20 replies to this topic

[DCapps]

About this time each year for the past decade or so, I have made it a point to listen to Trucking' (1970) by the Grateful Dead.

 

Yes, perhaps being used by The Rolling Stone has made the phrase from the song something of a cliche, but still...

 

Although it did not actually appear until some point on the evening of 10/11 November 1999, the final decision to go ahead with the new forum was made at some point on the evening of 8/9 November, which is also when it officially got its name, with Bira making that decision.

 

It took maybe another day or so to work out a few minor items with the coding and so forth as I recall before it officially went out into the ether as a new part of the Atlas F1 lineup.

 

Twenty-two years is not a bad run for a motor sport forum in an increasingly fickle world.

 

It has certainly been a very long and rather strange trip on my part, to say the least.

 

And, like all trips, this one is finally coming to an end for me.

 

I'll see y'all around, just not very often.

Edited by DCapps, 08 November 2021 - 21:18.

[Joe Bosworth]

All credit and many thanks for all who contributed to the start of this forum.  May it reign into distant time with the next milestone being a 25th anniversary.

 

As I just had an 87th birthday over the weekend, my target is to see the 25th anni! 

 

Regards to all who have kept it alive,

[Stephen W]

Excellent innings; I have felt at home since the day I joined.

 

Sorry to see you stepping back, you will be missed.

[Doug Nye]

I was intensely sceptical when Allen Brown first urged me to participate in the Forum you created, Don. Ten thousand six hundred and forty-one posts later I guess I came around.  Take care, keep well and be happy.

 

DCN

[ensign14]

There's an important point at play as well.  20 years ago the main method of internet communication was via fora.  Many hobby-oriented websites had them. 

 

Over time, communication changed to being far more one-way; the fora closed and vanished, and communications were via Facebook or Twitter.  A message into the ether with limited interaction.

 

Even worse now are things like Whatsapp where the messages vanish pretty much instantly.  They are not good media for research or reference.  Like writing a history book on post-it notes.

 

There is at least reddit, if one can get to the good stuff.  But a forum like this one is absolutely vital.  There is so much good stuff knocking around, even if linkrot has destroyed many pictures.  I wonder how many people end up here when wondering about Otto Stuppacher or Superleague formula or whatever.  It's always quite nice to see a one-off post from someone who has been doing family research and found references to their Brooklands-racing ancestor, for instance. 

 

Unlike most publications, the internet is brittle.  Things can go.  I'm hoping at least some of the good stuff here is going to be recorded or repeated or turned into print so that there is a modicum of survival.  Just in case.  If I knew how to mass-save content onto a hard drive, and storage is cheap to do that, I would certainly be doing that with TNF every month or so.  The Wayback Machine at least has a clunky series of snapshots that are of some use, but really that's back to the days of perusing microfiches.

 

This is one of the last bastions of this sort of interactive research, and I hope it remains at least accessible until someone builds a better wheelbarrow.

[2F-001]

I thank you, as always, Don for your role in establishing this much-loved place.

 

I know that it has developed in a way not entirely in keeping with your original vision; but I feel that, compared to other forums I’ve used, the signal-to-noise ratio here is still favourable - and, as Ensign points out above, the other more ‘fashionable’ online platforms simply don’t work for what we do here.

 

Whatever the misgivings, I find that TNF is still a valuable environment for education and research (at my level of knowledge, at least) - as well as for entertainment and building personal connections and cherished friendships along the way. Things will change, inevitably, but long may the spirit of TNF continue…

[Bloggsworth]

Thanks for all the fish...

[cpbell]

I was intensely sceptical when Allen Brown first urged me to participate in the Forum you created, Don. Ten thousand six hundred and forty-one posts later I guess I came around.  Take care, keep well and be happy.

 

DCN

Well said, Doug! 

[Risil]

Take care Don, you're a legend and an inspiration (I'm sure you'll quibble with these word choices but they come from the heart).

