www.CostaRicaTicas.com

Dammit. I'm out of popcorn.....

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You ALWAYS have an option ....... "NEXT" !!!

Scuba ... he WAS a regular poster ... back when he was a paying member. His post count does not reset when his account expires.

And so far as the 'cheapskate' comment .... he contributed more financially in his 4 years of payments than someone who just opted for the cheaper lifetime solution. One can hardly be considered 'cheap' when they spend more for something than others. I purposely pay yearly for that reason.

Perhaps expired accounts should not be able to post anymore? It's not my call, but there are plenty of ideas to float about.

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bypassin' kinky, and usin' the whole chicken!!!

RETURNING TO THE ORIGINAL COMPLAINT:

Why would a site reject an advertiser at all? There is no argument that a Colombian advertiser is causing a problem or taking business away from a CR vendor.

What is the 'original purpose' of this site anywayz? If it is about "Costa Rica Ticas' then why accept advertising from dentists? (unless root canals come with happy endings.)

Why do you need to be a VIP to see information related to other countries? Especially posts related to comparisons to Costa Rica, which are of value to visitors who wish to see these when deciding to visit CR.

If the site is only about Costs Rica, then why are they keeping other countries' posts at all? Or, why would they not want to host it?

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bypassin' kinky, and usin' the whole chicken!!!

@SLRM
Your posts are usually well reasoned and sound, but you seem to be going off the rails on this. No one is dissing Costa Rica.

Srilm, your analogy is wrong. It's not Burger King advertising McDonalds in their store, or vice versa. It's Cosmopolitan and Vogue, who offer ads about competing products within the same group of pages all the time. Anybody who wants to can advertise and it just benefits the magazine. BUT, having said that, the whole premise of the argument is wrong because a city or a country is not a commodity in and of itself. It contains commodities that can be promoted. And even further to that, the competitive landscape for monger sites has as its norm the freedom, and in fact the desirablibity, of providing content from areas outside of its specialty, if it has one. I don't know of any that don't.

Having said all of that, the whole thing is a completely ridiculous argument, and is not on anyone's radar as a reason not to use the site. Let's just say for the sake of argument that this is a CR site and nothing but. Great, put up some useful CR info for me instead of the crap that's on this site now, which is utter pablum and almost completely useless for any experienced monger. Once you fix the content issue then come back and argue about the phucking inanities you guys have spent so much time and energy arguing.

Now, let's say for the sake of argument that this is a site that is open to info from anywhere (which in fact it is) then the same applies! The one difference is at the moment many members come here not for info about CR, because let's face it there isn't any, but instead to come and read the international trip reports and gather info about alternate destinations, where many of the old guard have gone, and hey! surprise, surprise, that's where the useful information is coming from.

Frankly if I was the admin I'd be trying to monetize the only useful section of my site too, because it draws readership. If you eliminated that and made this a CR only site then the place would be even more of a ghost town than it is now.

You could not be more wrong BD

He continues to post - if your point is that most of his posts came when he was a paying member....well, that may be, but its kind of a silly point - he continues to post - LONG ager he stopped paying - wouda, kuda, shouda - maybe a career in sales taught me the meaning of "what have you done for me today" vs last year, 2 years ago, whatever.

You remind me with that comment about cheaper solution of the pissing contest in the last presidential election about paying personal income taxes - and how it was somehow more noble to pay more, or a greater percentage - I say if you do, that marks you as an idiot - to pay more than you have to, that is.

If his point is he "paid more" in the past than others, see paragraph above - we are talking about the present - and believe it or not - I'm always open to changing my mind - nothing he has said has convinced me I'm wrong. You post - you should support the site - and this guy posts frequently.

(I'm also a big boy, and understand business - If I have a site dedicated to Costa Rica, and my value proposition to advertisers is my site is going to do all possible to encourage visitors to CR, and I have access to a niche market that is truly unique, I'm not about to dilute that message by promoting - overtly or obliquely - another destination - perception is reality, and I don't want to risk offending my core of advertisers - or so it would seem to me - otherwise why would they turn down advertising from a Medillin business wishing to advertise - as was reported?)


