So will the P&O Forum come back......

[Dancing Queen]

I regularly read the official P&O page, and I'm getting quite miffed with the people moaning that the P&O Forum isn't available, purely because they are unable to contact friends/relations on a ship!

If contact is so important, the folks on the ship could actually PURCHASE internet time!

GRRRR!

Have I read that right R you said PURCHASE

Seriously, I quite agree, I have only ever used the free internet via the forum to send the odd message to forum friends, if we need to speak to family we would purchase internet time or use our mobiles.

[Romig1]

DQ....please let it be on record that I have NEVER paid for internet time on a ship.

I too have used the forum to keep in contact with family...it's not that people do it (P&O are obviously aware of it and have made no attempt to stop it to my knowledge)...it's that these people moan when they can't do it. As far as I'm concerned it was a perk, (you could even perhaps call it a loophole), and to decry it's loss is pathetic IMO.

[Lulucat]

Sorry DQ I disagree. I think P&O had a community. There were a lot of people (me included) who stuck with it from day 1 and a community was built within the site, despite all its foibles. That community exists here on this site as people have moved over.

[Jaczs+]

I have never used the site to keep in touch with family but I do use it for posting a blog for you lot lol and I have to say I wish it was on now as we are missing HK & NDG's blog which I very much hope they will put on here on their returns.

[Dancing Queen]

Sorry DQ I disagree. I think P&O had a community. There were a lot of people (me included) who stuck with it from day 1 and a community was built within the site, despite all its foibles. That community exists here on this site as people have moved over.

Perhaps a poor choice of words by me Lu, I wasn't decrying all those that stuck with it from day one and I take my hat off to each and everyone of you that did, it's success is/was certainly all down to the ones that did.

When I say the community spirit was lost I should have perhaps said the continuity was lost with the new format, it was often the norm to see a thread flowing only to reply and then 6 or 7 hours later no further posts or you could be joining in with one - go away for a couple of hours and when you came back it would be 6 or 7 pages further on and a reply you might want to make would have been lost, how often did we end up talking to ourselves.

I appreciate some stuck with it more than others but what I find very heartening now is to see names on the members list that I haven't seen in years which indicates to me this forum will have the old community spirit back purely and simply because the continuity is there as we can quote, see who is online, use emoticons etc and that in no way is meant to take anything away from those who had the belief to keep the old forum going.

[Lulucat]

Sorry again DQ - but I think that is rather dismissive of what the P&O forum was all about. I don't ever remember it being as bad as that.

A lot of old names will come back just to see what it is like - hopefully they will stay - I hope so - but we had a community spirit at the end and I can't agree with you when you say it is coming back because a lot of old names are coming back - that is dismissive of all the people who joined and stayed.

[Dancing Queen]

I am not being dismissive at all, I am giving my opinion on how I viewed it initially and at the same time acknowledging all those that kept it going.

Please do not twist my words I am not dismissing anyone, maybe I am not explaining it very well but if you want to self elect to be offended there isn't much I can do about it.

[Lulucat]

Fair enough but I don't think I am twisting your words.

[oldbluefox]

I agree the P&O forum was a community and you only have to look at some/many of the posts on here to realise that friendships have been formed, some over many years, some as a result of the forum and some are simply cyber friendships. It was indeed difficult in the early days with the site playing up but I am pleased we stuck with it, warts and all, and others returned to build the community to what it is today.

If P&O do return and make their forum one which deals solely with cruising matters I believe it will be dead within weeks. Their official Facebook page IMO lacks enthusiasm, warmth and vitality whereas a forum such as this combines banter, information and advice all rolled into one. It makes a mockery of what has been written on other sites in the past about the P&O Community and it would be a pity if that was lost.

[jacksparrow]

If it did come back in a reduced way it would be good if we could also keep this one going....

[Jaczs+]

I don't think this one would go Jack but to have the blogs on P&O would be good as I do miss them.

[jacksparrow]

too true jaczs....

[oldbluefox]

I imagine the blogs and the reports are very important to P&O and fair dues to them they accept the honesty and integrity of those who are writing them. The fact that P&O allow people to post their impressions of a cruise, day by day, without censorship, says much for the line and gives new cruisers an honest view of what cruising with P&O is really like.

I'd be very surprised if they stopped these elements.

[ArtemisMiss]

DQ....please let it be on record that I have NEVER paid for internet time on a ship.

I too have used the forum to keep in contact with family...it's not that people do it (P&O are obviously aware of it and have made no attempt to stop it to my knowledge)...it's that these people moan when they can't do it. As far as I'm concerned it was a perk, (you could even perhaps call it a loophole), and to decry it's loss is pathetic IMO.

