Forum Ramblings
 

Not my forum. Do what you want.

Hello Bruce, I don't do a lot of posting on here, but I do a lot of reading.:corn: I like guns, mainly shotguns. When I joined the PGCA I didn't even own a Parker, now I have two. :) I went to the Southern this past weekend and shot both of them and had a ball. But back to your post, some people are going to join because they just enjoy it, others will not as long as they can use it for free. From what I've read some people just end up with a shotgun that they have no use for and they just want to find out how much it's worth so they can sell it. I don't know what the fix would be as far as getting people to join. All I can say is that I joined it, I use it and I enjoy it.
Thanks, Mike

I joined the AH Fox Collectors so I could get to the "AHFCA Members only section" of their (our) BBS. We could do the same thing here. Not a recommendation, just a free idea.

When correcting beginnerss mistakes here we could be overly tactful and careful with our words. Those among us that just can't be overly tactful could refrain from correcting the new forum members errors until the beginner feels he is part of the group.

If we want people to join we want to be friendly and helpful to them, especially when they are just getting started. Stating the obvious there are two different memberships, the BBS membership and the PGCA membership. It would seem the first would sometimes lead to the second.

The PGCA is the largest and most successful of the American shotgun collectors associations as is.



Best,

Mike

We PGCA Members know that there are some terrific benefits that come with the very reasonable $40 annual membership like the automatic subscription to Parker Pages, the Guns For Sale page of the forum and a few other forum pages as well. We also have the Membership Roster with addresses and contact information of those wishing to participate in sharing this imformation. We also share the benefit of being recognized by other PGCA Members as being PGCA Members ourselves, which keeps us in a certain "loop".
I think we can add other "PGCA Members Only" forum pages but I think we need to be careful because if we begin to exclude others and limit the number of forum 'accesses' then we stand the risk of being known as an "exclusive" club. We've been there before and I don't think we can afford that again.... being thought of and spoken of as "a club of elitists who refuse to share information" or "a bunch of nose-in-the-air Parker snobs who don't like outsiders".
I think we need to allow ourselves to be "used" but only to an extent. Research letters are more expensive to non-PGCA Members and there are other ways we can encourage Forum Members and lurkers to become PGCA Members so lets put our heads together and try to come up with some amicable ways of doing it.

JM$.02

And John, could you kindly move this thread to the "PGCA Members Only" section of the forum?

i guess im one of the forem ramblers your talking about bruce.....charlie

Charlie, I'd like to see you join. I have to tell you, the Parker Pages is first rate and you would enjoy it. How can we get you to join? Plus you get the secret handshake and decoder ring.

Plus you get to join an exclusive club and become one of the elite. Those Marlin Bolt Action Goose Gun Club boys, they let anybody join.

Why?

Charlie, you are a valuable part of this forum like several others are. We would love to have you as a PGCA Member so you could fully enjoy all the benefits.

Your post is a prime example of how some might feel slighted or singled out by the PGCA becoming "Exclusive".

Best to You Charlie,
Dean

Because, Bruce, it should have been started over there. Anything involving setting policy should be decided among those who set policy and by engouraging PGCA Members to offer thoughts and opinions on just how to do it... you know that - after all, you were a member of the BOD.

Best, Dean

Bruce, I guessed you might do that.

If you would like to discuss it further you know my number 978-621-9338

Dean

One forum improvement would be to disable both the edit & delete functions.

I must say that the PGCA is the gold standard of collecting organizations in my opinion. I was one of the founders of the AH Fox Collectors Association and must say we strive to match your example. The members and leaders of the PGCA are all a class act and I am proud to be a member even though I don't own a Parker. The web site and Parker Pages are first class. Our small organization has been supported and encouraged by the PGCA and we really appreciate the support in your Newsletter and by many of your members. Improvements are necessary in any organization but you guys have it about 99% right. Keep up the good work! Craig

When I wrote my post I had no one person in mind and I hope I didn't offend anyone. I meant it in general. Every board necessarily has a variety of personality types and they are all needed.

Best,

Mike

I am a member of the LC Smith, Fox, and Parker associations. I've always been an outsider on the Smith forum. Oh, there are a lot of great members but the forum is not so friendly. I am a new member of the Fox club and am still forming my opinion. Maybe with a few more members it will turn into a great organization.

As for the PGCA, it has always been open and friendly to strangers. A lot, not all but a lot, of the old timers on this forum provided instructive and often positive comments toward my questions! With their help and guidance my knowledge and Parker collection have grown.

A few months ago while negotiating with a notable midwestern SxS collector, he stated that a significant factor to the popularity of Parker Guns has been the PGCA. So by being open and friendly to the newbees the PGCA members have increased the value of thier collections. Perhaps this is a lesson other organizations could learn from.

