Padiham Saints J.F.C

No sitting on the fence please...

For me, this website has had a lot of time, money and effort put into it, and it would be a big shame if we had to get rid of it, which is what looks like happening if this password protection farce continues. It was created in the first place as a means of promoting the club, and has acted as a shop window for other football clubs and players, sponsors, league officials and prospective new recruits. Not only this, but it has helped to give those connected with Padiham Saints a way of conversing with each other, sharing opinions and supporting their team in a way that simply wouldn't be possible in a club without a website. And now, to be on the verge of losing the site, which would be a huge dissapointment and a massive step back for the club, seems in my view a bit over protective following what can be classed as an isolated incident. Plus if we look at how the situation focused the clubs attention on the matter of child protection, not to mention the support we recieved from both the league and the relevant authorities, a simple passcode is surely an unnecessary and irrelevant preventative safety measure? What is it we will actually be protecting anyway? Information on where we train and what time? Because that could be found out easily enough without the aid of the website. We have articles in the newspaper most weekends, and plenty of flyers around schools in the area stating this kind of info. The only sensible measure to take regarding the website would be to avoid matching player names and pictures, which I don't think happens anywhere in the site anyway. That's the sort of thing that should be kept inside the club, and it would be pointless and silly to possibly give that away to people with ulterior motives who have visited the site. A passcode on sections like the club news and contacts - even the guestbook - would be pointless endeavor and would only stunt the clubs growth.

What could have happened to Padiham Saints recently could unfortunately happen to any other club anywhere in the country, and it's slightly naive to think that preventing access to the website will stop it from happening.

-Tom

P.S. My brain has somewhat overheated after writing this so please don't let it be in vain... I want to hear what you all think on this subject. And don't forget to vote on the poll as well, this is a democracy y'know!

Tom
I only started using the website a couple of months back and thought the website was very good with loads of info about training, forthcoming games and information about Padiham Saints.
Suddenly the website closed down and when it got back up running everything was password protection. Why?
I use alot of club websites ( clayton le moor harriers, accrington road runners etc etc) these websites are run by people like you who do it for the club and encounter problems with spam etc etc. Most websites have a forum where members must join up first and send in their details to stop people mis-using the website.
Could this be done with the Padiham saints website?
good luck
Barry ( Carlton's dad)

Cheers Barry

The main problem we have had with the site was regarding the guestbook, where it's possible for anyone to leave messages without leaving any details, however to post on this forum you must first leave at least a valid email address which means whoever leaves any messages could be traced a lot easier if need be.

I didn't mention thish in my first post, but I think it would be a good idea to maybe just scrap the guestbook, and add a section onto this forum which allows people to leave a quick message to the club. And it's also possible to make certain sections of the forum accessible only when you have registered.

It should all be reviewed at the next commitee meeting anyway, hopefully everything can be resolved soon.

Hi Tom, here's my two pennyworth. I fully agree with you.....I think ...the site in its present format i.e. locked off and not open just sounds the death knell for it and in a very short space of time.
There may not be a huge number of contributors but the number of hits the site gets makes it worthwhile. Like you've pointed out it is the shop window of Padiham Saints and who goes shopping and doesn't look in the window first? Supermarkets excluded.

I understand why the site was shutdown and these days it's easy to be wise in retrospect. Personally I didn't read as much into it as others but that's only my perspective and as you've pointed out, website or not, information is readily available from other sources. Information on here only needs to be as explicit as someone wants it to be i.e. if you don't want your location on your profile you don't put it on likewise with email and phone numbers. What would be a great shame is if for example team and players photos were restricted or removed.
I really don't know how many of the lads look on here but I'm sure those that do like to see their pics on the internet, same with the facebook page, our highlight in my day was getting your picture in the Burnley Express, you'd made it locally then.

