Earlier today on MAF and a thank you message to our members!

[Midwest]

Hello everyone, Midwest (owner of the forum) here.

Just wanted to chime in on what happened earlier today and say that on behalf of the forum it's inappropriate to limit discussions or content on the forum based on a member's personal grievance and that it's inappropriate to take a formal public stance on behalf of this forum or admins of the forum against another forum. Within reasonable limits, we are looking to have free speech on MAF.

I'm going to go on a limb and assume that the average collector has no interest in conversations pertaining to personal grievances between members. I also firmly believe that no collector needs to take sides towards something of that nature. We're all here because of our shared interest in aviation and collecting 1/400 models.

In terms of link sharing, the MAF staff has decided that it is acceptable to post links to other websites (including other forums) when it relates to the topic/conversation you are engaging with. At this time sharing links or discussing other forums will not be an issue unless it comes off as spam/inappropriate/irrelevant. Essentially we aren't interested in limiting the content on the forum as long as the content is reasonable for MAF.

Furthermore, I would like to express how happy I have been with the MAF community by and large. Our conversations and content as a community have been incredibly fun to interact with and helpful in many cases.

As a note, we have modified our staff list for MAF due to concerns expressed by several members. No members have been banned today but we have made warnings to respective members regarding keeping content relevant, avoiding unnecessary censorship, and keeping the forum civil. Thank you all for your patience.

 

[YesterAirlines]

While this is your website, and so you can make the decisions you feel appropriate, this site was originally begun as a partnership between Connor, yourself and me. As such I expected my feelings to be taken into account and that includes not supporting those who have attacked me historically and made my life difficult for no other reason than they dislike me discussing models. I strive to be fair in that discussion but I cannot allow the assaults on me to continue and it doesn't seem unfair in my eye to not actively support the offenders at other sites.

I am sorry that you do not care to take into account the history of persecution I have suffered and instead prefer to sit on the fence and plead ignorance. To you they may be personal grievances but to me they have been ongoing assaults, which I had hoped this forum would be a haven from.

I cannot participate in a forum where there is this lack of empathy, support and trust. I appreciate the concept of MAF however free speech which protects your own personal interests and not mine isn't of value.

 

[BWI-ROCMan]

I am very sorry to see that this forum has driven out the man who essentially brought, I suspect, a lot of us over. Richard Stretton's fair, objective, and unbiased reviews, and detailed historiography, are an extremely important part of this hobby. They very much figure into my own willingness to put considerable money into the hobby. Richard has indeed suffered persecution elsewhere, and his concerns about other forums are not "personal grievances." If he is made to feel unwelcome here, I will need to reevaluate my own participation.

 

[Midwest]

I am very sorry to see that this forum has driven out the man who essentially brought, I suspect, a lot of us over. Richard Stretton's fair, objective, and unbiased reviews, and detailed historiography, are an extremely important part of this hobby. They very much figure into my own willingness to put considerable money into the hobby. Richard has indeed suffered persecution elsewhere, and his concerns about other forums are not "personal grievances." If he is made to feel unwelcome here, I will need to reevaluate my own participation.

Richard is very much welcome here and I have encouraged him to stay and be active.

 

[Midwest]

While this is your website, and so you can make the decisions you feel appropriate, this site was originally begun as a partnership between Connor, yourself and me. As such I expected my feelings to be taken into account and that includes not supporting those who have attacked me historically and made my life difficult for no other reason than they dislike me discussing models. I strive to be fair in that discussion but I cannot allow the assaults on me to continue and it doesn't seem unfair in my eye to not actively support the offenders at other sites.

I am sorry that you do not care to take into account the history of persecution I have suffered and instead prefer to sit on the fence and plead ignorance. To you they may be personal grievances but to me they have been ongoing assaults, which I had hoped this forum would be a haven from.

I cannot participate in a forum where there is this lack of empathy, support and trust. I appreciate the concept of MAF however free speech which protects your own personal interests and not mine isn't of value.

Thank you for letting us know Richard. The forum is intended to be for members to discuss model aircraft and related aviation content. By and large the average collector has little to no interest in conversations pertaining to personal grievances between a few members.

These matters are not relevant and better left to private discussions elsewhere. As I have mentioned you are very much welcome here and are encouraged to stay and be active so long as the content is relevant to model aircraft and aviation like your blog content and model critiques which I personally enjoy.