And Shadowman - if you have something to add to the site, by all means post it - but don't complain if you choose not to - and I'll put my knowledge of Costa Rica, common sense, whatever up against anyone's - I don't mean it in a nasty way - you are obviously articulate and know how to write - and it would seem, have some strong opinions, and are not afraid to speak your mind - so post. We don't do a good job or reading minds - personally, I'd be interested in hearing more of your opinions - seriously

Final point - a lot of the "old guard" <so called> have gotten old and retired from the hobby - some others, sure, have found Asia, or Colombia. The fact is all message boards go through cycles - no one is suggesting that the inclusion od alternate sites is a bad thing - I just can understand the decision the Admin's made and also know the solution is actually fairly simple and inexpensive.

PS While I like and mostly tend to agree with Srlim, on one of his points, I can't

I don't think Estebanh's posts are worth any less b/c he is an unpaid member - in fact, I'm willing to state that some are no doubt very helpful - its the feeling of "I contribute with my knowledge and in the past I paid - and probably more than you" attitude that I just can't accept.

Just keep in mind we are talking about 11 cents per day to be a yearly member. If after a number of months or years, of being on CRT, a person who continues to post regularly is so cheap and greedy that they cant part with 11 pennies to play on CRT for a day then their opinion is kind of worthless to me also.

I will also ad that I agree with almost everything Srilm has posted on this topic. I do not see anything wrong with protecting the interest of the sponsors of this board. Without them, as well as our paid members there is no CRT. Keep in mind that the former paid members who renew on a yearly basis did so subject to the conditions of a yearly membership. After being on the site for at least a year they chose the option that suited them at the time, to complain about it 3 years later is lame.

Finally as Scuba1 has pointed out several times on this thread members such as Irish Drifter, BangBang57, Vegas Bob, Bilko ect...all who live in the San Jose area are all paid lifetime members.

you're nitpicking. So let me. Technically, the site is not about Costa Rica, but Costa Rican TICAS. Ticas live in all nations on Earth. Sex with women in one country does not have anything to do with the subject of CRT, which is TICAS. How's that for nitpicking and derailing the thread?

Get back to the subject of why CRT doesn't want to accept advertising dollars from a Colombian property rental company. And why it is now required to pay for access to posts about countries other than Costa Rica.

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bypassin' kinky, and usin' the whole chicken!!!

Scuba, my complaint is an old one, and this isn't the first time that I've made it. I have in the past tried to encourage posting about things other than the handful of over-covered gringo central venues that have become the mainstay of the site. I also was not gainsaying your knowledge, or that of many of the other members who are on the site. My claim was rather that the knowledge is not shared. There is no content other than postings about what are essentially the advertisers and a couple of the best known gringo-ized venues. In a city with dozens of MPs the site now choose to glorify a handful. Check the MP page by way of example. How many threads are there about scores or Zona 2? Now how many are they about anything else? Paseo Colon is all but ignored, ad as most of the lower and mid range venues. The site used to provide valuable, regular intel about girls good and bad that frankly doesn't rate anymore. The site provide valuable, accurate and up to date information about restaurants, services, and non-mongering activities. The brothers frequented those non-mongering activities and the CRT card was good for something other than discounts at Sportsmens. In short, there was a staggering variety of information about venues, girls, places to eat and stay, services, photographers, dentists, drivers etc etc etc.

This site is a pale shadow of what it used to be, content-wise.

