Hello,
"nchauler" raised some questions in his post which I feel need to be addressed, and I thought that this open letter might clear the air on a few topics.
Lawrence McCord is not only my boss but a long time friend and I hope that speaking from my perspective will add to this discussion.
For those not familiar with what goes into developing and
maintaining an Internet location, it takes outlays of money (quite often, large amounts of money) on a regular basis. From day one, Lawrence has invested his money(and that of investors), his time and effort into developing ExpeditersOnline.com as the premier web site for expediting information, all of which is focused towards the owner/operators and drivers in this business.
At the risk of sounding like I'm trying for points with the boss, I have found Lawrence to be an innovator and original thinker in the realm of the Internet and specifically ExpeditersOnline.com and related sites. I believe that his goal has always been to make this Web destination the best it can be, no matter how hard I have to work. (Sorry, couldn't resist)
Despite the plans of various Internet sites to move to fee-based viewership, we have never discussed the possibility of making ExpeditersOnline.com a pay site, just as our Expedite Expo is admission free.
Because of this, ExpeditersOnline.com is most assuredly advertiser-supported and we make no apologies for that. I'm sure it's understood that if we didn't enjoy the support of our sponsors, there would be no Forum which to read or on which to post comments.
It's quite true that FedEx Custom Critical has taken a number of shots on this Forum as have other expediting companies. It's also a fact that FedEx CC(Roberts) is also just about the oldest and largest company in expediting, so by the sheer numbers of former and present contractors, it would be expected to see the occasional negative comment about the company.
If one monitors the Forum closely however, there have been very positive comments regarding FedEx CC, but those comments typically don't attract the attention as do the negative postings.
To set the record straight, when we have been in discussion with expediting carriers about advertising on ExpeditersOnline.com, they have
occasionally mentioned that they have seen harsh comments about their company on our forums. We have replied to this by telling them that we monitor our forums, but unless we have serious issues about the content of a post, we try to give the greatest latitude possible and not to impose "censorship."
To date, our position has been accepted by EVERY advertiser and we have NEVER been requested to remove a negative post by one of our sponsors.
Our advertisers have proven that they are rational, reasonable people who know that their companies will sometimes receive criticism, warranted or otherwise. We feel that it's to their credit that they have never attempted a "hardball" approach with us by threatening loss of sponsorship over a post on the forums.
Yes, ExpeditersOnline.com's Open Forum is a public forum in the sense that all are welcome to access and read our site, and after registering, post their comments.
We utilize registration and we moderate these forums because, in our Internet experience over the years, we've seen other Internet message/bulletin boards degenerate into "flame" boards with personal attacks towards individuals or personal vendettas against companies.
It is our sincere desire to maintain a sense of community on the forums as well as keeping the discussions on a business-like level. It's always going to come down to a judgment call by a moderator or administrator as to whether a post is pulled or archived. Lawrence stated his reasons why the post was archived, but in the interest of fairness, he relaxed the rule and posted the link to the comments in question.
It's a fine line between what some would term "censorship and responsible administration of a forum; hopefully, we'll make the right call more often than not.
I want to thank the expediters who posted their thoughts about these issues, and whether they are in complete agreement with Lawrence or not, their input is highly-valued.
Thanks also for visiting, posting and being part of the online expediting community!
Jeff Jensen
Editor