Rae...all our fellow Downers....it has been decided! All Hallows Eve, 2004 will be our wedding day! If all of you knew us well, you would realise what a PERFECT day this is for us! Rejoice! [img]smilies/biggrin.gif[/img] [img]smilies/wink.gif[/img] [img]smilies/evil.gif[/img]

Bring your masks everyone!

Yay! Congratulations, Cuthalion and Maika! [img]smilies/smile.gif[/img]

I am new here but I sent my picture in anyway! I hope no one minds [img]smilies/biggrin.gif[/img]

Oh and congratulations, Cuthalion and Maika! I hope you both have a long happy life together!

We don't mind at all, Seremela! [img]smilies/smile.gif[/img] It's always nice to be able to see members, new or otherwise.
Peace

Yay, I finally got my PC wiped (we had 3 virus') and I can finally see you all!

I was wondering where you had disappeared to, Mattius. And welcome to the Downs, Seremela! Enjoy being dead!

I have been sick in bed and so I have been unable to work on my web page or post on the Downs. hope to be better soon.
Take Care [img]smilies/smile.gif[/img]

I wish you good health, Alk. And, once again, I say that your work on the page has been fantastic! [img]smilies/smile.gif[/img]
Peace

Hey whats up with the link? It won't work!

What link?

-Menelien

The link works, Matt.

The main website opens but the link to the gallery won't open, it says something is wrong with the page.

Try this link Mattius...
BD Photo Gallery

The old page was attacked by gremlins and was damaged, resulting in me needing to make a new page.

Dear Alkoonion,
I hope you're quite well again! I just wanted to thank you for all the work you keep doing on this photo gallery. I really enjoy seeing some of the people I know from discussions or the quiz- and quote room. [img]smilies/smile.gif[/img]

@ Diamond 18 : Thanks for the compliment. (Hypnosis?! I sometimes wish I could do that to my younger boy! He doesn't do anything I tell him !! [img]smilies/biggrin.gif[/img] )

I am well ,thanks [img]smilies/smile.gif[/img] I have been working on my web page and have at last completed the new look, if you have used any avatars from the site you may need to be relinked them.
keep sending the pics.
Take care.
Alk

Some people may have read that many chat areas are being closed


As I run a web site that has many young people I have a "Duty of Care" to members.

Duty of care requires everything ‘reasonably practicable’ to be done to protect the health and safety of others at the workplace /on the web) and in a bid to help protect the younger members of the downs from predatory animals I will no longer post photos of Downs members who are under the age of 18. If you have your picture up and you fall into this category please pm me so I can remove your picture. I am still happy to post caricatures of members or a suitable replacement pic.

Peace
Alk

reasonably ≠ everything

Seems like a bit of an overreaction to me... especially as respectable Tolkien sites are not really the kind of places pedophiles go for scouting out kids. Anyway, if you feel you really need to do this (I don't see how anything is different now than it was before, just because Microsoft took some action on chat rooms) I suppose it is a thoughtful action... but I will miss being able to see our younger members' faces, and it seems like we're raining on our own parade because there have been thunderstorms somewhere else. [img]smilies/frown.gif[/img]

I’ll be sending in a photo of my honor student speech of my enrolment as a Lawyer so I’ll get it in once I get the pictures [img]smilies/biggrin.gif[/img]
Nilly

You really never know Niluial, these sites might be the perfect opertunities for the predetors. What about all the talk concerning meeting up with other members?

I think all people on any web site should never let out any personal information about themselves. Just to be on the safe side. But that doesn't mean that we can't get to know each other, but stating what city you're from, or what your real full name is, is licking the wire a little.

PS: I sent my picture in, and I am only 17, so I guess you won't be seeing it. Sigh. [img]smilies/confused.gif[/img]

You never really know, the world could really just be the last fevered imaginings of a dying man, some strange man that maybe you wouldn't call a man, but something else, maybe. I don't expect that to be the case, and I don't expect anybody in this community to be a rapist. In every thread that I've seen about people meeting other people there have been parents that would not allow it, or cautioning to talk to parents, or etc etc. However pertinent that issue may be, though, it is not this issue. A picture hosted on a website is not going to help anybody get murdered, leastways one on THIS website. The city I live in has more than 100,000 people in it, a million cities have more than that. I live in Norman Oklahoma. My picture is everywhere online. Come and find me, please. I will bake you a cake if you do.

If people start thinking that way on this site, it won't ever be the same. I don't think that anyone here joins the discussions to rape or murder anyone.
And being paranoid about everything won't protect you from anything.
As burrahobbit has said, If anyone finds me, he /she's my guest for a year.
Good Luck.

Hey, hey wait a minute! Ainaserkewen I never said that, Diamond18 did! And anyway I agree with Burrahobbit and Balin999. My picture is also posted everywhere, come find me! I doubt you actually will I am always moving. And I am more likely to be murdered by the guy begging at the shop who wants my car and my money than someone on the net going out trying to find me! But each to his own!

~Niluial

I honestly agree. I have been hit on over the Internet, and I know what to look out for. It really should depend on the merits of the individual, because even though I am 16, I certainly don't act like a 16-year-old. Even my parents say that I'm more mature than some 27-year-olds that they know and work with.

