New drone footage of Watchet east quay wall repair also showing the dredging progress

TwoHooter

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Excellent video, very interesting. Shows the scale of the challenge to make the harbour fully functional again. We draw 1.6m and cannot sit in mud because we have stabilisers and it puts too much stress on the GRP fins. Hence although we have passed Watchet 4 times we have never attempted to go in, which is a pity because we "collect" ports, harbours and anchorages, 56 so far in 6 years.
 

TwoHooter

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It's not right to criticise the moderators too much. I believe they are volunteers. I don't agree with the way that the Watchet news has been censored, in fact I strongly disagree, but I don't want to risk the forum disappearing because the moderators get fed up and resign. It must cost at least £50k p.a. to keep a forum like YBW going, even if the moderators aren't paid. My best guess is that nobody here would be willing to pay more than a token amount to keep the forum going, and some would not pay anything, so we need to accept that he who pays the piper calls the tune.
 
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It must cost at least £50k p.a. to keep a forum like YBW going, even if the moderators aren't paid.
I'm an admin of a forum. It basically costs nothing to run, hosting & a domain. This one is on a sub-domain & the company's hosting account.

Of course, I don't actually bill for my time but where does the 50k come in? I'm amazed by the money slewing around the bilges of the IT world.
 

TwoHooter

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I'm an admin of a forum. It basically costs nothing to run, hosting & a domain. This one is on a sub-domain & the company's hosting account.
Of course, I don't actually bill for my time but where does the 50k come in? I'm amazed by the money slewing around the bilges of the IT world.

Well here is what I know about the costs of running a big website with a busy forum like the YBW. Not the actual figures, just the cost headings.
  • Platform - XenForo isn't free for a big site like this.
  • Design - not free
  • Hosting – a site like this needs a big host and big bandwidth
  • Staff – Even if the mods aren't paid there must be at least one salaried bod managing the site
  • Tech support - obviously
  • Email service – The forum sends out emails constantly, telling people when threads they are following have had a post, and then there's the PM system. This isn't free. It's not going to run on hotmail or gmail.
  • Security – Anti-hacking, anti-malware, and anti DDNS are either good or cheap, not both.
  • Odds and Ends –plug-ins etc.
I don't know how big the forum is or whether my £50k is wildly inaccurate but I do know you can't run something like the YBW forum without there being some costs and it's been free for so long that I doubt many would pay to use it, so best not to criticise too strongly.

I still want news of Watchet though!
 
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Well here is what I know about the costs of running a big website with a busy forum like the YBW. Not the actual figures, just the cost headings.
  • Platform - XenForo isn't free for a big site like this
Ah, the old vBulletin legacy. It was horrible. Why pay when phpBB is free? Fine, agreed, I'll keep on topic. I've just been shocked recently in other areas how much developers expect to get paid. I'll spare the details, but much of it is a vast con. Ended up hating the industry.

But also internet users that expect everything for free, AND THEN TO HAVE "RIGHTS" ON TOP (like freedom of speech & freedom to be a moron), even more.
 
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TwoHooter

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Well let's stick with the subject shall we?

Thread drift is a hallowed YBW tradition :)

But the point I was making about forum admin, and my defence of the mods, isn't thread drift. It relates to the reason this particular thread was started. The only reason this thread exists is because of what happened on the original thread, which definitely relates to how the forum (any forum) is run (or perceived to be run).
 

sarabande

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Because a lovely local marina might become overrun ?

If Cardiff is going to spend squillions on dredging and polishing the place up, good luck to them.

I don't see it as an advertising ploy, but as a celebration by local sailors of a marina that never really got going to start with.
 

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