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The Big Announcement

23K views 44 replies 27 participants last post by  A1337STI 
#1 ·
There comes a time when all things must pass, and so it comes with our involvement in SpecialStage.com. When we started the web page in 1999, we hoped it would help bring the rally community together in the exciting new environment of the world wide web. While we never built the web page completely into our dream page, we are proud of what we managed to accomplish in those 14 years.

At this point we are starting a new phase and would like to announce that SpecialStage.com is now part of the Autoguide.com family of websites. We are confident that they are capable of taking SpecialStage.com to the next level.

We want to thank everyone in the rally community for their support of SpecialStage.com over the years, and we hope you will treat staff members of Autoguide.com with continued support and respect.

We would like to take this opportunity to thank all the forum members that, over the years, have always been there for us, helping to make this the best rally forum in North America. We would also like to extend a big thank you to all the SpecialStage.com vendors and sponsors that have allowed us to present SpecialStage.com to users free of charge.

Please give a warm welcome to Marco from AutoGuide, who will be joining the staff here as an Administrator from this point going forward.

We will still be available through e-mail and personal forum messages for any questions, as well as responding in this thread. Going forward there is a need for people interested in becoming moderators. These people would be a very important choice in helping to guide the direction of this community. If you are interested, feel free to send a private message to Jim.

Thank you again for making SpecialStage.com the best North American Rally Resource on the internet.

Peace and love,

Ben, George and Jim
 
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#2 ·
Hey Guys!

My name is Marco from Autoguide.com

I will be joining the site to help out as Administrator to answer all your questions, ideas, site issues, etc regarding specialstage.com

I am motorsports enthusiast as well who has build a variety of project cars from show to full race. So feel free to ask me anything if you need assistance!

Specialstage.com is a great addition to our wide span of automotive forum communities. I look forward to get to know you guys better and work together to keep the site growing!

Once again let us all thank Ben, George and Jim for putting together such an amazing community.

Thank you,


Marco
 
#4 ·
Seems like this is what happens to boards and forums all over...

Happened to the Lotus forums, and while it's still running and relatively healthy things certainly took a sour turn.
I can imagine there will be "super special awesome emblems" for paying a monthly fee.
People will get banned if they link to a "non-liked" board.
People will get banned if they try to sell anything at all without first paying a $3,499/yr fee.

So on and so forth.

...Oh and I almost forgot, extremely invasive browser hi-jacking advertisements... Can't wait for those.
 
#5 ·
It is a free forum board as it was before, we are not here to push members to paid subscriptions. That is an option for each individual if they wish so and of course they will be perks to differentiate between regular members to those who have paid memberships.

Our main position here is to keep the forum running and that would only work as a community. There will be no juristic changes on what you see now as a forum board and if there were changes to be made on the overall functions of the forum, then it will be advised to the community first before implementation.

In regards of of links and being banned, I have not seen a situation like this happen if the link was legitimate and not a direct advertisement post that leads to a link of a website store or services. Then if that is the case it is obvious that the user is using the board to get free marketing ads. Would that be reasonable for all other members?

This community have several supporting vendors to be able to sell their products and market their services with a set fee. Of course any company portraying as a regular member and attempts to sell their products will be stopped as it is not fair for supporting vendors.

SpecialStage.com is what is now even under the autoguide management. I am here to simply just help on maintain the site and keep it running for all you guys to enjoy. So if you have any inquiries, suggestions, issues, etc please feel free to PM me about it and I will do my best to give you an answer asap.


Marco
 
#9 · (Edited)
well..
a HUGE thanks to Ben, George and Jim for all their time dealing with the SpecialStage - this has always been THE source for everything rally for me and I have spent many many hours reading very informative or very entertaining threads about random rally stuff -

I bought my car from here and hope to someday sell my car on here (inquire within...)

again, thanks for all the good SS times and hopefully they will continue well into the future!
 
#10 ·
So how much did SS sell for then? Enough to retire on?? Maybe making a forum and then having it bought by someone else is the ONLY way to make money in Rally!
 
#15 ·
Huge thanks to Jim, George, and Ben. This is THE largest rally community in the country. It has its quirks, but we all love it.

That being said, I personally feel that trying to monetize a reletively small and, for the most part, tightly nit group may prove to be a poor choice. I personally greatly dislike the idea of attempting to build a class structure elevating a certain group from the masses.

