From about a month ago:
I’m not sure what to make of that. A lot of times, people say things like, “It sure doesn’t seem like it’s been five years,” but, in this case, to me, it seems like more than five years. I don’t know why. It just seems like this website has been around forever. A lot of water has passed under the bridge since I made my first post.
Lanny H Golf 
Huh, 5 years….I seem to remember being one of the first posters on your site…At the time, I was looking for some media outlet to put out the truth about Eldrick, and you provided that outlet of information, dismantling the pathetic golf channel/media rhetoric…….Yeah it does seem longer than 5 years ago….Esp when you consider how 5 years ago, nearly EVERY article was about Eldrick and breaking Jack’s record…..Now ofcourse that’s an Eldrick pipe dream, that EVEN the media doesn’t seem to be able to muster the courage to write too much about anymore…..
Since then Rory, Spieth, and now Day have come along, and whether the media really likes it or not, has helped golf move on…..
The ‘dinosaur media’ has been exposed, and they are biased to the point where the TRUTH means little to them….So we must have unique outlets, like this one, to see the real story…..
Good Job…….
The sad part is that they only gave up, what, eight months ago? After the back-to-back back surgeries. Prior to that it was still all about “chasing Jack.” Funny how they refused to back off at all, and then one day, Woods basically went over a cliff. I do have to say TV seems to still want to mention Woods, but the print media seems to have moved on pretty well.
I don’t know how long I’ve been posting here but, while I don’t always agree with your stance on certain things, it has been a good outlet to converse with knowledgeable golf folks….unlike CBS that’s turned into a complete debacle.
On a side note, it appears we officially have Clinton vs. Trump. This should be interesting.
I don’t think there is a single golf website that hasn’t overhauled its comment section at least once during the past five years. (It was only shortly before I started this place that commenters on GolfChannel.com had the ability to delete each others comments. What kind of nonsense was that?) So all those comments are gone. Contrast to my Macklemore/Nike posts which are almost four years old; they are still up and get hundreds of views every week. So do the Woods/PED posts; they’ve beome sort of unofficial FAQs for the Truth about Tiger Woods and Galea/Biogenesis/PEDs.
Five years ago, a lot of the websites had site-specific logins; now they want you to use Facebook or one of the others. Why? Well, here’s a case study of me:
I sometimes use a game website to kill time. I had ads turned off via an add-blocker. They requested I turn that off, saying they promised to have very limited ads. I did so and they kept their word. It’s been enlightening; their ads reflect my up-to-the-minute browsing habits. If you go to Aquariums ‘R’ Us and read about tropical fish, be prepared to see ads for fish food.
Golf Channel allowing readers to delete each others’ comments was laughably horrible. However we lost some good stuff, too. Remember the old CBS golf website that allowed users to set up their own blogs? We had one, and it was fun to maintain (although by then I had this one). They also had auser-managed discussion board. I don’t know how many of you, if any, remember that, but it was great. It was like users could write their own articles, then others could comment on it. I suppose it took attention away from the main content which CBS used to attract ad money, because it was unceremoniously dropped. I guess places like Reddit replaced it. Come to think of it, I believe there are some golf-specific places that do nothing but provide user forums. The beauty of CBS’s forum boards was you got the boards along with the real articles from real writers (Elling). As well, they were active thanks to CBS’s big golf presence.
Thinking back over these years, I have the occasional interesting interactions with the websites. After I deliberately and cartoonishly cursed on the Golf Channel website to make a point, I had some email exchanges with those guys where they told me I was one of their best posters and that I should return.
Then one time at CBS, I started scoring a contest between Elling and Bacon (I think those were the two) based on their picks for each weeks tournament. I based the scoring system on what their returns would be if they were betting in Vegas. (It’s possible I wrote about that here; I’m too lazy too look.) A representative of the CBS website sent me an email asking me if I would be interested in doing that for the webstite. I thought he just wanted my formula, so I sent him that with explanation. I thought, “Cool! I won’t have to do it anymore.” But he responded that they wanted me to actually do it. I declined. Looking back, I understand that episode better. Elling and Bacon, who made real “sportswriter salaries,” were nearing the end of their affiliations with CBS, whether they knew it or not. They were probably fishing for me to be an early experiment at cheap labor, which would turn into the semi-pro model of the Porters or Kallards. (For the record, CBS never mentioned pay, and I never asked about it. I didn’t want any part of an obligation, so it ended there.)
A few startup websites have contacted me, and I felt a little proud at time, but I realize now they, too, were fishing for very-low-cost content providers.
The world of online golf journalism has changed dramatically in those five years.
Here’s a short article I read yesterday ( https://www.yahoo.com/news/us-newspaper-industry-hollowed-job-losses-190549050.html ) which provides a lot of number comparisons between 1990 and now for things like newspapers, magazines, etc. I found it fun to reflect on how news dissemination has so utterly changed, and all the profit-making models are struggling to find stability.
Commenters on The Golf Channel site are the most immature, crude, vulgar people. I rarely bother to read them anymore. I didn’t know that users could delete comments. When I’ve been on that site, I’m always thinking that it really needs a moderator.
They can’t delete them any longer, but at one time they could. It was a real mess. If someone didn’t like your polite, on-topic comment, away it went!
Well, thanks!