Dropping Off Forums

[tropicalwaste]

Something come up lately and I just wanted to clear things incase any chatter goes on in the background.. I dropped off not just this forum but literally every expat forum as I have found the uses rather limited to what I am doing. I am still here at 4am not because I am sat sipping on San Mig but because I am working.. I don't mind answering posts about "where is immigration" etc. but most are already archived or there are plenty of other people who can tell new members where to go. I have haven't any issues with anyone here or on any forum as there are all walks of life and the disputes between people aren't mine. I haven't the time or interest to get involved in arguing. Someone writes a post on business 10 people will write one about not doing business here yet there are a small minority of us here that do business every day. I live here on my income from those businesses. Every business here has some degree of profit and most failures are down to trust and human error rather than the ability of the business to function. Culturally you find most people here will bring in a relative or manager to run it, that is one major flaw in any business regardless of where you are in the world trust is earned not given on a free plate and anyone looking at a business needs to realise that. It doesn't mean that its all negative as several of the people I am associated with are literally earning tens of millions of pesos a year. I myself am slowly climbing in to the P2m a year bracket and over the next 5 years will expect to be doing a lot more.So how does this tie into the forums? Mainly its time consumption as I like meeting people but often I will spend at least 2 hours a day on forums and most of that it is reading through garbage posts. E.g. someone asks about goats there would be 30-40 replies which aren't even relevant until you get to people who have ignored that and put the information you want or can help with. This Isnt directed at a single forum its just the nature of the beast. Most forums have a lot of people who do have the spare time to write on nearly every post its partly habit and its partly nothing better to do. It would be more constructive sometimes for people to just leave a post a couple of days to try and draw out some of the larger member group to try and get them involved more especially when there are a lot of people out there with more experience. I know several people here that don't write yet have had long discussions in private as regards business. I am also in the process of helping someone else develop a venture for export. At the end of the day I do more via email constructively than I do on open forums which is why the ratio of members to posts is very low on most of the expat forums as a lot of people feel intimidated or won't get the right advice.I am neither annoyed or bothered with anyone on any of the forums same as generally I don't take sides in arguments I will give opinions if asked and I can understand why some people don't get on or end up in arguments etc. but I would ask this.. Is it really worth it? arguing with someone you hardly know and may meet a couple of times a year better to agree to disagree and move on. There is more infighting on forums than I see anywhere else which is another reason I have decided to distance myself as there is no real need for it. Its not like most of the people on forums work together or have any close contact except the forums.. live and let live.. there is more to do than disputes. I know its easy to get caught up in a lot of the stuff that goes on but I have also seen people change their minds on a whim after throwing their dummy out the pram its all irrelevant. I have also seen people sabotage peoples business ventures because they don't get on.. guess what most people here wouldn't give you a second look.. the expat community should be helping each other not dragging each other down.The night out that this forum had at The Ranch I done a review to help promote the place. The owner thought it would be a bad review as its common knowledge Expats run things down instead of pick them up.. Its about time people started helping each other because nobody outside of the Expats will. Dragging over old conversations and chat doesn't fix anything what does need to be done is constructive things to show how things can be done. When we met at The Ranch there were several people saying about the problems with sponsering students, why aren't there any posts on how to put this right surely some of you out there have managed to control that problem.My post may seem negative but its more to do with looking at what is wrong and getting it put right.. the issues some have had recently are irrelevant I had dropped off the forums before then. Just wanted people to know why I am not on here.. and its nothing personal to any individual as its just purely the forums being the way they are I hope someone gets the formula right although you can't please all the people all the time..

[UZI]

