| Author | Message | ||
     charlotte snow Member Username: Charliharry_snow Post Number: 1 Registered: 03-2011 |
I am a Junior driver and i would like to point out that our coaches and hosts of our training venues have gone out of their way to help and support the British Young Drivers often at thier own expense! One of the things that attracted me to carriage driving was the friendliness and willingnesss of experienced and or 'proffesional' people to help those novice/less experienced drivers to participate in this great sport. Many of these 'proffesionals' put far more back into the sport than they will ever get out of it by selling a few ponies,carriages or harness on here! and i think it is important to remember this when critising them! | ||
| Chris Hillman Member Username: Marketing Post Number: 1 Registered: 03-2011 |
I feel it is important for Lin Marshal to know that the people she feels fit to criticise are the people giving thier valuable time for free to move the sport forward. Wilf Bowman Ripley, Anna Grayston Minta Wynn 3 prfessional UKcc coaches have been incredibly supportive in moving a number of new initiatives forward, with no reward to themselves, other than the warm glow of helping our fantastic sport move forward. I am sure the membership would be delighted to hear what Lin Marshal has done to move the sport forward. | ||
| Martin Member Username: Ponyandcarriage Post Number: 4 Registered: 06-2007 |
Hi If the BHDTA forum is not constantly active the trend of casual visitors is likely to be that of not returning to read posts on a regular basis! In the general chat section for instance there have only been 44 threads In 4 months Nov 2010 – Mar 2011 I would consider that to be not very active. Posting messages takes time and effort for forum members and pro forum members alike More members – posters – readers should be encouraged making the forum very active diverse and interesting and hopefully then catching and enticing more of those sitting in the wings to join in with what we know as a superb hobby and sport of carriage driving. If the BHDTA Forum were to have had thousands of members and hundreds of postings a month then maybe a separate section or raising a little bit of revenue from professionals might be appropriate but I don’t think it’s got to that point. More professionals as Maxine pointed out [also BHDTA members] posting help and advice should be encouraged keeping the forum active – yes on occasion there is a little bit of self-promoting that goes on, but in the 4 years plus that I have been regularly reading the forum it’s my opinion that in general the advantages to the forum on the whole, of professionals posting far out way the negative effect of a quieter less diverse forum. Self-policing of BHDTA forum members / professional appears to work relatively well and I am sure that if things got a little out of hand , to the detriment of the forum Mike and Vic the BHDTA forum moderators would tactfully step in behind the scenes firstly and if necessary more publically on the forum . Hi Lin “To be taken in a light hearted manner” are you perhaps a plant on the forum testing the water for BHDTA revenue opportunities?  My personal gut feeling is at this stage it would have a negative effect on the forum growth. There was a very active carriage driving forum that had hundreds of posts per month that introduced subscription all be it a small amount – that forum is now all but dead http://www.newrider.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?s=347365756d7a056f46d36adc3393b3c 4&f=73 As an example of a very active carriage driving forum with many interesting posts that has got to a stage of being able to raise revenue! http://www.miniaturehorsetalk.com/index.php?s=ccce5d7d3e4581a7be945a50c4cffd9c&s howforum=18 Unusually I am actually hesitant in posting this, finger poised and hovering over the mouse not wishing to incur wrath – but then again lively discussion is a good thing [click] Martin | ||
| Vic Kusin Moderator Username: Vic Post Number: 6 Registered: 03-2007 |
Can I just let everyone know of two proposed developments that we have been working on with Chris Hillman and which should be appearing on our website soon. We are planning to intorduce an area where people will be able to "ask the experts" for advice and help. This will have a number of resident trainers and other experts who will be able to answer questions. Chris is working on this at the moment and is looking for people to be on the panel. Commercial advertising is also coming to our website, which will include an area where professionals will be able to advertise their services and products. There will also be opportunities for companies to have advertisements on certain web pages. A scale of charges is being worked on at the moment. The forum has always been fairly relaxed about advertising and, for instance, a coach or a trainer posting advice or reply to a question on here is absolutely fine. On the other hand, actual business adverts (e.g. someone advertising products or services that they normally sell as part of their business) are not permitted. This is not what the forum is intended for and we do not have the resources to administer paid-for advertising on the forum. Vic BHDTA Website | ||
| Mike Watts Member Username: Mikew Post Number: 10 Registered: 01-2007 |
What do members think about allowing/encouraging more trade/business advertising on this forum? In the present policy - essentially no commercial ads - there are grey areas - it can be useful to know who took pictures at an event, to contact the photographer, or who's selling horses or supplying tack, trailers etc if you're looking for one - including professionals/businesses, so posts like that are useful. Even clubs and club training are business in a sense [take money, deliver something]. We could: 1 - continue as is - but then some people are critical of the [useful] trade/semi trade posts and some useful businesses may be reluctant to post lest they break our policies, or Allow trade/business postings [provided we think it's to do with hdt] but: 2 - ask trade advertisers to put "/trade" at the end of their posts, or 3 - create a new Topic "Professional/Business" - so nobody has to look at commercial stuff, but then it's another topic to look under Other ideas? I doubt if there is enough demand for it to be worth the admin costs to charge for 2 or 3 at present - we could make it free, if volume justifies could charge sometime in the future. What do you think? | ||
| Maxine Ingham Member Username: Harvey Post Number: 4 Registered: 06-2008 |
This is an open forum run by the BHDTA and all members/users can and do benefit from that. Just because someone is 'a professional' and incidently also a member of the BHDTA, why should they pay for a service that is free to all the other members? They often give their time for free to benefit the sport, take the SoE carriage fair as one example. I know from experience that buying a horse from 'a professional' is a far more truthful and safe experience than from someone who is not 'a professional'. If you really feel that The Professionals do so little for our sport, why not ask to have a dedicated page on this forum where we can all ask Professionals/UKcc coaches for FREE advice???? | ||
| Lin Marshall Member Username: Themoaner Post Number: 1 Registered: 03-2011 |
We constantly see trainers who earn their living from the horse driving world keeping their name in the fore front by appearing regularly in the Forum. Not only are they promoting themselves but also advertising horses for sale or wanted on behalf of clients. Is it not time that professionals were charged for advertising so that they can put some money back into the sport where they earn their living. |