Kiene's Forum will be shut down permanently on April 1, 2019

[hwchubb]

Bill, add me to the list of those who would happily chip in if you continue this forum on your own. It has been a great resource over the years, and local knowledge of far flung places around the country (and globe) is especially valuable.

I’m not a FB’er either. Have an account, try to check it once a year whether I need to or not, but the last couple of years have escaped my attention.

Wayne

[BobVP]

Like so many other replies I was hoping this was a long-term April Fool's joke and am very sorry it is not.

This forum is the only one I regularly visit and it is very unlikely I will use it on FB, even though I am a FB user.

I would love to read something from the person(s) making this decision. Anything! No, you do not owe us, forum users, anything but it seems common decency would be to give us all some idea why you are making this change.

I cannot begin to count the number of things I have learned here. Very sad to this go.

Bill.....If you can wrangle a way to keep it going I will do whatever I can to support your endeavor.

[Big Jim]

Bill.
Like many others here, I have been participating in this forum since its inception and have really really enjoyed and appreciated it. However, all is lost if you move it to facebook. I personally hate facebook, and more and more people are beginning to feel the same way. I will be really sad to see it go. I haven't read all 7 pages of responses, and probably someone else has already suggested making it subscription based, to defray costs. I would certainly pay a subscription fee. I already do so on some other fishing sites (Coastsiders, for example).

Jim

[Rockman]

I am very sad to hear this and disappointed that someone won’t keep this going. I use FB less and less. This is due to the fine print in the use agreement. The amount of data mining, the loss of ownership of your photos so others can use them, the hacking potential. This forum site has become my regular morning read with my coffee in the am. I am hopeful that maybe a nominal subscription fee may make administrating the site a worthy endeavor. I will miss it for all the info that is shared, the friendships that were made on the water, the opportunities to buy and sell on the classifieds, the fish reports and photos of people who are out enjoying the resources that are available to us. If the reason for dropping this is that Bill is spending more time then he ever dreamed of being the admin guy, and less time being a retired fishing guy, I for one can not fault him for that, as all of us only have so much time to be here to do what we love, and that is flyfishing with friends and sharing embellished stories of the adventures we have taken. Some of us are now pushing the envelope to have enough time to scratch some of these off of our bucket list.
So if this is the reason, I say congrats to Bill for all his contributions to this sport we all love, the sharing of his knowledge which is how we all learn, the store he built, and the time he has spent admining this site.
No matter what the reason for closing the site, well done Bill Kiene and FISH ON!!

[Ralph]

The board has apparently been identified as an unacceptable expense by the bean counters. So be it. It is a great public service, but beyond simple good will, it is hard to see where the financial pay off is. The people who truly get a free ride here, at the expense of the hosts, are the guides who are often in direct competition with Kiene's stable of guides for business. Guide ads posted under the guise as fishing reports are enjoyable, but are counter productive if you own a fly shop with your own staff. I have never figured why this board allows competitors to post out right ads for tours, classes and clinics when Kiene's offers the same. Why not do what Blanton does and charge a strong annual fee for guides and services to advertise/post? It might be enough to keep the board above water or at least break even. Staff written fishing reports could easily fill the void by guide reports without sacrificing business.

[EricO]

If you could take it over that would be great!! This is an important part of fly fishing in Nor Cal. It provides a lot of information on what is going on out there. If there are fees for the forum I am sure you could get double the fees if you started a go fund me page. I for one would donate money.
Thanks

I would donate in a heartbeat too. Good idea on the GoFundMe if money is the issue.

Eric

[Bill Kiene semi-retired]

Gregg and I will be working on getting it in our control and it will be "Bill Kiene's Form".

Gary at the shop thought it was a good idea and is good with it.

Thanks to all.....will keep you posted.

[Carl Blackledge]

Ralph, Very well said.

Carl Blackledge

[PV_Premier]

but beyond simple good will, it is hard to see where the financial pay off is.

Several, myself included, have already noted there is a direct correlation between the presence of this board and what we spend in the Kienes online/brick and mortar shop. My spending will definitely go down at Kienes if the board goes away, reason being that it is not at front of mind as often when I am not regularly visiting the online forum.

The people who truly get a free ride here, at the expense of the hosts, are the guides who are often in direct competition with Kiene's stable of guides for business. Guide ads posted under the guise as fishing reports are enjoyable, but are counter productive if you own a fly shop with your own staff. I have never figured why this board allows competitors to post out right ads for tours, classes and clinics when Kiene's offers the same. Why not do what Blanton does and charge a strong annual fee for guides and services to advertise/post? It might be enough to keep the board above water or at least break even.

Another forum I frequent handles things this way. If you are a vendor and want to post advertisements or promotions of your services, you have to pony up for a commercial account. I think it's $59 or something per year, not a huge expense for the readership honestly. For the every day Joe who just wants to browse and talk fishing, it's free. If you start moving from being an everyday Joe to posting promotional threads about your hobby fly tying business or your 3rd party hosted fishing reports, you get contacted for lack of compliance and you either transition your account to a commercial account or you get banned if you keep posting promo threads under your personal account.

Another option to fund the board could be to charge a modest fee for posting classified ads. I would gladly pay $1-2 to post an ad.

There are a million ways to fund this that most people here would be happy to entertain various combinations of. There might even be some IT savvy people who post here and would be willing to donate time to help host the board. To just cut the cord without even thinking about it unfortunately appears to be turning a deaf ear toward customers even if that is not the intention.

I'm glad to hear that it seems there may be a solution currently on life support. Bill, let us know how we can support you in this effort.

[Jake B]

I’d gladly pay!!!