box, where you can run quizzes, tell jokes, have a wind-up, whatever, within reason. I've always been pro Bait Box because I think it helps keep the often thread-killing witticisms in check. Providing Bait Box stuff is kept in Bait Box, and those who don't like it keep out of it, there shouldn't be a problem.

That doesn't mean I don't understand Fred's point, which is that the existence of Bait Box encourages Bait Box posts to flourish throughout the site. To some extent he's probably right, but I think that providing a forum section like Bait Box is the lesser of the two evils.

Graham Whatmore also makes a good point with:"The oddhumorous remark is quite in keeping with a friendly forum such as this, but when the humorous remark sparks a whole page of witty repliesand the originalgist of the thread is lost, then itbecomes a farce."

Humorous remarks are great when appropriate and inkeeping with the conversation, but annoying when they take on a life of their own and destroy what would have been a good debate had itbeen givenchance to continue its flow and possibly reach a conclusion.

We even provide a means of chatting now via personal messages, so there is now no longer any need to clog up threads with one to one conversations. Unless that conversation is in keeping with the thread and entertaining for the rest of us.

The difficulty is that you can't have hard and fast rules about what I've said above. Judgements have to be made. But I will make a few suggestions:<ul>[*]Don't allow too much of Bait Box to spill over to other forum sections[*]Even in Bait Box don't post mundane, schoolboy stuff just for the sake of it[*]Don't risk spoiling a serious discussion with a witty remark, unless the remark makes a positive contribution to that discussion[*]Just think before you post[/list]

There's something for everyone on FM, so enjoy the parts of it that you like; just don't try tochange the parts you don't like.

Remember, someone else does like the parts that you don't like.

I think the balance is about as good as it could be.

People will say its different to how it was a couple of years ago,but with membership numbers increasing more people will use the forum - its bound to change.

To a certain extent it will flow in the direction that members want........ popular threads will generate the most number or viewings/posts, where as pointless uninteresting threads will be largely ignored.

There are some posts on this topic here, but any further discussion should take place on this thread.

<blockquote class="quoteheader">Mark Hewitt (ACA) wrote (see)</blockquote><blockquote class="quote">

He's sulking, now he's realised all his big roach were actually Chub!

</blockquote>

Chub

Hear Hear. The Marsbaris right I think.

I am quite as guilty as a few others of inflicting my odd sense of humour on others on multifarious threads when I shouldn't have. For the future Bait box should be kept in Bait boxand I for one will make a conscious effort to do so.

Just so long as the surreal and incredibly creative posts of those like Deanos, their two Lordships (well, not sure if Posh has one but if he doesn't then he ought to have that Mr. Mugabe's one now its going spare) and even the ArseCorker aren't made to feel driven away. I reckon I log on here 50/50 for fishing v. the craigh, and a day without one of the above or a Perkins perusal or a.... you get the idea. A little fun in its place never went amiss and the world would be a much poorer place without it.

I think FM is analogous to a visit to the fishing tackle shop. I don't know about you guys but whenever I go to my local tackle dealer, it is never a simple pop in, buy bait, pop out situation. I, along with other customers, spend several hours in the shop, gossiping about everything, including fishing, meeting old friends and making new ones. The tackle shop is more like a social club for like minded people. I have even been into the shop and bought nothing, buy a cup of tea and a doughnut from the shop next door, and just to have a chat with my mates.

I have made new friends (I hope) from being on this board and would probably never have met the original author of this thread but for a fish in. Alright, I didn't get to talk much to Steve, but I met him.

I would probably never have met Les Clark and his wife, Trev, Steaker, Christian, Matty and the others but for this forum.

I have plenty of fishing pals, many of whom I have known for years and years, but it is always good to make new friends, albeit that in some instances, I may never get to meet them.