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Archive through December 08, 2007

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Gardenfiend  Send Gardenfiend a private message!



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Posted on Friday, December 07, 2007 - 05:57 pm EST :   Last Buddysize PhotosPrint Post

Greg wrote on Friday, December 07, 2007 - 05:13 pm:

Many forums I visit have some kind of word verification system that one must type every time they post. You know, a randomly generated letter/number sequence or something that a spambot can't read but a human can.


Wouldn't it be enough to have that system required for registering? No one can post who isn't registered.

It would be good if the hosting company provided e-mail spam protection. I guess that isn't the case, though.

Gardenfiend - Germany, Zone "7a"
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Growit  Send Growit a private message!



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Posted on Friday, December 07, 2007 - 06:10 pm EST :   Last Buddysize PhotosPrint Post

Gardenfiend wrote on Friday, December 07, 2007 - 05:57 pm:

Wouldn't it be enough to have that system required for registering?


They recently introduced that on another forum I am on. Now I know why.

Growit - Hampshire, Zone "8/9"
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Plantynut  Send Plantynut a private message!



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Posted on Friday, December 07, 2007 - 07:12 pm EST :   Last Buddysize PhotosPrint Post

I deleted all my albums. That alone should free up a ton of space. I hope. It was a convenience but I can live without it.

Plantynut - New York, Zone "7"
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Ej  Send Ej a private message!



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Posted on Friday, December 07, 2007 - 07:32 pm EST :   Last Buddysize PhotosPrint Post

Please don't delete your albums. This would not really help much since it is memory the site is short on and not disk space.

Ej So.Cal. Zone 10a Click to hear a voice greeting from Ej
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Loretta  Send Loretta a private message!



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Posted on Friday, December 07, 2007 - 07:46 pm EST :   Last Buddysize PhotosPrint Post

I do use the emails. It allows me to keep track of where I posted. I like it.

Loretta - NJ, Zone "6"
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Zack  Send Zack a private message!



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Posted on Friday, December 07, 2007 - 09:37 pm EST :   Last Buddysize PhotosPrint Post

Ej wrote on Friday, December 07, 2007 - 01:38 pm:

I have struggled with a solution to this problem and I am leaning towards closing this site to non-supporting members in some fashion. Favorite "memory eating" options would be only available to supporting members. Archives might have to be deleted to save space.



I support this plan EJ.

We would certainly miss the visitors who choose to move on, but others will finally contribute.

If you need to kill the email notices and file uploads to make it run smoothly, do it.
When you contribute, you are given a photo album where you can upload to and link to Garden Buddies.

I was going to make (my usual) sarcastic remarks on the other thread related to this, but chose to try to be helpful here.

I don't think the newer Garden Buddies realize that this site isn't run by a large corporation with vast resources, but one man who donates a lot of himself (and his money)
so we can have a friendly ad-free place to visit.

EJ cut the fat to make it easier on yourself(and your pocket book)

Zack NOLA Zone 9a Click to hear a voice greeting from Zack
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Cindym  Send Cindym a private message!




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Posted on Friday, December 07, 2007 - 10:29 pm EST :   Last Buddysize PhotosPrint Post

Maybe this isn't the place, but ... I sent a check to EJ on the 25th of October and it still hasn't been cashed.

Cindym - Louisiana, Zone "8b"
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Sunnyday2day  Send Sunnyday2day a private message!



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Posted on Friday, December 07, 2007 - 10:40 pm EST :   Last Buddysize PhotosPrint Post

Cindym wrote on Friday, December 07, 2007 - 10:29 pm:

Maybe this isn't the place, but ... I sent a check to EJ on the 25th of October and it still hasn't been cashed.


That happened to me as well, Cindy. E.J. does far better with pay-pal I think... He spends a great deal of time trying to keep this site up and running and I think the checks (while certainly welcome support) are awfully time consuming. E.J. does this by himself out of the goodness of his heart. My next payment will be made with pay-pal, assuming we are still up and running by then.

