The Voice of Spalding and South Holland
A Facebook page which enables people to anonymously post photos, comments and rants about Spalding is proving hugely popular.
Spotted: Spalding has attracted more than 5,200 followers in less than a year.
Its cover page includes the tag line “Welcome to Spalding – turn your watch back 20 years!” and a photo of ‘Furry Dave’, the busker often seen in Hall Place.
All manner of subjects are covered on the page. Among the rants are poor customer service, bad driving and parking, dog control and anti-social behaviour. However, people also use Spotted: Spalding to praise good deeds and service, ask for recommendations and share news of family days and fundraising events.
And so many posts are being submitted for inclusion that the page’s two administrators can spend up to three hours a day on it.
Just three other people know their identities – their partners and Insp Jim Tyner, of Spalding Police.
Page founder Dave*: “The funniest thing for us both is sitting in a room whilst everyone discusses Spotted: Spalding with no idea they are sitting with the founders.
“We join in and share our views and enjoy being anonymous – similar to our posters.”
Dave and Bob* dropped their guard just a fraction to allow The Voice an insight into their world.
Dave said: “We’re friends aged 34 and 35, who were both brought up in Spalding.
“We still live here close to each other in the town centre. Both of us have families and jobs locally.”
The guys had the idea from other Spotted pages in the country, although they are not linked.
Dave said: “We originally started the page to share news, events and to give the people of Spalding a chance to air their views anonymously.
“We started it towards the end of last year. It got off to a fairly slow start and really took off when the car landed in the River Welland this spring.”
In fact the page’s 5,000th ‘like’ came as the duo were speaking to The Voice last week. Its phenomenal success has not surprised the guys, who insist that they have no plans to make any financial gain from their hobby.
Bob said: “We expected it to get this big.
“We feel people are often unwilling to give their opinion, sometimes through worry of offending, being ridiculed or ignored.
“This gives everyone an equal opportunity to express how they are feeling and give their views without concern.”
Some posts attract angry backlashes towards the administrators, but Spotted: Spalding insists it’s doing nothing wrong.
Dave said: “We get inundated with posts saying we are breaking the law. We are not.
“In a public place you can be photographed. We try to be responsible by blocking out faces and number plates etc.
“That isn’t because we have to, we just feel that is the fairest thing to do.”
He added: “We ditch any advertising ones and ones that are obviously untrue.
“We also have a problem with serious allegations. We don’t post these and advise the people in question to contact the police and provide numbers.”
Posts have been known to be taken down, but not just because a large number of respondents do not agree with the view. Spotted: Spalding insists that posts are someone’s opinion and they have the same right to express it as people have to reply.
“The most popular are always the most controversial,” said Bob.
Insp Tyner has the contact details of Spotted: Spalding’s administrators, who accept there is an important role to play.
Dave said: “We try to be responsible by directing people straight to the police if the post is serious.
“We understand how things can escalate and in the example of serious crime how this can affect police investigations.
“Also the impact social media can have if a case goes to court.”
The page gets upto about 40 messages a day.
Dave said: “It can sometimes get hectic. If something major has happened we can be managing the page for hours.
“On a normal day, though, we try to check through messages in the morning and this usually takes the longest as our busiest time is late at night. We usually check on our lunchbreaks, again at tea time and in the evening. On an average day it probably take two to three hours.
“Our partners are understanding. Well, they are to a certain point. At one stage the amount of time it was taking was affecting our families. We’ve got into a routine now, and everyone seems happy.”
Dave’s favourite post was a photo of a missing bike, with the poster asking for the local community to help.
The bike was recovered, leading to Insp Tyner leaving a comment on the post telling the owner to collect it from Spalding police station.
Dave said: “That’s an ace example of the community working.”
Bob admits to liking the drama of the page, but has also enjoyed posts asking for events that may be on that weekend.
He said: “I love that – small events would never get that amount of advertising for free and hopefully people find something to do with their families whilst supporting local charity events.”
Dave and Bob have recently created the “Spalding Jobs and Opportunities” page because they identified a demand from submitted posts.
Jim Tyner, Spalding’s Community Policing Inspector, said: “Spotted: Spalding is proving to be incredibly popular.
“It is another aspect of our Spalding community and, as such, it can sometimes reflect the strength of feeling about certain issues.
“The administrators have introduced a code of conduct and I know that they understand their responsibilities regarding people being ‘named and shamed’ jeopardising live criminal enquiries.
“As a Spalding resident, I occasionally look at the site and sometimes add a comment, but I do not monitor the site constantly.”
(* not their real names)