It actually is quite hard to track down a person, and actually end up raping/assaulting them if you are a pedophile. Most people realize what is going on after one or two sentences of talking with the person, if they even talk to them. All of the people that I know wouldn't talk to people who just randomly IM them or email them unless they know them personally.

Huge back flip [img]smilies/wink.gif[/img]

After receiving many MANY messages I am again willing to post all your pic as long as you are aware of all the possible repercussions. I personally love all the members’ pics and if I had my way I would have you all on the photo gallery. The only item I want Is that if you are young you first get your parents ok.
peace.

[img]smilies/smile.gif[/img]

[ October 01, 2003: Message edited by: Alkanoonion ]

Not so fast Alkanoonion.

There are killers and rapists on this site.

I know this because I'm one.

I've been spending hours every day reading and discussing Tolkien so I could find out where you guys live and then rape and kill you.

My other killer and rapist friends tell me it'd be easier to just go after somebody that I see on the street, but I know better.

It's much easier to waste hours reading and discussing a work of literature and then driving around cities trying to match one of the few thousand people with a picture than it is to arrange a meeting through a chatroom.

And no, I'm not being at all one tiny bit sarcastic.
[img]smilies/biggrin.gif[/img]
Does that include both room and board? If so, it'd almost be worth it to look for you. [img]smilies/wink.gif[/img]
Good call Alk.

Ah, I'm glad to hear that, Alk. [img]smilies/smile.gif[/img]

Well, first I argree with what Balin, burra, Nilly, Finwe and the phantom said (though I really am shocked, P, and to think I danced with you at the party [img]smilies/eek.gif[/img] ) But, my point was that the problems that are associated with chat rooms such as in the article Alk quoted, have to do with enticement. Pedophiles meet, talk dirty and/or seduce, then make private arrangements with minors. (So I've heard). So it still comes down to the minor's personal judgement (and the parents' attentiveness or lack thereof, in letting them out the door). On the other hand, there are brute rapists aplenty in the real world, I can't afford to be afraid to simply show my face there (and neither can minors.)

[ October 02, 2003: Message edited by: Diamond18 ]

Of course it does, but it wouldn't be any use, since I would never open my door for a Phantom. [img]smilies/biggrin.gif[/img]
But you won't find me anyway.
(*whistle* 'cause I'm sitt'n on top of the world...)

I think that you are so much more likely to be attacked on the street than over the internet (unless you are completely foolish and give out your personal info), much less on this site. And phantom...you crazy cad. [img]smilies/wink.gif[/img]

Well I am glad you changed your mind Alk. It would have been sad to have seen my photo (the most beautiful of all the Barrow-Downers photos ) go bye bye, for there would have been nothing left to look at in the gallery [img]smilies/wink.gif[/img]

I am happy though that you cared so much about the well being of the younger members of the forum.
Thanks [img]smilies/biggrin.gif[/img]

Yea that’s great Alka… not that it actually affected me but anyway that’s great! Oh and Ainaserkewen I must say I was happy that you mistook me for Diamond18, it was an honor! (Ok, ok! I know you didn’t mistake me for Diamond18 you just read the wrong names! But don’t say it, I would like to believe other!)

I would just like to add one last thing… Of all the cases I studied in Law School (I studied Homicide), I only studied two Internet cases the rest of the homicide cases I studied were either family members, close friends, drinks being spiked etc. And come on, if a Homicide Lawyer posts her picture up on Alka’s website it must say something!

Hey great pictures, people! Mattius looks fit [img]smilies/wink.gif[/img] [img]smilies/biggrin.gif[/img] .
I might send in a picture. I never look anything like them anyway, so I may as well. [img]smilies/biggrin.gif[/img]

Hmm...Alk, the link in your sig doesn't go to the BD photo gallery for me. It goes to a collection of drawings instead.

Cool photo album, very awesome.

Same here...

I'm very glad you're keeping the pictures up, Alk! I would love to send mine in, but my parents probably wouldn't let me :(. Although it would probably be a lot safer than having it on my own webpage, because that says my real name (hence why it's not in my profile), and I got permission to put it there. I'll keep my fingers crossed! Anyway, you all look great! Mattius, you look like the guy who plays Merry (I still can't spell his name!). Balin999, you do look like Elijah Wood, although not as much as my little brother does. ;)

Edit:Whoa! The BW looks a whole lot like my uncle, who also lives in Virginia. Scary...

That makes you the third person who thinks that I look like Elijah, though I never thought the same way. I guess your little brother resembles him more than I do.
But since I don't mind if people tell me I resemble him too, thanks for the compliment [img]smilies/smile.gif[/img]

Hey, sorry about the mix-up... honest mistake.

I was just worried that when people start to assume stuff, they get into trouble.

I've been around the internet alot and I know that bad things do happen.
I was really glad when I came to this site that there were so many rules and regulations about conduct and such. I may have jumped to a conclution about murderers being on this site, there probably isn't. But I've had bad experiences and learned my lessons the hard way. I'm just warning the assuming that anything can happen, if you let it.

ok this link should work until I can get home to fix the new page, this is an old version. This link should take you to the photo page