Fireball biggest i have ever seen observed at 12:28am

Martin,

This is the last I will say about this as I use this site for scientific use and not for personal attacks.

My first reaction to Conor's post was genuine.

The first comment was a tongue in cheek joke asking why he had taken 21 hours to report to this website. Now, Conor is young and was worked up by the lack of response by other people on the other website he was reporting to. Obviously this played on his mind when he replied to my first post in such a rude and underhand manner. His private message to me was equally disrespectful.

The rest of my message referred to my belief that it was ligthning and a similar experiece that I had when a child. At no time was I rude or insulting and I am sure that other readers of the thread can verify that.

I understand that the boy is young and not familiar with scientific method and because of which he appeared to demand that people believe him rather than hypothesising in the required scientific manner.

I have since deleted all posts in this thread as I do not wish to get involved in petty arguments with people. I use this website to share information with fellow astronomers and for no other reason.

I was visibly shaken by Conor's first reaction (both on this thread and in his private message) to my belief that from the information he gave that I believed he had experienced lightning . I am sorry if anything I have written exacerbated the problem but I do not expect immature people to attack people who do not believe what they say.

Astronomy is a science and not a religion. I believe what I want to believe.

As the webmaster here I would like to make a few points:

1) I do not expect all users to get along and for there never to be arguemnts, in an ideal world that would be the case but this world is FAR from such and ideal world. Arguments and dissagreements will happen, that is a fact of life.
2) However, it is not acceptable that this site be used to hurt or injure people. Sending insulting private messages is totally un-acceptable and if it starts being a regular problem on the boards I will be forced into implementing some form of "Warning" system where people get a warning each time they missbehave and if they get up to X warnings they get booted out. I REALLY don't want to have to resort to that kind of petty behaviour on these boards, they are far too good for that IMO.
3) People must be free to agree or dissagree with peoples opinions and interpretations, otherwise this place is useless.
4) "Attack the post not the poster" would be a good thing to bear in mind when you are posting up a reply that dissagrees with some one. Have a go at their arguments but don't have a go at them.
5) In a text based medium tone is easily lost in a statement so what may seem like an inocent joke to the author could be seen as a vicious attack by the recipient. Smileys can help to eleviate this problem but you needot bear in mind that the tone of your statement does not carry well on boards like this so missunderstandings can easily happen.

Please note that my above comments are general and are aimed at the entire membership of the boards, I do not want to get into a blame game here. Things went a bit mad on this thread and there is nothing we can do about that now, no use crying over spilt milk and all that, however I would ask evreyone to learn from this thread so that threads will not develop like this in future.

Now, I would ask everyone to move forward from here and get this thread back on track or I'll have to lock it.

Clear Skies,

Bart B.,
IFAS Webmaster.

Thanks Bart and James for your informative replies. I think we have all contributed our own 2cents and i have taken everyones view onboard, i think good points have been made from us all on this matter. I agree we should move on from this fiasco and i hope everyones egos are not damaged enough to prevent us from being friends. Lets do what we love to do and help each other out. You never know we may need each other to confirm another event in the near future. I hope to be able to post observations and ask for help if needed on this forum without treading on anybodys toes so lets put everything behind us and move on.

On that note......has anyone observed the nova in Cygnus yet? I have been planning on observing it in the pre-dawn sky but have been clouded out thus far. I have heard unconfirmed reports that it is fading? at mag 9.9. Does anybody know the latest state of this nova?....thanks in advance!

Guys,
Gosh I go away for a day and look at whaty happens.
I hope the above posts don't stop anyone putting up a post here again.
I've put up posts here a number of times where people disagreed with me, I take that on board whether I think they're right or not. I dont take it personally.

What I like about this site is that you get back what people genuinely think and maybe some humour.

I hope all of this can be taken as a discussion and not an argument ...
As marty was saying i hope we talk more on this form and keep up to date with what is going on as it is nice to be able to talk to more astronomors from another part of the country!

I hope all of this can be taken as a discussion and not an argument ...

Don't worry Conor, we are on your side after all!

I will say that in the history of these boards, we have actually only ever had 2 incidents where users and/or threads had to be deleted/banned. Maybe if I ever get a chance to talk to you in person sometime, I'll humour you with the funny rantings that went on!

In the meantime, kudos to you and Martin on your observing endeavours. Reminds me of when I was a teenager when I did the same with a friend, Peter Mahon - and that was only less than 10 years ago! Of course I do it now, but like all adults, time is not always on your side when you live to work!

:x

Seanie.