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Family Garden Trains^TM Roundtable Discussion Forum Signup Sheet

The FamilyGardenTrains.com^TM Roundtable Discussion Forums provide "safe places" for hobbyists to discuss garden railroading and related topics.

Signing up for the forums also automatically signs you up for our e-mail Family Garden Trains^TM newsletter, unless you're already signed up, of course.

New Internet Requirements for European Readers New regulations in Europe require us to make doubly sure that our European members really meant to sign up and didn't just get signed up by accident. They also require anyone who has European members to explain exactly how their information is used. We've done that all along, and will continue to do so. However, we have tweaked the Q&A below slightly to make certain we are in compliance.

Why Do I Have to Tell You Who I Am?

For two reasons:

I get hundreds of fake signup requests a month, sometimes using real people's e-mail addresses without their knowledge. These waste my time with bogus questions and sometimes result in me unintionally spamming real people who have no interest in our content - even to the point where we've been blocked from sending our newsletters to real people who signed up on purpose. To say nothing of wasting countless hours of my time that I would rather spend working on my railroad or creating fresh content.
I am wholely committed to keeping the Roundtable discussion groups safe, friendly and family-friendly for real people. If I trust fakers, sooner or later they start using their fake identities to say nasty things to other members or to post ads for nasty products.

Will People Start Bothering Me After I Sign Up?

Unlike 99.9% of the mailing lists out there, we will not start deluging you with daily "special offers." No salesman will call. Your contact information will not be given to anyone else. No unsolicited advertisements or other spam will be e-mailed to you.

Do I HAVE to get the Family Garden Trains^TM Newsletter?

Yes. We have tried keeping the lists separate, but it makes twice as much work for maybe 2% of our members. In addition, we occasionally use the newsletters for announcements about the forums, so you would miss those announcements otherwise.

What does the Family Garden Trains^TM Newsletter Contain?

Our newsletters may contain:

Links to new or updated articles we post,
Links to articles on other sites that we think you will find helpful
Tips about things you could (or maybe should) be doing at that time of year to improve your garden railroad experience
News items about garden railroading manufacturers, trends, and events

How Often Does the Family Garden Trains^TM Newsletter Come?

Our original plan was to send a newsletter once a month. But sometimes life gets in the way and we have to skip a month or more. We will never send you more than one newsletter every four weeks.

Will the Mailing List be used for Anything Else?

If our team members are participating in a garden or model railroading event that is in your region, we may give you a heads-up about that by e-mail. However we almost never remember to do that, so you're probably safe on that score. :-)

How Will I Know If My Signup Worked?

I add you to both lists manually - to keep from introducing bad people into the discussion forums. When I add you in, usually within 48 hours, I'll send you an e-mail with your user name and a temporary password.

How Much Do the Newsletter and Forum Membership Cost?

At this time, they are both free. However, if we continue to have trouble with fake signups and related issues, we may start charging a nominal fee of $1 a month - that's the only thing we have found that keeps all scammers and spammers away; they never spend their own money.

We have set up a PayPal button on the next page in case you want to start supporting us this way now. But if you sign up now with accurate and complete information, your forum membership and newsletter subscription will continue to be free for you indefinitely.

What Happens if I Unsubscribe?

We understand that interests change and life takes unexpected turns. If you prefer to stop participating in our discussion forums for any reason at all, please let us know using the "Unsubscribe" link we include near the top of each newsletter, or use our contact page. We will take you out of the forums as soon as practical. If you have requested to unsubscribe from the newsletter, we will try to take you off the mailing list before our next issue comes out.

As always, you may continue to access all of our articles absolutely free and to contact us with any question at all, whether or not you are "on our list."

Usually we put unsubscribers' e-mail address in a sort of "do not call" file, so if someone tries to resubscribe them later, we know to make extra sure the request is deliberate. Yes, this has happened.

If you request that we remove all trace of your information from our systems and files, we can do that for you as well. In fact, if you live in Europe, that's the ordinary procedure. Just promise you won't get upset if you accidentally subscribe again and start getting newsletters (yes, it has happened, several times).

What About US Mail Options?

In addition, we occasionally have the opportunity to send information by US mail (usually once a year or less). This may include information of regional interest or product catalogs supplied by our advertisers. If you want to occasionally receive such mailings, please check the "yes" box after the US mail question. Again, we will not sell or give this information to anyone else, but if a manufacturer such as PIKO or MTH gives us materials to send out to our readers, we will forward them to you. We don't have a "US mail" version of the newsletter, though.

