First Trink, then Stickman, who’s next?

[WorriedNoodle]

Political correctness aside, some of us (others who object or dont know can start their own thread!) over the decades have enjoyed a weekly smorgasbord of titillating trivia and occasionally thoughtful points about the goings on in and around Bangkok and other Thai tourist ghettos.

First there was Trink and then Stickman helped fill a small void of information with useful and useless facts to scan through over the weekend and relax over. A bit like watching a Coronation Street omnibus, irrelevant, nothing serious and enough to send you to sleep or relax after a hard week at the office.

Much like Trinks massage parlour recommendations for a good soapie with all the trimmings, from visa issues to b-jobs Stickman covers the lot and fills his blog with tarty looking girls of the week for which I am very grateful in this day and age.

So the question is, now he is leaving early next year, who is going to fill the space?

Edited August 4, 2014 by CharlieH

[AYJAYDEE]

i nominate you

[willyumiii]

I agree.

Stick will be missed.

I am in N.E. Thailand and have always wished he was not so Bongkok-centric.

He puts out an very good weekly.

The " icing on the cake" is his excellent photography.

He has always been great about answering emails and helping anyone who asks him. He has helped me on a couple of occasions.

I know the site is for sale and hope whoever gets it does as well as Stick on both content and photography.

For those of us up north, I hope the they will cover more of what this area is about as well.

.

It's still early, But ...Thanks for everything Stick and Choke dee in the future!

[KittenKong]

Go to any bar on Soi Buakow in Pattaya and you will find a hundred boring old farts spouting exactly the same pointless prattle that Trink and Stickman have been spouting for years.

Personally I am glad they are both leaving as that way I am much less likely to come across their inanities by accident.

[Bender]

Actually Stickman was talking to leave thailand for few years already, he was just keep delaying his departure.

I remember and love this sentence, something like that: "don't forget to leave thailand before it's too late"

I understand Stickman, we did move to thailand, when it was a great and real exciting place to live.

I have really great fond memory of bkk few years ago, now its completely fade, tasteless ... wish him good luck too!

funny thread about stickman, 10 years ago, http://www.thaivisa.com/forum/topic/18923-will-stickman-leave-thailand-soon/

and i was in my twenty.... luckily i will never be back

[ExpatJ]

Ill be sad to see stickman's weekly go. Will be the end of an era (without meaning to sound melodramatic!) for me in some ways since he arrived in Thailand about same time as my first job here and then I left and came back again a few years ago but i have followed his column over the years.

It should be a very lucrative website given the advertising and his readership with a good potential for more monetization - Stickman's Bar (i'd be willing to invest in that)!. I guess he is thinking of the future and wants his kids in future to go to decent schools (not having an expat package here in Thailand).

[samuibeachcomber]

Things are changing fast here since the army took over...........but i can see nothing detrimental to these changes so far.The good general comes across on camera very well and their TV station english sub titles are good.

i post this comment only assuming this guy stickman is seeing a different "wind of change" than i am.

[geronimo]

Go to any bar on Soi Buakow in Pattaya and you will find a hundred boring old farts spouting exactly the same pointless prattle that Trink and Stickman have been spouting for years.

Personally I am glad they are both leaving as that way I am much less likely to come across their inanities by accident.

It's not what he says, rather the way he says it.

[WorriedNoodle]

I know the site is for sale and hope whoever gets it does as well as Stick on both content and photography.

I do hope so, that Stick gets a good reward for his work and the buyers don't run the site into the ground.

[Neurath]

Me. After 16 wonderful years I'm off today for good. I'll miss some of it and some I won't.

[choochoo]

stick woiuld have more credibility if he stopped recommending bars with no customers...................lol.

Fun site!

[GuestHouse]

Go to any bar on Soi Buakow in Pattaya and you will find a hundred boring old farts spouting exactly the same pointless prattle that Trink and Stickman have been spouting for years.

Personally I am glad they are both leaving as that way I am much less likely to come across their inanities by accident.

Yes but they, like you, will pass their time in Thailand and be forgotten - Trink has left a mark of the language of expats in Thailand that will remain long after he is pushing up the daisies.

