Unfortunately when you start to build something before you know it...you've created a monster. i feel the same way when I joined. Only about 2000 members and less to problems but like I said you want your cake and eat it too. Definitely not like the old days and many members I know have said the same thing to me. Who I miss? Probably Caleb would be my choice...we became friendly.

Wow, I love that video!!  Here's one:  I miss Tizsa  http://activerain.com/widdletink

There are sooo many ... but one who comes quickly to mind is Danny Smith. He just up and disappeared one day.

I don't remember how many members when I joined... in July 2006 or when I started participating in August 2006 but it was small.  Thanks for the comment Neal.  I forgot Tizsa, Cheryl... Are any of the apprentices really active anymore?  Inez is I am sure but I don't know if I even see her anymore,,, I see her on Twitter.   I see Kristal and Teri on Twitter, so it is not like these people are gone. I can go to their outside blogs in sooooo many cases to find them.   

I am just being nolstalgic for an earlier ActiveRain.

Great example... Sandra... one day Danny was blogging about "monkey butt" and the next he was gone....

Hey! ! !    What about the folks who are still here????

Don't we count???  

Since I have always believed that ActiveRain is a real estate network and not a social network, looking at what is and figuring out how to use it to my business advantage is the goal. 

BTW, I don't miss Caleb.  He dumped my photos. 

ActiveRain is what it is.  For me, it's a business tool.  Old friends like Maureen McCabe just make it more friendly.  I don't really "feel" any friendships on any other network and I've tried about 10 of them.  Now if I could just find those passwords, I'd get out of all of them. 

Maureen, have a wonderful 2008. 

I missed Danny Smith enough to call him a few months back.  He was fine, just "Rained Out".  He sounds like he should be on radio and I had a great time talking to him.  I'm sure he wouldn't mind a few more calls.

I miss Heather Saul (she was taking over her town in such a good way), Steve Conklin (amazing writer) and Theresa Cavanaugh (sweet and loves animals).  I miss Angela Wagner (FUNNY!) and Jessica Hughes (awesome stager). I miss Cyndi Sloop but her sweet husband Bob has recently come back to post.  I miss Bruce Bourgault and the way he was so supportive to a whole host of us.  I miss my Codger Harold.  I miss a bunch of people.

Mostly I miss my "Grandad" Jay Merton.   

It's not the same here.  I kind of feel like I'm walking through the empty hallways of my old high school when I'm here, and the place is full.  Great post, Maureen, we can't go back again.  

And that is one of my all time favorite songs. 

Thanks all for the comments. 

Thanks Sarah for the names... I don't think I knew Heather, Angela or  Steve... I do remember the others.  

I don't necessarily miss any specific people (ok, I do miss Caleb!), but I miss the feeling that AR had when I joined March 07.  I am sure it is not the same for those who joined at the beginning, but even for me- it sometimes feels big and kind of empty.  Hard to describe, but probably why I took more than a month away.  I have gotten tired of the LOOK AT ME, LOOK AT ME stuff. AR was fun when I joined.  I would love to get that back.

Maureen, I love that song and the YouTube is great. Ok, I miss Tony Marriott, Pat Kitano, Cyndi Sloop, and Ashley Drake Gephart.

But, people come and go... and I've met alot more people that I follow. But, being it's time to reflect on the old times, I do miss those people. Of course I follow Pat on his other blog but it was nice to read them here too.

Happy New Year to you !!

Maureen, I do not feel like I have been here long enough to have such a list of those that I miss. However, I do have one that a lot of us probably miss... It is Bruce Bourgault. He was one of the first commentors I had and one of my first associates. His kindness and encouraging words were always so timely.

MM ~ Twitter it and they shall come!  Yes, I miss some of the old times too, but life moves on.  AR will never be what it was and that's ok.  It's big and cumbersome now with many folks going in different directions.  We had a lot of fun but now we are off to explore and blaze new trails.  There's not much point in looking backward when there's something new on the horizon.

