RIP VLJ??

[Steve27752]

Almost two days and no VLJ! I have emailed Bill and I am awaiting his reply. In the meantime what am I going to do?

 

[derleicaman]

I was going to post up here to see what was going on. As a member of both sites, I do appreciate the differences between the two. I would be sad to see VLJ not survive. Having sworn I had enough jackets, I just purchased a like-new Goodwear Star from FlyingYankee and a new Diamond Dave Dubow 27798 in goat that were featured in the buy/sell there. Both transactions went very well as they usually do there.

I am intending to write a review of the Diamond Dave jacket as he is just starting out. The jacket is exactly as billed, and a much less expensive, off the rack alternative to Goodwear. You can see the actual jacket on Dave's site diamondclothingco.com. As he says on the website, his jackets are not meant to be absolutely perfect, but more a reproduction of the actual war-time jacket produced and issued to the boys in WWII. He is working with John Chapman on this. I own a number of John's jackets and have owned/own Eastman, Aero, Lost Worlds, Real McCoys and others. Dave's jacket is not perfect like one of John's jackets, but is certainly more authentic than Aero and on a par with Eastman at a very reasonable price. The jacket fits well (actually great), was presented nicely in a brown paper bag with official looking label and tag and was delivered quickly. As mentioned the fit is great and all the important details (jacket label, pocket and epp pattern, snaps, lining, pocket tag, are correct) are there. The only criticism I could make is that the collar stitching at the tips is not 100% perfect, but again would not be 100% perfect in a mass produced jacket either. Again, just as intended and described. Dave has done a great job, I wish Dave well in his new venture!

 

[chamboid]

I do hope it comes back, it's just a good place for true interest about jackets and the history of them rather than if it fits right.

And apart from that people are very happy to help each other which I think lacks in age other places, had the feeling of community instead of common room.

Let's hope for the best and see what can be done.

 

[Skyhawk]

Really to me the VLJ site is invaluable. A great wealth of information on history, care, and identification of vintage flight jackets. Also a great marketplace to get a fair deal, and a fair sale price on rare vintage jackets. To see it go would be sad. A loss to the vintage jacket collectors in my opinion.

 

[Edward]

The reason for is because of some very near misses of the forum being sued due to slander and also recurrences of one or two very spiteful troublesome individuals rejoining after banning due to unacceptable behaviour.
I believe some FB groups vet every post before it appears on a page.

I do think we should relax the rule though to encourage new members. But with over 1000 members in what is the equivalent of Outerwear here only a handful post. We do have some very knowledgeable members though
John Chapman, Ken Calder, and Gary Eastman.....between those three what is left to know ?

It was the same on here at a time; other websites have adopted this policy - as in this instance, as John has noted, typically owing to persistent trolls - it's amazing how much better some people's behaviour becomes when they know their identity is out there....

In terms of legalities, defamation is not so much an issue for forums in the US (where there is a mind-bogglingly broad get-out if the content was uploaded / posted by a third party) - usually it's copyright (though I'd be surprised if that was much an issue with a forum like VLJ). Here in Europe, of course, website operators have to be a lot more careful with that sort of thing!

I've never managed to get myself onto VLJ, so I've never seen any of the content. It does seem a shame if it were to disappear, though.

 

[derleicaman]

I asked John Chapman if he knew anything about VLJ being down, as he is one of the original members and a moderator. Here is what he said

"The site is down, and Bill French and Chris are trying to find out why. There's a missing file that needs to be replaced, which will bring it up to speed, and Bill was pretty sure he could restore the site back to Sunday night. It's one of those strange errors that makes the host people think the site was hacked"

Hopefully they will get this sorted out soon.

 

[w126c]

I owe/blame my addiction to VLJ. Too much invaluable reference information for the site to go down.

 

[a2jacketpatches]

Glad to hear a fix is in the works, I've been there for years and have earned the friendship of many through joint efforts in several projects and discussions.

 

[53Effie]

I too am glad it will be fixed. I have been a member there for quite awhile and have learned much from others there. I don't post frequently, but I have made a friend or two and I would miss the site if it was gone.

 

[oneterrifichog]

Yep, looking forward to it coming back soon. Great reference for future buys.

 

[Carlos840]

I tried to sign up to the site ages ago but they only accepted members that had email addresses linked to their internet provider and did not accept email addresses from yahoo/hotmail/gmail etc... i mean how crazy is that. I even emailed them saying i was genuinely interested in the site but got no response.

any forum that makes it so difficult for new members to sign up is eventually doomed for failure in my opinion

Same here, i tried to join a while back but wasn't able to because of that. It shouldn't be that hard to join a forum!

 

[dudewuttheheck]

I just joined that site and noticed that the posts there are VERY few and far between. I am not surprised it has gone under due to this. However, there was definitely some great info on there.

 

[Persimmon]

It's not that hard to join with a normal email. I think some folks are always wanting to beat something down.
As for frequency of posts - it's not just about quantity. It's about quality of posting.
It's a more specific site rather than the much more wider reference and entertainment tool that Fedora is.
It is a superb reference tool with many members with excellent knowledge to share. Many of whom are members of the Fedora Lounge website.
If you read the latest news it has not gone under it is a technical glitch that is being resolved. "Not Surprised ". ... I do think that is a very poor choice of words from someone who has, as you say,just joined the site.
Hopefully when it returns when you use it more and appreciate it as well

Alan

 

[2jakes]

That A-1 on your avatar looks very familiar. I recall doing a sepia-tone rendition for a fellow member on the
VLJ. Just curious if this was you.

 

[AdeeC]

I find for a newbie VLJ is the place to get questions answered. Experienced members are always around to provide informed reply's. Threads might go for only a few posts because there is usually nothing more to say.

 

[Persimmon]

Yes it was and I still have those pictures
Thank you for doing them

Alan

 

[Buco]

It's not that hard to join with a normal email. I think some folks are always wanting to beat something down.

Alan

Ok thats great, if and when the site does come back up could you explain to me how i join with a generic email address please?

Many thanks

 

[Justhandguns]

Ok thats great, if and when the site does come back up could you explain to me how i join with a generic email address please?

Many thanks

I believe so. I remember in the beginning, I tried multiple times to register and failed, until I emailed the mods. I eventually found out that it was because I used Gmail to registered and then I just could not use anything offensive as my login name.... and hence, I have another identity there.

As from my experience of managing forums and websites, it is almost like a 24/7 job these days as there are so many trolls and junks that you need to modulate. It is really not easy.

 

[Carlos840]

It's not that hard to join with a normal email. I think some folks are always wanting to beat something down.
As for frequency of posts - it's not just about quantity. It's about quality of posting.
It's a more specific site rather than the much more wider reference and entertainment tool that Fedora is.
It is a superb reference tool with many members with excellent knowledge to share. Many of whom are members of the Fedora Lounge website.
If you read the latest news it has not gone under it is a technical glitch that is being resolved. "Not Surprised ". ... I do think that is a very poor choice of words from someone who has, as you say,just joined the site.
Hopefully when it returns when you use it more and appreciate it as well

Alan

I don't know, personally i only have a hotmail address, if i can't join with it i'm not going to go out of my way to find and create an address that is good enough for them!

 

[Justhandguns]

I don't know, personally i only have a hotmail address, if i can't join with it i'm not going to go out of my way to find and create an address that is good enough for them!

I am lucky because I am still paying for my old folks' broadband..(and yes, they have faster connection than my own home....), that is why I still have a ISP email address for VLJ registration. Or, unless you are willing to use your work email, it will also work.