History of Hunt Talk

The good old days.....😂

I don't even know where to begin with that!
 
Outstanding, I had no idea this forum had such a colorful history. I do know that one way members can help this forum is to use this Amazon link whenever they place an order.

https://www.amazon.com/?tag=onyouownadv-20

@BigFin has a portal for Amazon's sporting goods type category posted elsewhere on the forum, but it's very simple to just replace your bookmark with the short URL above or maintain it in your browser history for easy recall whenever you use Amazon. A small, probably very small portion of the sale should support the forum. But it all adds up in the end. Forums are expensive to maintain and every little bit should help.

FWIW, I've never met Randy and he didn't ask me to promote this Amazon URL by any means whatsoever. I found the longer sporting goods link on the forum and knew from my IT experience that it could be shortened to a tag that could be used on the main Amazon page. I've done it many times already.
 
That was back when Moosie was sheriff and the west was really wild.....lol Ol Moosie could throw down with the best of them !
 
In December 2008, Moosie called me and asked if I wanted to buy Hunt Talk. I think he offered it to some others before that who were smart enough to know that it is a money losing proposition. Since I had recently embarked on filming a season of hunts for TV in 2008 that were geared toward self-guided public land hunting and since the outdoor media industry thought I was a fool for thinking such idea would have any appeal, I decided I needed to have some outlet for people who saw hunting the way I saw it. Hunt Talk had the largest number of people I knew of that felt that way.

So, when Moosie offered it to me for the outstanding balance on his credit card, plus an additional $250 dollars, plus inviting him to one of our camps on a future hunt, I decided to do it. I was happy and his wife was happy, or so she said.

I took over in February 2009. Unknown to me, Moosie was running another side show business out the back door of Hunt Talk, a soon to be embarrassing revelation to me. Upon finding out such was going on, I immediately closed that portion of the server/site and lost about 80% of the traffic. But, those who stayed were the kind of people I wanted to have as the nucleus of this site.

Some have moved on to allocate their time to more of the things responsible adults do. Some still drop in once in a while and share a story or comment on the wild old days of Moosie's Hunt Talk. A couple were tossed, thinking that a registration prior to me taking ownership exempted them from the rules the forum would operate under; rules being fairly uncommon in the Moosie days.

We've now been through three different software platforms, two different tech firms, and still haven't figured out how to make it pay for itself. Yet, it is a very useful platform to help deliver the business WHY; "To promote self-guided public land hunting and create advocates for the cause."

Moosie and I still stay in touch as we can. I'm waiting for him to to get super rich with his camo company so he can buy it back from me at a large profit I can show Mrs. Fin and save face with her as the financially responsible adult she thought she had married.


Hey thanks for droppin in an giving us newbies a peek at how it started.
 
It has to do with a forum segment where guys were sharing pics that have no place on a hunting forum. I kept getting requests for the PW and link to the adult section. I told them they were on the wrong website, this was about hunting.

Finally I called Moosie to ask if he got these crazy requests. After he stopped his roar of laughter, the conversation went something like this.....

Moosie, with laughs and snickers, "You don't have access to that?"

Fin, as serious as an accountant,
"Access to what?"

Moosie, still laughing, "To the private adult forum. Some guys wanted that, so I put so&so (can't remember the member's name, as I toasted his account immediately) in charge of it. He manages that."

Long pause from Fin..."WTF are you talking about?"

Moosie now still laughing but trying to restrain and not piss off Fin anymore than he already is, "Dang, I thought you knew. I would have told you, but just assumed you knew. Here's the PW. You can access it from the Admin Panel."

Fin, now realizing his two weeks of owning Hunt Talk has him implicated in Moosie's shenanigans, "Well, that explains a lot of things."

Click.

Fin's first call is to his attorney. Next call is to the tech firm with instructions to take down that part of the forum and rebuild the database on a new server, without any images, causing us to lose a lot of the oldest images in the forum threads.

Moosie called the next day, "Dude, man, I'm so sorry. I thought you knew."

Fin, "(a lot of non-repeatable words that formed a lecture to Moosie about business risk, reputation, and internet laws. All the while Moosie was laughing and chuckling)."

Traffic went down 80%+ over the next few weeks. My email was full of messages that the "other private forum" wasn't working. I never responded, just deleted their accounts.

And Moosie and I are still good friends, even after that.

😁 😁 😁
 
I was on here in the old days using the name BeanMan. Although I never visited the secret room I couldn’t log back on as BeanMan when I came back so now I am using Phaseolus, which is the Genus name of dry beans. it was pretty wooly when I left.
 
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I was on here in the old days using the name BeanMan. Although I never visited the secret room I couldn’t log back on as BeanMan when I came back so now I am use Phaseolus, which is the Genus name of dry beans. it was pretty wooly when I left.


Funny, I didn't know anybody grew dry beans in EOM. ;)


I lurked on the forum for a couple years before signing up. A good friend was a frequent poster but frankly I didn't care for the forum's vacuous hubris, high-fiving and the distinct lack of meaningful conversation. I see no reason to celebrate the past here. HuntTalk and it's members are in a much better place now, IMO.
 
It seems like there would have been money to be made with 80% of the traffic going to this private forum. Really could have monetized that in the last 11 years. The internet was such a different place in 2009.
 
Good to see so many people remember me. I still have people asking if I'm the "MOOSIE FROM HUNTTALK" from time to time when I introduce myself at the Hunt Expos. Getting to be fewer and fewer though, so time for me to resurface. Well, that, and I like to raise Randy's Blood pressure.

The Original Hunttalk had some great times and it was a "bit" wild. The "Moosie and @IDBUGLER" adventures were the best. (For the time's they were.... BigFin, You're the best now ;) )
 
A good friend was a frequent poster but frankly I didn't care for the forum's vacuous hubris, high-fiving and the distinct lack of meaningful conversation. I see no reason to celebrate the past here. HuntTalk and it's members are in a much better place now, IMO.

Vacuous hubris - I salute your verbiage, sir.
 
It seems like there would have been money to be made with 80% of the traffic going to this private forum. Really could have monetized that in the last 11 years. The internet was such a different place in 2009.

It went to Tumblr... then BigFin killed the fun there too ;)
 
Funny, I didn't know anybody grew dry beans in EOM. ;)


I lurked on the forum for a couple years before signing up. A good friend was a frequent poster but frankly I didn't care for the forum's vacuous hubris, high-fiving and the distinct lack of meaningful conversation. I see no reason to celebrate the past here. HuntTalk and it's members are in a much better place now, IMO.
Live on EOM, ran the states Foundation Seed Program out of CSU’s Fruita Research Center & 19 and L
 
Use Promo Code Randy for 20% off OutdoorClass

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