Something come up lately and I just wanted to clear things incase any chatter goes on in the background.. I dropped off not just this forum but literally every expat forum as I have found the uses rather limited to what I am doing. I am still here at 4am not because I am sat sipping on San Mig but because I am working.. I don't mind answering posts about "where is immigration" etc. but most are already archived or there are plenty of other people who can tell new members where to go. I have haven't any issues with anyone here or on any forum as there are all walks of life and the disputes between people aren't mine. I haven't the time or interest to get involved in arguing. Someone writes a post on business 10 people will write one about not doing business here yet there are a small minority of us here that do business every day. I live here on my income from those businesses. Every business here has some degree of profit and most failures are down to trust and human error rather than the ability of the business to function. Culturally you find most people here will bring in a relative or manager to run it, that is one major flaw in any business regardless of where you are in the world trust is earned not given on a free plate and anyone looking at a business needs to realise that. It doesn't mean that its all negative as several of the people I am associated with are literally earning tens of millions of pesos a year. I myself am slowly climbing in to the P2m a year bracket and over the next 5 years will expect to be doing a lot more.So how does this tie into the forums? Mainly its time consumption as I like meeting people but often I will spend at least 2 hours a day on forums and most of that it is reading through garbage posts. E.g. someone asks about goats there would be 30-40 replies which aren't even relevant until you get to people who have ignored that and put the information you want or can help with. This Isnt directed at a single forum its just the nature of the beast. Most forums have a lot of people who do have the spare time to write on nearly every post its partly habit and its partly nothing better to do. It would be more constructive sometimes for people to just leave a post a couple of days to try and draw out some of the larger member group to try and get them involved more especially when there are a lot of people out there with more experience. I know several people here that don't write yet have had long discussions in private as regards business. I am also in the process of helping someone else develop a venture for export. At the end of the day I do more via email constructively than I do on open forums which is why the ratio of members to posts is very low on most of the expat forums as a lot of people feel intimidated or won't get the right advice.I am neither annoyed or bothered with anyone on any of the forums same as generally I don't take sides in arguments I will give opinions if asked and I can understand why some people don't get on or end up in arguments etc. but I would ask this.. Is it really worth it? arguing with someone you hardly know and may meet a couple of times a year better to agree to disagree and move on. There is more infighting on forums than I see anywhere else which is another reason I have decided to distance myself as there is no real need for it. Its not like most of the people on forums work together or have any close contact except the forums.. live and let live.. there is more to do than disputes. I know its easy to get caught up in a lot of the stuff that goes on but I have also seen people change their minds on a whim after throwing their dummy out the pram its all irrelevant. I have also seen people sabotage peoples business ventures because they don't get on.. guess what most people here wouldn't give you a second look.. the expat community should be helping each other not dragging each other down.The night out that this forum had at The Ranch I done a review to help promote the place. The owner thought it would be a bad review as its common knowledge Expats run things down instead of pick them up.. Its about time people started helping each other because nobody outside of the Expats will. Dragging over old conversations and chat doesn't fix anything what does need to be done is constructive things to show how things can be done. When we met at The Ranch there were several people saying about the problems with sponsering students, why aren't there any posts on how to put this right surely some of you out there have managed to control that problem.My post may seem negative but its more to do with looking at what is wrong and getting it put right.. the issues some have had recently are irrelevant I had dropped off the forums before then. Just wanted people to know why I am not on here.. and its nothing personal to any individual as its just purely the forums being the way they are I hope someone gets the formula right although you can't please all the people all the time..

:551:I too contribute my time to forums less & less, for the same reasons. Uzi.

[Art2ro]

Anyone will always have difference of opinions coming from different walks of life, it's just human nature being different from one culture to another, so therefore it would be difficult to please everyone you meet on forums let alone in real life! Anyways, a lot of people are already set in their ways after retirement and aren't about to change the way they view things in general. So, there's no use in trying to analyzed what is right or wrong about their remarks or topics, you can just agree or not agree and then just move on to avoid further discussions or confrontations by choice! But there are those, that like discussions and confrontations just because it's in their nature to be mean or sadistic and enjoy putting other people on the spot and causing them discomfort! So, each to their own! Take it or leave it! Dropping off forums is a good way to give you more time for other things of importance in your life.

Edited May 13, 2010 by Pinoy Art

[Mr Lee]