What if I Have Other Questions?

If you have any questions about signing up for the forum or newsletter, please use our contact page. If you have questions about garden railroading topics, please put them into the comment box in the form below.

You may also contact us by surface mail through:

Thanks, and happy railroading,

Paul Race

FamilyGardenTrains.com^TM

Your First Name (Required)	Your Last Name (Required)	Your email address (Required)	Your email address again, just to be sure (Required)
The User Name/Nickname that you want to use on the FamilyGardenTrains.com Roundhouse Discussion forum. You will have to type this exactly to log in every time, including capitals, spaces, and punctuation, so make it easy to type right the first time every time. (Required)

Do you use a spam-blocking mechanism that blocks all messages from unknown senders?(See note at bottom of page.)

Yes No
Street Number and Street Name (Required)

Your City or Town
(Required)
Your State
(Required)
Your Zip Code
(Required)
Your Country
(Required)

Membership Standards - Because our first priority is keeping this site safe for all honest, courteous people who want to participate, please tell us whether you agree that:

Your interest in joining this forum is to discuss the hobbies and related topics this forum was created to support.
You will treat other members with courteousy and respect, on and off this forum.
You will refrain from advertising products - even related products - without previous permission of the site moderator. (We gladly promote the web pages and products of members who are truly supporting the site with information, tips, and resources. But we don't want folk signing up JUST so they can keep promoting their Etsy listings or something.)
You understand that providing incomplete or fraudulent information during the signup may cause your registration to be deleted without notice or cause your membership to be terminated if it is discovered later.
You will not take credit for or resell our members' contributions even off the forum.
You understand that your participation here is by invitation of the site moderator and can be terminated at any time if the moderator determines that you have violated these membership standards.

I agree to abide by the Membership Standards in the above list (Required):


Yes	No

Are you already subscribed to the Family Garden Trains^TM newsletter using the e-mail address described above? (This is just to keep you from getting duplicate e-mails.)

Yes No

If you have already subscribed to the Family Garden Trains^TM newsletter using a different e-mail address than the one you entered above, please enter that e-mail address here so I can sync up your account.

Would you like to receive (by US Mail) any Garden Railroading-related mailings or product catalogs that become available (usually about once a year)?

Yes No

What kinds(s) of railroad would you like to model? (Optional, check all that apply)

No Preference
or Undecided US Narrow
Gauge US Standard
Gauge European
Metre Gauge US 24"
Industrial
Lehmann European
Standard Gauge

Other Modeling Interest(s)

Do you have any Large Scale Trains? (Optional, check all that apply)

No AristoCraft Bachmann USA
Trains LGB/
Lehmann MTH Accucraft/
AMS Lionel

Other Large Scale Train Brand(s)

If you have a working Garden Railroad, how long has it been operating? (Optional)

Under 1 Year 1 to 3 Years 3 to 6 Years Over 6 Years

If you don't have a working Garden Railroad, how soon might you be building one? (Optional)

Already Have One Under 1 Year 1 to 2 Years 2 to 4 Years Over 4 Years Don't Know

Please Describe Your Interest in Garden Trains (Required) Please enter at least a one-sentence comment describing your interest in garden trains and explaining why you want to be part of this discussion group. Be specific. Scammers usually enter something like "Nice site; I'll tell my friends." That's one way we identify them. Leaving a blank or vague entry in this field will delay or disqualify your application for membership.

Please Enter Any Questions - If you have a question at this time, please enter it here, and we'll get back to you as soon as we can.

Before You Hit Submit: Please go back over the form and make certain you have filled out every required field with accurate information. Our software does not catch all of the missing fields, so it's possible to submit an incomplete form. Most scammers do, and that's one way we identify them. Please make certain your form is complete.

*Note: Unfortunately, in addition to the many reader questions we answer every month, we get a certain number of questions and signups from people who are nevertheless use systems that keep our e-mails from getting through to them. If you use a system that rejects e-mails from all unknown senders automatically, please let us know in the comment area how you've made provision for our e-mails to get to you without us having to jump through hoops. Thanks - Paul &c

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Note: Family Garden Trains^TM, Garden Train Store^TM, Big Christmas Trains^TM, BIG Indoor Trains^TM, and BIG Train Store^TM are trademarks of Breakthrough Communications (www.btcomm.com). All information, data, text, and illustrations on this web site are Copyright (c) 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020 by Paul D. Race. Reuse or republication without prior written permission is specifically forbidden.
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Family Garden TrainsTM Roundtable Discussion Forum Signup Sheet