Spoke to Blue

markettwain

July 16, 2006

I just got off the phone with Blue, an administrator here, and was very encouraged by what I heard.

1. He agrees that Yahoo! facilitates bashers/political posters with their policies, and he is proactive to prevent such manipulation here. Use the "report abuse" feature (but don't abuse it!) and these vermin with be exterminated. Only report clear cases of abuse. Abuse can only happen here if we let it. He quipped that Yahoo! changing its format is a bigger blow to bashers/boiler rooms than the SEC.

2. As far as others usurping your Yahoo! name, he does NOT guarantee that you will have the same name here as you did on Yahoo!. It is an unfortunate reality. To try to remedy this would be opening a can of worms and use too much of his time. If you have any good solutions, he would like to hear them. He recommended that people finding themselves unable to get their old Yahoo! ID make it known here who they were on Yahoo! and start using a different ID here.

3. IV was on a shared server with about 20 others, but last night they moved to a dedicated server. This has helped the speed issue. More speed will be available if needed.

4. IV is seeking new advertising deals with their increased traffic. They plan to take advantage of the opportunity Yahoo! is inadvertently giving them.

5. They are very open to suggestions and comments about how they can improve the service. Some ideas they are tossing around include requiring a credit card to be a member, privatizing the board, and allowing members to create their own private boards. Being smaller, they are able to change and adapt much more quickly than Yahoo!.

Overall, I was very impressed with Blue and think that Yahoo! just handed him their business on a silver platter.

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1:05:10 PM