Randy, as a fairly new member around here, this idea occurred to me when I was reading the following post, about the Flyer Talk community:
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/Forum94/HTML/001926.html

This is your "house" so this seems a more sensible place to raise this as a stand-alone thread. I am sure there will be comment on my suggestion either positive or negative that will guide your thinking on the merit of the proposal.

droneklax said: I'd like to see an "age" feature somewhere (other bulletin boards have it), because I do not want to argue with a 13 year old - I am beginning to suspect that this is what is happening to me right now in another thread".

I have opined several times a REAL e-mail address should be the bare MINIMUM for anyone to post here. It might stop some of the flames, such as the present "Eurotrash" one for instance. And of course the "MileageGod69" outrage of this week. (And I personally feel dual and multi "personalities" should also be banned or at least actively frowned upon).

Whether requiring age is intruding too much into people's privacy, I am not sure. Others will I am sure have views on that.

One thing that I will pass on is the comment that the present policy of flagging newbies to this board as "Junior" members is perhaps a term that may be looked at amending.

I recall lurking on this board for a while and being surprised to read posts from "Junior" members that were taking daily round trip 1st Class flights and staying at Hiltons and Sheratons 200 nights a year!

After a while the penny dropped. These were not 14 year old kids, but more like the CEO of some companies here. Likewise the "FT Evangelist" rating ... took me a search of the archive to find out what that meant - did seem like a curious choice of term to me. But attracting senior and educated new posters to these boards and labelling them as "Juniors" or "Evangelists" may not be the correct terms.

Perhaps the term "New Member" or something might be more applicable?

Likewise the other levels.

Seeing we are all totally familiar with the Silver and Gold and Platinum type Frequent Flyer scheme levels, it might be worth considering re-rating members here along those schemes. As a mere suggestion:

Up to 100 posts - Silver.

100 - 500 posts - Gold.

500 - 1,500 as - Platinum.

and the Docs or Rudis or Catmans or Premexs etc with many more postings should surely rate a Plutonium or Diamond rating or whatever! Maybe:

1,500 - 3,000 rates - Diamond.

Look at any of the eBay chat boards for instance. Each poster is rated on this sort of basis. It is clear at a glance who the senior members of that "community" are. eBay chat boards get 10,000s of posts a day. The system works well.

This board now copes with colour "Smilies" and may be able to cope with a Gold or Platinum star etc next to each poster if Randy & Co choose to look at the idea? Maybe do little plastic credit like cards for those who reach higher tiers and offer to anyone who wants them for 5 bucks or whatever to cover shipping and manufacture etc - like FF cards, or maybe a FF luggage tag coded as to level?! A few of the people here would see these tags on cabin or checked baggage and "put a face to a name".

Just my 2¢ from "Down Under"!


[This message has been edited by ozstamps (edited 07-31-2000).]