AND I don't care what LENN says.  I miss Caleb, he was a cutie! Of course he didn't take my photos down, I took them down before anyone pinched them for their own.  hahaha

 kk 

What's with the taking-down-photos stuff?  Nobody ever took down any of my photos.... Although about the only photos I think I ever post are screen shots .....   Somehow I always seem to be a little clueless about whatever controversy goes on about me.  Oh well.  :-)

interesting comments here. I am new here, so I will check back to hear the others comments Happy New Year Don

interesting comments here. I am new here, so I will check back to hear the others comments Happy New Year Don

Hi Maureen - I'm with you about missing the old AR. I liked it better when it wasn't all this "Look at me" junk that Ginger wrote about - that gets just a tad bit sickening. I do miss the way AR felt when Caleb was here and so much a part of things. I miss Leanne's posts, and certainly miss Danny Smith. I miss Moo being here. I see him in other places but miss him here. Tony Marriott was very active here when I joined, as were others that no longer post much. I joined in July 06, and got active here about the same time you did. We've seen a lot of changes for sure. Some good, some great, some not so. But as others have said, and as you said, you can't go back, but we can certainly reflect back and remember when....... Happy New Year Maureen! Ann

I miss a lot of them too! The old AR was fun and intimate (sniff sniff) Like Ann said we can't go back but we can reflect back. Nice reflection post :)

Happy New Year. 

I miss seeing regular posts from Tony Marriott.  He shared a lot of insight in team building.

I've only been blogging regularly since May 2007, a lot of people have stopped blogging and I miss them too, but we've gained a WEALTH of knowledge among the new people. 

Ginger:  I should take off a month. I took off three weeks last spring... 

Kristal: Thanks for the comment! 

Missy:  I don't think of Pat Kitano having participated much on ActiveRain... It seems like I just saw Ashley... someplace else? Thanks for naming names.

Cheryl:  Pictures being taken down is http://activerain.com/blogsview/73276/Localism-Photos-Reposted-May

Ann: Angus now there's someone to miss but it has been a long time.

Donald: Welcome to ActiveRain.  Enjoy it.  

Randy: I remember when Tony joined.  

Mary:  AR will always be  changing so that newbies will remember the good old days... 

Happy New Year all!  Thanks all for each of the comments. Thanks for naming names. 

MM.

A/R has evloved so fast and so much it`s hard to believe a year has gone by.

Many us have grown from this experience while others leave for many different reasons.

It`s been a wild ride, that`s for sure.

Have a wonderful 08!

God Bless.

I miss the "good ole days" as well. I think there were just over 2000 members when you got me to join. 

I learned so much from Kristal and had so-o-o much fun with Moo-Man. What a hoot! I still carry my cowbrella in the WEENR-mobile.

I'm surprised Kristal took all her beautiful photos down. A couple weeks ago, I deleted all my photos from Localism. Too many thieves. Some guy on MySpace is using one of them as his background. (I reported it)

I have left my photos up on Localism....so far.   I never put many up

Hi Maureen, I didn't join until we had over 40,000 on AR and that was just a over a year ago and look at it today.....the growth is amazing.  I was shocked you have invited that many new members....Very Nice post Maureen have a great 2008.

Nice post Maureen. 

I have thought about this for awhile myself, and I have to admit I don't miss AR. I never really enjoyed it tremendously to begin with and got completely burned out last summer, but, having said that, Active Rain has brought me opportunities and introduced me to people that I would never have had without it. I'm indebted to this place, and you for bringing me to this party, but don't care for it. If that makes sense. Yeah, that's pretty much like high school! :-)

I enjoy other means of communicating so much more than here. The people I like from here are elsewhere, except Caleb, Elaine, and Anthony Clark, and I havent' seen Art Blanchet around lately outside AR. I do miss them. I need to check in here because they have not made a regular jump to Twitter. Which brings up a good point. Since so many people are twittering it's not necessary for me to be here regularly to keep in touch.

I like to hang with people in different businesses, different walks of life- that's what makes twitter so interesting to me, and AR not so interesting. I follow all kinds of people on twitter- I learn so much.  

The other issue I have is with putting time and effort into producing content for a website other than my own- Ownership issues- who owns the content here? What happens to content? For example, I don't like the ads that are now here- I don't have ads on my blog for a reason. Things are happening here that I don't particularly like, but I have no say in it. On my blog, I am the queen. It works for me. ;-)

I agree with you that there is no better place to cut your blogging teeth, but I encourage people to move off asap. 

I'm thinking there were less than 12000 people here when I joined in summer of '06.  

Teri said a lot of things that I agree with. I'm reading fewer and fewer people and spending very little time here because the quality of the posts has deteriorated as the good bloggers have left. 

