After making my earlier post today, I spent a little time thinking about the situation and recalling how things played out and I think I bear some responsibility for the failure that is BlackJack the Forum.

Like I said, when BJinfo shut down, the membership was looking for a new home. There were a couple small temporary type forum, but we were sort of looking for a permanent type forum that would allow the core group to remain together. It was at this point that Norm Wattenberger announced that he had a paid license to the same software that BJinfo used and could set up an almost identical forum. Norm actually had a forum running linked to his QFIT software site (that is why he had the license) but that forum was completely dead. Any legitimate posters had been driven away.

So when Norm suggested he could set up a forum (which became BJTF), like I said there were a number of members that objected. One was Automatic Monkey, a real smart AP. Others that objected were Creeping Panther, Zengrifter, Bojack, Shadrock (billryan at WoV) and several others. These were all long time players that knew Norm all too well. Zengrifter was the first banned at Norm's new site. Creeping Panther and Bojack, eventually signed on using new handles. Creeping Panther didn't hide his "new" handle too well and was quickly shown the door. Bojack, a long time very successful team manager/player, posted briefly under a new handle and then gave up. AutoMonkey and Shadroch never did migrate to BJTF that I am aware of.

But it was me, who took Norm at his word, that things would be different and encouraged everyone to join. I made the very first post. As a matter of fact, I think I made the first half dozen posts trying to get the ball rolling and begin some good discussion. And I tried really hard at BJTF, for about 4 years, sharing my experiences until I was banned along with the others.

And in the end I was wrong, and the guys that knew Norm best and knew he would not change were proven right. What is the definition of "insanity"? Doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different outcome. I fell victim to insanity.