Black and White Together

[cosmic]

Not sure if anyone has seen this on Twitter. The new supporter group "Black and White Together" were questioned on the legitimacy of their 13 members who were "democratically elected" to represent the fanbase. They've since changed their "About Us" page and removed that part...

 

 

No listed names of members (unlike e.g. RamsTrust). Rumours of fake twitter accounts. Lying about how they operate. Somehow they get a seat at these Supporter Group meetings. Maybe decent Twitter engagement is enough. Anyway, a lot of us scrutinise RamsTrust as fan representatives, so I thought it was worth sharing.

[WharfedaleRam]

Don't use Twitter so never heard of them. Anyone who spells organisation with a 'z' is not to be trusted imho!

[RadioactiveWaste]

Oh lordy, if there's a baddie in the piece BAWT are the last place to look. It's not like they're asking money off people and being unhappy with the answers is more the fault of Quantuma than anyone who goes to the meetings.

 

[cosmic]

11 minutes ago, RadioactiveWaste said:

Oh lordy, if there's a baddie in the piece BAWT are the last place to look. It's not like they're asking money off people and being unhappy with the answers is more the fault of Quantuma than anyone who goes to the meetings.

 

Agree with you on this. I didn't want to directly tie the criticism to our current situation, which is why I created a new thread for it rather than add it to the Administration thread.

For what it's worth, this isn't me tweeting about them, I don't have an agenda against BAWT (even if the final part of my post was a bit salty, in retrospect). I just thought it was interesting and something to keep an eye on.

 

[RandomAccessMemory]

I’m trying to figure out whether they’re open or closed?

Quote

BAWT is open and welcoming to all DCFC supporters…

…On that basis, it was decided BAWT would not be an open membership organization but would have a small, closed membership of 13 people, which would form The Committee.

Is it just me or is that incredibly contradictory?

[Boycie]

5 minutes ago, RandomAccessMemory said:

I’m trying to figure out whether they’re open or closed?

Is it just me or is that incredibly contradictory?

Well, yes and no.

[Day]

Oh boy, here we go, was only a matter of time before they went under the who are you, why are you better than us and the you don’t represent me spotlight.

Would appear that this has come about as that have been “attacks” on other fans from some of the members, so Ryan started looking into them and their authority. Not sure who he is referring to, I only follow one of the members and haven’t personally seen anything, although I don’t tend to stray outside my narrow line on there.

The 13 have been named in the replies now for what it’s worth and their authority comes from the number of Twitter followers they have, where in the world of social media this does represent a membership base. Yes you will have bots, fake accounts in the numbers, however that would represent a very small percentage of that number and still shows a healthy number for the club to interact with.

Not too dissimilar to this forum, it’s just quicker to press follow than sign up here, but that doesn’t make their “member base” any less important.

Gone are the days of filling out forms, paying annual memberships, social club meetings. The internet gives supporters groups far more reach now and if you can create a platform that has enough eyes on, you have a reason why the club will open a line of communication with you.

I had some disagreements with the more traditional supporter group whilst we was in the SCG, we were prevented from releasing the information following the meetings as they wanted time to relay the information to their members via the more traditional methods. My argument was always it’s not about who’s first, let’s just get the information out there. Anyhow I’m going over old ground here.

Am I arsed personally by who the 13 are and how the group came about? Not really, likewise I have no real feelings on how long RamsTrust board members remain in control. At the end of the day if they can provide fans with relevant information I as a fan am grateful for that, stay in power longer than Putin.

The abuse, the commitment to attend meetings, I have to respect the thick skin they have, the resilience to continue for the fans that like myself are grateful.

BAWT will make mistakes as other fans are not so forgiving on the lack of transparency, some will want their chance to be elected,want to know the process and what underwear you are wearing each day.

It’s like those that walk into a hotel room, run their fingers along the top of the mirrors looking for dust, a reason to complain, whilst others just want a bed for the night and a layer of dust will not keep them up all night.

[DarkFruitsRam7]

Got not strong feelings either way on BAWT. They were obviously wrong to claim that they were “democratically elected”, but that strikes me as something that was thrown in when the website was developed and just left to sit there, rather than outright lying. I haven’t seen them claim to be speak on our behalf either, but I could be wrong. 

