Posted by: San April 7, 2008
Sajha getting unpopular ?
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Whenever there is a post regarding sajha, I feel that my input is sought. In the same regards, I know that it could seem unwarranted to some people. If you are outside in nature and comment that the temperature sucks then it's an observation of nature and nothing much can be done about it, but if you are inside someones house and complain that it's cold, then there's something that can be done about it by the owner.

I run and manage sajha so on one hand I can do things to make it better. On the other hand it's supposed to be a 'sajha' platform and any changes that I may impose may take away from its 'sajha' nature. Hence there is always a fine line that I tread when I decide to post my response in sajha.

In this case here, before this thread "Sajha getting unpopular" starts to turn into an unpopular thread, I wanted to mention a few things.

First of all, as we know it, everyone has different yearnings and goals. Some people want to be rich, some people want to be famous, some people want to climb mount everest, some people want to gawk at ladies all day at Tukucha. In the same context if we personify websites then these have certain yearnings or goals too. Sajha did not start off with goals of being popular. It did however start off in order to be of help to Nepalis. However popularity always helps to get the word out and to be of some kind of service to Nepalis living anywhere across the globe. Though popularity is important, what matters more is that the website is of some help to Nepalis. May it be a bored student stuck in a rural area missing company of Nepali friends, food or chatter. Or perhaps a Nepali graduate who found a new job in a different city and looking to find a roommate or connect with other Nepalis. Or a Nepali teenager who wants to feel part of the Nepali culture he/she is missing by growing up away from Nepal. Or a Nepali family who won DV and is looking for some helpful suggestions. In this regard, any assistance that sajha has provided is awesome and is infact helping itself reach its goals.

In helping out folks needing information and providing a cyberspace to exchange and share information and interact with other Nepali brothers and sisters, Sajha has become sort of a daily cyber convention.

One aspect of popularity that I hope for sajha is to be a cyber destination where we "Keep it Real". Sajha caters to such a diverse crowd that keeping it real for one kind of visitors may not be real for another kind of demography. This very fact itself whereby there is a difference of opinion on how things should be in itself points to the fact that sajha is "keeping it real"! Depending upon individual preferences, everyone is free to express their views of "real" which is a relative concept.

In this day of the internet when the lines between real world and cyberworld are diminishing quickly, reality is an important aspect that we need to uphold or enforce.

Like boston555 pointed out above, in real life you don't say "you fag" "fug you" etc to someone's face directly when you don't agree with their statements.

That is the kind of "keeping it real" that I am talking about.

There are lots of regular visitors in sajha who spend a lot of time in sajha and who love sajha as much as I do; some possibly more than me. And I would like to request them to help "keep it real" by interacting respectfully with others as they would in real life. That is the main message that I want to send through this message.

Moving on to some other topics of interest:
1. Automatic ban filters have been activated
- Due to few users who have consistently tried to jeopardize sajha by flooding sajha with crap and taking over all the threads with meaningless content or using scripts to direct sajha visitors to undefined locations, I have had to write a semi intelligent script that tracks user postings and automatically bans the user and their IP  if found to fall under suspicion of flooding the message board.

Some have and some may be incorrectly banned because of this automated system, but I keep a track to see if it was an unintentional ban in which case the bans are reversed asap.

If you are on a mission to monopolize something on sajha by posting it multiple times then you may fall under this automated ban filter.

2. Advertizing other websites in Sajha:
- It takes away from the sajha kurakani when people continuously advertise their sites. I try to be lenient and not care for first couple of times depending upon the site, but when people consistently advertise their sites using different means and tactics, it will be blocked more actively from now on.


I am just going with the flow so please excuse any exclusions or over inclusions. I think I have covered most of the things I wanted to say. Hope everyone is doing well. Happy New Year to everyone.

PS: I want to emphasize the following:
In this day of the internet when the lines between real world and cyberworld are diminishing quickly, reality is an important aspect that we need to uphold or enforce.

Like boston555 pointed out above, in real life you don't say "you fag" "fug you" etc to someone's face directly when you don't agree with their statements.

That is the kind of "keeping it real" that I am talking about.

There are lots of regular visitors in sajha who spend a lot of time in sajha and who love sajha as much as I do; some possibly more than me. And I would like to request them to help "keep it real" by interacting respectfully with others as they would in real life. That is the main message that I want to send through this message.

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