I can see how this benifits the original owners of the site, as well as the new owners. The real question is, does it benifit those of us who use this board regularly?

Essentially, what's in it for us?
 
#16 ·
Oh lord.... This will not bode well....

But yes, what will happen to the classifieds. What will happen to the little guys who make small cool things for us? This isn't a car brand board like Veloster.org or the other large forums dedicated to a single car brand... Do you have any examples of forums you guys "own" that has a culture similar to ours? Small tight knit group who are focused on a sport, not a car?
 
#17 · (Edited)
To Jim, George and Ben.. I can not say enough thank-you's to what you have done over these 14 years. I do not think any one could say enough...you have put rallying where it is today about getting the information out there with the press releases, etc. i just hope this means you are going to do more rallying now. It is always more fun to be a competitor then adminster anything...a rally, a forum, etc. So good luck and wish you ALOT of future success.

Again, George thank you for coming out to Lucas Oil Desert Storm Rally this past March to compete. We did appreciate it ALOT. Ben and Jim...you get your butts back out there and enjoy the other side- Rallying or for George-surfing and rallying.

Denise McMahon
Series Director - Bilstein Southwest RallyCup Series Presented by Lucas Oil
Organizer - Lucas Oil Desert Storm and Arizona Extreme Rally
Lucas Oil Products Inc. Rally Distributor
 
#19 ·
George, Ben and Jim have been especially awesome to Safe Drives these last few very trying years. I honestly cannot say "Thank you" enough.

I can comment that Safe Drives has been unable to continue to advertise on other forums in the past that were taken over by companies like Autoguide. This fact was due to massively increased advertising costs. I certainly fear / expect the same with this situation. Rally is actually a very small part of Safe Drives total sales but, a huge part of our passion for life.

Again, many thanks to George, Ben and Jim.

Peace and love to you all.
 
#20 ·
I'm sorry but I think we are mistaken what is being talked about vendor sales to single regular member classified ads. Classified will remain free as what it was before, what I was trying to explain early on was in regards of members taking advantage of the free classified to sell mass production parts from a company with out being a registered vendor. If you have cool parts that you have made in your garage and have one or two pieces to sell.. sure why not... you're not putting a company name behind that product or anything else. I believe it is a general rule of thumb on all forums across that have registered vendors supporting the site regardless if it is under autoguide or not.
 
#23 ·
BTW, thanks SSadmin for being brave enough to step into the lions den... starting to feel a little bit like you're gonna be fed to them .. shoot the messenger and all... there's definitely some tough questions and some fear of change going on (both are justified)

its nice to have someone who's so open to telling us what's going on. Its really appreicated (even if that appreciation or feeling of good will aren't really being felt) hehe
 
#24 ·
Step one:
http://www.specialstage.com/forums/showthread.php?46171-First-Day-as-a-Team-Owner-Rental-Agent

I welcome Dan's involvement on this forum and in rallying but he always posts topics just like this that link directly to his own blog, often times with little to no useful info. Seems like he's stealing advertising revenue from autoguide.com and the new owners should definitely take him to small claims court.

Step two: Rallyanarchy.com
There's gotta be some way that autoguide.com can attack that forum and remove the competition.

Step three: Unban all previously banned members like JVL and Bob Dobolina.

Step four: Change forum names. I'd suggest:
USA > Boring
World > OMG someone died somewhere in rallying and Ken Block got 9th again in WRC!
Canada > Antoine wins again!
Photo/Video > Gymkhana and boring onboard
Car Construction > How to get started in rallying and fix a dent volume 1.

Remove regional forums and replace with
Ivan's NY Mafia
CRS still has P class?
Rally America stronghold
NASA Global World Rally Championship Headquarters
 
#28 ·
Yikes - say it isn't so.

But - we survived when Ben's original idea(s) (Ben's Rally Page) morphed into SS, so this too will hopefully work......

Ben, George, and Jim - you have been friends through the years - please remain so.

Ben - we ever going to do that interview?

press on,
 
#29 ·
Jim, Ben, George, and Jeff,

Thanks for keeping specialstage going for all these years. I doubt many realize what a PITA and financial drain this has been over the years.

As I look back at all the years of forum posts I'm struck by how many new people there are and how many of the same old people are still here.

Here's to continued success for the specialstage.com's new owners!
JBN
 
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