Posted By Bryn Maidment Sorry to open old wounds but am I alone in thinking that this forum has lot a little sparkle? The requests are OK enough but gone are the plentiful responses. Are the usual visitors still out there? Are they put off by the seemingly convoluted method of replying? The word 'moribund' springs to mind. Bryn PS before anyone criticizes me for having nothing better to do , yes I have raised the Revitalising H & S document with my CE and Board, as well as 101 other things...as well as sending comments direct to IOSH!

Posted By Bill Fisher Bryan Your observations are quite correct. However I am more inclined to take the view that about 90 usual readers have moved onto another home (chat site) suggested by Geoff. Whilst not getting IOSH to act on the comments in totallity (I for one believe they did listen and did include some of the comments)that group decided to pull the plug rather than stay and fight for change from within. I do question their loyalty to the Institution when they respond in this way to one point that didn't go their way! Let the small group remaining see if we can bolster numbers again and through comment see what we can achieve in livening up this Forum from within. Regards Bill

Posted By Geoff Burt I was just thinking the same myself. However I don't think it is a deliberate attempt to stay away - it just (in my most humble opinion) seems harder to respond in this format. Maybe I just need time to get used to it (that was a joke folks!) Bill - isn't life funny. If you argue a point someone says it's divisive, if you don't respond to messages you lack loyalty! However, watch this space on response times on the help/information lines from the BSC, IOSH and the HSE. I asked the same two questions of all three organisations yesterday afternoon and advised each one I needed an urgent response(which I did) - guess which one hasn't answered yet? Geoff

Posted By Mike Charleston Yes Bryn, lacklustre it is. I don't think it so likely that many of the old timers have disappeared, so much as simply sitting back to see how things develop, if my own feelings are anything to go by. I don't like the new layout or the way that the threads cannot be so easily opened, neither do I like having to go through a memory chase to try and work out which messages have previously been read and which are new to me. However, I have not been prepared to comment whilst forcing myself to get used to accessing the site frequently. That's done now and I find very few redeeming features to offset the downside. More importantly, it is the content of the chat that will really make/break any Forum, so as long as people want to come to the site for that, they will put up with the way it is run. Nevertheless, if people decide not to put up with the way it is run, the content will evaporate over time. So .... it's my choice to decide what is interesting for me, and if another site is more useful and user-friendly, it follows that it will attract me. As for disloyalty ... how can one be disloyal to a system that was there for our convenience and was then changed without adequate consideration for the effects? IOSH receives an annual subscription from me and would be unlikely to complain that they also need my loyalty on this issue. If newcomers to this specialty wish to see how someone else can establish a website and offer a good service, let them decide which is the more attractive. Incidentally, I have not accessed web-safety over the last 10 days but I'm off to do so now!! For anyone who wants to do so, try this address: http://members2.boardhost.com/websafety/ I have no commercial or other tie with that site or the organisation behind it, so feel happy to broadcast the name in order that others can decide for themselves on having a look at it. We don't live in a Big Brother state and it is a nonsense to refer to this "other site" as if we can stop visitors to it by not publishing the name! At my last look, the site was not showing very much activity compared to this one, but keep up the good work Ciaran!

Posted By Ken Taylor If the old site format could be likened to looking at a row of books with interesting titles on a shelf and easily accessible, this one seems more like a library card index system. It was interesting to see the questions and answers snaking and spiraling down the screen - all available with a quick click of the mouse and as easy to respond to. Clicking on a 'thread' here only gives you another index and a further action is needed to see the responses - and if you feel inclined to enter the debate another time-consuming series of screens have to be navigated before being afforded access. It is also notable that one can no longer respond to a response but only to the main item. Why does change have to be so boring and cumbersome? However I persevere for the present hoping this will not become as lifeless as some of the other forums on offer.

Posted By John Webster Copy of e-mail to Angela Wheatcroft, IOSH As a contributor to both forums (fori?), I did not enter much into the heated debate until I had chance to get used to the new format. My comments now? My only criticisms of the old forum were that I had to individually open and close each message to navigate a thread and that it could be a bit slow each time one went back to the index, holding as it did some 500 messages At first I liked the new ability to read all messages in a thread, but find now that I cannot reply to individual messages once the thread has moved on without it getting very confusing. The old system allowed branches. With the old, a quick scroll down the index revealed any un-read messages by the colour change. They could then be opened and read with a single click. The new system does not highlight which threads have un-read messages, only which threads I have not entered and which have new postings in the last 24 hours. Whilst on the one hand, promoting the threads with the most recent postings to the top saves having to look for them, the unfortunate side effect is that dormant threads die more quickly. Someone asking a question which has not received a reply within a few days will soon find that it quickly passes down to the next page, where it is now unlikely to be read again. The old scrolling of the full index with active threads interspersed throughout encouraged replies of the "as nobody has replied to your message" type. I don't see this happening any more. Finally, although I don't object to the password system per se, it does throw up a couple of problems. We have lost the spontaneous humour - not very professional the stuffed shirts might say, but a laugh always brightens up the day and encourages readership and participation. If I forget, and compose a reply before logging in, I am not reminded until I try to post the reply. Unless I am very careful to copy and save the text elsewhere, I am liable to loose it and have to type it again once logged in. On a couple of occasions, I HAVE logged in, only to be told I haven't on posting a message. Very frustrating. A mod could bring up the log in screen when "post a response" is clicked. Hope these comments help as you develop the site. John PS I see the last point has been attended to - and I only sent the e-mail 2 minutes ago!!