In the thread "Hi. I've just joined the JRA ! "

Brian Kerslake wrote:Roy, that link's incorrect info about the JRA was reported to me  a few months back. I emailed the correction but didn't get a reply. Not much else we can do without pestering people again and again. Some respond, some don't. Thanks for taking this job on and thanks Lesley for creating a project post for it.

 The website seems to have been abandoned, as the page about the JRA newsletters only goes up to issue 50 of January 2008, and the home page is dated 27-10-2012.  I expect this problem will increase as websites, started in enthusiasm, become a burden to their authors, then remain in stasis but still accessible.

Here are some responses and my suggestions:

Lesley responded: "My thought is that we make it as easy as possible and include their page URL of the incorrect link as well as the correction we'd like to see (which often includes an update of the hon.sec. contact details which I reckon should probably be just the email link rather than postal details so it's future proofed)"

I agree with Lesley's link suggestion.

Roy responded: "I first thought on the same lines as you, but then thought to make it easier for us, and have more chance of a response, if we left out the detail until certain someone was listening.

Don't agree, Roy. Easier to report the problem right away rather than maybe have to go looking for it again. It's usually quick to explain or just a case of copying a URL or giving an email address.

Happy to go along with your ideas if that's what is decided, but it might be wasted effort if no-one is actively caretaking the site. Also, there may be other pages we have not visited on the target site with errant info, which an active webmaster would know about and could then correct."

Lesley replied: "Good point, your strategy does keep work to a minimum for us, and active sites will no doubt respond.

Roy you're right there but on balance I think it's best to tell them right away what's wrong and leave it to them. Better to go back and check if they get back to you. Most do. Here's a slight redraft which aims to give them the info up front. In my experience webmasters don;t have the time to get into a series of email exchanges - just give them the errors and leave them to do it or not. Chase again if there's time - I've never been able to find it, but if someone can take this job on, they might be able to.

To the Webmaster at (insert website URL here)

From the Web Team at www.junkrigassociation.org

Hello from the JRA and thanks for referencing our organisation on your site. One of our members recently visited it and found one or more out of date links to us or incorrect details about us. I hope you don't mind me contacting you, and hope that you can correct those issues and any more that you come across to give your visitors the best chance of finding us. My list is below. If you can make those changes I would be pleased if you could let me know when you have done so.Thanks for your assistance.

(Signed)

Roy, are you also offering to do the work of searching for dodgy links/info and the follow up? It would be great if that's the case.

Brian

Hi Roy. Great, that's the kind of news we like. So there's a challenge to all members. Roy will chase up the webmasters/owners websites that have out of date info about or links to the JRA. He'd like your help in finding them and asks that you report URLs here with a brief description of the problem. I just searched Google for 'Junk Rig Association' and it reported 4,400,000 links, so plenty to keep us busy :-)