Good manners will take you far.

Mark

I don't know who deleted the post that threw this thread into a state of confusion. However, I have stated before that deletions that confuse the state of the thread are considered quite impolite on internet forums. One forum member was suspended for such behavior, was reinstated after changing his screen name and, to some extent, his behavior.

Bruce, you started a good discussion. Perhaps as a newer PGCA member I'm missing something. Whether or not you agreed with the ensuing posts, it seems puerile to remove the original posting.

Cheers
Marcus

40 bucks!, there; Now I feel better!
 

Now I am a PGCA Member. Just used the PayPal feature so as to not to be considered one of them Lurkers. Thought I had Crotch Crickets once, turned out to be chiggers, but a lurker, not on my watch! (Second time I thought I had the Crickets...never mind) All kidding aside, probably about time. Several of my "bestest" friends are Parker guys, and I have gained quite a bit of knowledge about vintage shotguns over the last several years from posts on this forum. Hate to think I've been stealin!
I remember the exchange over on the Elsie site that may have given brother Mark the impression he currently has, but I'll respectfully disagree with his take. Those folks are just as accommodating as you (us) guys over here, and I'll say that just because one doesn't get the answer that they are looking for, doesn't make the folks unfriendly!
That aside as well, if I ever decide to step outside the box in terms of acquiring one of the two best American made shotguns shotguns in the history of Earth, I'll be checking in with you guys to make sure I'm not crapping in my own sock!
Looking forward to my first Parker Pages, and I have to agree with the poster who indicated that the Edit/Delete function on the forum should get a Double Tap to the face (Rock-n-roll VB Seal Team Six, believe it or not, Seal Team members frequently show up and shoot 5-stand at our local venue). Stinks to check into a multiple reply post on the forum only to find that the original post, that incited multiple responses, has been deleted. Just plain bad manners in this guys book.
My passion is LC Smith shotguns. Have a reasonable quiver of same in spite of a hideous bridge building market in my area over the last few years. Don't anticipate for one second that my joining this fine organization will gain me even one new friend, as alot of the guys I shoot with are Parker guys and were my friends before I joined. Just feel like I'm payin' up for some of the info and insight I've gained on your dime over the last few years. Thanks for the opportunity.
John

John, Thanks for joining! Danny and I really enjoyed spending some time with you and Alyssa at the Southern. You are a first rate guy in my book even if you do shoot the second best shotgun made in America....:rotf: And you have one more Parker friend.....:)

John,
Welcome to the PGCA you will be an asset to our organization. It was great meeting you and your lovely target busting, award winning daughter. I don't think of the different collector organizations as adversarial but as a group of guys and gals who love these wonderful old guns. I'm a Parker guy but have an interest in all three of the big American makers [Parker, Fox, Smith] just to name a few. Noone from any of these groups has treated me with anything but respect when I have a question about one of their guns. Once again welcome and looking forward to seeing you in the near future. I'll be contacting you soon regarding your health drink.
Daryl

Hello Dave,
Lizard and I enjoyed meeting you and and Danny as well. Great weekend in my book! In agreement with your thoughts, likely the best shooting event that we've attended together to date. Only 361 days left before that ranking might change!!
Hope you and Danny have occasion to visit VB this summer, and if not consider this an invitation! Water's a little bit warmer here, and fly-fishing for flounder with some of my flounder-pounder flys is likely alot easier than the entomological mystery tour that one has to embark on to catch the elusive rainbows, browns, etc. that you folks are used to up there.
Appreciate the welcome,
John

Thanks John we may take you up on that some day! Are you and Lizard going to Hidden Hollow?

Mr. John Liles, I did not meet you at the Southern because I couldn't make it this year but I must say you have indeed made another new friend here simply because I like the way you make a point... or several, in fact. Wish I could have met you and your daughter and shot with you. Maybe next time. I hope so.

There have been a lot of good encouraging opinions expressed on this thread and even though I might have come across as the dissenter I have nothing but the best interests of the PGCA and all of the forum users, be they PGCA Members, Forum Members or "lurkers", at heart when I made my earlier posts and I stand by what said. It is very good to know what other people think about our organization and our forum so Thank You all for your positive words.

John mentions that our original poster has bad manners. Marcus describes our original poster as "puerile", a good assessment also. I described his behavior as impolite. The person who, a while back, was suspended from participation in this forum was all three, as well as disruptive to the users of the forum. The original poster on this thread knows that his behavior and sometimes his demeanor is unacceptable, but continues to post contentious rhetoric, then bows out when the words hit the fan. He is otherwise a positive contributor to the forum. What is going on here?