There will always be concerns where kids are concerned these days but are we to allow one isolated and as far as I'm aware unsubstantiated incident spoil the enjoyment of many that visit this site. I'm not trying to make light of the issue but the world terrorists that are active today seek just this sort of reaction from ordinary lawabiding citizens seeking only to disrupt something that in itself is totally harmless.
Just as an afterthought I can't remember which American it was that said it but it's relevant 'It's not guns that kill people it's people that kill people with guns'.

What a great shame it will be if the site has to close, we can moderate it ourselves without encroaching on freedom of speech and the right to have an opinion. No one in their right mind would post on a public forum something that is easily traced back to their IP address. Sure someone will say 'But not everyone's in their right mind'.

Tom
simple, scrap the guestbook. If anyone wants to leave comments they can do it via the forum. We at Clayton Harriers had this problem last year so we shut the guest book down straight away. As they say " It only takes one idiot to spoil things"
Keep up the good work.
Barry

Hi again Tom just read your reply to Barry regarding the guestbook and forum. One thing I noticed about the guestbook when it was operational was that there were people who would post on there and yet not post in the forums? Go figure.

The more restrictive the site is the less effective it's going to be. Let me give you an hyperthetical situation.
I'm looking around for a team for my young lad/lady, I go to the FA website and get the list of junior football clubs within xxx miles of where I live. I click the links or Google the clubs and the ones that have no website fall at the first hurdle.
The websites that are restricted in any way, at least to look around it, are bypassed because I'm a busy chap, I don't have time to go registering every time I visit a site, I've got a list of over fourty clubs.
Then I arrive at the website that has free access, might be Saints maybe not, but this site is up to date, match reports are on and performances discussed. People are allowed their say and debate an issue be it football or otherwise. The kids are well looked after, training facilities are good, achievements of the club are excellent and activities outside of football are catered for on occassions.

Where's my lad going to finish up playing? Certainly not with the club without a website in 2009. Doubtful about the club where there's a rigmarole to get onto the website. Just worth bearing in mind folks, like it or not the internet is todays and tomorrows communication.

Agree with you there Jon, if we are to have a website, it needs to be readily available to those who need it, simply put its either have an unrestricted website or none at all.

Thinking a bit further into the matter, I think the danger comes when an undesireable type decides to target the club, and no action is taken. I think it was lucky we acted so readily when the situation arose, and it was dealt with so swiftly. And if you think about it, if the person was to find us through newspaper articles etc. instead of using the website/guestbook, we wouldn't have had any warning of it happening, which could have been disastarous. The good thing is that now we seem to be more aware of security at the club, but let's not take it too far.

Now all we need is for people to start giving their views.

It's a natural reaction to overeact in a situation like this or any other that is down in text. It's extremely hard sometimes to put into words sometimes exactly what you mean as opposed to what you say. Smileys are a good help, at least that way people are aware of whether an issue or statement is tongue in cheek or otherwise. An example would be critisism, it's often taken more personal than it's intended when it's said in text because there's nothing for the recipient to intereact with.

How many times have you sent a mail or written on a forum and then thought 'That doesn't sound right' or 'It sounds like I'm having a go'? We've all done it and relating to the Saints issue I'd be fairly confident it was totally innocent but not 100% hence the need for moderation.

I'm sure there are few kids at Saints that have total free reign on the net and are not supervised by the parents in some way which is how it should be. The safeguards are in place without disrupting club facilities.

Well I don't come on straight away and what a debate going on. I totally agree with the password coming off if anybody is going to be abusive they will do it no matter what.

I will get it taken off as soon as possible.

Now lets encourage more and more of our players, parents, grandparents and friends to use the website it's up to us few that do post comments to make this website as successful as possible.

Paula

Good to see we are in agreement Paula I've taken the password off for you, normal service has been resumed!

That's great news Tom, let's hope the site can get back to being used as it should be used.

Well I haven't posted on the site for a while until today for various reasons although I have been logging on a few times a week to see if there were any new post's. It seems like my prediction of what would happen to the site if it was locked off has materialised and folks have stopped using it. That said, even the managers seem to have abandoned it as well.

Hopefully after the meeting ths week. The website will have more visitors it is one of the thngs that is being brought up.