I really do not know, I believe a lot of us who have been on forums for a long time seem to get upset by new people asking the same old questions over and over again, but I think that we should all remember that those are new people asking those question, and asking us for help and not the same old people asking them over and over again, and we also need to remember that we were once new to forums and the Philippines and needed help ourselves. So I ask, do teachers stop teaching because the same questions have been asked before? I think not, and forums have given each and every one of us an opportunity to help our fellow man and woman, that we would otherwise never be given, and maybe many of us need to seize that opportunity and impart some of what we learned so others do not have to fumble around in the dark as I first had to do, and I am sure as some of you must have also had to do. Where else in life are we given this unique opportunity to help our fellow man or woman. I also feel that many of us non Filipino men, and maybe even some Filipino men, also need to remember that our ladies where probably the ones who guided us during our earlier years in the Philippines and that they may not have been worldly enough to always give us the easiest or best way to do things because they most often had no previous experiences dealing with issues that we would face. So all, I am not sure why each of your are on forums but I know that I am on forums to give something back and to keep learning, and I guess each and every one of us has different reasons why we started on forums and maybe some of us have only come to learn and now may know all they feel they need to know, or others have been on so long that we may have forgot what brought us to forums in the first place. I know that I came to learn and I am still learning after all these years and many of you keep teaching me, sometimes daily and sometimes weekly or monthly but I still keep learning and I thank each and everyone of you for that, so IMO none of us knows so much about the ever changing Philippines and its laws or rules that may be related to us, that we can now stop learning about them, or even about life itself and other cultures, that we get to a point that we can stop learning. IMO we learn from the cradle to the grave and we will only stop learning when the end comes and maybe not even then.So all, I ask you all to help each other and keep helping each other because each and everyone of us may have some knowledge that others can use, and IMO it would be selfish of us to keep that knowledge all to ourselves when it might prevent someone else from having a problem that we could have prevented. All just my humble opinion given in hopes of a better future for all.

[Travis]

I really do not know, I believe a lot of us who have been on forums for a long time seem to get upset by new people asking the same old questions over and over again, but I think that we should all remember that those are new people asking those question, and asking us for help and not the same old people asking them over and over again, and we also need to remember that we were once new to forums and the Philippines and needed help ourselves. So I ask, do teachers stop teaching because the same questions have been asked before? I think not, and forums have given each and every one of us an opportunity to help our fellow man and woman, that we would otherwise never be given, and maybe many of us need to seize that opportunity and impart some of what we learned so others do not have to fumble around in the dark as I first had to do, and I am sure as some of you must have also had to do. Where else in life are we given this unique opportunity to help our fellow man or woman. I also feel that many of us non Filipino men, and maybe even some Filipino men, also need to remember that our ladies where probably the ones who guided us during our earlier years in the Philippines and that they may not have been worldly enough to always give us the easiest or best way to do things because they most often had no previous experiences dealing with issues that we would face.So all, I am not sure why each of your are on forums but I know that I am on forums to give something back and to keep learning, and I guess each and every one of us has different reasons why we started on forums and maybe some of us have only come to learn and now may know all they feel they need to know, or others have been on so long that we may have forgot what brought us to forums in the first place. I know that I came to learn and I am still learning after all these years and many of you keep teaching me, sometimes daily and sometimes weekly or monthly but I still keep learning and I thank each and everyone of you for that, so IMO none of us knows so much about the ever changing Philippines and its laws or rules that may be related to us, that we can now stop learning about them, or even about life itself and other cultures, that we get to a point that we can stop learning. IMO we learn from the cradle to the grave and we will only stop learning when the end comes and maybe not even then.So all, I ask you all to help each other and keep helping each other because each and everyone of us may have some knowledge that others can use, and IMO it would be selfish of us to keep that knowledge all to ourselves when it might prevent someone else from having a problem that we could have prevented. All just my humble opinion given in hopes of a better future for all. 

I know that i joined to learn & you all have been very helpful to me in many ways & I want to tell you all that I could have never lived here without your help so God bless those who help others   :D & I hope those of you who appear to have given up on helping will reconsider cuz you have made a difference in my life & I am sure others lives so don't give up   :541:

[Tom in Texas]

...I dropped off... as I have found the uses rather limited to what I am doing. I am still here at 4am not because I am sat sipping on San Mig but because I am working.. ... Mainly its time consumption... I will spend at least 2 hours a day on forums and most of that it is reading through garbage posts. ... I know several people here that don't write yet have had long discussions in private as regards business... At the end of the day I do more via email constructively than I do on open forums...... Just wanted people to know why I am not on here.. and its nothing personal to any individual as its just purely the forums being the way they are...

