Fnarf, Fnarf!

There was a post on the Green Place regarding how to stop your audience touching or fiddling with your cards.
This got the kiddies in a real lather of anxious enquiry. As none of these idiots have ever performed in real life - audience management does not occur to them.
So, the subgenial in me ( ) made the following post.....

if anyone asks me if they can S*** my C****, I tell them to F*** O**. Obviously, I did not want the kiddies on the Green Place to be let into a technique with cards that I have 'kept close to my chest' for years; namely 'shuffling'.

imagine how upset I was when I received the following post from one of the idiots who wear the ermine in the palace of nobs:

---

Hi,

Your post in "May I shuffle your deck, Please?..." - Embarrassing questions series, issue 2 was deleted because it contained profanity, and when the profanity was commented out, there was nothing meaningful left.

The rules do not even allow a single letter in profanity.

While I expect you meant "Shuffle Deck" for the first term, the use of asterisk characters gives that a possible other meaning, and I would have to change the only letters to be asterisks. The second phrase has an obvious meaning, and would have to be commented out. Normally, that is what would be done, but in this case, your post would become meaningless if that was done, so it had to be deleted.

---

I have a good mind never to go back there!

























.......at least not as me!

It never ceases to amaze me how much censorship (and lack of humour) is going on at these kind of places.
Talk Magic is just as bad. It seems to me that any site that hires out loads of advertising space, purely to make money
operates in this fashion.

I think they are frightened of anything vaguely controversial because:
1) It may upset their paying advertisers.
2) There are children watching.

What also astonishes me is that certain people are given carte blanche to say what they like wheras others will receive
a ban. The "untouchables" are obviously the advertisers and also a few favourites that seem to be exempt from any
criticism despite how much they offend people.

A perfect example is Talk Magic - or Mark Lewis' Playground (as I like to refer to it) - on there he says what he likes,
is offensive and rude, yet you are told "It's just the way he is", "It's his sense of humour". I have a lifetime ban from TM,
whereas Lewis rants go on to this day.

The people that run such sites are the kind that wished they had become prefect at school, but never did. And these little corners of cyberspace give them a sense of power that they are deprived of in the real world.

If you want to see the quickest magical vanish there is - post something negative about Outlaw on the Magic Cafe and watch it vanish!

Dr Todd's thread concerning the trouble he had regarding Luna disappeared in a puff of smoke, yet there was nothing offensive in it and based on his own experience. The Cafe are worse than the Illuminati for controlling how people think.

Christopher J Gould wrote:

if anyone asks me if they can S*** my C****, I tell them to F*** O**. Obviously, I did not want the kiddies on the Green Place to be let into a technique with cards that I have 'kept close to my chest' for years; namely 'shuffling'.

imagine how upset I was when I received the following post from one of the idiots who wear the ermine in the palace of nobs:

---

Hi,

Your post in "May I shuffle your deck, Please?..." - Embarrassing questions series, issue 2 was deleted because it contained profanity, and when the profanity was commented out, there was nothing meaningful left.

The rules do not even allow a single letter in profanity.

While I expect you meant "Shuffle Deck" for the first term, the use of asterisk characters gives that a possible other meaning, and I would have to change the only letters to be asterisks. The second phrase has an obvious meaning, and would have to be commented out. Normally, that is what would be done, but in this case, your post would become meaningless if that was done, so it had to be deleted.

---

I have a good mind never to go back there!


!

That's funny.

Freddie - you are spot on.
The main problem is with fear of offending advertisers.
At some point in the future - it would be good to raise some capital from advertising on this place to pay for future developments. There are real lessons to be learnt from the other forums.
Makes you proud to be here huh?

BTW - I love a good rant!

Chris, your initial post had me in stitches, thank you.

The cafe was one of the first magic forums I encountered. At first glance, it seemed like a friendly place, populated by some very knowledgeable people willing to share and help - well, I was new!!! That misconception didn't last very long though. It becomes obvious fairly quickly that there are those on the board who get away with murder and woe to anyone with the guts to criticise or upset them. Needless to say, I haven't posted on there in a long time and rarely visit any more. I prefer honest reviews and free discussion. Then again, I might set up my own advert so that I can be as rude and obnoxious as I like to other users with no fear of reprimand.

