New Message Board - cougaruteforum.com
 

We are pleased to announce the formation of a new message board:

http://www.cougaruteforum.com

and we would like to extend a warm welcome to our many friends on CG. We hope you will join us. It is our intention to follow a light style of moderation and we hope to foster an environment for interesting and thoughtful discussion on sports, politics, religion, and current events.

In terms of administration, it is our goal to operate the new board as a community. In that spirit, we have formed an executive committee that will provide input on board management. Policies are still evolving, but we hope to establish an atmosphere of democracy, fairness, and community input.

Since this is a new board, it will take a while to tidy things up. Please be patient. For example, the URL for the new board has not been distributed to all domain name servers so you may have trouble with the link shown above for a few days. If so, please try the following link for direct access.

http://67.15.157.6/~cougarut/

Sincerely,

Jeff Lebowski
Creekster
Pelagius
Surfah
Gidget
Solon
UtahDan
SteelBlue
MyBoyNoah
PaloAltoCougar

Why?

Obviously to exclude Wyoming fans. The name says it all. Open community my ass.

I bet you say that to all the communities.

I don't catch your meaning.

It's these damn exclusionary Mormons.

Since there is now an awkward silence of sorts, maybe I will be the first to address the elephant in the room. I make these comments as an outsider, since I was neither part of the inception of CG nor of CUF.

Also, I notice that everyone is still online here and many are likely PMing. Why not bring it out into the open, air it out, and then see where the new direction takes everyone. This will have to happen eventually, so why not now?

This seems to be an instance wherein the community has banded together to make a statement. Does it make any sense at this point to clarify exactly what that statement is? Lest mistakes here repeat themselves over there?

PS Will CUF have big avatars?

I think he's baiting you about your sexual preference. I wouldn't take it.

I see now the need for a new forum. CB's bigotry has infiltrated CG in the form of DDD.

I don't know what's going on.

And maybe Mike's being a dick.

But it seems Mike deserves some patience, since he's put a lot of effort in making this board what it is today, which is a pretty damn good board.

I didn't mean to say you are sexual preference. I meant your sexual preference. It seems you caught my drift.

I wonder if many here feel that mikewaters has been given patience, ad infinitum?

This is a watershed moment for him. Does he even care enough to address this? Or is he too prideful to apologize for bad behavior? I am not even sure this is about him, frankly, which is why I made my request a few posts above.

But here is someone who built something viable and now appears fully content to allow it to be destroyed, rather than to get in here and address the issue. This is a community. The community is unhappy about something, or at the very least, grown bored with something. I would think that if it were me, I would at least be asking what the problem is. Why the ambivalence?

As I have stated before, the coincidence in all of this is uncanny. As with the Godfather, Michael Corleone ends up sitting in a chair in the dead autumn cold, alone, no friends, no family, trusts nobody, those around him only so because they are paid, as he ponders his behavior and how he alienated everyone close to him. Fade to black.

It isnt a cool story, btw. It is a sad one.

I work with engineers and thus am used to people who have a strained relationship with the English language.

I'm curious as to the answer to this question as well.

This new cougaruteboard or whatever sounds exactly like what CG is right now. Perhaps I'm missing something.

Those of us without access to the secret message area they all use are in the cold on this one. Somehow Triplet ticked Waters off, Waters temporarily banned him, and now a cadre want to take their ball elsewhere.

The whole thing is odd.

I seem to be unique in that I don't take this or any other message board as seriously as most. Maybe I should re-evaluate. I'm ever the profane one, I guess. The written word is indeed a powerful thing.

Anyway, Waters has never offended me, and no one has been more a target of his invective than me. I find his antics quite entertaining, and I think we understand one another. I do think, as I've said, that Waters himself should lighten up. Some of the board's best repartee has gone on between 3D and Waters, and Robin and Waters, but I guess it has upset him. Even 3D's suspension provided opportunity for hilarity, as far as it went, in my view.

The new board doesn't seem to me to provide soil for the kind of color we've experiened here but maybe that's the point. I doubt 3D can even get his game going unless there's opposition.

But on an optimistic note, I think the boards serve two different purposes and can co-exist. I'm pleased Pelagius has moved on with his Suday School lessons, which bored me to tears. Someone I love and respect recently said to me that one of the most important lessons you can teach your children is to hate church.

