Been a member on OB's since early 2005, over 10K posts over there
As far as where Ketch is taking that site, I'm not sure. The coverage and insight into the football program and political landscape just isn't as good as what I'll read from JS, McPhaul, Scipio or some others. I'm stunned that cleaning up the riff-raff isn't a high priority though. I'm not sure he realizes how much of a power down that is. The mods rarely participate in the day to day threads so they just don't see how worthless some posters are. When a poster like CS starts a thread, it's just terrible the responses that generate. The civil discussions are few and far between now. In terms of an identity for the site, I think he's struggling with that now. I almost thinks he wants to blend in pop culture with the centerpiece of longhorn football to create an "online bar" type of atmosphere where a wide range of topics are discussed. Just read his weekly column. But that's tough to pull off when you have a niche site.
As far as advice for this site and learning from others 1) Keep out the non-sense, it will maintain the quality of the board 2) As mods, feel free to facilitate some discussions by starting threads of your own and letting the posters take control with quality discussion...the Crossfire is just one example 3) If you have different contributors, make sure each is bringing something unique to the table.
-Dallashorn02
