only one posting in 24 hours (sing when you're winning, Rob?) seems a total underusage of this site ~ it's not as if the end of the world has happened is it!
spread the word guys and get your programme ed to feature this site in next week's match mag.
out of interest, how many of the regular contributors get good support between clubs and web sites? Ashton run an official site but it only seems due to the hard work of our webmaster that it ever gets anything on it...he gets a lot of stuff from the internet rather than the club.
having looked at quite a few sites, a lot seem to be unofficial ~ is this because they run alongside official ones or because the club won't/can't be bothered to give them sanction?
Good luck in the cup guys

To be fair I have to make the most of it when I get the chance.

I really think that clubs underestimate how much the Internet is used by non-league fans. My site was unofficial for the previous two seasons and trying to get any news from the club was like getting blood from a stone! All my news came from local papers and rumours on the terraces!

I think a lot depends on whether clubs have directors who are on the web. When I first started, we (Leek Town) didn't. Now we have a press officer, groundsman and local reporter who are surfers. This makes an enormous difference to the speed and quality of the information I receive.

As for official/unofficial, it was discussed (unofficially!) last season, but I'd rather it stayed separate so that differing points of view can be aired.

My only concern about an official site being created would be that my information sources would dry up!

The other problem I find (and I'm sure other webmasters do too is that people don't always appreciate how much work it takes to run a site. On a few occasions, I've had "fans" have a go at me for not keeping the site completely up to date - NO TIME!!!

The barrow site is also an 'unofficial' site, but part of it is set aside for the club to update direct.
We are building up our relationships with the club regarding information but running the site miles away from Barrow can hinder things (as in getting to know the directors due to the unfortunately few games I get to these days!).

I really agree with the other problem you mention though. Recently we missed providing our usual latest score during the game (we only missed one game last season!!) and people were complaining on the forum!. Other emails received complaining about them not being able to get things to work were rather blunt and impolite. It was as if they expected us to be there 24/7 to solve any problems....not that we were doing this as a 'hobby' for a loss of money and time!

The way to look at it Brian is that people have expected the service to be too good in the past and miss it when you can't keep the high standards going.
(least that's a positive way I can see it!).

Cheers,
Rich
(webmaster@barrowfc.com)