Too late.
What the FREAK, Ed?
I hope you gave Otto a refund…
Re-read a few pages back, or read the “time out” thread in ABTM-it’s been changed to a weekend suspension.
Word.
Ps. Only a punk bitch would use prison as their cite on a lame message board.
The restaurant analogy was never very good. The convention one was much better, though a bit inaccessible. I would liken this board to a sporting event.
The lurkers are the audience, the posters are the athletes, the mods are the refs, and Ed is the commissioner.
Advertisers pay for the audience, who is watching the athletes. Not one thin dime of advertising is brought in by the commissioner or the refs. They can and do enforce certain conduct rules in order to prevent losing ad revenue, but they do not generate any of it at all.
I find Arnold’s persistent claim that the mods provide content to be an excellent insight into the misguided, overblown ego of the staff.
Nobody goes to watch the refs. Ever.
Bring Otto back, kick Omegaman out.
Or lose them both, it’s all good.
Omegaman is batshit insane, but he is funny on occasion. Otto isn’t.
I’m about half sorry Ed recanted that particular banning. The excuse was really, VERY bad, but I wouldn’t miss Otto. It should have been handled with a couple of quick applications of the Don’t-Be-A-Jerk rule, instead of how it was.
I would miss (just a little) Omegaman-when-he gets-a-drinkin’-style posts. He’s an ass, but he’s a funny ass. YMMV.
Wow. Just wow. Not only did you fuck up the “you’re”, but you came right back with a fucked up “your”. I know the English language is a tough one, but put a little effort in will ya?
Can I be Manny Ramirez?
No, you haven’t got the hair. 
Michael Jordan?
Only if he grows a beard.
Better analogy: The board is like a porno movie. The lurkers are the audience. The posters are the stars (I’m Long Dong Silver). The mods are ticket-takers and janitorial staff, while Ed Zotti is the manager of the grubby, disreputable theater where the movie is shown.
Who are the fluffers?
Enjoy,
Steven
The charter members?
No way, man. The newbs are the fluffers.
I joined before P2P, but let my membership expire.
Am I now relegated to ATM porn?
The idea that you are in some way equivalent to an athlete at a sporting venue gives an excellent insight into your own overblown ego.
This is a message board, it has conversations that people can read. The closest analogy I’ve ever seen is that it’s like a party at someone’s house. Sure the guests all provide “content” in the form of conversations but they are here because the host allows them to be here. The host used to charge a door fee to cover expenses but has recently gone to hanging banners around the place. This has bought many people back who really like the place but not so much that it stops them whining, and not so much that they could spare the $7/year when there was the door charge.
Ultimately the host is free to kick anyone out. They can do it whenever they like, and for any reason, or no reason. You on the other hand are free to go somewhere else. After all, as it is you who provide the content, any place you go to will be just as interesting as here.
Don’t forget also, that the primary content of this site are the SD columns and staff reports. THAT is the content, THAT is why people originally came here. To suggest that the staff provide no content is being blind to what this place is.
How much worthwhile content do you actually provide Ellis Dee? What about you JayJay, how much do you personally provide that is meaningful and worthwhile and contributes to attracting people to this place?
The primary content to this message board seems to be the stuff posted to this message board. “What if LOTR was written by?”, “The Horror of Blimps”, etc…
I can’t claim that Ellis Dee or JayJay have drawn any number of new members, but they both have provided enjoyable content for me to read and stick around for.
And the fact that you honestly seem to believe that we, the members, don’t actually provide desirable content gives an excellent insight into your lack of self-esteem.
PRIMARY?! Are you serious? I visit ATMB occasionally, usually when something’s going wrong so I can see what’s up, but I NEVER visit the next two fora. There’s rarely anything there that I even really care about. I haven’t read an actual Straight Dope column in years if it wasn’t linked as an answer to a GQ.
I only come here for the member fora: GQ, GD, CS, TGR, MPSIMS, IMHO, and the BBQ Pit. That’s it. If the first three fora on the forum list is the primary reason people come here, why do the member fora outnumber those both in number of fora and number of posts?
The Straight Dope column could go into permanent reruns (if it hasn’t already…I wouldn’t know one way or the other) and it wouldn’t affect my reading here at the board one bit.
I know I’ve read and enjoyed posts by Ellis Dee, and by many, many members (including some mods and admins…in non-SD column-related fora). Modesty prevents me from claiming any value to my contributions. Doesn’t mean they don’t exist, just that I’m not the best judge of whether they’re good.
And as I’ve said before, more people come here because of the “What If Someone Else Wrote the LOTR?” thread, for Scylla’s humor threads (blimps and groundhogs, etc.), for a new thread by lieu about his cow-orkers’ toilet habits, to check up on how TokyoWife’s pregnancy is going, to talk about a knitting project or a sewing project or the latest episode of the Amazing Race or to schedule a Dopefest…the columns are the thinnest of the pedestals that this board rests on.