I recently saw a thread in the Probe Lounge, where MOPOC's name is talked about, and I wanted to give some input as to why our name was chosen to be MOPOC, even though we cover an area that's more than just Missouri. I decided to post here in the MOPOC forum, since it's info that probably not a lot of people still remember, and the new members probably don't know about it at all.
I don't know where to start, so I'll start from the beginning...
When I first bought a Probe, there were no Probe clubs to be found in the area (looking on PT and searching online brought no results). So I searched on PT and found a couple of other members of PT who live in Missouri (Josh Belcher and Matt Lemons), and we decided to start a club. I still remember that first meeting at Chili's with Josh to talk about details and plans for the club. We named it MOPOC, to go along with the themes that are already presented in the PT forums (state initials and then POC). We found some other members of PT in Missouri, and then started searching for those that were in surrounding areas (Kansas being one). Well, when talking to other Probe Owners in the area, we found that somebody had started a small Kansas Probe club (consisting of somewhere between 4 and 6 Probes), going by the name of KPOC. This was the first we'd heard about them (they didn't have a club website or forum). And some of their members had already joined our club. Others in their club suggested merging the two clubs together and changing the name to reflect the covered area. Some of the name ideas that were given were:
KCPOC - Kansas City POC
KSMOPOC - Kansas/Missouri POC
MOKANPOC - Missouri/Kansas POC
MWPOC - MidWest POC
And there were some others that I can't recall right now.
Well, I personally had already gone through a lot of work to get the club name of MOPOC established (we were hard at work building up a good MOPOC website, and we were working on meeting the requirements of ProbeTalk to get our own club forum), and back then we were like PT was before it was a website. All we could do was e-mail each other for info.
Josh and Matt were very against changing the name, but since some members (and non-members) of MOPOC who were from Kansas wanted to change the club name, we decided to hold a vote. Most of the members wanted to keep MOPOC, and a few didn't care either way. But a couple of people (non-members) were refusing to have anything to do with the club, unless the name was changed to represent Kansas as well as Missouri. Well, since the majority (by a large margin) and myself wanted to keep the name of MOPOC, that's what we did. We have never been an exclusive club by any means. Any Probe owners in any of the surrounding states have always been invited to join up, and ANYone is always welcome to come to club meets, especially considering that some of the meets aren't even held in Missouri.
So when you see posts like this one:
"Yeah we need a meet... we had one meet a long time ago as the KPOC in Lawrence... until our POC was highjacked by MOPOC."
And that is why there is still some grudgery by some non-mopocers.
As for myself, I have always thought that there would eventually be a KSPOC. I think there is definitely a large enough Probe gathering there. But as with the beginnings of MOPOC, organization is what it will take to make it happen.
If you want to know how to get a club forum on PT.com, I will list the requirements for you:
1. You have to have 20 or more members in the club
2. You have to have a meet and have pics to prove it
3. You have to have a club website with a link to ProbeTalk
4. You have to have a president (they will serve as the forum Moderator)
5. You have to have enough participation in the forum, that the Admins don't shut it down once it gets started (1 post a week isn't going to be enough)
That's it. If you can get organized enough to do all of those things on the list, then you just have to PM and tell the Admins you're ready to have your own forum.
I think that a KSPOC and a MOPOC would be able to work well together. However, I also think that MOPOC (as a whole) is doing great as it is in trying to ensure that everyone possible is being included.
The end.
I don't know where to start, so I'll start from the beginning...
When I first bought a Probe, there were no Probe clubs to be found in the area (looking on PT and searching online brought no results). So I searched on PT and found a couple of other members of PT who live in Missouri (Josh Belcher and Matt Lemons), and we decided to start a club. I still remember that first meeting at Chili's with Josh to talk about details and plans for the club. We named it MOPOC, to go along with the themes that are already presented in the PT forums (state initials and then POC). We found some other members of PT in Missouri, and then started searching for those that were in surrounding areas (Kansas being one). Well, when talking to other Probe Owners in the area, we found that somebody had started a small Kansas Probe club (consisting of somewhere between 4 and 6 Probes), going by the name of KPOC. This was the first we'd heard about them (they didn't have a club website or forum). And some of their members had already joined our club. Others in their club suggested merging the two clubs together and changing the name to reflect the covered area. Some of the name ideas that were given were:
KCPOC - Kansas City POC
KSMOPOC - Kansas/Missouri POC
MOKANPOC - Missouri/Kansas POC
MWPOC - MidWest POC
And there were some others that I can't recall right now.
Well, I personally had already gone through a lot of work to get the club name of MOPOC established (we were hard at work building up a good MOPOC website, and we were working on meeting the requirements of ProbeTalk to get our own club forum), and back then we were like PT was before it was a website. All we could do was e-mail each other for info.
Josh and Matt were very against changing the name, but since some members (and non-members) of MOPOC who were from Kansas wanted to change the club name, we decided to hold a vote. Most of the members wanted to keep MOPOC, and a few didn't care either way. But a couple of people (non-members) were refusing to have anything to do with the club, unless the name was changed to represent Kansas as well as Missouri. Well, since the majority (by a large margin) and myself wanted to keep the name of MOPOC, that's what we did. We have never been an exclusive club by any means. Any Probe owners in any of the surrounding states have always been invited to join up, and ANYone is always welcome to come to club meets, especially considering that some of the meets aren't even held in Missouri.
So when you see posts like this one:
"Yeah we need a meet... we had one meet a long time ago as the KPOC in Lawrence... until our POC was highjacked by MOPOC."
And that is why there is still some grudgery by some non-mopocers.
As for myself, I have always thought that there would eventually be a KSPOC. I think there is definitely a large enough Probe gathering there. But as with the beginnings of MOPOC, organization is what it will take to make it happen.
If you want to know how to get a club forum on PT.com, I will list the requirements for you:
1. You have to have 20 or more members in the club
2. You have to have a meet and have pics to prove it
3. You have to have a club website with a link to ProbeTalk
4. You have to have a president (they will serve as the forum Moderator)
5. You have to have enough participation in the forum, that the Admins don't shut it down once it gets started (1 post a week isn't going to be enough)
That's it. If you can get organized enough to do all of those things on the list, then you just have to PM and tell the Admins you're ready to have your own forum.
I think that a KSPOC and a MOPOC would be able to work well together. However, I also think that MOPOC (as a whole) is doing great as it is in trying to ensure that everyone possible is being included.
The end.
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