THE RESULTS AND DECISION

I would like to thank all that have contributed their opinions to this issue .
It was not an easy thing to deal with . I have strong feelings on both sides of the issue and frankly could not form a clear decision myself.

After all the comments I decided to take a step back and look at the history of this site.

AMFONE.NET and the AM FORUM are sites that were started by others hams. AMFONE.NET was conceived by Brian W5AMI. It was called AM North America. The AM Forum was once The Am Window BBS started by Steve WB3HUZ. Both Brian and Steve had a clear direction they wanted their sites to move towards.

Here are two quotes that state the direction each sought for their sites - - - -

Brian W5AMI - Am North America (AMFONE. NET)

"I started this site back in the late part of 1997 with the intent of promoting the use of Amplitude Modulation on the Amateur bands. It was, and never will be intended as my personal home page, but rather a page for each and every enthusiast of AM."

Steve WB3HUZ - THE AM WINDOW BBS

"The purpose of The AM Window Bulletin Board is to allow AMers around the world to communicate, in a topic based, efficient manner.

You can post technical questions, operating info (frequencies, nets, etc), for sale items, wanted items, requests for information.... almost anything, as long as it is related to AM operation within amateur radio."

When I assumed responsibility for these sites I agreed to maintian and improve on the sites in the same direction and spirit each site was conceived on. AMFONE.NET with the addition of The Am Forum is now the largest resource available of its kind dedicated to our mode.This site represents all of us on the web.

With this all said it is apparent I lost direction a few months ago. We tried The AM Inquirer as an experiment and well here we are. I apologise for this but at the time I felt it could have contributed to the site.

Over the last week many of you have called me, emailed me and posted your thoughts on the Forum in regard to the Inquirer and the sites direction in general.
I have a new insight as to how many of the users feel and I must take this into consideration when making decisions for the site.

So let's look at the Polling data.

Users Poll - 98 votes cast out of 770 available - 13% participated

At first glance it looked like a close decision. But looking closer it was not clear cut. About 50% wanted it to go , That was clear, But the other half that wanted it to stay could be broken down into 3 groups.

1) Those that really wanted it to stay.

2 Those that said it didn't matter because they only looked a certain threads.

3) Those that said it was okay but they wouldn't go near it.

Not quite so clear!

Admin & Moderators poll 10 votes cast out of 15 available - 60% participated

4 votes for it to stay

8 votes for it to go

Having evaluated this data it is quite apparent that there will be some people unhappy with either decision so I have been thinking and I beleive I have a solution that, beleive it or not, would accomadate all parties involved.

The Decision

I am going to uphold my word to Steve and Brian and bring AMFONE.NET back to it roots and direction originally conceived. This of course means that The Inquirer will no longer be hosted on this site.

This is where Moose comes into play. I don't how or why but he found out about the events taking place here . Maybe someone tipped him off? I don't know.

The Am Inquirer no longer exists on The AM Forum .

AT THE TOP OF THE PAGE YOU WILL FIND A LINK FOR THE AM INQUIRER at it's new site.

I hope this decision works for all.

For those that did not want the Inquirer here - it is gone.

For those that wanted the Inquirer - - It lives.

I apologise for putting all of you thru this but I really wanted your input on this. I hope we can now move on. In fact I beleive we will gain positive momentum from all of this.

I would like to thank, Jay N3WWL, Bob K1KBW, Bill KE1GF, Blaine N1GTU, Larry W8ER, Paul K2ORC, The HUZ Man, Tom K1JJ, Jack KA3ZLR, Bud WD8BIL, Brent W1IA, and Moose. These people had to deal ( put up ) with me over the phone and in chat rooms many times this week as we worked thru this. Each of these people had great insight and helped me thru this process. I appreciate all their thoughts and efforts.

And again I thank you, the users, for making AMFONE.NET the best - - it's time to get back to radio!

Gary - W2INR
Webmaster AMFONE.NET