Wednesday, August 31, 2016

A new support group for family and friends



A brand new OARS Group is now available on an independent site!

When I closed down my site for Linda’s Front Porch, I also closed the OARS Forum on Linda’s Front Porch. The only OARS group available currently is the one on FaceBook. While FaceBook is awesome and that group has a lot of activity, I sometimes question if it gives enough access to those who are not members of FaceBook.

Announcing the New and Improved OARS Group! The site is up and running for the next 30 days. Members of this site are subscribers and pay a $5 monthly fee for access. However, membership is free until September 29th, 2016. After that date, a fee will be charged on a monthly basis. This will give the members a chance to try the forum before having to pay the fee. If you don’t like the site, and opt out, no fee will be charged.

I wanted to give this forum a try, get feedback, comments and suggestions, before I commit to a long-term contract. If it doesn’t seem to work, I’ll take it down.

Forums work best when there are active postings and a sufficient number of responders to the post. Without that no forum can survive for very long. The more members, the more there is a chance of people being logged in at the same time, which means more opportunity for conversations.

You do not have to e-mail me and ask to join. Simply click the “subscribe” button, fill in the form, and wait for a confirmation e-mail. After you fill in the form, an e-mail is sent to me and my administrators and with a simple “acceptance” you will be added to the group. You won’t have to wait for me to reply to your e-mails – which can often take weeks. And – with this site – I can have other administrators to help me accept/decline new members.

This is a private site. The administrators will monitor it regularly and watch out for members who do not respect others viewpoints, challenges, etc. In short, we all must play nice and be courteous of each other. You are welcome to vent your frustrations, but not to show anger to others. Heated discussions are allowed, hatefulness is not.

Another great thing is the ability to private message members in the group. Sometimes we connect with another member and just want a one-on-one talk. Talking is good and now available on OARS Group private messaging.

Please visit the site and help me make this a success! It’s free for now – so there’s nothing to lose except your feeling of isolation. Let’s all connect together and survive this chaos.


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