FREE GOSSIP, SCANDAL, LAUGHS AND HOURS OF AMUSEMENT FOR DOOYOOERS (hotshotsdesigns.co.uk/tooyoo/)

Member Name: goodasgold

Product:	hotshotsdesigns.co.uk/tooyoo/
Date:	28/05/02 (343 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: get to know other members, fun, personal guest book, can bring issues out of the dooyoo comment boxes

Disadvantages: too time consuming!

Some of us live here. Some pop in now and again. Others have sadly never entered the world of tooyoo. If you are one of these latter specimens, read particularly carefully…

Ok, the now marvellously (in)famous (!) dooyoo member IloveJackDaniels, who has recently joined the dooyoo hall of fame, made these for us. Each dooyoo member can have one, and as of today, there are 248 members who have signed up. That’s a pretty large number… But few in comparison to the number of members dooyoo actually has, so the word needs to be spread….


*What are the tooyoo guest books??

They are, or are what could be, your own personal guest book for other members to leave messages for you. They thus also provide an opportunity for you to contact members. They are free, contain no advertising, and provide an opportunity for you to get more closely involved with the dooyoo community, and to meet and get to know fellow members.

*How do I get one??

Follow the website link, and register. Simple as that. No forms to fill in. Sign up with your dooyoo user name and you’ll be ready to run riot on tooyoo.

*Why would I want one??

One of the things that keeps drawing people back to dooyoo is the community spirit that exists here. Most members have their own unique, personal style of writing, tastes and interests, and through a persons opinions you become familiar with their own little ways and personalities. Through the comment boxes of the opinions you may become friendly with members, and gradually as you become familiar with the ways of dooyoo you start to make friends and build up your COF too.

I find it hard to remember what dooyoo was like before the guest books were introduced – I had got to know some cool people, and we would have a laugh and write stupid comments on each others opinions etc (just occasionally, of course ;-)), and I enjoyed myself on the site. However, we must re
member that the messages left on the comment boxes should be related to the opinion we have rated. There is also a limit in what you can say and convey through the comment boxes – you often see banter between members, but rarely a proper conversation.

This is where the guest books come in. If you or someone else has a problem, or you want to ask a member about a matter, or just want to generally get to know other members, tooyoo gives you a space, to do this. There are some things that you may not want to appear in the dooyoo comment boxes – a dispute about a rating for example. The guest books hence also provide an area where issues like this can be discussed properly.

*What goes on in tooyoo??

What goes on?? What doesn’t go on is more like it!!

1. Conversation and chat

You have two options when you sign in – you can be invisible… or you can be, well, er, visible. By checking the invisible box, other members will not be able to see that you are on tooyoo. If you don’t check this box, your name will appear along the top, along with all the other people’s who are on tooyoo at the same time. This means that you can instantly see who is available to talk to if you want to get in touch with someone. This means that there is always conversation going on somewhere, and the general message area provides for a free for all, where anyone can chip in. It’s common that people will just leave a message on your book saying “Hello!” with a big smiley face after it that looks like it’s got a pair of Y-fronts for teeth if they see you online at the same time as them.

When I first joined up, I got messages from complete strangers who were welcoming me to my guest book – I thought it was strange that people would keep insisting on welcoming me to something that was already mine, but it was nice all the same – and most of them are no longer strangers! Yo
u will meet some really great people on there and although I’m not going to name many people here (for one reason because there are so many characters on there that you would need an opinion just to cover them!), Juliemaker is a prime example of one of the lovely people who are regularly popping in to say hi and to see how you are doing! I’ve got to meet so many people who I may not have had the chance to on dooyoo, and some of which I now speak to on a regular basis.

The usual way for these conversations or just general hellos to be carried out is by leaving the message on the intended reader’s guest book. On dooyoo, we reply to comments on the same comment page. On tooyoo, you generally leave the comments on the other person’s book. It may look like that you are having a conversation to yourself on another member’s book, but don’t worry, this is how it’s mostly done!!

In addition, there is also a link to the chatroom where there are normally a number of members who are all very friendly and willing to chat about, er, all manner of subjects ;-)

Just thought I'd say a thank-you to everyone who's left nice messages on my guest book - ta, and thanks if you're one of the people I regularly talk to too.

2. Laughs

To start with, people generally come on tooyoo for a laugh. Tooyoo is a light-hearted place for everyone to mix together – it does not have the atmosphere of other similar sites, as everyone is connected by their membership and love of dooyoo, and feels a sense of responsibility to the other members.

I’ve got to mention another two people here: Ozzy01 and Jimblob.

These are two people who I hadn’t heard of on dooyoo, but who I ‘see’ in one form or another quite frequently!! Ozzy01 optimises the friendly and relaxed atmosphere on tooyoo, and makes fantastic use of all those little faces we have at our disposal ;-).
Gone are the :-) and :-( and in are the ….. hey – if you don’t know you’ll just have to go and see, wont you??! Little Miss Ozzy runs about the site madly greeting everyone and anyone, leaving huge smiley faces, all over our guest books, often accompanied by chirpy, sassy messages frequently smacking of girl power, and can’t fail to bring a smile to your face. Jimblob also provides a large part of the entertainment on the general message area, and has demonstrated an incredible ability to spurt amazingly wicked poetry (or perhaps ‘poetry’?) at the drop of a hat in the process, often encouraged by his partner in crime, Auldmac. In my mind, tooyoo is the place for a lot of the sillyness, chatting, and joking that you just can’t do on dooyoo, and everyone is on there to break up a dull day at work, or for something to do if they are bored etc etc. The faces that are left all over people’s books are funny enough on their own, but you’re guaranteed some laughs, especially with the people you have already become acquainted with on dooyoo..

3. The spread of information

Tooyoo is a focal point for dooyoo members. It therefore makes sense that any new developments, or any issues that need to be drawn to people’s attention, or news etc lands up, or now originates on tooyoo. Basically, if you’re not in, you could be left out. News spreads faster when everyone is close together, so the enhanced community spirit and the increased virtual physical closeness of all the members’ means that it is easier for everyone to keep up to date on dooyoo related things, be it community aspects or site developments, if they are part of tooyoo.



If you have yet to join tooyoo, you may well be getting worried now, and have thoughts running through your head of crazy people going mad and leaving ridiculous messages full of faces with underpants in their mouths all over the place. Howe
ver, your guest book is whatever you want it to be. You can even choose the colours of it (and there are some choice colours out there, I can tell you!) so it’s your space. If you want to delete messages from people, you can. If you want it to be private, it can be private. If you don’t want to become involved too much on the site, you don’t have to.

Come and go as you please, leave messages to as many or as few members as you want, and paint it grotesque colours if that’s to your fancy also. Tooyoo is for your own personal use. Pop in occasionally to check for any messages, or stay all day and leave a ‘hello’ in every member’s guest book – it’s your choice, everyone uses it differently according to what they want from it, time restrictions etc. All I say is give it a try – you wont know until you’ve tried it….. and you wont see those smiley faces either…!!!!

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