It's been disappointing that the AR Gods aren't willing to control the plagiarism or gaming. I think that will impact the respect this platform receives from outsiders and from Google. I've already noticed that my blog and even my web site, are doing better on Google than my AR posts. Those posts used to come up on page one ... now they're on page 2 or 3. My blog and web are now on page 1.

Back in Sept, someone noted that AR's Page Rank dropped when Google reset then. For someone only posting to AR, and who doesn't have their own blog, they may find themselves in a predicament.

Thanks for the comments all.  See you on Twitter Teri.

Maureen,

I only saw this post because of a TEST post you just put up. I'm with you. I was just thinking of writing a post about the people I "miss". MOO is one. Kristal Kraft and Maureen Francis whom I thought of as icons at the time. They say change is good, but hey I'm from New England. We resist change!!!  I especially miss Caleb! There are so many people who have been here, made an impression, and slipped away!  You're right about most of them being on other networks, but they are not the same as being here:( 

Here's a toast to Innocence and a Wonderful New Year! Peace!

Karen...  maybe having Rich J working for AR will bring back the community feeling of AR.  It will never be the same but I hope it can be better....

sorry about the test.  I just had to know...

Maureen, So did you find out? I am curious. I was not aware of Richs job change, but hope you are right. He is one of the originals. Cripes, I feel like an elder!

Jonathan W. blogged about it on Thursday.

http://activerain.com/blogsview/325593/Rich-Jacobson-employee-1

Rich's title has to do with 'community" he's the "godfather of ActiveRain" now... I think Linda Davis coined the title.

I deleted my Localism photos today too... not sure why... because Kristal and Elaine did?  Because someone could steal them? Because I don't want my photos consorting with pictures of local gas stations, strip malls, members kids and subdivision signs?  I think I deleted all of mine  I did not have that many up.... I am not much of a photographer.

I deleted them after reading the post Colleen has about the photos in Localism now...  Ohio did not look as bad as some states must no photos of interiors of homes... no pictures of real estate signs but there were still some photos that people were complaining about months ago, where a member posted strip malls maybe Ohio was never edited like other states.

I guess I wonder don't any photos you use on an ActiveRain post or your real blog or another social network end up on Google images anyway for people who will take them to steal and use?  If you remove photos from AR but post those photos on another social network like say Realty World on Ning.com are you any further ahead?  

Over the holidays, I watermarked all my photos on my WP blog with my web address. At the same time, the file name I gave to the photos contained the word 'copyright'. So the file name might be "copyrighted Olentangy River summer". Then after replacing the previous photo with the new watermarked one, I deleted the previous photo.

I'm going to delete the photos I have on Real Estate World and replace them with the watermarked photos.

I found a guy using a photo I had taken (train tracks) and is using it as the background to his MySpace page.

I've sent a question to Bob regarding this issue. The problem with AR is that (1) we can't access our photo file on AR and AR assigns their own name to our photos. I think that means that deleting them from our posts or on Localism doesn't really remove the photo (or the link) on the servers. Thus, any photos on Google Images will still carry a live link to the AR server. I've asked Bob if that could be changed.

Any photos that are currently on Google Images will still be able to be stolen by right-clicking, From now on, any photos I use will carry the watermark.

Maureen, I miss the old days, too. Teri Lussier, and Maureen, Leanne, and Shari George who is not around much anymore. Laurie is here less and less. The Intimacy ...Marti G and I at would talk every night at 2 am in the comment boxes...Now I never catch him in the same place.

There are some terrific new bloggers that I follow. Elizabeth Nieves, Paul Slayburgh, and Martin Asbeshaus, Patricia Kennedy.

I do hate the fact that plagiarized posts are allowed to remain on the network, It makes me sick. It is so wrong. What happens if a lawsuit shuts us down? I have emailed and talke to the big boys about this. Removing points is not enough.  This is still the best place to learn about marketing techniques and Seo,  i was clueless to most of this stuff before. After reading the comments I am concerned again about my photos on localism I have quite a few. and have been thinking about watermarking... Wow that would take a lot of time.. I  wonder if there is a shortcut way to do it?

About Localism..who is looking after it?In my market, posts that are 6 months old are in front of recent ones??? 

I have an outside blog with Wordpress. I am planning on revamping it to include IDX...  

Thanks for adding me as associate, I just added you thought for sure I had you on there! 

G 

Ginger I added you as an associate when I saw a comment from you about something you are going to post... I did not want to miss it.  Yeterday I added you and a few people I have known a long time because of my Old Lang Syne attack at the end of 2007. 

