Hank's Message
Posted: Tue Mar 05, 2013 1:26 pm
Welcome to the Project Pad! First off, I want to express how awesome the community has been. Motorgeek.com has provided me with a tremendous amount of knowledge and truly has shaped my life. It gave me a thirst for all things mechanical, from cars, to software modeling, CNC machines, manufacturing and electronics! I doubt I go to engineering school if I were not exposed to the intelligent minds on that forum around 2002 when I joined that forum. I have made life-long friends on there. What a fantastic spring board it was for 034 to help their new customers have a support group.
My personal view is that products sell themselves if they are quality products and the service is reasonable. For this reason I have always hated forums with paying vendors and moderation protecting those vendors. I get that a lot of forums are created to generate revenue and those venders must be protected to accomplish that goal of making money. The problem with this model is that it does not serve the community. I find customers are more upset when a problem is masked or censored than if you were just honest with them in the first place. I am more inclined to believe in capitalism and free enterprise. If a product and service are good, the products will sell themselves. If you do not like another company getting in on your profits, develop a better part or offer better service.
This forum is being set up as a place for people to post their projects and track their progress. It truly is a foundation for people to see alternative options to building a car. Iroz Motorsport is the drive behind the site but I do want to make it perfectly clear that I do not intend to get special treatment here. Moderation will not save anybody from poor services or poor products. If you are a company with great products, you will flourish here. If they are not, the community will lash out. We truly hope to get all sorts of projects here, not just Audi/VW/Porsche. We don’t mind projects from any company. Hopefully we can get some wild builds here, both domestic, import and European.
On that note, I do not want to see this forum turn into a bash 034motorsport forum. I have a great relationship with 034motorsport and think a lot of a good portion of their staff. They have done a tremendous amount of good for our community and it is ungrateful to discredit all they have done. Companies like mine within the niche do not exist without their influence and innovation. I suppose I understand their limitations and position better than most being in the same niche market as a manufacturing facility. There are delays in manufacturing, changing customer needs, unmet expectations, and variation on oem cars and in every manufacturing facility. My customer base generally understands that timely sometimes is hard to get from me, but quality is something to expect. There is room for improvement everywhere.
I just ask that everyone treat this forum with professionalism. I would hope that my kid could get on herein a few years and not be exposed to hateful speaking, foul language or non-work friendly content. We will moderate these Vortex type attitudes and actions. Please keep the site fun, mature, innovative, light-hearted and appropriate. Please use the Private Message system to the fullest by keeping trolling or arguments within the confines of privacy.
Venders on this forum are not paying with money. They are paying with knowledge and product development. Any company, and I do mean ANY company, that wants to maintain a project thread can have access to releasing parts to the forum. If you have a product outside of automotive, feel free to pitch it to us and we can direct you to a way of pitching it to the site.
Be patient with the site as we experience the small growing pains. We are still establishing rules to help keep the site clean and organized, free from freeloaders wanting free advertisement. While this site is my idea and creation, I have purposely entrusted the keys to the castle to an individual that is not currently employed in any automotive firm. I know that Ed will use these keys to help the community. Please try and respect whatever action he takes on this forum.
A huge thanks goes out to Marc for donating the servers and to Ed for setting up the forum. They are 2 great assets to our community.
Have fun! Build some projects!
Hank Iroz
Iroz Motorsport
My personal view is that products sell themselves if they are quality products and the service is reasonable. For this reason I have always hated forums with paying vendors and moderation protecting those vendors. I get that a lot of forums are created to generate revenue and those venders must be protected to accomplish that goal of making money. The problem with this model is that it does not serve the community. I find customers are more upset when a problem is masked or censored than if you were just honest with them in the first place. I am more inclined to believe in capitalism and free enterprise. If a product and service are good, the products will sell themselves. If you do not like another company getting in on your profits, develop a better part or offer better service.
This forum is being set up as a place for people to post their projects and track their progress. It truly is a foundation for people to see alternative options to building a car. Iroz Motorsport is the drive behind the site but I do want to make it perfectly clear that I do not intend to get special treatment here. Moderation will not save anybody from poor services or poor products. If you are a company with great products, you will flourish here. If they are not, the community will lash out. We truly hope to get all sorts of projects here, not just Audi/VW/Porsche. We don’t mind projects from any company. Hopefully we can get some wild builds here, both domestic, import and European.
On that note, I do not want to see this forum turn into a bash 034motorsport forum. I have a great relationship with 034motorsport and think a lot of a good portion of their staff. They have done a tremendous amount of good for our community and it is ungrateful to discredit all they have done. Companies like mine within the niche do not exist without their influence and innovation. I suppose I understand their limitations and position better than most being in the same niche market as a manufacturing facility. There are delays in manufacturing, changing customer needs, unmet expectations, and variation on oem cars and in every manufacturing facility. My customer base generally understands that timely sometimes is hard to get from me, but quality is something to expect. There is room for improvement everywhere.
I just ask that everyone treat this forum with professionalism. I would hope that my kid could get on herein a few years and not be exposed to hateful speaking, foul language or non-work friendly content. We will moderate these Vortex type attitudes and actions. Please keep the site fun, mature, innovative, light-hearted and appropriate. Please use the Private Message system to the fullest by keeping trolling or arguments within the confines of privacy.
Venders on this forum are not paying with money. They are paying with knowledge and product development. Any company, and I do mean ANY company, that wants to maintain a project thread can have access to releasing parts to the forum. If you have a product outside of automotive, feel free to pitch it to us and we can direct you to a way of pitching it to the site.
Be patient with the site as we experience the small growing pains. We are still establishing rules to help keep the site clean and organized, free from freeloaders wanting free advertisement. While this site is my idea and creation, I have purposely entrusted the keys to the castle to an individual that is not currently employed in any automotive firm. I know that Ed will use these keys to help the community. Please try and respect whatever action he takes on this forum.
A huge thanks goes out to Marc for donating the servers and to Ed for setting up the forum. They are 2 great assets to our community.
Have fun! Build some projects!
Hank Iroz
Iroz Motorsport
)
Love you too bubs...
I have a lot of respect for this community and have learned a great deal. Keep up the good work guys!
Where are your 07k projects swap threads and pictures and good stuff? 