Horse Racing and Equestrian Fora to be merged

convert

Pretty much as it says in the title.

Unfortunately, and despite the mod's best efforts, the powers-that-be have decided that the Equestrian and Horse Racing fora are to be merged. They are of the opinion that all things 'equestrian' should be together rather than having them split into a number of different fora. Although originally suggested as having 'Equestrian' a sub-forum of Horse Racing, we managed to convince the powers that be to retain the Equestrian Forum in its own right, so therefore, as and from Monday, the Horse Racing forum will now be known as 'Equestrian and Horse Racing'.

I hope everyone will continue to support the racing side of things and to post as normal.

I'd like to thank you for your support over the years, and look forward to seeing you all in our shiny brand new forum next week.

Convert

Clemon

The power that be are fools

Clemon

Or this is an april fools?????????

RichieLawlor

Jesus if there wasn't enough idiots in here already now were gonna have a load of ponces who prance around on nags jumping over Walls and trying to make sure there hair looks nice.

RIP horse racing forum

UrbanSea

I mis read the post.
I don't know to believe it or not...
I'm going for not.

Sparks

RichieLawlor wrote: »

Jesus if there wasn't enough idiots in here already now were gonna have a load of ponces who prance around on nags jumping over Walls and trying to make sure there hair looks nice.
RIP horse racing forum

Unfortunately, it's something you will have to cope with. Forums don't look like they cost anything, but in actual fact they do - disk space is cheap, but RAM on a server isn't, nor is having to provision more server capacity, and every extra forum generates load on the server farm due to the way vBulletin is written (it's due to a really underoptimised SQL table schema, for those interested). Boards already runs almost two dozen machines to cope with the site at the moment. Having the two forums combined doesn't solve any problems on its own, but it does help a little - and since all we've seen from HR in the last few weeks has been complaints and general noise, the decision was taken to merge the two. Similar reviews are underway for other forums at the moment.

Clemon

Sparks wrote: »

Unfortunately, it's something you will have to cope with. Forums don't look like they cost anything, but in actual fact they do - disk space is cheap, but RAM on a server isn't, nor is having to provision more server capacity, and every extra forum generates load on the server farm due to the way vBulletin is written (it's due to a really underoptimised SQL table schema, for those interested). Boards already runs almost two dozen machines to cope with the site at the moment. Having the two forums combined doesn't solve any problems on its own, but it does help a little - and since all we've seen from HR in the last few weeks has been complaints and general noise, the decision was taken to merge the two. Similar reviews are underway for other forums at the moment.

You'd swear that ye wern't making a afortune on advertising...:rolleyes:

UrbanSea

Convert-swear is it true?
Or are the mods having a good laugh at my uncertainty?

RichieLawlor

You lot ( mods admins ect, not u in particular sparks but you get the idea ) already managed to kill the poker forum, now your gonna kill the horse racing forum, by the time your done you will be left here talking amongst yourselves. HR and equestrian is like combining poker and snap. Use sone common sense if there is any out there in admin world. I doubt it though

Sparks

Clemon wrote: »

You'd swear that ye wern't making a afortune on advertising...:rolleyes:

There isn't a fortune being made, unfortunately, and while the Moderators and Category Moderators (and most of the Admins) are volunteers, the founders and the development team aren't; and server farms aren't as cheap as people think (it's not just the once-off cost of the hardware either, server farm colocation is a service contract covering everything from power and cooling to network bandwidth).

It's not that boards.ie ltd is facing a loss in the next quarter, it's just that given the rise in demand on the site since January, something had to give eventually, and this is part of that. But it's just a temporary measure for a few months, it's not the end of the world.

Clemon

Sparks wrote: »

There isn't a fortune being made, unfortunately, and while the Moderators and Category Moderators (and most of the Admins) are volunteers, the founders and the development team aren't; and server farms aren't as cheap as people think (it's not just the once-off cost of the hardware either, server farm colocation is a service contract covering everything from power and cooling to network bandwidth).

It's not that boards.ie ltd is facing a loss in the next quarter, it's just that given the rise in demand on the site since January, something had to give eventually, and this is part of that. But it's just a temporary measure for a few months, it's not the end of the world.

But isnt it the more demand the more money they get from advertisers

Say hi to your new mod people.

For the record, my pony is not a nag but rather an excellent arabian who is not wasted on doing laps of an empty field, and one of the benefits of the new GPA hats (the cool ones with the vents) is that my hair now looks great when I take off the helmet.

Sparks

Clemon wrote: »

But isnt it the more demand the more money they get from advertisers

That only works if you can meet the demand. If the demand exceeds the capacity of the servers, the site loading times suffer, at best. At worst, the site falls over. That sort of thing does not mix with advertising very well.