Good business sense?
 

I missed the original post but I think I've got the gist of it.

From a purely economical standpoint, wouldn't it be in every Parker owners best interest to educate anyone and everyone with even the slightest interest in these fine vintage guns? I enjoy all of the pictures I see from all of the various shooting events but I must say, you guys aren't getting any younger (except for AmarilloMike :rotf:). To me, it just makes good business sense to cultivate a future market for vintage guns or indeed, our wives will be selling our guns for what we've told them we've paid for them for lack of any knowledgeable or interested buyers in the future.

As always, :bowdown:
Bobby

Bobby,

It seems that is what the older Parker guys figured out!

Toward the original discussion, this forum will always have lurkers. Often though, over time some lurkers become interested in buying a Parker Gun because the PGCA allows them to hang out here. Eventually some lurkers will join PGCA where if they had not been allowed to lurk, most probably they would have not joined.

My personal example is that a few years ago I lived in Northern Virginia and often saw the PGCA display at the Nations Gun Show in Chantilly (Dulles) Virginia. I remember talking to Bill and others at their table but that wasn't enough to interest me in Parkers. I became interested in Parkers in large part due to this forum and the information which was readily shared.

Because of the action types, frame sizes, and other factors Parker Guns can seem overwhelming to a new guy. What I most like about this forum is that it is open to new people and that the members make great efforts to educate them. Sometimes as members we may not always agree but that's because we all have opinions base on our experiences and perceptions.

While I encourage active forum members to become PGCA members, especially those very active forum members, I would not want to exclude them from participating in this open exchange of knowledge and ideas.

Mark

I bought my first Parker, then found this forum. For about a year I was a forum member, gaining a lot of info. I started feeling guilty of being informed but not being a member of the PGCA so I joined. Not everyone will, but I think with an open forum it encourages people to join. Oh, a lot of you guys are hurting my feelings when you don't include Remington along with the other fine doubles. I rate the 1894 right up there with any of them. Paul

If we can dispute and argue data, facts, ideas, and ideals instead of trying to assign names to behavior and impute motives to those we disagree with this will be a very pleasant BBS.

Best,

Mike

I asked four questions intended to spark thoughtful discussion among non forum lookers, forum members and pgca members

Would it be possible to have dealer members post parkers for sale here like we used to do in the Parker pages

How do we move lookers into becoming forum members

How do we move forum members into becoming pgca members

I commented that it seemed to me that this forum had become the pre eminant shotguN collecting site and I asked if there was any way to measure that


For those questions I got what I felt were inappropriate comments so I withdrew the question.

I am presently out in the hill sending this on a cell phone so - apologize if this post is not up to grammatical standards.i

As usual, I missed something on this thread, early on.

Dave

You made a reasonable post, why you pulled it is not obvious to me and in my opinion, pulling it was unreasonable. I didn't see anything about any of the questions that your post generated that warranted it being deleted. I would assume that if the thread was "out of control" it would be pulled in total by administrators.

Your post was good, it generated a good exchange of valuable comments. It was only after you pulled the original post that things got confused.

Posting on any forum is like pulling the trigger, after the bullet (or post) leaves the barrel, you can't take it back.

Just my $.02 worth; but with inflation it isn't worth that much anymore.

Since the OP has recreated his first post can we now take this thread back to the discussion items he listed?

Best,

Mike

Except for the facts that....

1) I sent a confidential document to the BOD and Staff as an overview of the Website. Many of the stats are alluded to in the OPs initial post, yet diluted in the subsequent post. In fact - and in short - the first post in this forum began with "Hey John". I presume I was that "John".

2) The OP asked a question - which was my idea and a discussion point I had IN PRIVATE to a few of the BOD and other interested parties (Dealers posting in the for sale area) - which again, were private conversations and frankly - had anyone asked - are contingent upon tertiary action items which would have to occur well before that plan is in place (things like Sponsorship, advertising rates, whatever. Without THOSE - the Dealer for sale really doesn't make a whole lot of sense in growing PGCA, becuase we will be either shortchanging ourselves OR those same dealers.).

3) Thank Gawd I didn't discuss other ideas I have had in the making - as again - they would have appeared in this thread as well.

In short - when my private conversations are blasted across the General Forum without remorse or consideration to those of us who have the day to day task of delivering this forum, then something is broken.


4) Dean was/is correct. This conversation belongs in the PGCA Member forum - but you know what? I'm all done caring.

So you folks carry on.

Soon enough, my guess is - you folks will soon have a new Admin, on-line Membership guy, web hosting service (I do that too), new PHP and SQL programmer, a new guy to pay for the code, the servers, the circuits, hardware each and every day - and shucks - just a new guy...

