Admin AWOL again

[Richard Russell]

I am very sorry to report that once again it appears that this forum has no active administrator.

I have tried contacting the sole (as far as I know) admin by Private Message and by email, and have received no reply to either after several days. I have even resorted to 'reporting' a post to see if that process is at least operating, and the answer is no.

I have previously encouraged the forum's owner to appoint additional administrators to protect against exactly this occurrence, especially as somebody (not me!) volunteered to take on the co-admin rôle, but unfortunately with no success.

Obviously it is not safe to leave the forum rudderless, especially with the requirements of the Online Safety Act needing to be met, so unless the admin resurfaces I will be forced to close the forum by the only brute-force method at my disposal (deleting files from the server).

This is the second successive occasion when the administrator has 'disappeared' without explanation. The last time it happened the previous owner had retained a 'back door' into the administrative interface and was able to appoint a new admin. Now that mechanism has gone.

[MikeMC]

I have not disappeared. However, unlike the other guy (not naming on public forum) I don't have the experience of the Ofcom nonsense so I am waiting for his response.

Regarding the report, for some reason I did not receive any notification about it (should phpBB email me, or do I need to be checking that page multiple times a day?) - I have closed the report as the message has now been deleted and the user has all posts moderated.

[Richard Russell]

I have not disappeared. However, unlike the other guy (not naming on public forum) I don't have the experience of the Ofcom nonsense so I am waiting for his response.

I see. But it is still the case that I received no response to, or acknowledgement of, my attempts to contact an admin by email or PM.

It is right and proper that the support forum for a software product should be 'distanced' from the vendor of that product, in the interests of encouraging honest debate and criticism. But this forum is hosted at my web site, which may (although this is uncertain) impose on me some obligations under the Online Safety Act, so having no means of contacting an admin isn't really a workable arrangement.

If one looks at support forums for similar products, for example Liberty BASIC which also has a sole vendor (Carl Gundel), there are typically multiple administrators, so there will always be somebody available to handle urgent business.