Dear Cloud researchers / cousins; As you probably know, I am the administrator for this Cloud surname email list as well as for the Cloud bulletin boards on rootsweb. That lofty title means nothing -- it is only something I undertook to help us all out. Many of you have done or are doing similar things. The reasons I write are: 1 - I want some input from you as to what can be done to: a. make the list and bulletin boards more useful b. increase the "traffic" on them so that there will be more information available to us. c. perhaps some "promotion" .... I am a total "dud" when it comes to charisma. The Dalton list has an eighty-year woman (Millicent Dalton) who does an absolute bang-up job .... makes me feel like a complete loser! ..... if anyone has any ideas and maybe wants to be the promoter, let me know. 2 - I want suggestions about: a. the various web sites we have for Cloud family histories .... specifically, I have attempted to make the site I maintain (http://mykindred.com/cloud) be a central "jumping-off" site, but I'm not pleased with it. b. do you have any suggestions for how we can better coordinate and integrate the various web sites and data together? 3 - WRT this email list, specifically, I would like some ideas for the "tag lines" that appear in sequence at the bottom of the emails from the list. There are ten "rotating" tag lines. I have chosen to put pointers there to three things -- the two mirror Cloud Family Association sites (1) http://homepages.rootsweb.com/~cloud, (2) http://mykindred.com/cloud and (3) to the genealogical kindness site (can't remember its exact name right now ... think it's "practice random acts of genealogical kindness" or something like that. ... soliciting suggestions for the utilization of the tag lines. Keep in mind as you mull over your suggestions: - all of this is done by volunteers, so creative cajoling is much more productive than being forceful. - many of the web sites are bought and paid for by the people who have their pages on them -- like the mykindred.com site. None of them, to my knowledge, are owned by the Cloud Family Association. Obviously, they aren't going to cotton to people telling them what to put on them. Once again, creative cajoling is the way to go. All of us, I think, share the same goals -- to make research easier for everyone and to find out more for ourselves and to meet new cousins -- so they might be very interested in anything that lets them feel their contributions are being used and appreciated. .... think about it and write me -- either on or off-list thanks, Tom Cloud