Website issues

The purpose of the Audlem Online website can be defined as to inform, entertain and promote the interests of the local community.

We like to think that the website is a leader of its type in terms of technical presentation, content and "up-to-date-ness". The record of at least one news story each day for what is now almost five years of the website's existence must surely speak for itself.

Official statusThe website is official insofar as it was originally a spin-off from the 2005 Parish Plan, and it is still supported to a limited extent by the Parish Council. It carries all Parish Council agendas, minutes, newsletters etc.

A member of the Parish Council is, coincidentally, also on the small group which runs the website, but it is nevertheless completely independent as far as any design, content or editorial policy is concerned. Following various comments about the official status or otherwise of the website we have decided to remove all references that we can find to the word "official".

Editorial PolicyWe, the Audlem Online team, try to avoid an editorial stance on any controversial internal village issue, restricting ourselves to reporting such facts as we can obtain from official sources. These are the issues which seem to cause most of the aggravation on the ChatBox, and there have been a couple of recent cases which have highlighted this:

• The problems at St James' School
• The Speed Watch group

We do have a policy of supporting village issues where a substantial majority of residents have clearly indicated their wishes, and the Parish Council have also declared their support:

• Reduction of heavy traffic through the village
• Support of local businesses, especially shops in the village
• Improvements to national services, e.g. ambulances
• Improvements to the environment, e.g. the canal, roads, footpaths etc.

#The ChatBoxA year or two ago we introduced a forum feature which allowed website readers to contribute to a running discussion about specific topics. This was changed last year to a ChatBox which is almost identical in principle, but whose format is more in line with current website design.

The ChatBox has proved to be a benefit, in that has allowed lively discussion about some aspects of village life, but it has also led to some quite unpleasant exchanges of personal epithets. The recent experience with some of the ChatBox entries relating to the SpeedWatch Group has been very counter-productive and we clearly need to be more careful about what we allow and don't allow on the website.

We have considered closing down the ChatBox altogether, but to have to do this would seem to be a sad commentary on the state of debate in the village. It has also been suggested that we only allow postings which give the real name of the contributor, but the nature of the Internet is such that it would take an unacceptable amount of our personal time to check that individual contributors are really who they say they are.

So we have decided for the moment to keep the Chatbox going in its current form, albeit with a greater degree of moderation and control. I can hear the shouts of "censorship" even as I write this, but the sad fact is that one person's mild joke is another person's deadly insult.

In a relatively small community such as ours, where the participants are likely to have a good idea of who other contributors actually are, even when hidden behind aliases, it is simply not worth creating unnecessary levels of bad feeling in what is, after all, supposed to be a bit of fun.

So, for example, if "ConcernedOfAudlem" posts an entry commenting on a particular topic, it is quite acceptable for "CombermereMan" to respond with an entry which is something like "ConcernedOfAudlem, have you thought about x, y, z. etc...", but not "Who does ConcernedOfAudlem think he is – of all the bigoted one-sided arguments I have ever read this must be the biggest load of twaddle since the Magna Carta. ConcernedOfAudlem must really start to restrict his comments to ideas nearer his obviously limited intelligence etc etc....". (And, believe me, we have had some postings much worse than this hypothetical example).

When we decide not to post a ChatBox entry (the technical term is to "moderate" it out of existence) we will attempt to inform the contributor, assuming that an e-mail address has been supplied. However at the end of the day we do have actual lives to lead as well, so it may not always work as one might wish.

In addition, as on two occasions recently, we may decide not to allow ChatBox entries on a particular topic at all.

Please bear with us while we try to get this right.

The website logo....and, yes, we will do something about the much-abused logo....

....eventually....

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This article is from our news archive. As a result pictures or videos originally associated with it may have been removed and some of the content may no longer be accurate or relevant.