Well I understand peeps need to go to bed, but having started reading this thread I had to read to the end and now I knackered... Still I think as a longish term member I need to put an oar in here as well. (Would have said this earlier but was going to see new HP movie)...
So first off, Mark you still have to meet me one day... no sneaking off. It was really good to see from Martin that you are, and will remain a member. I can understand taking a few steps back for a while (got to allow new people room without seeming like a shadow) but I hope to see you around again one day with your lovely wife. Thank you for all your hard work over the last few years.
Martin and Elliot, well quite a day you peeps have had. I think you have seen a lot of all the sides of us today, and reading your responses has given me what I hope is a good insight into your heads. I would say Martin that you should not take things to heart, especially now. However I respect your wish to defend your company that you and collegue built up. If you come to hold the SH community in similar regard to your company we will have nothing to fear. Elliot however, you seem as mad as the rest of us, sure you will find this an interesting challenge to work on technically.
So here we are then, new owners, new options. It is not all doom and gloom peeps. Lets be honest, poor Mark did not have the time to put into creating any new features. I will miss him loads, but there is more that could be offered. We may not want all of it, but if the site will continue around a free forum board and free basic adds system and chatroom what do we lose? People have mentioned the law (and I have a lot of respect for Reese), but we already comply with it as Mark did not want to get sued anymore than our new owners. It should not really be different. As for our moderators, they are great peeps and I hope they will want to remain mods for the same reason we want to be members, our friendships on here.
So lets see how this pans out. After all the secrecy is not unusual in negotiations like this. I have been in a number of company takeovers (I keep working for good companies other people want) and as others said it was not that bad in the end. Deep breaths my friends, we are all still here, the site is still here, and for now it is safe and free and they plan to keep what is here now intact. The new thing is add on services that will be charged for if you want them, and some people will. If this helps pay for development and bandwidth it is better than the site going the way of the dodo.
To counter my friend Ice and some others I do not feel our new owners have lied. In fact they have been inherantly rather honest, some may say too honest. The words have been typed add hock, the minor inconsistancies only go to show this is not big corporate marketing gibberish but real thoughts from real people. I for one prefer that to a politician with every question prepared, his answers learned rote, and repeated over and over...
I look forward to the new features, but I must agree that verification is a bad idea, see the thread from a few months back. Locations drop down wins me on spot, dreamed of that for ages... More photos, hey ho no fuss either way. However if you could offer a better photo upload with automatic resize on the fly that would be helpful

(Not to me with my MCSE and techy job, but to all those normal people out there

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