RodBuilding.Org Sale

The heart and soul of everything I’ve considered most important within what I do in the custom rod building industry has been RodMaker Magazine. I have always seen it as far and away the most important aspect of the three major rod building businesses I’ve run, RodBuilding.org and the International Custom Rod Building Exposition being the other two. By now, most know that I have accepted an offer to sell the RodBuilding.org forum and want to know where this leaves the magazine and Expo. The fact is, it leaves them in extremely good shape.

The forum has taken up the major portion of my time these past two-plus decades. As good as the magazine and Expo have been, they could be even better and will be even better, now that I am free of the daily obligation to the forum and its related websites.

A public internet forum isn’t something you can just peek in on every now and then. You darn well better watch it as much as you can 24 hours a day. This means getting at it early and staying with it late. And there are no weekends or holidays as far as a public forum is concerned. Only with close moderation can you keep personalities and opinions on an even keel. 

The forum has other daily tasks that must be completed as well. Keeping up with the sponsor contracts, authorizing new registrations, answering private emails from users who are having problems with their log-in, need to change their passwords, etc. And, of course, the usual daily complaints from folks who don’t think you’re running the place correctly! When you’re dealing with 14,000 users there is no off-day – somebody (more than few) will need some sort of help every single day.

It’s been rewarding and I’ve come into contact with a great many fine, creative rod builders, who are also responsible for the forum being as popular as it has, but it’s also been a never ending cavalcade of work, 24/7/365 for 20 years. In fact, I can state with certainty that from the day I opened the forum, I have not taken a vacation or spent a single night away from home for over two decades now.

I’ve been able to manage the forum reasonably well for all these years, albeit at a great consumption of time and energy. Now I’m freed from it and can redirect that time and energy towards RodMaker Magazine and the Expo, which will greatly benefit all those that enjoy those entities. Who knows…  I might even find a little time to build some more rods and take them fishing.

1 Comments

  1. Marco Cellini on February 12, 2022 at 10:30 am

    Thank you Tom for everything you have done for us regarding the forum.