[Mr 5 0]

Dark_ 5.0:

Let me try to explain something to you and anyone else who may be interested.

Does anyone here pay one penny for using this website or do anything to sustain it? The answer is: no, of course not.

You - and every other member - use it, obviously enjoy it and contribute your opinions and advice to it when you feel like it, as all our members do, but Dan McClain does most of the heavy lifting here, including paying money out of his own pocket every month to keep the site running. He gets some help from moderators, like me, who do what we do for free. We depend on our members to maintain a grown-up, civil and reasonable attitude in order to keep MW a friendly, useful site. When we make some simple requests and are met with attitude and snide remarks, it's not appreciated.

Can you not understand this?

Dan (and myself) have spent many hours and much effort to take MW from a simple, home-grown hobby site to what it is today, with over 20,000 registered members and a good reputation within the Mustang and internet community. We value all of the MW members but the fact remains that you are still a guest on another persons website and as such, the owner, Dan McClain, has a perfect right to do whatever he wishes and make whatever rules he see fit. You might complain but as a guest it behooves you to accept the minor restrictions without pouting about it.

As his agent, I do what's necessary to maintain the standards set by Dan for Mustang Works. Sometimes, that means criticizing a practice some members engage in, as in photos within signatures. Dan and I attempt to make this criticism as civil and reasonable as possible, and for our trouble, we are often met with hostility and 'attitude', as if we had no right to make a negative comment. Sorry, that's unrealistic.

Dan will finalize the signature issue and your small photo will probably stay. What's the problem? Someone criticized you? C'mon. I take more criticism from MW members than I ever get in daily life and yet, somehow, I manage to survive it. You can too.

Sorry about the job stress. It explains a lot. Let's try to move on from here. I'm willing.

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Mustangbelle306:

You seem to be under the impression that a mild criticism equates to 'jumping down people's throats'. That's unrealistic. You need to learn to differentiate a simple suggestion (or even mild criticism) from a personal attack. Big difference.

I have opinions and I express them. Being the messageboard administrator does not prevent me from telling someone they made a mistake or could do things better. Why should it? I don't give up my right to an opinion and free expression when I log onto the MW website, and neither does anyone else, including you.

I try to make my criticisms civil and look for the positive but your view appears to be that I'm having some sort of low-grade mental problem if I post a negative word to someone. Does that apply to you, too? Are you having 'a day' if you criticise someone or make a suggestion? I doubt it, so why do you project that attitude onto me?

Case in point: I quite often see posts asking questions that could be answered with a 20-second Google search, like the infamous Nokia ring tones. I'm not sure if it's ignorance or laziness that causes this. Anyway, on that thread, I did the search, supplied the links and casually mentioned that anyone can find this information by utilizing a search engine.

You seem to have noted and retained that casual exchange and obviously thought there was something negative about my post. I disagree and think your perception of what's really negative and what's just advice or a casual observation is somewhat skewed. Look, no one, including me, likes criticism but we're going to get it, like it or not. Fact of life that we all need to understand and try to deal with realistically.

When the day comes that all I do is post smily-faces and never make a negative comment without being criticized in turn, I'm outta here. Since that won't happen (I've outlasted many, many posters who thought they knew exactly how I should be doing my job) you'll just have to bear my occasional criticisms on various topics from time to time and try not to attribute them to anything more than what they are. Observations, suggestions, advice and yes, criticism. Just like you occasionally offer.

Belle, based on your record here on MW I know you're up to it so I think we'll be fine here.