The Book of Proverbs has many things to say on this subject and most of it is summed up on one site - http://www.gotquestions.org/Proverbs-26-4-5.html
Paraphrasing Proverbs 26:4, George Carlin said "Never argue with a fool, as they will bring you down to their level and beat you with experience" while Mark Twain said "Never argue with a fool, onlookers might be able to spot the difference."
To me the KLHA member who came up with the gem to "save money and do away with the Media Officer" uttered the most foolish statement I have ever heard. It is people like this who have driven Hockey to stay in the Olympics by a mere 3 EC votes and unfortunately there are far too many of these kind of people in Hockey around the World.
Last week the Department for Sport and Recreation in South Africa threw a lavish banquet to honour Marsha Marescia on her 300th International, part of which was to gift her a car. Despite this extraordinary expenditure by the Government Department who give South African Hockey almost their entire budget, the President and CEO did not think it was worth issuing an official media release about the banquet. How stupid can you get? What will happen when they request more money from Government and get met with the reply "No, because you do not appreciate what we do for you."
Yes, you have been abused and grossly insulted by some of the most stupid people on the planet. Do not take out your anger on the fans of the sport or the sponsors in turn and punish them to show your anger. Remember last year that it was the Sponsors who asked for you to run the Official site after the MHC idiots snubbed you and they had to listen or risk losing the sponsorship.
The quality of your work was amply acknowledged by the 223 000 visitors to the Azlan Shah Cup site in the 10 days of the tournament who believed in your integrity. Listen to all those people and not the one oxygen thief from KLHA. Why sink to his level? He is only going to crow on how he was right that you cannot provide a reliable service when you shut down the most reliable and almost the only sites for information on Hockey in Malaysia.
By all means remove any reference to the MHC and their sponsors from the sites and run them as unofficial sites.
For years I have been trying to tell the FIH that a dedicated fan can outdo their inadequate efforts easily from the stands through a cellphone or a tablet device. Show this view to be 100% correct and approach the official sponsors of the event for funding to do so. The only thing the Sponsor is interested in is seeing their name attached to coverage of the tournament. Editors of the National print media are very careful to omit all such reference to the sponsor's name and the MHC is too stupid to berate them because of this. Tennis, Rugby, Golf, Formula 1 - all the big sports have got this right.
Play on this weakness in approaching the event sponsors for funding. If they don't want to pay don't mention them, but take pains to point out that nobody else ever mentions the fact that they sponsor the event. The backlash will soon hit the MHC.
Illegitimi non carborundum
