[JoJo6]

Thelma, I feel the hurt I hear in your words. I too have been here since the dinosaur days. I too remember when John took time to interact with the members at MGH/BT.

It seems very strange now when we speak of getting letters, emails, notes and post from John Lester. I wish I could help everybody take a peak into the olden days.

I can not count the times he sent me PM's for many different reasons. Yes, I do believe he could hear back then. Somewhere along the line something happened, he made some very unwise choices, wouldn't listen to anybody concerning those choices.

I'm saddened at the bad things that happened to some good people because of the bad choices.

I am not saying John doesn't need rest, vacations, time with his family and time for his work. I simply can not say the good he has done over the years, but the halo is beginning to tarnish. I too lay the blame at the feet of this person that I can not find the right words to describe.

As Thelma said, this person treated his home forum the way he should have treated all the chats and forums.

I saw a need for a chat room for family and friends that cared for their LO's that suffered from this disease from hell, Alzheimers Disease. We had the forum, yes, but things changed so very fast at times and it was harder to get to the forums and by the time someone else saw the new post they no longer needed answers to their questions concerning meds. and such.

I had been a part of the MGH Chat for AD and I knew what it could do to help these caregivers. such a simple request, but instead another Social" type chat" would be created. This type forum and chat had been a help to so many, I don't think John had or has a clue. By this time though "someone else was in charge". IMHO of course.

I asked in everyway I knew how to ask, I BEGGED, more than once, well of course it didn't happen. Just another sad story from the un-caring "in charge" person. I had given up a long time before trying to get in touch with John, or trying to get his attention. One other point that I don't believe has been brought up hear. Daily the count (#) for new members were inflated. It was a joke!!

Yes, the "count" got up past 50,000 I think, close to it. what was the most telling was how many people were using the forum that very day, changing up and down, but didn't go much pass 100 on any given day or night

50,000 + members and only 100, maybe 200 members in the forum at any given time? what is wrong with this picture????

Those that keep talking about "a forum this big" need to go there and look if the site ever goes back up!

One last thing. the 2 or 3 "updates" including the one in this thread does not sound like something John would say. Look hard if iterested in seeing,I think this "temp. in charge" wrote all those updates!!

ZS, I'm not talking about you here. As someone else said today you are kind, caring, would deny yourself sleep to help someone else, I can not say enough to let you know what most of of us here think of you. I just hope I don't "jinx" you

[Curious]

<-------hands jo a mug of hazelnut coffee and a brownie

psssttt.....i just read your emails. i'm behind a few days.

welcome to bt2!!!!!!!!!!!

[anonymous_no_more]

So. let's think of a way to make the site [BT] into an enterprise that could be "acquired" by a larger organization, who would care and maintain it on a daily, minute by minute basis.

Don't you all think that if this were "WebMD" that the uptime would be a number one priority?

In order to achieve this...we need corporate sponsors/and or ownership. The end. We obvioulsy need to make Braintalk.org a facility for making money. Since our members are clearly strapped, it becomes one of making this more than just a bulletin board. Perhaps, an UI that includes advertising from docs, medical organizations, a doc finder, etc.

We have been doing that [linking to resources] incidentally via our posts sharing info/docs we have found, and personal referrals. It could be a tiered structure. To access certain features of medical access/info, might require a membership that actually costs money (not a huge amount)...just like those "memberships" that allow access to medical libraries; basic membership costs nothing...

Somehow, for us to require 100% attention, there HAS to be something "more" for the person/organization running it. Donations are not going to do the trick in the long term. No doubt, those that have contributed are to be commended. But, it would be a better process to formalize the endeavor...to do away with these feelings of expectation/let down, when our donated dollars amount to nothing negligible. It also levels the playing field, as those that can't afford to donate would not feel "less" than those that can.

We can't make this JLester "want" to make us his number one priority with words of let-down and emotion (I do believe "he" must know how important BT is to everyone].

Instead of focusing on what isn't being done, or harboring hurt feelings and moral outrage that we are no longer his priority; let's make this into something that is stable, open, and a better vehicle for "broken" people to access and use however they see fit, with or without JLester.

Again, just how I see things [and no one needs to agree with me]. No need to get worked up.

[JoJo6]

my dear Monkey friend The HN coffee is delish! Tis OK about the emails, my dear. Now I can do it myself?

thanks for the welcome. People are friendly here. I also spent some time on DocJohns site a couple of times. I liked what I saw there too.

thank you to DocJohn for giving us drowning people a shelter during the storm. Curious you make sure you don't let him get away with ALL the cookies or brownies!
JJ

[Thelma]

Hi Jo

I have been thinking about this for a long time and if we can not get any respect [and that is really what it is] from John or his protege then we need to appeal to whoever will help.

You are perfectly right in all you say.

[Curious]

Originally Posted by Granola Liberal

Has anybody told you lately that you are adorable??


xoxo

******blush*****

awwww

XOXO back at ya!!

[Chemar]

(((JO))) how good to see you!

see monkey, the smell of your coffee is bringing in the friends

[JoJo6]

CHEMAR!!!! so happy to see you too. Its been a long dry summer,eh?
We'll have to catch up when we get the world problems settled!

Take care and we'll talk soon, JoJo6

[lady_express_44]

Originally Posted by anonymous_no_more

[B]In order to achieve this...we need corporate sponsors/and or ownership. The end. We obvioulsy need to make Braintalk.org a facility for making money. Since our members are clearly strapped, it becomes one of making this more than just a bulletin board. Perhaps, an UI that includes advertising from docs, medical organizations, a doc finder, etc.

Frankly, this could concern me . . . unless there was some way to ensure there is no bias, especially if sponsored by a pharma company.

There are enough boards out there like that already, and that's one of the primary reasons I liked BT so much.

Cherie

[JoJo6]

it's times like these that doesn't give us pleasure to be right, ya know? Thank you for your kind words.

Yes, its respect that is lacking and I don't think we will ever see it. It makes me so very sad. I wouldn't know where to begin to have things as they were.

People say "times have changed" and yes they have, but we don't just throw away years of caring ,sharing knowledge of health issues, helping those that are weaker at the moment, NO WE DON't just throw it all away.

Rright now it feels like there's been a death in the family. not being morbid here, but we were and ARE family!!

Take care Thelma, don't over do yourself. I know about your wreck and how ill you have been, just keep working at getting better. Jo