Originally Posted by
cblaisd
The remit, description, structure, and protocols of the forum were explicitly approved by the Community Director. The forum is functioning exactly as she intended it, I believe.
The first point is not in question; the second point has been questioned by others in this thread. As to the Community Directors' viewpoint, I wouldn't personally dare be so bold as to speak on her behalf.
Originally Posted by
cblaisd
Yes (to revisit the issue that was raised before) such posts could be in other hotel/destination forums but a) they would be much harder to search for (do I search for "smoke," "smoking," "smoker," or ??); and, b) the mods in other forums would get to clean up off-topic posts that posts/threads about smoking almost always generate.
I get your point but I don't think searching for smoke related terms is any less or more difficult in the hotel and destination forums - it really is a matter of what key words you use and obviously knowing which hotel/venue you are interested in does help. The hotel forums contain incredibly useful property indices which helps navigation immeasurably, so an alternative to the smoking forum might be as simple as adding smoking policies to specific hotel thread wikis. Easy to add, super easy to update.
Originally Posted by
cblaisd
The forum is a useful and successful (judging from page views, as noted) forum that well-complements the library of information that is FlyerTalk.
That is a very narrow view of FlyerTalk, IMHO. I see FT as a travel discussion place first and foremost, the "library" aspect is purely an positive by product but first you need enough eyes on the forum to sustain the discussion. A handful of pamphlets does not make a library, and page views do not automatically equate to a successful forum - The Ansett Australian Global Rewards forum still gets page views despite being closed down 8 years ago.
I actually have no desire to close the smoking lounge forum but when I see a forum that is struggling to take flight, I begin to ask questions, and try to make suggestions that might invigorate/improve the discussion numbers and density, and hopefully, encourage others who are probably much better placed than I and who possess the imagination necessary to step forward to make their own suggestions relating to how the forum can work better.