Trouble in ForumLand

Im posting this on behalf of Ben Dwinger, who has found himself banned on http://www.lakemalwi.co.uk

he posted the following message in this thread and its quite a long read. Incidentally I am also banned from that form, my crime was to call a raging anti semite (“Hitler had the right idea but was undiplomatic”) a cunt. Well its all out in the open now. If anyone reading this also disapproved of the flagrant bias being shown on lakemalawi.co.uk, why not try out www.riftform.com.

Heres bens post…

just want to point out how disgusted I am with the way this forum is run and by some of the people running it!

I always thought this was a decent enough forum originally but was mainly using MF. It seemed to be run by people with a good amount of knowledge albeit that LM had a bit of a stuffy serious image. Not much banter and threads seemed to be locked too easily.

I was invited to become a MOD on here and thought I would give it a go but it has shown me why it’s bad for a forum to be controlled (in the background) by a shop/seller.

The bias towards Natural World was a little shocking to say the least!

For everyone’s information.. and let be honest now.. I stepped down as a mod! I didn’t get removed by Richard.. I asked to quit as I wasn’t comfortable being part of the team with some of the attitudes! It was solely my decision.

I also don’t have fan club and I haven’t written anything that isn’t fact.

The fish Inc thread was the catalyst for the whole episode.

It was unpleasant to read and as I stated at the time should have been left as a factual review by people who have been. At the end of the day the average customer wants to walk into a shop and buy good fish. They don’t want to know the background politics and that’s what was being brought up in it. It was all very wrong.

As for Colin… Michelle and I have never slagged NW or Colin off but have stated facts! I had a lot of time for Colin and would have loved to have seen NW do well but there are/were issues that need addressing!

Fish from Natural World have a high mortality rate and quite often people aren’t sorted out with refunds of replacements.

I will now back up my arguements

I bought the following fish from Natural World:

Male Zebra Chilumba – Didn’t eat, was emaciated when I got him and just sat at the top of the tank and then eventually died.
Male Zebra Chilumba – replacement which I paid for myself was bullied and died (not NWs fault)
4 Zebra Mbowe – Bought as 2 pairs and got them home and they vented as 3m/1f… Colin said he would source me another female.. never happened. 3 died the same way as the first Zebra Chilumba
6 Afra Ndonga – Colin seemed to think that they were 4m/2f but were all male. I was however happy to keep them all and Colin did a good deal on price and said he would source me fems from next shipment. All healthy.
Female F1 Membe Deep – was a male and was easy enough to find this out when I vented at home. I guess a genuine mistake so didn’t make a big deal about it!

Now Michelle..

Bought pair of Dwarf Lombardoi, and male died. Colin was supposed to replace or sort something out. He repeatedly ignored her pm’s and emails about this to the point that she gave up.
Long Pelvic Mdoka male – was emaciated and ended up kicking of a massive outbreak of what we think was columnaris in her tank. This resulted in massive losses.

Now I know of quite a few other people that have had similar problems with fish dying or not being sexed properly and then not getting anything back, like there is no interest after the sale has gone though. Adrian even told me himself that he had huge losses in Wilds from NW with no comeback.

Now if this had been the behavior of another shop it would be shot down totally wouldn’t it?

I or all the others I have spoken to have never had this kind of problem from Fish Inc, Mike Whittaker or Kevin Smith at Ramsey who all do Wild Caughts as well. So as far as I am concerned NW is 4th choice for me as it can be money down the drain.

And I’m sorry Colin you don’t quarantine fish yourself.. Tan does it… and I am not convinced he does the best job either especially as if the rumours are true they get quarantined at his home in the centralised system? Is this right? Spread the bugs about hey?

PM Reader – Someone found a thread on a PHP forum written by you Richard, asking about a PM reader? Explain that one? It was there for anyone to see. That’s what happens when your user name is the same 😉

Colin’s slur about me not being a proper Malawi keeper.. and that my fish are all oversized and unhealthy. Get your a*s over to my house and see them yourself in person before making these claims.. or are we back in the realms of making statements with no facts to back them up… ie.. fish Inc

I also think that LM should make their members aware that Colin contributes considerably to the forum financially. Hence why NW is pushed for members to buy from. I have heard rumours about the figures paid that have apparently come from Colins mouth directly but would be nice to hear a bit of honesty.

So there you go… all out in the open and I wonder how long you have the balls to leave this thread up for people to see eh?

I won’t be blamed for this forums shortcomings or issues.