[arttidesco]

Thanks Don, for not only a wonderful place to be online, but also the inumerable reconnections, and friendships this place must have facilitated off line. Strange does not  even begin to cover it, enjoy a long and healthy break 

[AdamFerrington]

Well done, Don - an understatement if ever there was one. It would be nice to say that TNF is in safe hands, but I’m not so sure…..

[Doug Nye]

Well done, Don - an understatement if ever there was one.It would be nice to say that TNF is in safe hands, but I’m not so sure…..

Why would you say that...?


Some recent posts critical of this place have left me really puzzled. Don created TNF with sometimes prickly Bira and it rapidly became, and remains, the most powerful research tool within 'our' field that I have yet encountered. There's certainly a time and place for earnest rigour. And there's another for posturing faux academia. Here we see it all with an enormous amount of shared enthusiasm across the broadest spectrum in between. So what's not to like...?

DCN

[Giraffe]

.

 

And, like all trips, this one is finally coming to an end for me.

 

.

 

Don, ....you can check-out any time you like, but you can never leave!....

[Henri Greuter]

Thank you very much Don,

 

You know for what

 

Hope that you still will find it too difficult to stick to the intentions after all.

Have a great time!

[SamoanAttorney]

We had all the momentum; we were riding the crest of a high and beautiful wave.… So now, less than five years later, you can go up on a steep hill in Las Vegas and look West, and with the right kind of eyes you can almost see the high-water mark—that place where the wave finally broke and rolled back.

 

Hunter, a true genius.........he would have appreciated the strange mix of folks associated with this forum, and would be as grateful as minnows such as I, for the vision that you, Don, had in its creation.

 

Bravo!

[Roger Clark]

Sometimes your chips ain't worth a dime if you don't lay 'em down.

[opplock]

 

Why would you say that...?    

 

Some recent posts critical of this place have left me really puzzled.  Don created TNF with sometimes prickly Bira and it rapidly became, and remains, the most powerful research tool within 'our' field that I have yet encountered.  There's certainly a time and place for earnest rigour.  And there's another for posturing faux academia.  Here we see it all with an enormous amount of shared enthusiasm across the broadest spectrum in between.  So what's not to like...?

 

DCN

 

 

 

Well said. I get the impression that some on here think that motor racing history should be left to historians. I disagree, those of us who marshalled, spectated, collected autographs and drove racing cars are often in a position to identify errors of fact that have crept into the written record. I have done so in respect of two errors relating to a race I attended as a 13 year old. 

 

My father read hundreds of books on WWII and when reading those about campaigns he played a (very minor) role in would often say that they were describing a different war to the one he'd been in.    

[Gareth]

 

Why would you say that...?    

 

Some recent posts critical of this place have left me really puzzled.  Don created TNF with sometimes prickly Bira and it rapidly became, and remains, the most powerful research tool within 'our' field that I have yet encountered.  There's certainly a time and place for earnest rigour.  And there's another for posturing faux academia.  Here we see it all with an enormous amount of shared enthusiasm across the broadest spectrum in between.  So what's not to like...?

 

DCN

I only turned up on this board in 2001, so 2 years after TNF was created.

 

But as far as I can tell, some version of the "OMG this place is going to the dogs, it ain't what it used to be" discussion has been doing the rounds for all 20 of the years I've ever dipped in here.

 

If it ever stops happening, then I'll know the place really ain't what it used to be.

[Michael Ferner]

I'm sorry to see you go, Don, I truly am. But don't ever underestimate what you created with this place - it's very special.

[Pascal]

What a wonderful achievement this place is!

 

Don definitely deserves much credit for getting the ball rolling, and anyone who posted since has contributed to making this place what it is now. May it last and get even richer in the decades to come!

[wolf sun]

A big and heartfelt „Thank you Don!“ for all the countless hours you made me spend here when I really should have been doing other things.

 

What an amazing place you have created.