Why can't we have a website?

Snapshot9

Snapshot9

son of 3 leg 1 eye dog ..
Silver Member
Why can't we have a website with all or most of the Pool rooms
in our country with the proper physical address, phone number,
and a GOOD CURRENT EMAIL ADDRESS FOR THEM?

So many people are involved with tours of one sort or another,
as a promoter, a tour director, or a player, or even as a spectator
of tournaments, and being able to EMAIL A POOL ROOM THAT GIVES
A TIMELY RESPONSE is a convenience that is badly needed by all
those involved.

As one trying to put a tour together, this becomes a thorn in my side
when I am unable to contact a Pool room by email, have to call them,
and then have to snail mail information to them instead of just sending
it to them via email over the internet.

AREN'T ROOM OWNERS AWARE of how much having an email address
can benefit their business? It does not cost THAT much to be on the
net today, and most Pool rooms have computers for other business
purposes anyway.

What are your thoughts? And what is the holdup on this?

Mike ... Are you listening to this? I hope so ...
 
Last edited:
Sometimes if you want something done, you have to do it yourself. I've been contemplating something similar myself. I was more concerned with the rooms in my city that hold weekly tournaments, but why think small.

The only problem I can see is keeping the information current.
 
I know ...

supergreenman said:
Sometimes if you want something done, you have to do it yourself. I've been contemplating something similar myself. I was more concerned with the rooms in my city that hold weekly tournaments, but why think small.

The only problem I can see is keeping the information current.
Click to expand...

That is a concern of mine too, but being a retired Sr. Systems Analyst, to
do a mass email to the Pool rooms every 3-4 months, or more often if
necessary, to remind them to keep the email current would do the trick
because any unable to deliver woulld come back, and other means, like
calling them to get an update could be done.

Besides, the website might want to notify them of tours, tournaments, etc.
that might be coming their way, and who to contact about it.
 
You have to find out who is going to pay for the domain, who will host the site, who will pay for ongoing bandwidth and server work. Who will keystroke in all this data. Who will answer the emails from room owners to the site?

Sounds like a helluva lot of work for little or no pay.
 
Most of the work

uwate said:
You have to find out who is going to pay for the domain, who will host the site, who will pay for ongoing bandwidth and server work. Who will keystroke in all this data. Who will answer the emails from room owners to the site?

Sounds like a helluva lot of work for little or no pay.
Click to expand...

Most of the work can be minimized by a good systems expert, where a layman
might be doing something by hand, a systems expert could automate the
function. The data would be input by the Pool rooms person to a set format
with input edits. The systems expert would answer emails although most would be avoided by clear definite instructions of the purpose of the website and how it is to be used. As far as hosting the site, it would be nice to just get Mike to 'host' the function of this, and just be a transaction off of the main menu. Compared to the forum, this function would take up very little
disk space.

As an option, a nominal fee could be charged, say $5 a month to the
pool room owners, which I do not think is much, or even $3 a month, and
billed on a 3-6 month basis. Say 2,500 Pool rooms at $3 a month is
$7,500 a month would pay for anything, and $36 a year for Pool rooms
is more than affordable for the services and instant contact benefits it
would have for the room owners.
 
Maybe like the "poolhall finder" at www.playpool.com

I think that Ed Mercier, who built that site, came to the unfortunate conclusion that pool hall owners were too cheap to support such a thing. He wasn't the first. In the early nineties(?) James Lawson(?) tried to create a web site with all pool halls on it, with descriptions of the rooms, food, etc. He also printed a pool player's road atlas. He wanted a small subscription fee from the rooms. He gave up on it.
 
But what if it was like a blogged site, in which the users contributed the data? IE, you just put down the base format of the site, and then allow people to enter in tour information and pool room locations and phone numbers, etc.

What do you guys think?
Shorty
 
Shorty said:
But what if it was like a blogged site, in which the users contributed the data? IE, you just put down the base format of the site, and then allow people to enter in tour information and pool room locations and phone numbers, etc.

What do you guys think?
Shorty
Click to expand...


Sounds good to me. And it wouldn't require those pool room owners who haven't a clue about the web or email to do anything at all. Most of the places I go to play could care less about web presence or emails. They seem to like taking the cash though...:rolleyes: Maybe they think it won't bring them many new customers...

Flex
 
You guys are underestimating the work involved and overestimating the appreciation you will get from the pool room owners. I would be shocked if Mike let you run some sort of MySql or another database driven site hang off of his servers for free. Especially since you would be looking to have many many people be given write access to the database. This sounds like a formula for having his servers crash due to some moron screwing up the mysql processes.

The blog option is probably the most viable solution but you would again run into problems with getting access to active scripting and databasing. Blogs don't do this usually.

Just so you don't think I am just talking out of my ass, I am very familiar with website development. I head up an internet division that collectively pushes 300+ mb/sec of traffic (think in terms of millions and millions of uniques per month) and have a staff of 30+ webdevelopers I oversee. Mike knows some of the details of my work.
 
uwate said:
Just so you don't think I am just talking out of my ass, I am very familiar with website development. I head up an internet division that collectively pushes 300+ mb/sec of traffic (think in terms of millions and millions of uniques per month) and have a staff of 30+ webdevelopers I oversee. Mike knows some of the details of my work.
Click to expand...