And Srilm, yes that's exactly what I believe and why I come here only infrequently now, for the reasons I listed above. The info that's available here now I could get over a beer and 5 minutes conversation at the Del Rey. You insist of misinterpreting what I have written, made some inane assertions based on those misinterpretations, and appear to be perpetuating an argument for the sake of doing so. You're being so over-dramatic that frankly it's probably not worth saying my two cents but I will anyway, It's not about about vogue saying cosmo is shit. It's about whether the contents of cosmo say they are better than the contents of vogue. Most of the time they're the same contents, and it's not a question of competition of the medium, but rather of gaining exposure to the consumers. Vogue and Cosmos don't care that they both advertise Dior and Chanel. They just care that they advertise. People don't buy magazines for the ads. They buy them for the content, and in the process of reading the content are exposed to the ads.
Whatever, agree to disagree if you like. Put a title on it. I don’t care. Until the membership decides as a whole to address its content issue and to address some of the negative aspects of the current site culture then there’s no hope that it will ever again be a site for anything but the naysayers. Might as well be over on *******’s site if I’m going to do that. What made this site the best on the net was its sense of community, and that’s gone the way of the dodo. It’s not even in the top 3 anymore.

Technically, that means they are all cheapskates that no longer support the board. Yes! that is sarcasm and not intended to be taken seriously!

Can we please get off the nonsense topic of whether lifetime membership trumps yearly membership.

The point being made is whether it makes sense to move non-Costa Rica topics to the paid section.

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bypassin' kinky, and usin' the whole chicken!!!

If you read my post above, I think you will get an answer - it may not be the only one, but its a pretty good start

This:

(I'm also a big boy, and understand business - If I have a site dedicated to Costa Rica, and my value proposition to advertisers is my site is going to do all possible to encourage visitors to CR, and I have access to a niche market that is truly unique, I'm not about to dilute that message by promoting - overtly or obliquely - another destination - perception is reality, and I don't want to risk offending my core of advertisers - or so it would seem to me - otherwise why would they turn down advertising from a Medilin business wishing to advertise - as was reported?)

Huumm
wonder why sp____1 has been so quiet on the other site
Been getting busy on CRT LOL! he is our savior doesn't
anyone get it, expect his posts to pickup again if he leaves here.
mustbfun

Well now that Sr limp has shared his email address on his farewell post i guess we know who Speedy 1 is

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Why settle for just one woman when you can enjoy them all?

Guys, I don't mean to hijack this thread, but it seems to have degenerated from the original post to a personal attack on Srilm.

Let me suggest the change of CRT from being a forum of like minded men is because the makeup of the guys visiting Costa Rica and participating in CRT has changed. Years ago, when I sat in the bar at Del Rey or Sportsmens, the majority of the guys were over 55 and most appeared to have a few dollars in their pocket. Most were experienced in the P4P arena.

As we old guys came back to the States and talked about chasing pu*sy in Costa Rica, the young guys began coming down in groups of 4 or more. Next, black guys discovered Costa Rica and started coming down in groups of 4 or more. The same has happened with Asians. Most, tend to congregate by themselves and ignore the old white guys, except for a few of the old guys who are young at heart like BangBang57. Some of these guys participate in the CRT forum and have ideas that differ considerably from the views of the old guys.

My point is that just like what's happening in US politics is happening with the divergent opinions expressed on CRT. Perhaps it's less obvious on CRT, but the reactions are very similar. The old guys want it back to what it was like in the "Old Days" and the younger guys with different opinions want to be heard and have their points of view impact the discussion. In addition, some of the old guys who were early members feel they were directly involved in making the CRT website what it is today and they are not being appreciated today for their prior contributions. Some who had valuable insight and information in their early postings are no longer participating.

All this being said, I recently received a request from Admin3 to participate in an advisory capacity to CRT, and I hope that some of you have also received a similar request. If you have, please speak up so that others may know who you are. Now, I really don't know if Admin3 sincerely wants to know what I think, but I do know that CRT is very important to the owner(s) of the website. Perhaps one of the owners instructed Admin3 to contact me; I don't know. However, I don't think there are any meetings to attend since Admin3 just suggested that when I'm next in town to let him know. Perhaps he just wants me on the inside of the tent pissing out.

I look forward to hearing what you think about all this.

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Slut Puppy in Training

Is low self esteem a prerequisite for being a good Ho or is it a result? ;-)