ANNOUNCING A LOAD OF ENHANCEMENTS TO SAM’S CELTICS FORUM

[Sam]

Your administrators, armed with helpful suggestions from members, have come up with a bunch of ways to expand the benefits of membership while hopefully giving the board an energy burst. Without further ado, here’s the deal.

The ultimate goal will be to inject greater vitality to the forum. And we're planning a multi-faceted approach.

Whatever other inducements may be offered, the foundation of this forum will always be conversation and debate. We feel the time is right to aim for a higher level of conversational energy without sacrificing the welcome comfort level that pervades relationships on the board. Our focus will be on three areas:

1. Increasing the number of members and, presumably, the diversity of viewpoints.

• We’re not for a minute talking about abandoning or even diluting our conviviality pledge. There will be no changes in our rules or moderating policies. We just feel that more members will produce increased conversation and broader perspectives, therefore adding greater dimension and energy to discussions.

• From time to time, we reach out to BDC membership with greetings (often involving holidays) that do not directly solicit anything but do put our name in front of them. Invariably, some BDC members say very complimentary things and ask how to access our board. We don’t provide our URL, which would probably be frowned upon by BDC mods; but we simply tell people to google our forum name. Our most recent BDC foray appears to have produced one or two new members immediately. And, within a couple of days, we had as many as 15 non-member guests visiting our forum at the same time—an unheard-of number. Within the most recent week, a record was set for the number of people simultaneously online here (many of them guests). If anyone would like to volunteer try this same "passive aggressive" recruiting approach on other message boards or blogs, be our guests.

• Your personal endorsements and referrals are probably the best marketing tool we have, and we urge you to let others know about us. To aid you in that endeavor, administrators are working hard to make the board Facebook-accessible. We still have some work to do to make the Facebook connection a reality. But, when that happens, we'll announce it; and we hope a healthy percentage of people who find us through Facebook will want to become members.

• If a similar vein, if any existing member would like to give a holiday gift of a year's subscription to the board, we're offering a special price of $10 for 12 months. Simply let Sam know of your intent by Private Message, and he'll respond with instructions. This offer is good until December 31, by which time all gift payments will be due. All proceeds from any gift subscriptions or regular subscriptions between now and December 31 will go to Jeb's Epic Support Fund to help him in his time in need, and credit will also be given for subscription payment in full.

• We are experimenting with the metatags that provide a link between us and people who submit certain terms to search engines. ("Shaq" is one of our new additions.) If anyone googles the name "Sam's Celtics Forum," we're now the first option that appears.

2. Revitalizing the Game-on Threads

• We realize that we cannot force people to post on game-on threads. Either your schedule and interest level permit it or not. But we’re hoping that we can increase interest and participation in one key element—the game-on contest.

• Typically we get the same staunch group of very few who enter the contest. We're hoping to increase interest and participation in the contest—and the game-on thread along with it.

• Accordingly, effective immediately, we’re going to end the current contest format and declare a winner, who will be awarded an Encyclopedia of Basketball. Then we’re going to institute a new contest format as follows:

√ The winner of the contest for each individual game will win $5 in cash. The cash prizes will be funded by membership dues.

√ To avoid $5 awards flying around all over the place, each member will be assigned a Contest Winnings Account. With each game-on contest win, $5 will be credited to the winning member’s account. The accumulated cash winnings for each member will be mailed out (in the form of a check) at the end of the playoffs. In the meantime, we'll post periodic updates to show the accumulated winnings for each member.

√ The criterion for winning a given game-on contest will vary from game to game and will be announced early in the game. One game, the criterion might be total points for both teams (which has been the only criterion so far this season). The next game, it might be last year’s criterion (number of points required to win the game). The next game, it might be the number of hairs on Sam’s head (pretty easy to count). The next game, it might be the exact time at which Rondo records his last assist in the game. We’ll try to keep the criteria varied and interesting.

