Steve:
I think this has gone on just about long enough.
I got a message from Bob announcing that this forum was up and running and, quite frankly, I'm glad that he or Gene sent it.
The message I got was an INVITATION. Nothing more, nothing less. I didn't get that invitation from my participation on the James Kitching Forum. I believe I got that invitation because I have e-mailed Mr. Werner personally and that is how I got on his e-mail list. When he replied to me, he got on mine in my personal address book. It's the same deal with other posters that I've had personal e-mail exchanges with who also happen to post on the Kitching Forum. When they sent me a personal e-mail, they got in my address book IF THEY WERE INQUIRING ABOUT AIR RIFLE HUNTING, as that is where my main interest in air rifles is found. When I launched my Uplandhunter.net site, I e-mailed people who had already e-mailed me. How is that unethical? I didn't ask for Steve in CT's permission, either, since who I send e-mails to from the folks in my address book really isn't any of his business, nor is it any of his business how we "met" or where.
The fact that some of us who have communicated with Bob also post on the Kitching Forum doesn't mean that the Kitching Forum is where Bob and Gene got our contact info. That is an assumption. Ultimately, unless Bob or Gene admit to farming the Kitching Forum, all Steve in NC and Steve in CT are doing is assuming that they did. In order to make that assumption, you have to also assume that the Kitching Forum is the center of the airgun universe.
It isn't.
Honestly, getting insulted for being invited to check out a new forum on a subject that the recipient has already expressed interest in is tantamount to getting one's proverbial panties in a wad over nothing.
On the "Yellow Forum," I see the Steves still on a rampage in painting Mr. Werner out to be the Anti-Christ or something equally evil. Here, I see Mr. Werner talking airguns. I see him mention that he's got some stuff for sale that some of us might want to buy.
There is definitely a lesson to be learned from the public thrashing that Mr. Werner has received and I think that lesson is a Biblical one. Something to do with a warning not be be "unequally yolked"........................
It's kind of amazing to think that God can use even unbelievers like Steve in NC have professed to be as instruments to get His message across.
-JP