There are three things that prompted this thread.

The first was Max's April Fool thread. I have often thought of how Max must feel and I think he summed it up with the bit about being the host of the party. I would just like to say a big thank you to him for hosting the party, and inviting me to one that I feel very happy about attending. Up to finding The Mudcat, I had always felt a bit like Groucho Marx, I never wanted to join any club that would have me as a member. Clubs tend to be exclusive, this place on the other hand is an inclusive community.

I hope Max, that you can find a bit more time to join the party in future. One way to encourage this, I would suggest, would be to start a lot of Delta Blues related threads.

The second was some of the comments on that thread made by others but Joe Offer in particular. I will single out Joe and embarrass him immensely, as being largely responsible for the 'Voice Of The Mudcat'. By that I mean that if it is Max we have to thank for providing the framework and pushing forward the technical magic, and Dick and Susan for the DT, it is largely Joe we have to thank for the tone in which things are conducted in the forum. He alluded to this in the above thread by making the point that because of the limitations and other reasons that make the net a potentially hostile place, it is a good idea here to 'err on the side of civility' (my words not his). This is one of the main reasons why this place is special. All of those mentioned are responsible for creating this piece of sanity on the Net, all the things that the Newsgroups should have been, a place for adults all across the world to freely air their views, without being verbally shot down for being 'off topic' or talking about something that was on the 'FAQs' and all the other juvenile things that are found there.

This brings me to the third. It was noticeable to me, at least, that there was a subtle change of tone, over the last month or so. It was not a coincidence, that it coincided with Joe's absence from The Mudcat. Which was partly why I started the 'Come Back Joe, All Is Forgiven' thread. I would have probably left it there, for like music sessions, if you do not like what is happening there, the only recourse really open to you is to leave. You have no right to tell other people what or how to play, and if enough people leave, then effectively that is the end of the session.

I thought that I would mention it however after, quite out of the blue I received a Mudcat personal message from someone who had been a contributor to the forum, saying goodbye and that they were going to leave the Mudcat as they did not like the way things were going, over the same period I mentioned earlier. They said that they would probably come back after a while and see if the tone had changed. This was without any prompting from me, as I said it was out of the blue. The reasons given were that they thought there were people there, answering posts, who thought they were very clever (again, words to that effect). I have to be careful here, of course, 'one swallow doesn't make a summer', but I think we should take notice of this. There is of course no accounting for taste, but if this place is to be inclusive and welcoming to all, as I for one think it has been and should be, we do have to recognise that we will have to work at it to achieve this.

I am not going to 'lay down the law' as that is not my place, or anyone else's, but I am going to steal a speech from JFK's speech-writers now. Think Not, What Your Mudcat Can Do For You, But What You Can Do For Your Mudcat. Yes I know that was corny but it is what I mean and what I think Joe's approach has been, up to now and I think we should help him.

In effect this is a public place and there are things, like swearing that I don't like hearing there and that I will not do in a public place either. Some people would not, rightly or wrongly, want their children exposed to, what they would consider to be 'foul' language here and if as Max mentioned, he sees this as an educational site, we would surely not want to do anything to discourage children/students from being here. These are not my views on this subject, but I do respect those who do hold these views and I use it as example of some of the areas where we could tread lightly. There are many others that we do tread lightly, but we still seem able to tread.

The answer here I would suggest is balance. There is a fine balance here between music, humour and the serious stuff and if we follow Joe's, common sense approach, I think in time we could get the whole world here, or at least provide a model to show the world how these things can be done.

PHEW! Max how much do I owe you for the suggestions, so far? *smiles*

Love to you all from Iceland to New Zealand and all points in between.