When folks don't give a crap about what they post - I lose interest.

But....

I won't lose my professionalism.

When I have private conversations, I expect them to remain so - until I have something to announce.

I don't need others to do it on my behalf.

John

Bruce,

Concerning your first two questions concerning how to convert lookers into forum members and forum members into PGCA members, I think that we are doing that by being a very knowledgable body of members who also share their knowledge. I copied your prodding forum members by suggesting they become PGCA members in my answers to them. Perhaps that method would be more effective it every PCGA member ended their answers to forum members with something like what you suggest: Please considering joining the PGCA.

Another idea is to add a link to an entire Parker Pages from a year or so ago. Let the forum member see what they are missing. That could be followed with a link to the cover and at least one full story and the opening paragraphs to several stories in each current Parker Pages.

"...this forum had become the pre eminant shotgun collecting site and I asked if there was any way to measure that" Well Bruce there is. There are websites that track the activity on the top 100 websites of many different subjects. Maybe our magnificiant webmaster Mr. John Dunkle would create a (for profit to John) Top 100 Gun Collecting Sites? I mentioned gun collecting sites because there is a cost to starting and running something like this. Would we be as popular as the Colt SSA or Winchester Lever Action forums?

Just my thoughts for now,
Mark

John, please don't. Your efforts, your words... all you do are so appreciated by the vast majority of those who use this forum. I know how you feel and what you're thinking... we've spoken privately and I understand. Just know that you are appreciated and are such an integral part of "who we are" and how we appear to those who come to this forum for knowledge and comeradship. You're the glue, man - the bonding agent. Dean

john what ever i am on this forem you are one super guy...got the best thing going as far as im concerned...i watch this forem with a passion has reallygiven me something to look foreward to each day i get up...i know im not a member but i say parker forem is it.... charlie

Charlie....

Thank you... You got it... Let me explain...

You see - when you, and others wake up excited to see what is new - new posts, new threads, new users, new ideas, new pictures - well, in my world - what you are talking about is making a new community. Each day - every day. You are that community, Charlie. You are a huge part of making that community. You see....

I don't write the posts. I don't post all the pictures. I don't add much knowledge. All I do - is be sure that you - and many others - have a place to go to each day which is different, welcoming and well - a "community"?

I don't care much Charlie, if you are a PGCA Member or not (I know - I'm running against the original grain of this thread - but, I'm a little aghast at the original context of this thread anyway, so - I'll continue). Yea, sure - Membership has its privileges, and that's neat - but for some - they contribute just by virtue of sharing in this same community. And that's equally as cool. Why?

Because - like you - they just get up everyday and WANT to login and read and learn and post and contribute...

Yea - that's my world....

What my world is NOT about is forcing folks to become PGCA Members by excluding something? Something in that same community that they are excited about.

You see - in my world, Charlie - if I can improve my end of the forum - the technology to improve the community and give the members (all members, not just PGCA Members) a different experience - better than any other experience in any other website, then, well - you will become a PGCA Member, because you WANT to, not because we say YOU HAVE TO.

I've done these communities for over 15 years, Charlie. The largest I started is now almost over 100,000. My ideals in making this the single best community is the culmination of years of experience, BUT....

Without you Charlie, and folks like Linn, Richard, Eric, Dean, Dave, John Davis, Mark (just to name a few I've heard from in the past few minutes) - none of this would make much sense.

I can tell you what this forum and PGCA is NOT about though? I can tell you it's NOT about forcing anyone to become a PGCA member by virtue of threads like these.

That much I'm pretty sure of...

I'm also as sure, if you see the value of Membership - you, Charlie - and thousands of folks like you, will become Members - as long as "we", who are PGCA Members - continue to just "do what we do".

And for that - you have my promise - that's exactly what we will continue to do...

So you wake up every day and continue to get excited to get on the forum...

And for me?

When you do - I'll be here along with the rest of the community.

Charlie, thank you for your post, support and enthusiasm...

You, Sir - are what this forum is all about.

If it were not, I would have told you so...

John D.

John D let me second what Charlie said and add that you are doing a heck of a great job!
We sometimes take all the work that people like you for granted and I am glad you cleared up the mess this thread generated. I'm am with you in that anything discused in private should stay PRIVATE. A good friend/gentlman always practices this.
Thank you for all you do.

John I don't think anybody could fill your shoes. Seems to me your the charles parker of this great thing. If somebody was to do your job they would have to work in the trenches a long time to learn what you know. Just like all the parker's and king did before they got management jobs. a big ol thank you from ch! And if somebody wants to just b a fourm member thats super with me! they'll get no hastle from me. and a big thank you to all who do all for PGCA.