For what it's worth, I hate the name of the new board.

Hecklers are only one source of material, my friend. The best stand-ups simply riffed off the top of their head.

Besides, Tex registered over there.

As the Foo Fighters once said: Alone + Easy Target.

I just did it so I can get the jump on some fresh blacks and the priesthood threads.

LOL!

Tex, awesome, my man. Now THAT is what I am talking about!

In a word: hilarious.

The idea, if I'm not mistaken, is to reproduce CG but with an oligarchy/democracy instead of a monarchy. This setup would serve as a buffer so that any single person's sinusoidal behavior patterns wouldn't have an unduly drastic effect on the board as a whole.

CUF, I'm certain, was never intended as an affront to Mike, just to help CG move closer to what Mike had stated was its original objective. Mike knows that, of course.

Anyhow, it is hard to deny that there has been an awful lot of drama involved with CG. At the same time, if you think about it, for CG, this is simply another act in the play.

Barb -- what I don't understand is whether this is a "serious" play or whether it is all playacting, kind of a fund virtual reality where personas are adopted, fights feigned, etc. I just can't imagine an adult being so emotionally dictatorial on a place like this. But I'm not privy. Still, is it just one great game where you write the play by saying "you next" and then the next person comes up with the next play.

Remember when you were in the sixth grade, and you and your friends decided it would be fun to start a story and pass it around and have everybody write a chapter and see what happened?

It's like that. For some people, it's a very serious endeavor. For others, it's all just for fun. Unless you know the authors involved, it can be hard to sort out which is which.

And, of course, each person can only control their own storyline, not knowing where the next guy's going to take it.

For people that have been here three years, there have been very close friendships forged. Some of them are nervous about the state of the community and its future. So, they decided to write the next chapter themselves. All we can do is watch and see where it goes from there, or the more motivated among us can help shape the storyline.

CB spawned CG spawned CUF. Is there an Intrade on how long until the next iteration?

Mike has taken a CUFf to the head.

It has been brought to my attention that this post sounded perhaps more arrogant or self-righteous than intended.

I didn't mean to imply that I was one of the motivated. Clearly I'm not. And my use of the word sinusoidal is for the sake of accuracy, not sycophancy. (Though I suppose it's pretty good for both.)

Anyhow. The great thing about communities is they're not passive. You make them what you want. You like the new board, go make it a great place. You like this one, invest some effort here.

Either way, Mike's done a great job of bringing together a core group of really great people. And the network he established is going to remain, regardless of what happens to this or any other URL.

In a manner of speaking, CUF is Mike's board.

It is.

BTW, I appreciate the removal of the reference to USC in the football forum's subtitle. I for one found Trojan inclusion highly offensive.

It was supposed to be offensive. It was Southern Cal, not USC, so it was offensive to all the Southern Cal fans, but it is now gone.

I know. I find it offensive that USC even warrants attempts at offense. (And you have to admit, their offense is suspect this year.)

You're a little touchy, your royal soonerness.

I believe bitter is the word you're looking for.

One always treads lightly around the Queen.

We are pleased by your discretion.

whoops, wrong thread

How'd you get into med school with that handwriting?

never knew they accepted people who can write.

Perhaps it's Farrah's handwriting.

You know, I can't say that I'm not a little sad that "act one" is done.

To continue the metaphor, there is a reason that plays have acts. They signify departure and change.

But this place and time will never exist again. The "act" will never again be performed. It was just one showing. And it was a beautiful act. And only a few will know of it.

But the wonderful thing is that life goes on, actors come on stage right, and exit stage left. Some actors in the first act, never return for the second. The wind that blew them away was not capricious. It was insistent.

The second act may be a smaller production, but it will be immensely more rewarding. I look forward to the merry band that will continue with this production.

Some of you have other plays to be in--God speed. May you experience the richness and blessing I have.

Very magnanimous of you to allow the post about the other board to stay up.

I thought all the stuff with DDD was a joke but I guess some people were annoyed. I guess I'm missing something here. Why make another board that looks exactly like this one but with a stupider name reminiscent of the abominable half-Ute, half-Cougar hats and shirts?