I suspect too, that in years to come when time and attitudes make their full circle, the record that Trink has made of Thailand's nightlife in the period upto the 90s will become a valuable historical and sociological resource.

[jacky54]

Stick is a top bloke, his photography is second to none and he is one of the nicest falangs you could meet here. I never understood his reverence for undesirables though. He often described one well known 'club' owner, actually a tacky brothel, as a 'gentleman' when actually he was a pool shark and then no better than a pimp who involved himself in shady dealings, was it fear or favour?

Stick did what he did very well and at least he has a great country to go back to, he probably got as much out of Thailand as he could. Hopefully he will either write a tell all book, or publish one of his great photo's. Good luck to him anyway, he is the real gentleman.

Edited August 4, 2014 by jacky54

[choochoo]

his photo skilss are ok. The problem is most of his hookers are not that good looking!

[Bulldozer Dawn]

Sticks content was great, but his coding skills are atrocious. There is money to be made by just renovating his site and getting rid of that horrible old white on black formating and other navigational problems. The layout of his site is a mess.

His website is worth 29,000 USD. What is he trying to sell it for?

http://www.checkwebsiteprice.com/searchResult.php?url=stickmanbangkok.com

[lingnoi34]

He is looking for a multiple of what its worth.

The website will not survive without him so it will be very hard to sell unless some sucker falls for it. He has been trying to find a buyer for several years but so far no luck.

L

Edited August 4, 2014 by lingnoi34

[sundrenched]

I like the 1990s html look of the site. It's easy on the eye and is cool in a retro way.

I always thought the girl of the week feature was borderline trollish. Many of them look like cheap tarts that I wouldn't touch with a stick, and there's even been a ladyboy.

I'll miss the parts of the site that I like though, mainly the weekly column, reader's email roundup, and reader's essays. Couldn't care less about the nightlife section.

I think content-wise someone could pull it off to take over the site, especially if it's a phased takeover where he still contributes for 1-2 years while the new guy proves his worth. A big impediment, however, is that it's seen as a sex website by Google so he can't get regular advertising. Personally I'd be happy to pay a small amount to subscribe, provided the content is there, but all said I can see why people aren't jumping to take over the site.

Edited August 4, 2014 by sundrenched

[KittenKong]

Yes but they, like you, will pass their time in Thailand and be forgotten - Trink has left a mark of the language of expats in Thailand that will remain long after he is pushing up the daisies.

I suspect too, that in years to come when time and attitudes make their full circle, the record that Trink has made of Thailand's nightlife in the period upto the 90s will become a valuable historical and sociological resource.

Possibly. But to me it all just seems like the ramblings of an inebriate.

[Ace of Pop]

Trink was a one off,he never seemed the same after his Son died of Cancer.Unless one has met Him , dont judge Him.

[KittenKong]

He often described one well known 'club' owner, actually a tacky brothel, as a 'gentleman' when actually he was a pool shark and then no better than a pimp who involved himself in shady dealings, ........

Compared to many expats (and locals) here the club owner does indeed sound like a perfect gentleman.

[jacky54]

He often described one well known 'club' owner, actually a tacky brothel, as a 'gentleman' when actually he was a pool shark and then no better than a pimp who involved himself in shady dealings, ........

Compared to many expats (and locals) here the club owner does indeed sound like a perfect gentleman.

He was a criminal, hopefully not many expats get up to what he did.

[KittenKong]

Unless one has met Him , dont judge Him.

Surely the whole point of people who put their lives and thoughts on a website is that one doesn't need to meet them to judge them?

[KittenKong]

He was a criminal, hopefully not many expats get up to what he did.

I think plenty do, and much worse.

[thailiketoo]

Go to any bar on Soi Buakow in Pattaya and you will find a hundred boring old farts spouting exactly the same pointless prattle that Trink and Stickman have been spouting for years.

Personally I am glad they are both leaving as that way I am much less likely to come across their inanities by accident.

And what pointless prattle would that be? Like you would have any idea but what the heck have a crack at answering a question that belies your real intent of bashing without content but I'm willing to be proven wrong. Specifics remember the devil is in the details...

