[Announcement]: Ceph Care Ethics

[sorseress]

I don't drink beer, but I'm in.

 

[Thales]

Good morning! Let me state some things:

OB is correct!!

Drunken ethics! Yeah!

2) Obviously this didn't go well. In hindsight, it does turn out that moving Thales' thread to the Supporters' forum was not a good idea. I can't really defend that position.

Sure you can Tony! You were doing what you thought best, and I cannot fault you for it at all. I am mightly impressed/releived/happy that you were willing to even hear what I had to say about it.

I have a related concern with the merging of Jay's post into this one. If he comes back to see if there is a response to his post in the forum he posted it, will he know it has been merged, will he think it was deleted, or some other option I am not thinking of?

3) I have yet to hear anyone disagree with the "code of ethics" itself. Other than needing to change the word "octopus" with "cephalopod" in one or two spots, everyone is in full agreement.

I am still a little worried about the 'collect your own' part of the COE, and with the title 'code of ethics' but your milage may vary. Other than that, sounds good.

So that leaves us with "how do we enforce it". I am experimenting with an "Exotic and Rare Species" forum under Ceph Care. The idea is simply that you need to be logged in order to view its contents. By forcing login, we are assured that the user is registered, and as such, they have accepted our terms of service, which have our "code" embedded within them. That way we have confidence that anyone who seeks info on keeping exotics isn't just some "window shopper".

Thales, I'm particularly interested in knowing whether you'd find this agreeable...

Totally agreeable! I don't remember if TONMO is set to send an email on registration, but if it is, I think adding the COE to that email text might also be a good idea. Also having the COE 'stickyed' (sp?) at the top of the forum seems like a good idea, but I am sure you already thought of that!
Tony, what do you think of dropping an empty, locked copy of the Fontenelle thread into the Journals and Photos forum that has a link to the new forum? That way, the friends that I had following the thread would know where to look for it. Just an idea, and not really the most important thing to me, but I thought I would ask.

All this got me started writing an article about the dangers/pitfalls of keeping 'exotics' and if, upon review, that would be something TONMO would be interested in hosting, I would be happy to share.

 

[Michael Blue]

Wow.

I've been on many forums over the last 14 years or so, and I've seen the situation "start" a million times before; but I've never...Never...Seen a solution like this before.

I'm so pleased to be on a forum where people and disagree, be misunderstood, and still come to a mutual concensus and resolution!!

Way to go, guys!

 

[cthulhu77]

Well, you have to realize that many of us are friends, and quite a few of the members are considered to be the "top notch" in their fields of interest, which leads to many a disagreement, but quite a lot of mutual respect also.

Tonmo, basically, just kicks a**.

 

[tonmo]

Thales, I think all that works, that will be on my to-do list this weekend.

Regarding the note from Jay, I have sent him a full mea culpa, and he let me know he understood.

 

[tonmo]

The changes have been implemented!

I appreciate the kind words, and likewise, I appreciate that no one up and left us, during a time when we were uncertain (yet decisive in our actions), and ultimately headed down the wrong path, under my direction. Thanks again for sticking with us through this and please accept my apologies for the mishap.

Back to our regularly scheduled discussions about cephalopods!

 

[Thales]

Well, you have to realize that many of us are friends, and quite a few of the members are considered to be the "top notch" in their fields of interest, which leads to many a disagreement, but quite a lot of mutual respect also.

Tonmo, basically, just kicks a**.

Agreed!

Thanks to TONMO staff for everything!

 

[pipsquek]

I'm glad it worked out.

Greg, I want your kids to be able to swim with the fishes too, but to be honest, I don't think it makes a snowflakes' difference it hell ,IN THE LONG RUN, whether or not people keep exotic pets if we don't do something about the massive number of people on th planet. I do my best not to think only about children and grandchildren, but ancestors as well, even though I will never have any of either.

I think the largest problem here is that it truly would not matter if people kept exotic pets if humans were at a Middle Ages world population. And many will knee jerk and say that there is no solution, that we can't go backwards, but a solution was found here on TONMO, and that is a positive example. It will take hundreds of years if we started today, but if we don't.....

Tony, I'm a proud to be a member of something that finds a solution for the group, good work to all of you.

 

[OB]

Urrrr.... Pipsquek?