I'm still not clear why profanity (even partially blanked out) merits a post deletion. Pathetic really. Fair enough, if a forum caters to kids too, have a language filter set up to spare them. However, there's no reason to remove a whole post for the sake of a bit of swearing. Bloody hell!

A forum funded by advertising is always in danger of stepping over the line one way or another. Without the advertisers, there isn't always enough money to fund the site, but without the users, the adverts are reaching nobody anyway. Bit of a Catch 22.

Why not have a manifesto that advertisers must agree to? If they choose to advertise, they do so on the understanding that the users of the forum can (and probably will) bitch and moan about their products, alongside the fanboys. If they want to advertise and then put their name to a product or provide a service, they should be willing to take the commendations with the flak - and on the chin. I'd have thought a forum would be a perfect place to show how good you are at helping and supporting customers.

To be fair to TM, there has been a recent thread specifically attacking the lousy service from one of their advertisers. No end of people have complained bitterly about unfulfilled orders, ignored emails etc. So far, the whole thread has been pretty much a free for all against this advertiser. There have even been a number of questions asked about whether the advert should be pulled and whether TM should distance themselves from what looks a little like a recommendation or endorsement. Up to press, neither the supplier in question or any mods have responded or intervened in the discussion. To their credit, the mods have let people rant quite freely. Which is how it should be.

Well, it's been a long time for me... I keep checking in to the cafe in order to get my daily dose of adrenalin going. Works wonders. Some people recommend a glass of red a day to keep the doctor away, personally I would recommend 15 minutes spent at the cafe. Although, to make it more enjoyable I would recommend a glass of red to go with it.

I got banned when arguing with Richard Osterlind. Another untouchable on there. I didn't like his products, so he didn't like me

The one thing that gets to me now though is that I was told that I wasn't allowed to advertise my products on there, or talk about them. I referred to an ebook of mine in a conversation. The post got deleted. Im looking at the forum now and everyone seems to be doing it. Or have their friends to go on and say "WOW, I mean WOW! Can't believe so and so is letting this out of the bag. I begged him to keep it to himself" etc etc. It's like a freaking train station for hype trains, and unlike London's transport system, these trains leaves on time every minute, every day. Grr... oh well...

My point is that some people are allowed to do whatever on there... Whereas some of us are not "famous" enough to.

Sincerely,
Daniel

SIGH and SIGH again.

Another bizarre forum I frequent just finished a month long exchange about the nonsense perpetrated by Cafe administrators.

Their rules are absurd, their enforcement is arbitrary, their behavior is childish.

There are only two reasons I bother with the Cafe at all:

• Product announcements. People with something to sell go to where the masses are. I first learned of Freddie Valentine's The Tarot Reader's Black Book (and consequently of this forum) from a posting of his at the Cafe.
  
  
• Bargains. There's a thriving dose of "OOh - Shiny! New!" in the membership of the Cafe. I let others buy things when they first come out, then I buy from them a few months later when they've moved on to the next shiny new thing.

As long as there are forums like this one, I largely don't care what happens at the Cafe. By nature, I'm disinclined to engage such people - Wise men never argue with fools - people from a distance can't tell who is who.

The Cafe is what it is.
I think it is a hugely corrupt place run by r****-w*** C*********.
However, it has very definite uses, if you do not take it too seriously.
The place serves the function of rubbing egos and promoting advertisers wares.
There are rules to be learnt to take advantage on the C***.

First, see it and use it for what it is.
Don't expect a thread to stay up if it is promoting your work without you paying for ad space.

Don't do what I did - openly criticise and get a life ban, for the place has it's uses.

You can dramatically increase your sales through hyping on the Cafe.
We know it is wrong, we know it is corrupt, it makes us angry, some of us become addicts of Cafe crack.
Just don't take it seriously - there are better forums for serious work

I think as a community on the Moon, we should have a feeling of responsibility to each other to hype each others work.
I certainly hope a few of you will be kind enough to bump the AMA threads that we are planning.

like this one
http://www.themagiccafe.com/forums/viewtopic.php?topic=379214&forum=15&6

I will do the same when you need something bupmed.

Learn the game and take advantage of it.

Otherwise, let the children bicker and squeal over there and don't get involved!

Even a boulder in a stream gets worn away slowly, be careful out there.