[MrWorldwide]

OK - I've read his column pretty much every week for over a decade - if that sounds sad, then you obviously havent had the withdrawal symptoms I suffered as a weekend warrior. Anyway, that's all behind me now and these are my thoughts:

- Stick definitely changed after the John Galt fiasco. He was outed very publicly and - I believe - the knives came out from some of the sadder keyboard warriors out there. I guess that's part and parcel of any commentators life but it got very personal.

- Stick was a regular poster on another Thai-based board, where he was a personal friend of the board's owner and got on very well with several of the regulars. That all changed after the Galt episode and he became very thin-skinned - another public exchange on the board and I believe that friendship was kaput. The board owner in question is one of the nicest guys you could hope to meet, but stick was more interested in comparing site revenues in his parting jab - to my mind, a low blow for the owner of a site in decline, particularly when it was someone he had previously counted as a friend and a site he openly recommended to his readers.

- if you go back and read some of his weekly columns from 12-18 months back it's clear that he was grappling with the fact that his readership - and his advertisers - insisted that he focus on the nightlife. He has published a couple of columns on places like Lumpini Park - complete with some great shots - but inevitably he has to go back to some Godforsaken dump like Patpong and post photos of the women in Bar XXXX. I believe that this, more than anything, has changed him. Most of us know what it feels like to be trapped in a given job - Stick cant just wander off and start photographing temples for a living, at least not in Thailand.

- I agree with others that he periodically contradicts himself in print, and I also agree that he has displayed a different attitude to the lowlife element when he's interviewing a 'colorful Bangkok identity' than in his usual rants, but what stands out for me is that he seems to pine for the Bangkok/Thailand he staggered into as a newbie off the plane from NZ back in the mid-90s. For all their (many) faults, those Bangkok characters were a big part of what made his early years so much more interesting than if he'd gone somewhere else to teach English.

- if I remember nothing else from Stickman's weekly column, it'll be piece he wrote after his friend Blackie died. For the wowsers on this board, Blackie's story is the ultimate cautionary tale of a man who came to Thailand with a lot of money and no family, blew the lot on the usual suspects and died with very little to show for any of it. For those of us with a little imagination, I think Stick's obit bought the man to life - it wasn't overly sentimental but it had heart and it was clear that he missed someone who had made his weekends seem larger than life.

No surprises that he's flagged 'first quarter 2015' for his departure - trying to convince advertisers to stay with the site in the lowest of low seasons must be an interesting experience and I can only assume that he will have to progressively hand over to the new owner if and when the site is sold next year. I wish him every success and I hope life back in NZ is everything he's hoping for after so many years in Thailand.

[thailiketoo]

I don't know the man but agree with the above and add I noticed a difference that seemed to have something to do with his woman and then she was gone. I used to read him weekly but stopped when he jumped on the anti punter bandwagon.

Edited August 5, 2014 by thailiketoo

[choochoo]

I like the 1990s html look of the site. It's easy on the eye and is cool in a retro way.

I always thought the girl of the week feature was borderline trollish. Many of them look like cheap tarts that I wouldn't touch with a stick, and there's even been a ladyboy.

I'll miss the parts of the site that I like though, mainly the weekly column, reader's email roundup, and reader's essays. Couldn't care less about the nightlife section.

I think content-wise someone could pull it off to take over the site, especially if it's a phased takeover where he still contributes for 1-2 years while the new guy proves his worth. A big impediment, however, is that it's seen as a sex website by Google so he can't get regular advertising. Personally I'd be happy to pay a small amount to subscribe, provided the content is there, but all said I can see why people aren't jumping to take over the site.

the sex content iswhat i go to stickman for..................lol. Bacara has banned girl from using phones in the bar, for ex, i learned from reading his column. Thing is i never noticed overuse of phones in baccara.

Go to a Rainbow some girls do nothing but play with their phones.

[Ulysses G.]

- Stick definitely changed after the John Galt fiasco.

I used to follow him faithfully before that, but lost interest when he went off-line for a while. John Galt really hurt Stick's brand.

Edited August 5, 2014 by Ulysses G.

[KarenBravo]

Was a Sunday evening ritual for me.

[brewsterbudgen]

Good writer, great photographer and invaluable bar news/gossip. I can't stand the readers' emails as they spout the usual nonsense but, unlike here, with no right to reply. If/when he goes, I'll miss it.