Brand New Official Club Website launched

[friar tuck]

I know full well this is an error and I believe it's being rectified very shortly. How can you not put a link to this site ! We'd all be lost without it

This sit is excellent, without doubt. But the club have long been in need of an "official" website. I'm sure the two can work in harmony !

[Brocky]

Rich,

I was horrified to read your reaction to the launch. Profuse apologies on behalf of the Club for not informing you of the new official website.It was a complete oversight in what is a very busy period. Everyone in the club appreciates what you have given us over a long period of time and long may it continue.

The new website is meant to complement what you do, not replace it in any way. However, we are now a reasonably large business which needs to offer a real-time commercial operation, in order to raise the money to keep a successful team going. We both know that you were uncomfortable with advertising on your site so the Official web-site will concentrate on bringing in the money.
It will not have a forum and I give you my word that you will continue to receive my phone-calls to give you the information that you and the fans have been used to receiving, at the same time.

Additionally, there will be a link provided to this site. It has just been requested.

We have a lot to be cheerful about this season. The squad is gelling nicely and hopefully will be invested in further in both the short and long-term.

I will hopefully have a chat tomorrow at Winchester to update you further but let's all get behind the team and enjoy what promises to be our most exciting season for some years. I am genuinely optimistic.

Apologies once again,

Trevor
COYH!

[Metalien]

All you need now is a club shop on the website like Weymouh have.

[wotnoclass]

A link from the new website has now been added as promised by Mr Brock.

[rich]

I was going to let this go, but I really don’t feel I can without one reply – I wouldn’t be being fair to myself. The last time anything was mentioned to me about club websites was when the Westleigh one was launched, at which point I was told that the club would ‘leave the football side of things’ to me and that the Westleigh site would be the commercial arm. So you can imagine I’m a bit disappointed. Not bitter or annoyed, I understand the need for a club owned web presence, but I don’t really understand why that needs to basically be a rewritten copy of this site.

I’ve been to the club twice in the last few weeks for player signings and seen both Trev and Jim at a point when I really felt progress was finally being made about releasing info simultaneously in the paper and on the internet, but neither said anything. It would just have been a courtesy.

This site may always have been unofficial, but it hasn’t exactly been separate to the club. I’ve done everything the club has ever asked, ranging from moderating message board posts, through adding sponsorship logos, to creating entire sections like the Academy, Commercial and Community pages – even a calendar system for events on and off the pitch - which were all then left out of date or empty because no one ever sent me any info to go on them. So to read the new site has ‘everyone from the Board Of Directors down to the Playing Staff, keen to support this new venture’ grates hugely when I think of the wasted time over the years spent implementing everything the new site has, at the club’s request, only for it to be ignored.

I realise this is my personal endeavour, and despite the multitudinous requests over the years from the club for changes, the club has no responsibility for it or to me. I’m just a fan and I have no say in the way the club goes about its business.

But I’ve given 12 years of free time to ensure the club has had a solid and reputable internet presence. I’ve kept my own personal opinions out of the match reports and my message board posts, trying to be an advocate for the club in case casual readers saw my position as website editor as something ‘official’. I have 100% toed the party line and at times kicked myself for that, especially through the last two years. Even then I was accused of losing the club sponsorship revenue by posting negative match reports on what was viewed as the mouth piece of the club on the web. I’ve never sought or been offered any kind of recompense and not put independent advertising on the site so I couldn’t be accused of making money out of a hobby. I even pay to get into games, despite missing a lot of them these days doing live web updates; making notes for my own reports; and writing the match report for the non-league paper, which, incidentally, I have never been credited for.

I’ve never complained. I’ve done it all for the good of the club and because I wanted to contribute something back in return for the enjoyment I’ve had over the years watching the team. I’m not even complaining now, I’m not looking for explanations or sympathy, and I don’t need a reply to this post from anyone. I understand the situation, I’m just explaining why this has left me a little deflated.

However it won’t change anything, I’m not about to close all this down in a huff, the message boards are far too valuable. I truly hope that Trev continues to speak to fans directly through the boards and keep me in the loop with press releases like he always has done so this can still be a valid, useful resource. I would hope because of the boards it will always be the fastest and most direct route to talking to all of us.

[mosside]

Its said time and time again Rich, but we are all truly greatful for your hard work. The Club (not necessarily Brocky, especially as he was man enough to apologise,) have really let you down. Having read the first macth report written for the "official" site I will not be changing my home page in a hurry.......

Keep up the good work Rich

[simon lynch]

I have not been onto the new site, so cannot pass judgement on its quality or content. However, I have no compulsion to visit it either, for two reasons. Firstly, Rich's site gives me everything I need to know, and secondly, the shabby way Rich has been treated on this means I will boycot the site - the one less hit the site doesn't get from me probably doesn't make much of a different on it's own, but if many people follow the same vein, and nobody uses it, then I suspect the novelty and interest with wear off and it'll die a death like all the other internet ventures.

The thing is with this club is that it never learns from it's mistakes - anyone who has helped the club out of the goodness of their hearts has been p*ssed off by one thing or another, and it just keeps on happening time and time again.

[Cowplain-loovillefan]

Simon like you I will not be using the official site, although I have had a look at it and IMO it is not a patch on this site.

I only hope that Rich will be supplied with information from Trevor which is useful to know, but lets be honest most of the information is posted on this site in advance of any official notification.

This site is one of the best around, a fact noted by numerous visiting supporters, The officical site will be looked at, but visitors and supporters alike will find that this is the orginial and the best.

[baz]

I'm going to play a bit of a devil's advocate here, and I am in no way defending the club in the way it went about launching the site without informing Rich. But nearly every business of note now has a website, and I think any prospective investor in the club would expect to see an official site of Havant & Waterlooville FC. I believe it can serve a purpose of information, but it looks like it is
being duplicitous in its content to Rich's site which to me is pointless. It can be used for all the club shop advertising and sales surely, and an online sales feature that many of our long distant fans have been asking for.

Certainly in Commercial terms it can hold far more information than perhaps Rich wishes to put on here which makes a lot of extra work for him. As fans we all enjoy, and many of us participate in the message boards to express our views, and long may that continue. I sincerely hope that any important announcements will still be relayed to Rich ASAP as Trev promised as no doubt this will be the site most used by fans.

[ade]

fwiw i have no problem with us having 2 websites, so long as they run in paralell and compliment each other

i just can't understand the clumsy way it was done with no word to rich, link to our site. there was almost a 1984 style denial that we had ever had a www as in 'we've been dragged into the 21st. century and now have a website' type offering when the officaila site was laumched

our www is the best in our league and one of the finest, user friendly sites in english football

if you think i'm being OTT have a look around

i know rich will not feel deflated for long and continue to give us hawks fanatics hours of pleasure learning new info and indulging in wonderful humour on our forum

let's put it to bed....

COYH, love, ade (proud blogger on one of the finest websites our beautiful game has produced)