Listing non-Charlbury groups - opinions sought

Fri 11 Mar 2011, 14:23

Listing the itinerant businesses would not only be useful for new customers, but for those living in Charlbury who are outside the central area. I've missed the various vans on many occasions.

It would also be good to know if the vans are bothering to come during the Enstone Rd roadworks. As the road signs about diversions are so poor at the Enstone Rd crossroads, business must be affected in the various shops.

Fri 11 Mar 2011, 11:41

I agree with your decision, Richard, and this brings to mind a related question that I have wondered about. Should this site list in the Businesses section the itinerant businesses that regularly serve the community, such as Brian the Fishmonger, the Monday pizza van and the Friday fish & chip van? They are "temporarily local" businesses many of us rely on and it would be handy for potential new customers to be able to look up basic info like their regular times and location.

Fri 11 Mar 2011, 08:34

As per original posting, I'm not really canvassing opinion on events, simply on links to non-Charlbury groups. The consensus seems to be against so we'll stick with that. Thanks for the comments!

Thu 10 Mar 2011, 23:14

One wonders if we should should establish an accepted "hinterland" for areas around Charlbury for things that should be brought to Charlbury attention. How far would that extend into the neighbouring hamlets and villages? I'd say a heads up for Chippy, Witney, Stonesfield, Finstock and similar ranges for talks and events are all local and should be included. Though I would personally forbear on linedancing notices for Witney (snob values exposed mea culpa).

Tue 8 Mar 2011, 22:31

I'm one of the people who made the suggestion about listing something outside of Charlbury but which might be relevant to people here. My thoughts were that you can't always find what you're looking for on the internet if you don't know exactly how to ask it.

A bit like helping someone find the route of a footpath because you've walked that way before.

On the other hand, I understand how it would be difficult to draw the line.

Tue 8 Mar 2011, 15:02

Time moves slowly in these out-of-the-way places Richard: they've only just discovered fire in Chadlington, it'll be at least another thousand years until they stumble across the Internet!

Tue 8 Mar 2011, 12:11

We officially say "nothing outside Charlbury". I've always turned a blind eye to Finstock and the "hamlets", but I'd be a little uneasy at accepting postings from (say) Stonesfield given that it has its own nicely designed website.

It always surprises me that Chadlington doesn't have a website. Maybe I should offer templated versions of the Charlbury site for a modest price!

Thanks for the feedback on the organisations.

Tue 8 Mar 2011, 11:33

I suggest we leave the question of events in other villages as it isn't a problem (so far!). It's amazing that most villages don't have proper websites of their own.

Mon 7 Mar 2011, 12:22

Agree with all the above. The only grey area is when events are asked to be listed which are not in Charlbury - or are obviously commercial. Commercial OK if taking place in Charlbury - but what do we do about events in Stonesfield, Finstock or Leafield - or Hayley?

Mon 7 Mar 2011, 11:05

Agree with Russell. This is the Charlbury website. Google is the portal for worldwide or countywide information. If you broaden it, it would be very difficult to maintain boundaries. Silly arguments will arise: e.g. do we include the 'Oxfordshire and Bucks' branch of a national organisation whose local office is in Aylesbury? What about a 'south-eastern regional HQ' of an organisation whose office is in Henley? There is no limit! Keep it as it is.

The criterion of what is "useful to Charlbury residents" is far too broad. Today I want a town plan of Woodbridge: why is that useful (to me!) link not on the website? Or more locally: the opening hours of shops in Witney or Chippy? No, that's what Google is for.

Sun 6 Mar 2011, 21:14

I would say keep it as it is. There are numerous local branches of every organisation, so where would you stop. Also who would be responsible for ensuring the data was up to date, after say about a year on the site?
The value of the Charlbury site is that it is a site for Charlbury information only and not wider resource with a mutlitude less than locally relevant information.
If people in Charlbury want to find some wider information or find out about Oxfordshire issues they can do a google search.

Sun 6 Mar 2011, 19:34

I'd like to canvas people's thoughts on whether we should ever list non-Charlbury groups on the website.

Today we've had two such requests - one for the local (Chipping Norton) branch of Amnesty, another for an online Oxfordshire forum for home-schoolers. Generally we don't list non-Charlbury organisations at all. But there's clearly an argument that both of these would be useful to Charlbury residents.

If we were to do it it'd have to be with some pretty strict provisos: Oxfordshire-based organisations only, no commercial services, no groups where equivalents exist in Charlbury. And it would only be on a simple list page (like the existing info page), not full entries in the existing directory or community pages.

Against this, the Charlbury Website isn't meant to be a substitute for the rest of the Internet, and there's an argument that we shouldn't seek to list resources that can perfectly well be found via Google. There will, inevitably, also be more of a burden on the admins in keeping such a list up-to-date with changing contact details, website addresses, and so on.

Thoughts?