Re: Lovehounders

[Ulrich Grepel <uli@zoodle.robin.de>]

Hi David!

You said:
> I think this has been said before but occasisonally I get the feeling
> that Lovehounds is a very close-knit community (I would include Chris
> and Vickie, IED, Pete Manchester, Steveo, Uli, Doug amongst others).

Thanks...

> On occasion I feel that newcomers and people like myself can find this
> community a bit overpowering and extremely hard to get into. People are
> probably sometimes afraid to voice their own opions for fear of being
> flamed alived or in the case of newcomers they read their digests and
> unsubscribe immediately because they don't like what they see.

This sounds sad to me. It most certainly isn't in the intention of any
of 'us'. Some of us might be a bit too sensitive about certain subjects,
which is something I don't really like to see again and again, but there's
nothing I can do. This is also a reason why I try not to involve with
ANY flamewar, especially not on the list. On neither side. I have my opinion
in most cases, but I'm reluctant to get them known, even to those who are
on 'my side'. This is because I don't want 'my side' to use 'me' as an
argument against the other side. Such things happened before, including a
huge misunderstanding where I wrote some mild words to one side which
got misunderstood as being very supportive. Other people do think the
same way, normally flame wars don't achieve anything except bad temper
on the list, even if conducted in email.

> I know that a lot of the people who I mentioned above  have on the list for
> a very long time, if not from the beginning. I also know that a few of
> them have been lucky enough to have met Kate and their knowledge of Kate's
> life and  music is immensei. I admire them for their knowledge and like everyone
> they are entitled to voice their own opinions.

Well, I've only been here for three years now, I've only 'met' Kate once for
5 minutes (as have about 1000 others at the same time, last year in London),
my knowledge about her live & music is 90% from love-hounds itself, when I
started reading gaffa in 92 I didn't know most of the things I know now.

And I still don't know much. The fact that I maintain the FAQ doesn't say that
I know everything. I just might be able to remember where I have to look for
a piece of information, but for example that didn't help me half an inch
during the quiz at the Kate Convention last year... [and all of you thought
I should be in the experts group]. For those who don't know: I started posting
the FAQ about a year ago after Ron Hill (former maintainer) didn't post it
for about half a year and after it became clear that the FAQ was needed.

> Howver:-
>
> These opinions can become emebeded in stone (I'll cite the one of 'There
> Is Only One Truly Magnificent Album and That is THE DREAMING as an example.)

;-)

Start reading 85's and 86's digests in the archives, and you'll find |>oug /\lan
and IED arguing over this in a HUGE way which most definitely hasn't been
reached at all in recent years. Doug and Andy, correct me if I'm wrong, but
these 'arguments' are not THAT serious. It's the kind of arguments that are
usually fought out with great pleasure on both sides. Noone, not even IED or Doug,
would seriously want to offend anyone who thinks that Kate's instrumental cover
version of Candle In The Wind is The Single Greatest Piece Of Music In The Entire
Universe.

[...]
> These clashes of opinion can make being on Lovehounds more interesting
> and on occasion it can be a lot of fun. But just because you've actually
> met Kate or you've been on the list since year dot or you can name every
> Kate single including catalogue numbers doesn't mean your opinion is any
> more valid than someone who has only been on the list for a few days.

Of course not. As I said above, these arguments are meant to be fun.

And don't believe I know all those catalogue numbers by heart. I've just got
a large list in my computer. The discography is close to 9000 lines by now,
still needing reformatting. Some numbers I tend to recognize, and some
I might even know by heart, but only because I looked them up so and so and
so often to find out whether I had some version already in the discography
or not.

Quick test for the TrueFans:

What's the single with the catalogue number "OG 9380"?

;-)

[I hope PDFM isn't reading now to get ideas for the next quiz...]

> Well thats my spleen vented for now. The above is just my opinion, a lot
> of good things happen on Lovehound which far out weigh the bad ones!

I think sometimes a discussion like this is neccessary. I also don't think
this is (or should become) a flamewar, else I wouldn't have participated.
If it emerges into one, I'll retreat.

Bye,

Uli


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