At the very end of the 20th century I wrote to the Newcastle Emlyn Town Council and offered them a website for the town. The town didn’t have one and I said that I was prepared to pay for the cost of hosting and of development, if they would provide some copy, and allow me to put some advertising for Webs Wonder on it.
I heard nothing back from them for months, until early one Thursday evening, I got a call from the Town Clerk. He was just about to leave for the monthly Town Council meeting and sheepishly asked me, with reference to my letter to the Town Council, did my offer to create the website free of charge mean they wouldn’t have to pay anything? “Yes!” I said. “Totally free”. At last! I thought, the wheels of local government turn slowly, but they get there eventually. So I waited for a reply to my letter, and waited and waited, But none came. In fact, I’m still waiting to this day….
I was reminded of this strange incident years later when trawling through Council minutes on another matter. I found this entry from Thursday 15th February 2001:
“Newcastle Emlyn Town Council was informed that Mr Ken Jones has agreed to take responsibility of the Town Council’s Web site and has paid the license fee for the next two years which the Council would re-imburse.”
By then of course I’d taken the hint that they didn’t want my services – even for free! I launched the “independent town website”. The official website is at www.newcastleemlyn.com.
Since then, there have been three further redesign of the Newcastle Emlyn site. The latest one was launched this week. and It’s not just the look that has changed this time. I’m now running it in a CMS (Content Management System), which means I can update the pages and control the site more easily just using my web browser.
Click a screen shot to see a larger version. Visit the live site at
www.newcastle-emlyn.com
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