And it's a good alternative Nigel, and I think I'll---in future---be doing just that.
Dave
For a number of reasons, MrGDB, I do hope you're wrong.
If you're right, however, it's nice to be here during the fading away stage...
Dave
If you're right, however, it's nice to be here during the fading away stage...
Dave
I miss the days when Claire (Mrs T) was working for rspb and was kind enough to comment on posts, set quizzes and also help with questions. My main concern is that no request for help or advice should go unanswered as some can be quite urgent and most folk tend to use this community to ask seek that help. I have tried ringing rspca when an urgent case has come my way and you can't often get through on the phone even when you press the number on selection for urgent cases. With my meagre 8 years of experience regarding birds, I do not have the full confidence or expertise to answer some of the questions but rather than ignore their plea, try answer the best I can (as others also do) and it would be helpful if there was a sticky tab where either experts at rspb, or even bto could spot them and maybe offer the correct advice or answer. They don't need to be a full time observers of the forum as questions on an official page could be flagged up for answer (as with the abuse/spam tab) so they are alerted to these requests for help/advice or urgent action. This would not require much time from one of the limited numbers of staff at rspb if it was on a flag up for assistance alert.
_________________________________________________________________________
Regards, Hazel
I share your concerns Hazel.
The sticky tab seems a good idea. And, technically, it would seem relatively easy to set up criteria (length of membership, number of posts, etc. (the forums already generate metrics)) for which forum members could apply the tab.
Dave
The sticky tab seems a good idea. And, technically, it would seem relatively easy to set up criteria (length of membership, number of posts, etc. (the forums already generate metrics)) for which forum members could apply the tab.
Dave
They don't deal with SPAM very quickly, so I doubt they'll be any quicker for helping out here. Anyway, most urgent needs are evenings & weekends when nobody else is around.
We need to make the forum more user friendly to attract more regular users, who may have skills to help us out.
We need to make the forum more user friendly to attract more regular users, who may have skills to help us out.
Best wishes
Hazel in the Gironde estuary, France
Most RSPB reserves used to have there own blogs that where updated either every day or regularly on the RSPB Community Forums. But now only very few of the RSPB reserve blogs are now updated on a regular basis. Most of the RSPB Blogs on these forums have never been updated for quite a few years and some reserves are now updated only very infrequently. Most individual RSPB reserves now have there own official Facebook or Twitter accounts where staff and volunteers regularly post updates every day or on a regular basis and most RSPB members now post on either RSPB individual Facebook and Twitter official reserve accounts now. The RSPB Community might be discontinued eventually and that will be a sad day if that happens. But that could well be the case. The staff and volunteers now post far more frequently on Facebook than they do now, than even on the popular Loch Garten Osprey Blog on the RSPB Community Forum.
Regards,
Ian.
Hazel C said:They don't deal with SPAM very quickly, so I doubt they'll be any quicker for helping out here. Anyway, most urgent needs are evenings & weekends when nobody else is around.
We need to make the forum more user friendly to attract more regular users, who may have skills to help us out.
When Mrs T(Clare) the senior moderator and other mods posted on here every day and every evening, spam got dealt with very quickly and most on here new Mrs T’s email address as on one occasion I had a private message on here that was spam and I was able to contact Mrs T straight away by email to Mrs T at the RSPB headquarters at the Lodge in Bedfordshire and that problem was dealt with very fast and quickly. Sadly that’s no more and with a number of redundancies within the RSPB a few years before Covid and what the landscape will look like after Covid as has affected every charity that I know off in the UK big and small including all UK wildlife conservation charities, and it will be a very worrying time for all!
Regards,
Ian.