I probably will add more so I don't lose sight of people.    

I think the nature of the internet how someone who is plagiarized uses a DMCA protects AR from being involved in a lawsuit over plagiarism.   I don't understand 100% the process... Lenn or Elaine or others understand it better probably   The person who is stolen from can get the plagiarizer to fork over bucks but all they can do to AR is make them take it down???  Or I suppose anyone can sue but the first thing to do is a DMCA, and if a platform is smart they would comply quickly.  The fact that there is so much that is not taken down would lead me to believe AR is  not getting DMCAs saying take that down, that is mine!

I see lots of plagiarized stuff on the Realtor.com blogs, WordPress.com blogs, Blogger.com blogs too, not that it makes it right on AR but I think it is epidemic across the blogosphere so I try not to judge AR harshly or get upset about something I have no control over.  All I can do is resist any urges of my own... to steal maps, images,  others posts.  So far, so good! 

I hate the thought of watermarking pictures.  I am not a photographer! I absolutely hate editing photos in anyway. 

I was posting stuff to Localism but I don't see a point until they redo it, upgrade it, revamp it.  I am getting aggravated that, that is taking so long.   I am not sure I want my stuff mixed in with other peoples either...  I go back and forth on that I have two other totally local blogs. Maybe for me that is enough and maybe AR is just for me to talk to others in the industry....  It will look funny on Localism though it seems like it would not be fair to have the placement on the page without contributing local content.

Regarding Localism, as Mitchell Hall noticed, when I view the 'referral links' from StatCounter or even my WP blog, the domain is hardly ever from Localism, but rather from Active Rain. I pruned some of my posts over the holidays - those with no or very few comments, unless the post was totally targeted to my local area.

Going back and adding a watermark to the photos I've used was VERY time-consuming! It won't solve the problem of people right-clicking the photos that are on Google Images now, but at least going forward they'll be protected. I'll now gradually start replacing the photos on AR as I have time.

When Localism was first introduced, Maureen Francis asked the question as to why we should give it value with our posts, and be next to the posts from gamers. It's been very disappointing that AR has chosen quantity over quality. I don't know about other states, but Ohio is a joke. People that have never posted at all show up in the Top Agent. Plus, there's too many people who haven't even entered a photo. Months ago people ask that a time-limit be put on a newbie for (1) doing a profile and (2) doing a post. If they don't do either within those time-frames, then they would be deleted. But AR didn't respond to that suggestion either as a way to clean it up.

Localism is definitely not ready for prime time and is not optimized for the search engines the way that ActiveRain is. 

It's been in a holding pattern too long.  

I find myself visiting outside blogs more and more, but lately there have been some good posts on AR, so I find myself visiting more often during the week. I think the problem is that I don't comment as much, but have been lurking. I am still here though! :)

Hello Maureen, I noticed the post and started reading and just couldn't stop. The comments and your reply comments have shed a lot of light on some of the evolution here on AR. Fascinating to read and enlightening as well. I was in the newer class having not posted till March 30th, 2007. I joined in Nov of 2006 but had no idea what I had joined. We have grown so fast and there have been whole blocks of time, mostly starting after the fires here in Rancho Bernardo on Oct through the Holidays, that I, even loving AR as much as I do, just couldn't get with the program and post the way I should. I used to comment with such total regularity and find even that waned to not even logging in for many days in row.

I am glad I read all this, it somehow makes me feel that I have company and that it is OK to once in while just get lost in other areas in life and not have guilt feelings that somehow you are letting others down.

The You Tube addition made this post especially enjoyable.

PS, I think you are right about Rich and what he will contribute to the site with his vision. It was a great stroke of luck for everyone still here. Rich was then and still is about " community". Wishing him all the very best.

Happy New Year Maureen!

Rich is all about community.  Perfect for the job. 

Welcome back to AR.  I know Roberta was MIA for a bit after the fires, and others too.

Happy New Year William!

Maureen, The early days of blogging were indeed fun and exciting times! I enjoyed the postcard. Didn't Dan Fogelberg die recently?

Maureen, The early days of blogging were indeed fun and exciting times! I enjoyed the postcard. Didn't Dan Fogelberg die recently?

Is blogging in general not as fun?  Or is it ActiveRain?  Fogelberg did die... the week before I wrote this...  I think... or maybe it was a couple of weeks.