I disappeared from Prius Chat for a while near the end of 2010. Since I've gotten back, I haven't seen any posts from one of my favorite folks on this site, Bob Wilson bwilson4web. Anyone know what happened?
I'm sure someone will put this alot nicer than I am but I believe the mods pi$$ed in his wheaties about his car accident posts so he left PC.
I agree with you. Bob brought alot of useful info to the Prius world. I've spend many hours here at work reading his findings.
My view is that PriusChat is worse for the loss of his insistence on observed facts, his devotion to noble causes, and his ability to tell the difference between a fact and a cause, but apparently they disliked him at headquarters.
The PC moderators felt his over coverage of fatalities that involved Toyota vehicles was excessive and asked him to stop. My experience with Bob is a lot of things are non-negotiable with him so he left....I personally don't think this issue was worth the "line in the sand stand" and hurts Bob as much as anyone else....he has a passion on the workings of the Prius and PC is the best place to do that. While the motive of Toyota fatalities was probably motivated from the Chicken Little unintended acceleration climate last year, the PC staff felt the coverage was excessive and the way they asked for it to end was very polite/reasonable. That's my take on it.
But it was Bob who chose to leave. My take on it was they asked him to tone down certain posts, he didn't like being told, sulked and left. It's a shame but hey ho.
Bob is posting on the yahoo group Prius_Technical_Stuff (I believe I formatted that correctly) I've not asked him directly how he feels about PC these days. Might do, but I'd think that would be his story to tell, as opposed to mine to report.
Absolutely agree. I wish he were back here. I think your take is basically accurate. I think I was out of the country for a few weeks around the time he left so I wasn't able to monitor PC very well during that time. I guess I'll have to lurk on the Prius Yahoo technical groups. I, in the past didn't like Yahoo groups much because there was too much traffic that wasn't really categorized. It'd be tough to read Priuschat if everything were lumped into one area.
Then stay here, it's better organized, there are many here as knowledgeable or more so than him and they hopefully won't have a snit and leave the community when asked to follow guidelines by the home owners. :thumb:
Can't quite sign on with that Treb. BobW did (and does) always look to expand our knowledge of the NHW11. I can only think of one PC poster (name withheld) who might perhaps claim more in that area. But the PC archives are intact, and the clever new arrivals will use them. Others who wish to keep up with Bob will thread their way through Yahoo. Ain't that tough.
Correct, he had the choice of being disruptive or absent, once they made their ruling. I would have been petulant and disruptive, but he showed more maturity than I ever do.
Sooo, why don't the PC old-timers who know Bob invite him to rejoin PC? Obviously, his experience, technical know-how and wisdom is much appreciated and missed. Maybe BW is already back under a new handle? I'm just saying...you never know.
The Powers That Be have not relented on reporting and/or analizing Prius accidents, so there is no point to returning to be banned.
But that's the same 'Powers that Be' that allow us to use this forum and its bandwidth for FREE. I look at it another way - if someone was causing a nuisance of themselves in my cab and repeatedly ignored my calls for them to stop - I'd stop the car and kick them out!
I need to have my assumptions clarified. I assume PC is a public forum. I asssume everyone is welcome to join/participate at PC. I assume the usual courtesy and decent language rules apply. I assume freedom of speech applies. Based on those assumptions, how do TPTB have a right to ask someone to tone down a topic or even drop a topic for discussion? The BW scenario makes me think that Toyota or some other sponser has come to bear pressure (financial?) on TPTB based upon a topic that could hurt their market image. So TPTB asked Bob to tone it down. Bob took offense and left. I'm new enough at PC to not have the benefit of the multitude of previous posts to identify the specific straw that broke the camel's back.
Bob wasn't rude and he was very knowledgeable but at the end of the day its upto the owners of the forum to police/run it as they see fit. If people don't like that they leave - which is what Bob did. If lots of people don't like it they would leave too and the forum would collapse. As the forum is massively popular I guess the owners must be doing something right. You can't please all the people all the time though. Bob must have had a big effect though for him to be still discussed all these months later.
So why fuss about a patron who removed himself BEFORE being kicked out? Bob appears to have seen a no win scenario for both him and PriusChat, and solved it with the least disruption possible. It is not his fault I miss his graphs and accident reports.