Idiom: Swim with the fishes

Meaning: If someone is swimming with the fishes, they are dead, especially if they have been murdered. 'Sleep with the fishes' is an alternative form.

 

[pipsquek]

ob, what's your first language?? Maybe I'll give you some limestone loafers for trying to teach me my own language.

 

[OB]

Stylish, yet very uncomfortable

I'm sorry, it was just too good to leave hanging around. Got an interesting e-mail yesterday explaining how an agreement would be "singed" before being sent back to me. I found that rather amusing.

cn I k33p 10 cttl n 4 blrng n m 2 glln?

 

[pipsquek]

Tony, how do you suppose Tonmo hits stack up against subscribers and readers of TFH?

Because it seems to me that "casual" readers of the magazine are going to be very interested in keeping cephs, and while maybe there is a good percentage of them that are good hobbyists, I imagine that there are quite a few fish killers in there as well.

I've never had a cephalopod in a tank before, just fish, so I really don't know how expensive they are, but I imagine that you could pick up an octopus for less $100. And as far as I can tell, there are few breeders culturing cephs of any sort. It seems to me that this is going to create a much higher demand for these animals, even though I am sure that everyone that wrote articles did a fine job (I haven't read them) explaining the downsides and consequences of keeping cephs.

Of course, we have no way of measuring, but I think that importers and LFSs are going to be ordering whatever they can get their hands on to fill the demand, including exotics. Because god knows most of them don't really care ,right?, they are just in the entertainment industry.

Sorry to be such a downer, I know that being published is important and all, I just seem to be smelling a little hypocrisy since no one is complaining about how this is going to damage the reputation of responsible ceph keepers. If I am just missing the discussion on this, please point me in the right direction.

 

[tonmo]

John, that's a totally fair observation, but I will try to explain why I don't think this is a problem:

The reality is that the TFH initiative was a completely parallel effort, driven by Nancy and Carol to completion. Nancy was careful to stipulate "no pictures of mimics" in the magazine, and I believe her article speaks to which species are best for keeping, and which to avoid.

On multiple occassions (in different form), I posed a straw man proposal to the TONMO.com staff that perhaps we should close down ceph care altogether -- after all, talking about ceph care, posting pics, etc., feeds a problematic trade (at least in part). The team roundly agreed that removing ceph care discussions and content from TONMO.com is not the right answer (by any stretch).

Keeping "known" species of cephs is arguably a good thing, since it helps all of us understand these creatures in a better way -- and TONMO.com can help ceph keepers employ best practices when caring for them.

The staff (and community) all seems to be in alignment that in the end, the right decision was to require member registration in order to view topics related to exotic and rare species. So, we created that forum with those access requirements, and moved relevant posts there.

So, in that regard, I think we've been consistent -- our forum policies and structure essentially matches the article content and approach taken with TFH.

On the other hand, yes, our stated sensitivity to "sensationalizing" cephs (or at least my own sensitivity to it) would seem to be a bit compromised by supporting and promoting an all-ceph issue of TFH. My response to that is this: this edition was assembled with the highest of integrity (which is par for the course for TFH itself), and prospective owners are being directed to TONMO.com, where I feel we help make the world a better place for cephs -- so in the end, it's all upside.

Now, some will say that the picture on the cover itself is incentive enough for people to run out and buy cephs without educating themselves, and that's a bad thing. I've never been too concerned with images vs. text. I don't think we can (or want to) control all aspects of consumer impulse -- I personally just want to be sure that ceph care content is always put into the "right" context (i.e., responsible ceph keeping must always be promoted). TFH definitely accomplishes this. For TONMO.com, access to "fringe" practices should be restricted in some regard, and our registration-only access to the Exotics and Rare Species forum ensures that people will at least have an opportunity to read our forum guidelines and "code of ethics" prior to accessing.

 

[cthulhu77]

Well, the cat is certainly out of the bag...local stores are clamouring for octopus all of the sudden. But, the articles inside are very well written, and do stipulate the cares and concerns over maintaining octopus in captivity, all in all, I think the outcome will be better for cephs than worse...you can't keep everything hushhush for too long.

Hey, my mollies just had three litters.

 

[Michael Blue]

So I guess we should all brace ourselves for another rash of new members?