I found having a friend onboard with a mobile phone was as good a way as any to keep in touch with a family member onboard the same ship who didn't have any charge left in the phone and, if I remember correctly, didn't take their charger with them despite being reminded to!!

AM

[towny44]

I think that P&O should seriously think about adopting this forum as their official community forum, I imagine they could find some way to provide a link from their website that allowed forum members free access while on board.
If instead they bring back the old system once they find the stability problem, then I suspect I would still use this forum mainly because it so much easier and faster than the old P&O forum was; but I would probably still use the P&O forum whilst on a cruise.

[Kendhni]

Towny, I am not sure that a commercial company could be seen to favour a private forum ... however this one is born out of the community that built up around their site so who knows .. maybe David will receive the royal summons from a certain Ms Marlow ... that would be nice. However I still believe that the availability of a free internet access may be a marketing point for P&O which means they may well bring back the forum ... maybe they will pick up the system Carnival uses on its site.

Even if that happens it would be nice if this forum could still survive.

[Romig1]

Towny, I am not sure that a commercial company could be seen to favour a private forum ... however this one is born out of the community that built up around their site so who knows .. maybe David will receive the royal summons from a certain Ms Marlow ... that would be nice. However I still believe that the availability of a free internet access may be a marketing point for P&O which means they may well bring back the forum ... maybe they will pick up the system Carnival uses on its site.

Even if that happens it would be nice if this forum could still survive.

Do you mean that they may actively promote it in the future, as opposed to it being available for those "in the know"?

[Kendhni]

Interesting point Romig ... I don't think they hid it, but the facility was well buried.

[Romig1]

I'm sure that the whole "keeping in contact with home" was in no way intended by P&O (apart from the wider ability to do a cruise blog - for everybody to read) and was a quirk of the system (via closed groups) that was tolerated by the company, rather than being endorsed in any way. Just like the "tendering" of cruise reports to alternative cruise fora was an unintended consequence of the free access to the forum.

I really wouldn't have been surprised if -software allowing - access to the Groups section had been curtailed from the ships.

[Kendhni]

I would consider that to be a great shame, because it was a fantastic 'perk' for the passengers. What other line effectively gave unlimited internet access to its passengers albeit limited to the facilities they offered via their site.

[CaroleF]

I know some people don't want to spend time on the internet when they are on a cruise but I really enjoyed being able to post a blog when onboard. I liked being able to tell people at home what was happening on board. I remember being on the Arcadia cruise leaving from New Orleans that had engine problem and had to stay in port overnight - someone on the Community forum asked why Arcadia was still in New Orleans and it was good to be able to post the reason on the forum. Was this an amazing event? No but it just shows how interested people are in what is happening onboard ship.

We are on Azura in just over 6 weeks and assuming that the P&O forum is not back (extremely unlikely I would think) I will miss being able to log onto the Forum. If I manage to persuade myself to buy and ipad before I go (my laptop is too heavy) I will try when onshore to see if I can get access to this site but I'm afraid I'm not paying lots of money to use the internet onboard.

I would like the P&O Community Forum to return but I would also like this one to stay, it's an amazing site and would be a great loss if it went. It should really show P&O what a Forum can be like and there's no backbiting or trolling that I've seen - occasional disagreements yes but that's part of life.

Carole

[towny44]

Towny, I am not sure that a commercial company could be seen to favour a private forum ... however this one is born out of the community that built up around their site so who knows .. maybe David will receive the royal summons from a certain Ms Marlow ... that would be nice. However I still believe that the availability of a free internet access may be a marketing point for P&O which means they may well bring back the forum ... maybe they will pick up the system Carnival uses on its site.

Even if that happens it would be nice if this forum could still survive.

Ken, At present this forum is as specific to P&O as their's was, especially in the way that David has designed it. Personally I cannot think of any reason why it could not be "handed over" to P&O, even if David continued to administer it, I imagine his fees would be lower than P&O's IT section costs.
I wonder if anyone on the P&O IT management team have viewd this forum, if they have then they ought to recognise how much better it is than anything they ever had, and they ought to be able to recognise the benefits it could provide.

[Romig1]

Towny, I'd be flabbergasted if people from Admin had not viewed this site, given the number of references to it on the official P&O Facebook page.

I'd love to hear what they said about it!

[JenniC]

Towny, I'd be flabbergasted if people from Admin had not viewed this site, given the number of references to it on the official P&O Facebook page.

I'd love to hear what they said about it!

Probably "how come we couldn't build something as good as this"

[Mo2013]

I'm not IT savvy at all, but it can't just be as simple as P&O having a forum like this as part of its whole site can it ? I have read the Cruise Community over the years and it is a great pity that there have been such problems which were frustrating for so many.