"Expat forums" by their very nature are primarily a social interface, with merely the potential for picking up some helpful information... so, it is not surprising you have found their "uses rather limited" as a business tool.If I was seeking marketing ideas to increase the client volume at my law, I would not go to happy hour at a local club in hopes of getting into a substantive conversation on the subject... I might bring up the subject to see if anybody had a quick thought or two, or maybe a war story about something that had or had not worked at their business... but, I would not listen to 2 hours of "garbage" ramblings from every drunk in the place.Most of the Topics listed on this and other Forums are social based... a few specific information based... and only one specific to the topic of business.If you would log in and only read that specific Topic, you certainly will not waste 2 hours a day, as most days there is not a single new post.In the end, forums are a free source of social contacts, a wide range of information (some very helpful and interesting... some garbage), and the potential to get feedback on just about any expat related topic you would care to raise (probably 15 bs responses, but possibly the exact answer or solution to your problem). Since the percentage of expats actually doing business in the PI is probably a tiny fraction of one percent... your odds of a useful response to a "business in the PI" question is probably slim... but what have you got to lose. Besides, where else are you going to be able to be 100% guaranteed to get a bs response like this one. with your businesses... BTW, do you need a partner? Tom in Texas

[Travis]

...I dropped off... as I have found the uses rather limited to what I am doing. I am still here at 4am not because I am sat sipping on San Mig but because I am working.. ... Mainly its time consumption... I will spend at least 2 hours a day on forums and most of that it is reading through garbage posts. ... I know several people here that don't write yet have had long discussions in private as regards business... At the end of the day I do more via email constructively than I do on open forums...... Just wanted people to know why I am not on here.. and its nothing personal to any individual as its just purely the forums being the way they are...

"Expat forums" by their very nature are primarily a social interface, with merely the potential for picking up some helpful information... so, it is not surprising you have found their "uses rather limited" as a business tool.If I was seeking marketing ideas to increase the client volume at my law, I would not go to happy hour at a local club in hopes of getting into a substantive conversation on the subject... I might bring up the subject to see if anybody had a quick thought or two, or maybe a war story about something that had or had not worked at their business... but, I would not listen to 2 hours of "garbage" ramblings from every drunk in the place.Most of the Topics listed on this and other Forums are social based... a few specific information based... and only one specific to the topic of business.If you would log in and only read that specific Topic, you certainly will not waste 2 hours a day, as most days there is not a single new post.In the end, forums are a free source of social contacts, a wide range of information (some very helpful and interesting... some garbage), and the potential to get feedback on just about any expat related topic you would care to raise (probably 15 bs responses, but possibly the exact answer or solution to your problem). Since the percentage of expats actually doing business in the PI is probably a tiny fraction of one percent... your odds of a useful response to a "business in the PI" question is probably slim... but what have you got to lose. Besides, where else are you going to be able to be 100% guaranteed to get a bs response like this one. with your businesses... BTW, do you need a partner? Tom in Texas

I also noticed an icon on the top of a section that says "watch this topic" & I would guess that it sends a member a message when someone posts in it so maybe no one has to bother to read any subjects they do not wish to waste their time on. anyone know how that function works?

[UZI]

I really do not know, I believe a lot of us who have been on forums for a long time seem to get upset by new people asking the same old questions over and over again, but I think that we should all remember that those are new people asking those question, and asking us for help and not the same old people asking them over and over again, and we also need to remember that we were once new to forums and the Philippines and needed help ourselves. So I ask, do teachers stop teaching because the same questions have been asked before? I think not, and forums have given each and every one of us an opportunity to help our fellow man and woman, that we would otherwise never be given, and maybe many of us need to seize that opportunity and impart some of what we learned so others do not have to fumble around in the dark as I first had to do, and I am sure as some of you must have also had to do. Where else in life are we given this unique opportunity to help our fellow man or woman. I also feel that many of us non Filipino men, and maybe even some Filipino men, also need to remember that our ladies where probably the ones who guided us during our earlier years in the Philippines and that they may not have been worldly enough to always give us the easiest or best way to do things because they most often had no previous experiences dealing with issues that we would face.So all, I am not sure why each of your are on forums but I know that I am on forums to give something back and to keep learning, and I guess each and every one of us has different reasons why we started on forums and maybe some of us have only come to learn and now may know all they feel they need to know, or others have been on so long that we may have forgot what brought us to forums in the first place. I know that I came to learn and I am still learning after all these years and many of you keep teaching me, sometimes daily and sometimes weekly or monthly but I still keep learning and I thank each and everyone of you for that, so IMO none of us knows so much about the ever changing Philippines and its laws or rules that may be related to us, that we can now stop learning about them, or even about life itself and other cultures, that we get to a point that we can stop learning. IMO we learn from the cradle to the grave and we will only stop learning when the end comes and maybe not even then.So all, I ask you all to help each other and keep helping each other because each and everyone of us may have some knowledge that others can use, and IMO it would be selfish of us to keep that knowledge all to ourselves when it might prevent someone else from having a problem that we could have prevented. All just my humble opinion given in hopes of a better future for all.