√ Obviously we’re looking to increase the sense of immediacy and excitement associated with contest wins. Even if someone has not won a contest all season long, (s)he could conceivably win the contest for the very last game.

3. Increasing the scope of discussion topics.

• As the number of posts expands (now more than 42,000), we are constantly astounded at the array of abilities and interests represented by our membership. It’s truly incredible, and you should all give yourselves a round of applause.

• With this versatility in mind, we are adding several ongoing threads to expand the scope of topics that might be discussed on the forum. These threads will be added as “stickies” so they’ll always appear at the top of the “Hot Topics” forum. It will be up to you to remember to access them periodically, because you won’t be prompted when new messages appear therein.

• We believe this is an important move with the possibility of an NBA lockout possibly looming next year. What the heck will we talk about then? A broader number of conversational possibilities will help ensure that the vibrancy of the board doesn't slow to a gurgle if there's not much basketball stuff to discuss.

• One new ongoing thread will be entitled “Sports Other than Basketball.” We know your sports interests are not limited to pro basketball, and this will be an opportunity to discuss other sports (including college basketball) without fear of going “off-topic.”

• Another new ongoing thread will be entitled “Member News” and will be intended to tap into the wide range of activities and experiences in which members are involved. Here members can share new or recent developments in their lives. It will also be okay to promote (free of charge) products or services you may offer (preferably as an entrepreneur rather than a large organization). For example, one of the first entries will be a repeat of the contact information for a source of vintage and new Celtics videos. But the focus need not have anything to do with basketball. It’s important to note that we will be issuing a disclaimer to the effect that the forum does not implicitly or explicitly endorse, recommend, or guarantee any subject matter on this thread and will not bear any responsibility for reliance on the subject matter.

• Another new ongoing thread will be entitled “Reviews and Recommendations” and will enable members to call attention to books, shows, music, events, vacation spots, or other items (sports-related or not) that they think might interest other members. (We don’t think TJMakz would mind our revealing that this was his suggestion, and we’re grateful for it.)

• Another new ongoing thread will be entitled “Life and Other Oddities” and will be a repository of insights people have gleaned during their years on this earth (in Sam’s case, 137 and counting). Little devices that help you get through the haze; addressing relationship issues; experiences with medical situations and solutions; dealing with loss; whatever. We’ll be watching this one closely, because it could be a bomb unless people are willing to reveal a little something of themselves—a phenomenon that has occurred more than a few times on this board. In the best case, it could become a treasure trove of wisdom. We will ask that people avoid political, religious, or racially related topics, which we will be forced to delete because they have such inflammatory potential.

• Another new ongoing thread will be entitled “Moments to Remember” and was spawned by a letter about a very special family member that was shared with Sam by Mrkleen. (Many thanks, Mrkleen. The essence of cool, just like the man in question.) This will be about meaningful moments or influences, in or out of sports, that you have experienced and make you feel good just by telling about them. This is another one that we’ll be watching, because it could become maudlin. But, on the other hand, it could prove inspirational and even cathartic.

• Note carefully that each of these five threads will be one long thread; there will not be a new thread for every new topic. To add a topic to a given thread, use the "REPLY" function for that thread—not the "NEW TOPIC OPTION that would start a new thread.

• The usual rules of civility and moderating policies will apply to all these threads. We will be happy to entertain any additional ideas for ongoing threads. And we’ll welcome constructive feedback on any of these threads.

We’ll keep on trying to figure out ways to improve the board, and we appreciate your inputs.

Best regards from the administrators (Sam, NYCelt, gyso, Pete, dboss and 112288)[b][u]

[Sam]

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[Sam]

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[Sam]

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[jeb]

hey mods

i reccomended a fren to the site and they said it didnt show up in any search engine...i sent him a link. just wanted to let yall know.

[pete]

jeb,

We have found that the site shows up first shot, Google. Yahoo, etc. Let me know how he has been searching and I can look into it.

Pete

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