A note from Suzanne (admin here....)
 

Ok first let me let you know that the other week when Daisy suggested about challenging another forum/diet/group to a contest I passed that info along and I passed the issues with the server to her to and I got this quick response from her and this is part of our conversation..................

Basically its like we mentioned, due to all the increase in traffic it is over loading the server, they have ordered more RAM for the server to help and hopefully with in a few days, the problem will be solved! :D

Here's her explanation about the popup ads and the contest:

" We use two advertisers, Tribal Fusion and Fastclick. Fastclick limits pops to one per 24 hours. Tribal Fusion limits them to one per session. So if you get her and stay here, you'll just have one pop from them. If you leave and come back, you'll get another pop. .............."

Also she has discussed the possibility of a contest with the other moderators and forums and they think its a cool idea but they want to hear all our thoughts on how to do this..................so everyone, get your thinking cap on and spit out your thoughts and ideas

What about a small sign up fee - like 5 or 10 bucks - that goes to the winner. Depending how many people sign up it could be a nice chunk. Also I think it would also be more motivation to stick to the challenge. As far as the length of the challenge, I'm not sure. Sounds like fun!

Well - my idea (remember Laurie - I PM'd you so not everyone knows, LOL) was basically that for the month of February we challenge the other "groups" Like the LAWL gals and the Dr Phil gals etc to see who looses the most weight.

All that would be required would be for each "group" to say from the outset who is participating from their crew. You can not add or subtract once you start - that would skew the results. All team members would list their starting weight and then on Feb 28th weights are listed again. TOTAL POUNDS LOST divided by number of members = average for the group so the group with the highest average would be the winner.

All you would get would be bragging rights, of course - but hey! I'll take bragging rights, LOL...

Pretty simple idea. not a lot to keep track of - you would want to have signups prior of course... everyone would have to WI mid-week because the 1st falls on a Wed and the 28th on a Tuesday - but it is only twice - I think people could handle that.

Failure to weigh in on the first takes you out of the challenge. Failure to weigh in on the 28th defaults to a five point gain. This will prevent people from cheating.

So that is the loose structure - input?

That sounds like a great idea. I am up to what ever.