 

[Mark22]

Thank you for letting us know Richard. The forum is intended to be for members to discuss model aircraft and related aviation content. By and large the average collector has little to no interest in conversations pertaining to personal grievances between a few members.

These matters are not relevant and better left to private discussions elsewhere. As I have mentioned you are very much welcome here and are encouraged to stay and be active so long as the content is relevant to model aircraft and aviation like your blog content and model critiques which I personally enjoy.

We have send eachother a PM and already agreed to end the discussion and continue discussing models in a friendly manner. Richard made use of his free speech and no insults or threats were ever given. I don't know who those other members are that "showed concern", but this was all between Richard and me.

I would expect some more respect for his work and background and give him back his moderator status. He adds a lot of value and interaction to this forum and only yesterday it turned unfriendly because I underestimated how discussions on DAC had affected him.

 

[Adrian]

Thank you for letting us know Richard. The forum is intended to be for members to discuss model aircraft and related aviation content. By and large the average collector has little to no interest in conversations pertaining to personal grievances between a few members.

These matters are not relevant and better left to private discussions elsewhere. As I have mentioned you are very much welcome here and are encouraged to stay and be active so long as the content is relevant to model aircraft and aviation like your blog content and model critiques which I personally enjoy.

Please do more to encourage Richard to remain, as he did a lot to help set up this forum and without his input, MAF will die!

 

[747438]

DA.C is a ghost town, please do not make this forum the same!

 

[Alzyerpal]

Of for goodness sake, this venture has only just begun. Let's not spoil it with tantrums already, we really don't want another poisoned chalice. Now then, as Marty Crane once said on Frasier, "Let your brother play".

 

[Ciderman]

I'll second Midwest's opinion.

As much as I appreciate Richard's contribution and hate the 400SH rhetoric and hypocrisy I believe imitating their poor example of bias is nothing this forum and the 1/400 collectorate will benefit from. Biased forums like 400SH are losing members every day. Let's keep this place friendly and open to everyone and everything (like mentioning 400SH or DA.C from time to time) and MAF will flourish.

Richard has every right to be frustrated with AK and his cronies but personal grievances should not become policy.

 

[YesterAirlines]

I'll second Midwest's opinion.

As much as I appreciate Richard's contribution and hate the 400SH rhetoric and hypocrisy I believe imitating their poor example of bias is nothing this forum and the 1/400 collectorate will benefit from. Biased forums like 400SH are losing members every day. Let's keep this place friendly and open to everyone and everything (like mentioning 400SH or DA.C from time to time) and MAF will flourish.

Richard has every right to be frustrated with AK and his cronies but personal grievances should not become policy.

Ciderman I am a fan of your work and appreciate your input. However you can't have it both ways. You can't appreciate my contribution and yet enable the same people that try and crush it. The bias on those forums should be not replicated here and if I am going to be posting in an area then I demand protection and some aspect of control. If you think I am biased there isn't much I can do to dissuade you. I am not hiding behind a username with nothing to lose as so many members on here are. These 'personal grievances' you talk of are exactly the same ones you would face if you put the same effort in as I do - which is thousands of hours a year.

So either you play by rules that I accept or I don't engage. This forum was setup as a partnership - one in which I was doing a lot of work for nothing.

I had already accepted there wasn't a lot in this for me and there was much for Ali to gain at my expense but accepted that as a trade-off because he appeared to be trustworthy and I wanted a forum to enjoy. However he decided to remove my moderator rights without even speaking with me - so what kind of partnership is that? As it is Ali has decided that he wants full control - primarily to protect his store brand. That is his choice but as I say you can't have your cake and eat it.

So you are welcome to stay on MAF but I will not be. I apologise to everyone I got involved with this.

 

[Purpleplane]

Sorry to see you go Richard. I've always enjoyed your work.

 

[Mark22]

Quoted from the AC thread as it's more relevant here.

...there was no understanding that a staff member of the forum would use his position to defend/offend values of a personal debate and especially not to use the privileges as a moderator to censor and pressure members to take sides of an outside debate. Being a MAF staff member is not the place to take a formal public stance on behalf of this forum's members or staff against other people/forums...

Then why did none of the other staff members do anything about it? Or at least contact Richard (or me) before making the decision to remove him as moderator? Staff members are also just people with emotions, not robots. I even said it was mostly my fault but yet only Richard got blamed for it. I will not go into further discussion because I think it won't change anything, but still it feels unfair.

