robert Posted October 7, 2007 Share Posted October 7, 2007 Lately in some of these threads we've been entertaining the idea of restructuring the forum and bringing in experts in nutrition and training. We've talked about possibly paying to have them here. A few of us had been thinking about that for a while. Often times experts or high profile athletes don't spend time on forums. That isn't true of all forums. In fact, I think some of the best bodybuilders in the world hang out on the forums on www.bodybuilding.com VeganEssentials mentioned that well known and successful strongmen hang out on a forum he frequents too. The question is, would you be willing to make small donations every once in a while to help pay for experts to frequent this forum? We would have an organized schedule that would basically "require" them to visit X number of times per week, or whatever we determine. I support the idea and I look forward to the possibilities of having some true experts in a variety of fields. What are your thoughts? I know "I" run this website. I paid for it to be created, I pay for it to be hosted, maintained, etc. I'm fine with that since it's a "business" Vegan Bodybuilding & Fitness. This is just one aspect of what we do. But I'm not sure I can afford to pay the experts all on my own. I would greatly appreciate donations for this effort which ultimately helps all of us! Please share your honest thoughts. I really appreciate everyone's input lately. We're making some great progress lately and if things work out the way I think they can, we can have some of the biggest names in certain industries hanging out here with all of us! I look forward to reading your thoughts on this. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zack Posted October 7, 2007 Share Posted October 7, 2007 I really don't think that's at all necessary. We need to get some knowledgeable vegan members back, how to do that? I don't know. Not to say that we don't have any already, we have an awesome community. I just don't think paying for possbile non-vegan members is very smart... I think if we restructure and get back to focusing on what the forum is about, then things will work out with time. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
robert Posted October 7, 2007 Author Share Posted October 7, 2007 I'm not suggesting non-vegan members. I'm mostly suggesting well known vegan nutritionists, authors, registered dieticians, etc. Sorry, I wasn't real clear there, I just mentioned experts in a variety of fields. There are some exceptional vegan athletes too, who could really add to the forum. I don't know if it is necessary either, but imagine if John Robbins, Erik Markus, Jack Norris, or others stopped in here each week to address questions and provide solid answers. It's just an idea and I'd love to hear more from others too about their thoughts on this. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
veggieprincess Posted October 7, 2007 Share Posted October 7, 2007 Yes! I would be willing and I think it is an excellent idea Robert! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
robert Posted October 7, 2007 Author Share Posted October 7, 2007 Of course it's an excellent idea, wasn't it your idea? Actually, I think VeganEssentials, You, and I, and maybe others all had some sort of input to this process and idea formulation. We'll see how it unfolds, but I'm friends with a lot of these top guys in the business, especially as I'm out on tour and becoming a "regular" myself, so I can probably make some headway on this soon. I'll be a featured speaker at two upcoming events, in Boston and Orlando and if I have a proposal put together by then I can run it by some of the other touring speakers who are experts, authors, and well respected people in the industry. I'm sure we'll get much more input on this during the week, when more people are online and will express their thoughts. Thanks! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jason Posted October 7, 2007 Share Posted October 7, 2007 This is a great idea, I pledge my donation Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Veganitaliana Posted October 8, 2007 Share Posted October 8, 2007 I think that if you invite experts you'll automatically get more traffic which could be paid for by advertisers. Look at www.vegsource.com for instance, they are the most popular. As for me donating- what I've got to give is time and even then it's limited. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CollegeB Posted October 8, 2007 Share Posted October 8, 2007 Very interesting idea! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jonathan Posted October 8, 2007 Share Posted October 8, 2007 I think that it is a bad idea. Reasons being: * It creates a class divide. So called experts and those who should learn from them. * It adds a financial element to a community board. * There is no need to "employ" experts - on some of the boards I am on, there are national strongman competition winners, and they are happy to advise, for free. * There actually isn't any great secret to training. With regard to strength training, train hard, eat well and rest. That's it. * It does not reflect well on vegans if we employ non-vegans to advise us. Think about it - we can't direct our training ourselves, so we have to get non-vegans to help us. Doesn't look good, and is completely unnecessary. I think that it would be far better to simply try to create an environment that might entice people with an extensive sporting background to the board. By employing people, you just take the shortcut, and lose all the potential benefits that could come with shaping a forum that takes sport seriously. Just my thoughts. Jonathan Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
veggieprincess Posted October 8, 2007 Share Posted October 8, 2007 * It does not reflect well on vegans if we employ non-vegans to advise us. Think about it - we can't direct our training ourselves, so we have to get non-vegans to help us. Doesn't look good, and is completely unnecessary. Robert just said in the above post that he intended on getting VEGAN experts, not non-vegan ones. And the donation would be optional for members who want to contribute, not required. [/i] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jonathan Posted October 8, 2007 Share Posted October 8, 2007 * It does not reflect well on vegans if we employ non-vegans to advise us. Think about it - we can't direct our training ourselves, so we have to get non-vegans to help us. Doesn't look good, and is completely unnecessary. Robert just said in the above post that he intended on getting VEGAN experts, not non-vegan ones. And the donation would be optional for members who want to contribute, not required. [/i] Why not just invite them to the forum? Better to have them here because they want to be part of the community, rather than paying them to be here. For the record, I have no objection to donating to help support sites - I have done it in the past to help with the costs on veganfitness. I simply object to the idea that we need to employ experts. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zack Posted October 8, 2007 Share Posted October 8, 2007 I simply object to the idea that we need to employ experts. My sentiments are the same... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted October 8, 2007 Share Posted October 8, 2007 I agree with Jono. I think we need voluntary members. If we want an expert here we need to ask them to come for themselves. If they aren't completely into it they won't give it everything they've got unless we can pay them tons of money to make up for the money they aren't making working. Also pretty much any expert is going to disagree with another expert and both of them will likely know what they are talking about. This is the same boat we're in now. Lots of ideas here are correct but very different. We don't need someone with a PhD to tell us the same exact stuff while one member disagrees and looks stupid...but another PhD may support him. And its the same thing on pretty much any other forum with certain things. Lots of strength athletes...even Olypians have extremely different view on training and pretty much all of us have similar beliefs as they do...they just have medals to show for it but we may be saying the exact same things these two elite athletes may be saying. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Trev Posted October 8, 2007 Share Posted October 8, 2007 Yeah, I'm with Zack, Veganpotter and Jonathan on this one. I think bringing in paid 'experts' will only divide people up further on this forum and contribute to the conflicts already brewing. I also think that we shouldn't have to pay anyone. They should be here because they want to be. How do we put a $ value on a forum post anyhow? And who do we get? I can see the disagreements already, and when there's money involved... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
robert Posted October 9, 2007 Author Share Posted October 9, 2007 I just returned from Denver and it will take me a day or two to catch up but I'll read through this soon and consider all the options. I was thinking of brining leaders in the Vegan Community here, especially those who are experts on Nutrition, not non-vegans. I just used www.bodybuilding.com as an example. We'll also work on restructuring the forum just to cut down from 32 categories to a slightly smaller number. Thanks. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zack Posted October 9, 2007 Share Posted October 9, 2007 If these "experts" want to be here, they would be. Paying them is no good... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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