Sunnyday2day - Tanya-Michigan, Zone "5"
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Nibbs  Send Nibbs a private message!



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Posted on Friday, December 07, 2007 - 11:59 pm EST :   Last Buddysize PhotosPrint Post

I'll mention this in admin Cindym. Ej does have some behind the scenes help and perhaps there's been a miscommunication. I'd like to add that cheques and money orders are welcome, as is payment by PayPal, but keep in mind that PayPal takes its cut as well.

Diane British Columbia Zone 7b
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Digger  Send Digger a private message!



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Posted on Saturday, December 08, 2007 - 07:49 am EST :   Last Buddysize PhotosPrint Post

Thanks for mentioning that Diane. I was planning to send a money order today. I figured I could send one to cover both Deb and I instead of going through Paypal twice. Thought a money order would be better than Ej waiting for a distant personal check to clear. I'll send it today :)

Thanks for all the work you do Ej. Would disabling comments at the albums help at all?

Digger - Montana, Zone "4b/5a"
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Terryk  Send Terryk a private message!



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Posted on Saturday, December 08, 2007 - 09:09 am EST :   Last Buddysize PhotosPrint Post

Digger wrote on Saturday, December 08, 2007 - 07:49 am:

Would disabling comments at the albums help at all



I have thought the same thing too Digger. I was one that was hit with unwelcome comments. I think if anyone from gardenbuddies wants to make a comment-they can e-mail you or post somehow on the forums.

I would prefer to see archives stay over some other areas. The "search" feature is nice but some of our best information regarding certain specialties is in the archives. Maybe we could eliminate other features. The magazine was great to read when it was in use. But I was a gardenbuddy for several years before I stumbled on that. If it helps, get rid of the old monthly magazine articles. How many "chats" do we have, would that help if we did away with it?

Does anyone know how many gardenbuddies took up Ej's offer for the free album space and are not paying members? That is something that I feel should change.

Look at these posts, the majority are by supporting gardenbuddies. I would think that most of our membership doesn't know of Ej's problems or the need to support gardenbuddies as they are not reading all the forums. That has to be a major problem. We have to if reach the masses.

But I think in the long run, we need to come up with paid membership. Ej, you can't go on devoting your time to this website without some help. Paid membership may give you these options. You are entitled to have a life back to be able to enjoy rather than sitting at a computer solving our problems on a daily basis.

Terryk - NY, Zone "6"
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Posted on Saturday, December 08, 2007 - 09:30 am EST :   Last Buddysize PhotosPrint Post

I have had quite a few spam comments at my albums too Terry. Many were foriegn language but I could tell from the links they were spam. I just delete them. I went ahead and disabled the comment feature on our albums without waiting to hear if it would help.

Digger - Montana, Zone "4b/5a"
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Heirloomgardens  Send Heirloomgardens a private message!



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Posted on Saturday, December 08, 2007 - 03:14 pm EST :   Last Buddysize PhotosPrint Post

EJ, I'm sure you've thought of a million ways to thwart the spammers and spambots, and obviously I have no idea how your program is set up (so this might be a dumb, old, or useless idea), but would it help any to add in the step of typing in the hidden code (as mentioned previously) just before hitting a button to get to a page to write a message to post? (clear as mud, right?) In other words, I mean that the "add your message here" area would not be shown anywhere at all on this site, but when a person types the secret code numbers/letters and their username and password, then clicks a "verify human user" sort of button, a special page inaccessible by humans and bots would be created with the spot for "add your message here". (By inaccessible to humans and bots, I mean that it would be a page generated by your program, rather than one that resides on the Internet as its own entity. I'm kind of guessing that is how the pages on this site are generated anyway, since every URL seems to originate from the cgi-bin.) And, if that isn't muddled enough, how about also disabling the "Enter" button as a method of posting anything to this site (whether it is messages, passwords, or whatever), and instead require an actual mouse click on a button. (There must be some way to verify that it is a real mouse click rather than some code written to imitate a mouse click. Or, get really mod, and show the jibberish-looking code and then require people to correctly identify the code by clicking on the appropriate letters/numbers on a keyboard shown on-screen. I'm just full of stupid ideas today! )