Ryan did some excellent work on the #SaveDerbyCounty campaign, but this sudden attack on BAWT seems very odd. We should be doing everything to maintain a united front at this point. I thought he was better than this.

Edited March 11, 2022 by DarkFruitsRam7

[Yani P]

To be honest as long as any group is providing info and asking the right questions I don't really care who they are or what title they bestow upon themselves.

[Carl Sagan]

4 hours ago, WharfedaleRam said:

Don't use Twitter so never heard of them. Anyone who spells organisation with a 'z' is not to be trusted imho!

As a former Oxford University Press editor I can assure you 'organization' is the correct spelling; you can keep your modern -s- nonsense, thank you very much :)

[Turk Thrust]

4 hours ago, WharfedaleRam said:

Don't use Twitter so never heard of them. Anyone who spells organisation with a 'z' is not to be trusted imho!

Are you American? “Organization” is the correct spelling in UK. This coming from a former teacher of English to foreign students

[cosmic]

4 minutes ago, Turk Thrust said:

Are you American? “Organization” is the correct spelling in UK. This coming from a former teacher of English to foreign students

Oops. Americans spell it with a Z only.

 

Edited March 11, 2022 by cosmic

[Rev]

17 minutes ago, Carl Sagan said:

As a former Oxford University Press editor I can assure you 'organization' is the correct spelling; you can keep your modern -s- nonsense, thank you very much ?

Aye, and it's because you kept spelling it with a z that you're a former editor and not current!

Although having said that, it took me half an hour yesterday to spell consecutive in a way the spell checker deemed correct, I was sure it had a q, for some reason.

[Carl Sagan]

I thought it was quite odd that BAWT together suddenly appeared and IIRC claimed to be the united representatives of Derby fans. We seem to be a club with a plethora of supporters groups and here came another one. The "democratically elected" claim was clearly fatuous, but my guess was they might have taken a member from each supporter organization to justify the name. 

Here's the tweet with the names. As far as I know I've not heard of any of these people, but those more closely connected to the fanbase (and apparently the twitter fanbase) probably know some of them:

Ultimately, you have to hope the people in all the different groups that have access to the club and things like the Football Supporters Association are acting in the best interests of the fans, but as we've seen over the years I expect there's also a fair amount of politicking involved.

[Turk Thrust]

20 minutes ago, cosmic said:

Oops. Americans spell it with a Z only.

 

I know the thread is about B&W together but to answer, in my defence I did teach in an American school. However the “s” or “z” debate rages on. In fact, while the US spelling is with a ‘z’ the UK preferred spelling is also with a ‘z’ and as an alternative with an ‘s’ if you follow the guidance from leading authoritative dictionaries. There are no rules.

[TigerTedd]

30 minutes ago, Turk Thrust said:

I know the thread is about B&W together but to answer, in my defence I did teach in an American school. However the “s” or “z” debate rages on. In fact, while the US spelling is with a ‘z’ the UK preferred spelling is also with a ‘z’ and as an alternative with an ‘s’ if you follow the guidance from leading authoritative dictionaries. There are no rules.

[TigerTedd]

2 hours ago, David said:

Gone are the days of filling out forms, paying annual memberships, social club meetings. The internet gives supporters groups far more reach now and if you can create a platform that has enough eyes on, you have a reason why the club will open a line of communication with you.

I had to chuckle at this. ‘Gone are the days’ like the days were a few years ago, and the internet had come along and swept it all aside. Internet’s been around for like 40 years now. You’re getting old dude. 

[JoetheRam]

Spell it with an S, else risk being considered dumb, an Oxford graduate or worse, American.

[Day]

38 minutes ago, TigerTedd said:

I had to chuckle at this. ‘Gone are the days’ like the days were a few years ago, and the internet had come along and swept it all aside. Internet’s been around for like 40 years now. You’re getting old dude. 

When I was 20 people were still communicating by MSN messenger! ?

[Chester40]

9 minutes ago, JoetheRam said:

Spell it with an S, else risk being considered dumb, or worse an American ..or even worse an Oxford Graduate.

 

Edited March 11, 2022 by Chester40