Lee,With respect, I think you missed the point of the O.P. It wasn't about new members asking the same questions, Matt, you, me & many others are happy doing that & it is one of the main reasons we are here. We are also here, as you point out, to continue learning from others. Matt's 2nd paragraph sums it up. He (& I with my reply) were pointing out that there are too many members on forums who take threads away from the question before someone finally answers or only post rants or negatives or to talk about 'ME'. For every FACTUAL helpful answer to a question, you get 10 opinions / POV that don't really help the O.P. or even make them feel stupid for asking - something you & some others try very hard not to do, as shown by your reply.I could quote many example but we both know that would just invite the comments that would prove the point. Healthy debate seem dead where Expats could between us get some answer or solution. We can do it face to face but it seems, not on forums.To quote from Matt's O.P

what does need to be done is constructive things to show how things can be done. When we met at The Ranch there were several people saying about the problems with sponsering students, why aren't there any posts on how to put this right surely some of you out there have managed to control that problem.

So why not start a thread to do just that?Just my 2 centavosUzi.

[tropicalwaste]

Mr.Lee my issue isnt that people ask the same question over and over again but the fact there is plenty of people who can already cover that base. Most of what I do is a little different to what everyone else is doing. I don't mind sharing advice but I think a lot of the things I do and requested are better in emails purely because its relevant to an individual and a lot of the time they don't want it in an open discussion as well as the fact that things go off in a separate direction on forums generally. Tom in Texas hit the nail on the head with it being more like a bar.. You sit at the bar and ask a question you get answers from everyone yet the odds on getting good advice are pretty narrow. I am all for social functions where people meet up as the infighting doesn't seem to happen or a lot less but also many people are different in person to the way they act online. Business partner wise Tom I am interlinking with a lot of people come up with a venture and I will happily partner with it. I do have an opportunity that has become available but have to check the viability of it as it currently has a Korean backer but I know the owner/operator is looking to do it his own way. I.e. currently the Korean company wants to fund the project and be sole distributor of the produce which isn't the way we want to go with that business. There is also a pet project I am currently trying to sort out with a professor which involves about 2 hectares of farmland and fish farming. The fish farm is only part of the venture as education classes on new technologies implemented on the farm will generate more revenue than the farm produce especially if we get the setup right.One thing I have learned over time here is that there are huge gaps in the markets for specific every day needs and getting it done locally is the key to a good income and avoiding heavy import duties. Most good quality goods go for export but at the end of the day people are forgetting the home market. Yes fertilizers are overpriced, yes animal feeds cut out a lot of the profit margin. But that's why thinking and going big is the only solution. Producing own pig feeds for example or other products can and do work here. There is a growing market here for "eco friendly and organic foods and products" locally and for export.Getting a bit sidetracked Tom.. but there is opportunities that will keep arising over the next 10 years and everything involves being on site. Ideally I would like to develop networks of people as most failures in business here for locals as well as foreigners is down to not keeping close management. So for example developing a farm that produces sea cucumber,shrimps and fish someone would need to be at least visiting the farm daily and within view of it. Because the biggest risk is staff stealing more than anything else. Most other things like jewelery for export I have farmed out as a cottage industry where people bring the products after production at home. This allows them to keep an eye on the kids at the same time means I need no factory only a warehouse once it expands out. Anyway im getting into business conversations which is going off tangent...I will still hover around and if anyone wants to chat either online or in person I do still answer messages and meet up when I can. One last thing though if anyone is looking for seafoods I can supply but its for "commercial operations only" as its quantities that are important because the seafoods are coming up from another island. All for generating good friends and good business...

[tropicalwaste]

Hi Uzi, the student sponser thing isnt something I do or get involved in. I have found most students have a bizarre mentality and I can't deal with the immaturity would drive me nuts.. But I know a lot of other expatsdo or are sponsering students. Although the one solution that did work here is the aunt I don't get on with as she took in one of Aprils cousins who was failing and made her stay at her house and finish her nursing and I think its probably the best way to deal with it as they may not respect their parents or find their parents easy going but give them an aunt that knows its the way out of here and she will make sure the student passes with flying colours..lol