Heirloomgardens - Massachusetts, Zone "5b"
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Posted on Saturday, December 08, 2007 - 03:46 pm EST :   Last Buddysize PhotosPrint Post

As far as monetary support, what about bulb and seed sales? EJ could start a whole new business. (As if he doesn't have enough to do already. LOL!) How cool would that be... a site that sells bulbs and seeds and has real-life gardening addicts posting pics and babbling on and on about how much they love the bulbs and seeds in their fabulous gardens. It'd be the Internet equivalent of a gardening reality show.

Heirloomgardens - Massachusetts, Zone "5b"
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Posted on Saturday, December 08, 2007 - 05:54 pm EST :   Last Buddysize PhotosPrint Post

Yeah, TerryK, I looked back through the posts and I would be the only non-supporter that's posted.

I'm not part of the local clique.
I'm new but when you locals started talking about EJ, I was clueless.

I looked in all the typical places for the background on this board and who was running it. It's not listed anywhere. No ownership is listed anywhere that I saw.

I looked at the contributions and it made sense to contribute for album space. I've already got a lifetime membership on Dropshots, so why would I want or need to store photos here?

So for those that have contributed (paid for your albums and the email service) good for you.

This still comes down to a service type business whether it's a freebie or pay as you go. If it's popularity has outgrown Ej's expectations then he either has to go to the next level or shut it down.

Maybe he'll just sell it to one of you. That's been done.

If GB goes away and you need your herbaceous social hour, you could always go payup at DavesGarden. Tons of experts with ready advice, all background politics and jockeying for position with the hosts. Same ole stuff

Bulliedeux - IL, Zone "5b"
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Loretta  Send Loretta a private message!



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Posted on Saturday, December 08, 2007 - 07:09 pm EST :   Last Buddysize PhotosPrint Post

There may be other forums but this one is more cozy.

Loretta - NJ, Zone "6"
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Digger  Send Digger a private message!



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Posted on Saturday, December 08, 2007 - 07:29 pm EST :   Last Buddysize PhotosPrint Post

LOL, Mike says bullie for you

Too bad Dropshots has so many ads. I wanted to see if you had dog photos.

Digger - Montana, Zone "4b/5a"
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Missgarden  Send Missgarden a private message!



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Posted on Saturday, December 08, 2007 - 08:19 pm EST :   Last Buddysize PhotosPrint Post

I never used the e-mail option myself. I like to use the 1|3 feature and scroll down through all the recent posts.

Ej, I really admire you for having the willingness and patience to keep this site alive. I wondered many times how you manage to do it and that it must be at the expense of your personal time and money.
You have been and continue to be our hero but even heroes need help…in this case monetary. I rather pay a mandatory membership and/or be subjected to advertisements then lose this site.

Missgarden - Ontario, Zone "5b"
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Posted on Saturday, December 08, 2007 - 08:35 pm EST :   Last Buddysize PhotosPrint Post

Loretta wrote on Saturday, December 08, 2007 - 07:09 pm:

There may be other forums but this one is more cozy.


I would like to second that. I have been on/am on other gardening forums and this one is the chattiest, friendliest and least competitive one I have come across.

Growit - Hampshire, Zone "8/9"
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Posted on Saturday, December 08, 2007 - 08:58 pm EST :   Last Buddysize PhotosPrint Post

Bullieduex, Pleased too greet you
I know of only one gardner that has given GB a $Ben Franklin $ or more. Most gardners give a $Mr. Jackson...(some where around there.)
"Yeah, TerryK, I looked back through the posts and I would be the only non-supporter that's posted.

I'm not part of the local clique."

Mimi - Wisconsin, Zone "4b"

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