Not saying you are talking out of your backside at all man, and I understand fully...

To develop this the way it SHOULD be done may involve a Linux box and a MySQL database backend, along with a secured Apache server and a fair bit of disk space, may want to even allow hosting of pictures of the rooms and links to Google maps for addresses and such. Just something to toss out there as food for thought.

I am a system administrator with a company...can't say which or what we do really...but let me assure you, I have vast experience with web/database servers and setting up such beasts as we are talking about. I currently have a WAN network that I support that reachs halfway around the globe.

The blog idea, although easier from a user input to populate standpoint, would probably not prove to be as usuable or accurate. You always have a few monkeys at the keyboard who like to give out inaccurate information.

It would truly depend on the user support and upkeep if it was a blog type of server.

Shorty
 
We worked on a skeleton for a web site some time ago. If anyone is interested I will be happy to share. Information included things like drinks, food offered, is there an in-house pro shop, nimbler of pool tables (sizes), billiard tables (heated y/n), is a cuesmith available on site (if not recommended cuesmith and will the pool hall manage drop off's),...

Also, would be a link to the pool hall web site and if a pool hall did not have a web site, we could host it using a simple template were they would send pictures and stuff.

We already figured how to fill date database and ensure information accuracy.

Anyway if anyone is interested, I will host the web site with a unique name we could all vote on and this would be a community owned site. I would take care of the costs to ensure this remains a free zone for everyone.

Snapshot, you started this and if others are interested you could start a new thread to discuss the content. I could begin it with a list of what we captured some time ago. Everyone on this forum could then watch the site as it is built and throw in comments and suggestions. Again, keeping this community owned is best.

Just an offer...
 
Snapshot9 said:
Why can't we have a website with all or most of the Pool rooms
in our country with the proper physical address, phone number,
and a GOOD CURRENT EMAIL ADDRESS FOR THEM?

So many people are involved with tours of one sort or another,
as a promoter, a tour director, or a player, or even as a spectator
of tournaments, and being able to EMAIL A POOL ROOM THAT GIVES
A TIMELY RESPONSE is a convenience that is badly needed by all
those involved.

As one trying to put a tour together, this becomes a thorn in my side
when I am unable to contact a Pool room by email, have to call them,
and then have to snail mail information to them instead of just sending
it to them via email over the internet.

AREN'T ROOM OWNERS AWARE of how much having an email address
can benefit their business? It does not cost THAT much to be on the
net today, and most Pool rooms have computers for other business
purposes anyway.

What are your thoughts? And what is the holdup on this?

Mike ... Are you listening to this? I hope so ...
Click to expand...

Scott I think you should build the site, and charge admission...;)
 
FYI (good deal on hosting)

A note on hosting: I recently added a hosted account on Dreamhost Their Crazy Domain Insane plan includes 4800MB of space, 120GB of bandwidth, unlimited mySQL servers, and unlimited domains hosted. They even include a free domain registration and the plan grows weekly by 40MB storage, and 1GB bandwidth. It's $9.95 a month if pre-paid for a year, but by using the customer loyalty code "MAX97" you get $97 off, for a net cost of $23 total for the year.

It's also a "one-click" install for the following packages: (free of course)
WordPress Weblog
phpBB Forum
Advanced Poll
osCommerce Store
MediaWiki Wiki
Joomla (Mambo) CMS
Gallery Image Album
WebCalendar Calendar

Enjoy
 
Shorty said:
Not saying you are talking out of your backside at all man, and I understand fully...

To develop this the way it SHOULD be done may involve a Linux box and a MySQL database backend, along with a secured Apache server and a fair bit of disk space, may want to even allow hosting of pictures of the rooms and links to Google maps for addresses and such. Just something to toss out there as food for thought.

I am a system administrator with a company...can't say which or what we do really...but let me assure you, I have vast experience with web/database servers and setting up such beasts as we are talking about. I currently have a WAN network that I support that reachs halfway around the globe.

The blog idea, although easier from a user input to populate standpoint, would probably not prove to be as usuable or accurate. You always have a few monkeys at the keyboard who like to give out inaccurate information.

It would truly depend on the user support and upkeep if it was a blog type of server.

Shorty
Click to expand...

Shorty you do sound like you know wtf your talking about. Mike is running Microsoft-IIS/5.0 on Windows 2000, but I do agree with your analysis. It just so happens we run our cluster on Linux/Apache so yeah thats the ticket imo as well. Add in f5s, about 20 TB of Netapps filers and you have a snapshot of what we run.
 
Ummm I'm no techno geek but
1) Pete Lafond posted he had figured out how to keep info up to date and accurate.
2) As far as a good source for info wouldn't approaching APA,BCA,TAP league organizers provide a good base to start with? They would be familiar with all the local establishments.

Terry
 
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