 

[redriveraviation]

Midwest was not online and I was in touch with asking about how we wanted to handle the situation. We did not discuss sharing links from other forums prior to this situation.

 

[Ciderman]

Ciderman I am a fan of your work and appreciate your input. However you can't have it both ways. You can't appreciate my contribution and yet enable the same people that try and crush it. The bias on those forums should be not replicated here and if I am going to be posting in an area then I demand protection and some aspect of control. If you think I am biased there isn't much I can do to dissuade you. I am not hiding behind a username with nothing to lose as so many members on here are. These 'personal grievances' you talk of are exactly the same ones you would face if you put the same effort in as I do - which is thousands of hours a year.

So either you play by rules that I accept or I don't engage. This forum was setup as a partnership - one in which I was doing a lot of work for nothing.

I had already accepted there wasn't a lot in this for me and there was much for Ali to gain at my expense but accepted that as a trade-off because he appeared to be trustworthy and I wanted a forum to enjoy. However he decided to remove my moderator rights without even speaking with me - so what kind of partnership is that? As it is Ali has decided that he wants full control - primarily to protect his store brand. That is his choice but as I say you can't have your cake and eat it.

So you are welcome to stay on MAF but I will not be. I apologise to everyone I got involved with this.

No-one defended 400SH here or questioned you in any way. Allowing collectors to just mention or link to other forums does not enable those people who attacked you in the past.

 

[Jazajia]

I am coming late but I have a few words that I'd like to extend to @YesterAirlines:

Richard, congratulations on the wonderful work that you do with your website. I find it very noble that someone thought about documenting the history of small-scale model collecting and producing top-notch, well-researched, and well-written literature on the hobby. The first time I came across your website was in the middle of my collecting hiatus, I was researching something about Viasa, unrelated to scale model collecting, but when I saw it I could not believe my eyes as I sympathized 100% with the concept of documenting aviation history through die-cast models, and you have done an excellent job with it. I think it is obvious, but to make it official, your website is one of the main inspirations behind my own, and I still visit YesterdayAirlines regularly. So for that, you have earned my respect and admiration.

With that in mind, you have the absolute right to feel like an important influencer in the hobby, because you are. However, I think you are taking it a bit too far by suggesting that we should take sides with you and that those of us that remain neutral are by default not supporting you. I really wish you could take a deep breath and realize that it is simply not true.

I was really excited when I saw the MAF intro video in which you and the other two creators indicated that this was just a hobby, and as such, it was pretty pointless to allow drama and passions to get in the way of enjoying it; just like it has happened many times before over at DA.C and 400SH. I knew, however, that because of your prominent position in the hobby, you had been involved in some nasty arguments (whether you were right or wrong is not relevant here) and because of that, it was going to take some effort on your part to let go of those feelings and remain neutral. As a moderator, it is important to be partial, as it also is if we are to truly break away from the history of drama that has surrounded the forums of this hobby for decades.

I only know you as a collector, but I get the feeling that this might be more like a business for you instead of a hobby. If that is the case maybe you are not in the best position to be a forum moderator, and that is okay Richard. I for one won't think less of you because of that. Or maybe @Midwest and @redriveraviation could give you a second chance? @Adrian is correct in saying that a moderator from a different continent is needed to provide around-the-clock moderation. What I would really hate is to see you go. Not only because we will be missing out on the wealth of knowledge that you have on this hobby, but also because the whole situation will leave a bad taste in our mouths for a while.

I have a lot of model stuff to go through, but I took the time to write this because I think it is important for you to understand that we do care about your feelings, even though we might not show it in the way you want it to be shown.

 

[YesterAirlines]

EDIT - I wrote something but I have deleted it. I am tired of this - just let it die.

 

[BWI-ROCMan]

Richard is very much welcome here and I have encouraged him to stay and be active.

He has explained in some detail why he did not feel welcome. I hope that he may be brought back as a moderator. From this point, I'll join him to say, 'let it die.'

 

[Alzyerpal]

Well what with Richard being chased out and the acceptance of 'The dark villain of DAC' as a new member here, I may well be saying my goodbyes too. It's been a great few weeks so far, but if the same scenario starts to develop here, It'll be a case of thanks but no thanks.

 

[SoCalAviation744]

Umm pardon me but like is everyone forgetting we’re collecting 1:400 airliner models here? How is this much drama being created from such a simple hobby? I thought all this drama stuff was left behind on DAC. Now here too? Oh brother…