The NSS Racing Forums are Ready For You!
Since I was confined to rest after surgery, it was a good time to upgrade to a better board of forums for NSS Racers (many of the reasons explained on the board) from all over the country to get together to compare notes and swap lies. I spent three solid days of my time, and several hundreds of dollars to put together what I feel to be a pretty nice place to promote NSS Racing to the outside world — and provide some comradery for NSS Racers.
The web address is pretty easy to remember: www.NSSRacing.com/forums/
Once there, you're going to see a collection of forums to discuss NSS topics, NSS Events, and technical questions & answers concerning NSS Cars. There is also one off-topic forum for the occasional less controversial off-topic conversations. Finally in the forums, there are the classified ads. You will note that at the top of the page there is an index of the last 15 topics, consolidated from all of the forums — but you can ignore that (if you wish) and slide down to just the categories that interest you.
Under the index, you will see a random selection of five NSS cars selected from the "Staging Lanes". Each viewing of the main Forums page should give you a different selection of the member's cars. You are encouraged to add your car to the Staging Lanes. It takes about 5 minutes to add your car, and a couple of the digital photos of it from your computer. You can also upload the car's best time slip if you wish.
While on the subject of photos, each member (and membership is not only free, but quick and easy) has the ability to upload up to a total of 100 NSS related photos into a number of photo albums. For instance you can have an album with some photos of building the car, and album with track photos of the car, and an album of pit party photos from one of the events. Once these photos are in your albums — they can easily be posted in your posts with a simple Copy & Paste. I'll pay for the server hosting and bandwidth — I just ask you keep the photos NSS related.
Another feature of the Board are the calendars. Each member has a private calendar that he can use as a personal calendar — and he has access to a Public calendar to list (and give information on) NSS race events. These events listed in the Public calendar are displayed at the bottom of the board's Index page starting 90 days prior to the event starting, and disappear after the event. Now members can simply add their own events instead of having to email me to add them.
Back to the forums, one of better features over the old Pro Bards I use to use — is WYSIWYG posting. That means What you see is what you get. You can literally copy and paste posts including photos and links, without having to use code like url and img — like we had to on the old board. I also have total control over your registration information, and you can trust me to keep it private. I don't believe that was the case when we were using the Pro Boards forum. I own the software license, I own the server, and only I (currently — but I'm looking for Admin and Moderator help) have access to the information. I will not give, sell, or lease this information short of the FBI beating down my door with a warrant — should a member go crazy.
On the subject of help — I will be looking for two moderators (who visit daily) to help me keep the forums clean and spam-free; and one assistant administrator with a little computer savvy to help with the more complex duties of the board — and be a backup to me if something should happen. We'll get more into that a month or so down the road.
Using the board is easy, and the FAQ link in the Navbar of the board has the answer to just about any question you might have using the forums. There is a Help/Suggestion forum to ask questions if you can't find the answer in the Frequently Asked Questions — and I'll update the FAQ after answering. Should you have a registration problem — click the contact link at the bottom and tell me about it — and we'll get you fixed up. There should be no excuse why every NSS Racers isn't registered and participating.
There is something called Social Groups. Any member can create a social group of any interest he feels other members might have — and they can have their own little board for discussing those topics. You can make this Social Group Private or Public, and have any member join or have it be by your invitation only. I can envision someone creating and administering to a Christian social group, or a Social Group for a Regional group of NSS Racers, or an interest like politics (I'd narrow the focus to Conservative, Liberal, Libertarian, Socialist, …), motorcycles, photography, or guns. Any reasonable Social Group (and I would consider hate or porn to not be reasonable) can be created and administered by a member. Each member can administer up to five Social Groups — but start with just one to get your feet wet.
Another feature is a Profile Page that you can customize into your own personal web page. There is a lot of flexibility with look, feel, and colors — so give it a shot.
Please don't just be a stalker — but jump in there and participate. It doesn't make you a geek! I have no ulterior motives in building this board, or the home site to it. My only goal is to simply promote NSS racing to the public (more fans), event promoters (more races and bigger purses), potential NSS racers (more and younger drivers to carry on); and to create a virtual Pit where NSS Racers can get together and discuss the types of things we generally discuss in our Physical pits. We don't need a Mexican Standoff where everyone waits for others to post before they feel the board is worthy of their post — we need leaders to get the ball rolling so the followers jump in. This is not just the best place for Nostalgia Super Stock Racers to gather on the Internet — it is really the only place. Build it, and they will come! OK — I've done my job building it — now it is time for y'all to check it out and participate. Together we can better promote the finest class of drag racing to the world.
Thank you for reading this. Please pass it along to other NSS Racers.
Dave Schultz