A fight for the freedom of speech: bring back the BBC's 606 message boards.

On 1st June 2006 the UKs biggest online football debate was destroyed by the BBC. We, the members of the BBC's 606 football debate forum, are extremely unhappy about the recent changes that have taken place and are forming a petition as a way of protest to inform the BBC that we would like the forum to return to its old format.

For those interested, the forum can be found here: www.bbc.co.uk/606

The changes made to the boards in recent days have essentially killed all form of discussion between football fans. The new format means that only the BBCs staff can post new threds of discussion on the website, meaning fans cannot actually discuss what they would like to. The posting of new threds of discussion has been sparse and this has driven numerous posters away from the site.

One of the primary things that has outraged so many fans is that there were lots of small communities that had been developed on the site on individual message boards for different football clubs. The BBC has removed these message boards, thus also removing the communities. The BBC has said that it will now consider reinstating boards for different divisions, as of the week beginning the 5th of June. But they will still continue to control users in an unreasonable manner, not allowing them to start their own threds. Other message boards on the BBC have not been subject to such censorship and thus we feel the football users has been unjustifiably punished.

Admittedly, the 606 boards have suffered from rival fans winding each other up with abusive posts. Some users of the message boards have admitted that they did not mind such posts, and would rather have the old boards back. However it is a problem on the boards. The BBC decided to ask the users of the system what they would like to happen in the future. Numerous good suggestions were made. However, the BBC did not comment on any of them, or indeed listen to them. It appears that they made their own minds up of how to best solve the problem.

We would like to note that they have not solved the problem of wind up messages. Users who get banned can just sign up for a new account all you need is an email address and a name. Yes it is that easy! Why they feel the need to kill all discussion on the board and not solve the basic problem of wind up posts is beyond belief!

These changes have led to a digital uprising within the 606 community, and all rival football fans have been united in their feelings towards the BBC.

We hold Chris Russell of the BBC responsible for these changes and for not listening to what the real fans would like to see happen to their forums. We want Chris Russell to admit the mistakes he has made and reinstate the old system, but with some added improvements to the way in which users sign up, thus preventing users that are band from signing up for a new account. If the BBC cannot manage to make such changes at the moment we suggest they employ the people that can.

Please join us in our fight for freedom!