I waited a long time and thought long before posting. I am very conflicted about what has gone down in the last few days. Richard chose to seek a different forum that met his needs better . . . this one has very clearly written and shown that the membership is open to anyone who creates an account, and can mostly post unfettered unless offense is taken and someone rings up a moderator. As Royce said, it is pretty “wild west”. For good or for ill, we all have figured this out who have been around any length of time. We stay or we go based on what we know.
I am personally disgusted at the unabashed unprofessionalism shown to Richard Ames aka Daddio by two members of this forum. They chose not to confront Daddio or the owners of the site, PMQ Magazine, when they were unhappy with what transpired on this forum. They went and posted petty, adolescent, mean-spirited drivel over on their own piece of turf blog/site. Personally, this sort of ‘tolerance’ by the owners of this forum has dwindled my loyalty here, and to their magazine. PMQ forum, and their rules . . . I choose to spend my time where such is not permitted.
I appreciate the atmosphere that allows for open discourse and wide latitude in venting, ranting, sharing, topic choice (see monkey butt), and poking at each other while we all gather some rather useful insights from all sorts of professionals with expertise in their fields. “Owners Only” would leave off some very useful insights from marketing, equipment, dough development and Credit Card professionals. That would drive off a lot of useful knowledge to say the least! I find the wide variety of people, places and professions part of the attraction to this forum . . . for me at least. Intelligent debate and discourse from anyone at all can be useful. Employee, vendor, owner, franchisee, print designer, delivery driver, HVAC professional, whoever.
I gotta say that allowing any persons to wade into the Think Tank, disrupt the community that was established, then crow about it and congratulate themselves on their own discussion board . . . is poor judgment. PMQ has made, and continues to make decisions about this matter that confound me. I stopped posting as often as a form of self-protection. I don’t need continued unsubstantiated accusations levied at me that I have committed some criminal acts. If that sort of activity is accepted byte site operators, then I have really limited time to devote to making their “value added service†of value.
I am not in a snit or anything, since this is where I have made a lot of great friends and colleagues who have given me a lot of great advice. I just think that the time has passed for me to participate daily . . . . until I know better what the resolution and atmosphere will be.
Now back to operating pizza joints and making them successful in this pain in the neck economy.