It's not helped much by the problem being cumulative - one slow web browser session delays the next session, which delays the next and so on; and since all those sessions are running just a bit longer than they should, the backlog just grows and grows. At the moment, this only happens during the peak hours for the server farm; but with every new user and every new post, we take an (admittedly small) step towards a point where the server farm just can't cope anymore. What's really needed is to provision more server capacity, and it's hoped that that and some backend software hacking can give a more long-term solution, but for the next few months until that's in place, we need to make some temporary changes like these merges.

Sparks

Deleted User wrote: »

Say hi to your new mod people.

For the record, my pony is not a nag but rather an excellent arabian who is not wasted on doing laps of an empty field, and one of the benefits of the new GPA hats (the cool ones with the vents) is that my hair now looks great when I take off the helmet.

That's not really a very helpful attitude Zara. This isn't going to be easy on the posters in either forum, a bit more respect is going to be necessary for this to run smoothly.

UrbanSea

Deleted User wrote: »

Say hi to your new mod people.

For the record, my pony is not a nag but rather an excellent arabian who is not wasted on doing laps of an empty field, and one of the benefits of the new GPA hats (the cool ones with the vents) is that my hair now looks great when I take off the helmet.

I was trying to respond to this earlier but my connection went.
I was wondering how could a person be expected to moderate a horse racing forum,where people are sharing their love of horse racing,when the person themself sees the sport as a waste of time doing pointless laps around a field?
Surely this would result in a clash of personalaties at a future date as the posters and the mod can't even come together on a basic foundation amount of agreeing over their views and love of the sport.

And if horse racing is the pointless running of laps in a field,what is the snobbish sport of equestrian,jumping unrealistic walls the size of houses around the same circuit?

convert

greetings wrote: »

I was trying to respond to this earlier but my connection went.
I was wondering how could a person be expected to moderate a horse racing forum,where people are sharing their love of horse racing,when the person themself sees the sport as a waste of time doing pointless laps around a field?
Surely this would result in a clash of personalaties at a future date as the posters and the mod can't even agree on a basic foundation amount of agreeing over their views and love of the sport.

I mod both. And Wicked is involved in racing, too. And Zaraba's not a stranger to racing and point-to-pointing either (though Z doesn't always admit it!). so there's no major problem. I think Z was just trying to make a grand entrance!

/And I think Z succeeded!

yop

Well since the Interior Designs is going I can't see why we need 2 forums for the horsies Time to cut costs chaps.

convert

No comments on modding will be tolerated here. If you notice, the fora are not yet merged, so if you have an issue with a poster, please follow the correct procedure: report the post, PM the mod if you wish, if you feel your query has not been dealt with sufficiently contact a CMod, and only if you are not happy with the CMod's reply should you post in Help Desk. The next person who does so will receive an automatic ban from this forum.[

UrbanSea

convert wrote: »

I mod both. And Wicked is involved in racing, too. And Zaraba's not a stranger to racing and point-to-pointing either (though Z doesn't always admit it!). so there's no major problem. I think Z was just trying to make a grand entrance!

/And I think Z succeeded!

I think that grand and sour are different.
Convert would you be able to PM me a list of the forums that are being changed/gotten rid of,or will there be a sticky over the next few days? If you have it.

convert

See here for further information

UrbanSea

P'eed off.

Chicken Run

boo

I have neither a racehorse, nor a poncy nag that jumps over walls - just a muddy pony that I'm currently breaking to ride - so I don't fit in anywhere now....

and my hair looks crap, helmet or not.

sceptre

Shame those that called other members "a disgrace" and "an idiot" don't have a sense of humour. Or a calendar.[1]

Note: buy a calendar. Welcome to the day after April 1:)[2]

[1]Amongst other things...
[2]Cough, hint...

UrbanSea

Was it not asked was it an april fool's joke?

sceptre

Ever met anyone who ever said yes to that when asked?:)

UrbanSea

A good few,given the game to be up,and it doesn't really act as a joke anymore,rather something more serious.

RichieLawlor

sceptre wrote: »

Shame those that called other members "a disgrace" and "an idiot" don't have a sense of humour. Or a calendar.[1]

Note: buy a calendar. Welcome to the day after April 1:)[2]

[1]Amongst other things...
[2]Cough, hint...

Its a stupid tradition, and very very sad imo

Sparks

/facepalm

UrbanSea

We''ll agree to disagree,and be more alert next year.

RichieLawlor

Sparks wrote: »

/facepalm

UrbanSea

Convert is it safe to say this thread has run it's course?