Andy,
I appreciate your replies, but I really want to hear directly from someone at TMF about this. Unless you were directly involved in the process, you only know things in a hearsay manner. That’s not to say you are wrong - I actually believe you. But you are not the person I am asking to respond.
I also want to address this part specifically:
From this side of the fence, what you are writing comes across as blaming the victim. And it’s not like nothing was attempted. Plenty of people asked plenty of questions. The answers were few and far between, but were very clear. Let me quote one of those.
In this thread: Short question re the new boards system mungofitch, aka Jim of the BRK and Mechanical Investing boards, asked a very direct question.
After the switch to the new boards system, will the currently active public boards still retain access to ALL old messages permanently/indefinitely?
e.g., Berkshire Hathaway, Mechanical Investing, etc.Or is some/all of the older history going to be wiped after a short while?
The reply from CMFMints (aka Jen) was also very clear.
Ok, so, the currently active boards will have posts from this year migrated to the new platform
Jen very easily could have added: except for Saul’s board where all of the posts will be migrated. But she didn’t. If she knew about this exception and didn’t say anything, she lied by omission. If she wasn’t aware, the events you describe must have happened pretty quickly. This response from Jen was on Sept 20. The old boards shut down 3 days later, on Sept 23.
Let me add (or perhaps reiterate) a couple of thoughts.
In some sense, I don’t really care that the old posts from Saul’s board were migrated. It’s up to TMF what they want to do. What I do care about is the pretty clear attempt to hide the truth from board participants at large. I don’t like being lied to. And it sure feels like TMF lied to me and to all other board participants when Jen said what I quoted above.
I also don’t care if there is some special relationship between Saul and TMF. It sure feels like TMF is trying to hide any relationship that might be there. Again, I just want the truth. If there is a special relationship, just say so. If Saul forked over a payment to get those old posts transferred, acknowledge that. If it was just a favor to a board that drives a significant portion of the traffic on the free side, that’s fine, too. As long as it’s the truth.
All of this hiding sure makes it feel like there is something more nefarious going on. I rather doubt that, but the prolonged silence sure raises suspicions. As I said at the top of the thread, all I’m asking for is honesty and openness. At the very least, someone could acknowledge the question and say they’re not going to respond. That is at least honesty about the lack of openness.
I also don’t like the condescending attitude that comes across in your replies. Well, if you cared enough, you could have called and talked to the honchos. Umm. No, I couldn’t. I could try. But the honchos at TMF aren’t going to take my call. They don’t know me. They might know Jim from all of his very valuable contributions to actual investing discussions over the years. I’ve never received any indication that anyone at TMF knows I exist. I occasionally dabble in the basics of investing, like many others here. I have a bit of expertise in taxation which I’ve shared for the last 22 years. But that’s not really investing. So while I suppose I could have picked up the phone and made a call, no one at TMF has any reason to take my call. I do not add value where TMF wants the value to be added. Could I still have called anyway? Of course. But I’m not into wasting my time and the time of others. So I (and many others) posted our requests on the boards where those requests could filter up to the honchos. And I’m reasonably sure they did. And the requests were rejected.
Lastly, @CMFMints I’m tagging you to make sure you are notified of my post and have a chance to respond. I owe it to you to make sure you are aware of this post.
–Peter