I am periodically reading forums for the airlines I am using in my travel and find them very useful. I have come to discover several categories of members:
- Some are occasional travelers on this airline and asking genuine questions.
- Some are frequent posters systematically ranting and venting their emotional anger.
- Some are fakes, i.e. they hardly ever fly except in dreams thru the forum. One must be a bit careful with their posts as they primarily repeat what they read somewhere, without any personal experience or checking, and with a little twist of personal invention.
- Some true frequent flyers are frequently on FT because they got the FT bug and prefer that to a TV series.
- But there is another category of posters which I will call "airline monitors" (AM). On some forums (e.g. U.S. airlines or BD) they are airline representatives providing answers to difficult technical questions on the FFP. They do not hide behind a false nose and their contribution is very useful. But on some airline forums, one cannot escape the conclusion that some airline representative or service contribute by posing as a regular traveler. It cannot be avoided and it is normal that airlines monitor this and other forums. But it is annoying when the AM claims to crisscross the world (especially in F) and systematically posts very-positive experiences about every single aspect of the airline. How can such a successful, and hence extremely-busy, businessman find the time for these numerous biased posts? In some forums, it is easy to tell that the AM uses different names to post as some posts are almost copy & paste. I guess that this is good marketing by the airline, but it is misleading the occasional traveler posting on FT�.

And this has what to do with Thai Airways? Or the TG forum on FT?

The topic of this thread was somewhat of a tough call as to where it belongs on FlyerTalk, but the new home for this thread is now the CommunityBuzz! forum unless the moderators of the CommunityBuzz! forum deem otherwise.

Thank you in advance for your understanding.

Regards,

Canarsie
Senior Moderator

Yes, I think that it is relevant to the TG forum.

Just curious -- have you ever actually met any other FlyerTalkers IN PERSON?
Or did you come to your conclusions about other posters solely on the basis of reading their posts?

A lot of us have met in person (via events posted on the CommunityBuzz forum and elsewhere on FT), and I wonder if your beliefs about posters would match the reality. (I've personally met hundreds of FTers over the past 7 or 8 years.)

I think you're completely wrong, and that it isn't relevant to the TG forum but (if it's even relevant to begin with) that it's more relevant to FT as a whole.

Having met hundreds of FTers I'm curious as to who is in the last category and why you assume that.

It's been you all along! I knew it.

The first FlyerTalkers I met was just before (kempis), and during (too many to list them all but quick picks: ozstamps, Punki, violist, oldgold, horizons, AAplatinum, Tom911 et al) the Catman Do Trois in March 2001 in New York, NY.

The latest FlyerTalkers I met was DCBob and his Irish friend on 6 March 2009 in Sydney, NSW.

I would say that I have a quite extensive and long-lasting experience with meeting FlyerTalkers off the computer-screen (IRL).

However, picking form your "types-list", I can honestly say, that I have only ever met these two types:

• Some true frequent flyers are frequently on FT because they got the FT bug and prefer that to a TV series.
• Some are occasional travelers on this airline and asking genuine questions.

That would make sense though, since the other types, you mention, are not really the kind of people that would meet up with me?

I think, though, that your list is lacking this type:

• People, who like travelling and collecting miles/points and meeting others with the same passion.

I would say that all FlyerTalkers, I have met, fall into that category. :-)

I have met one FlyerTalker, who was (is?) an airline employee, but I do not really consider her an "airline monitor". I had sushi with her and lots of other nice people in Seattle in 2002.

Well I'm an airline employee & not a monitor. I try to help whenever I can & make it clear that I speak for myself only & not my employer or anyone else.

I can't say I've meet hundreds of Flyertalkers but I've meet & are very good friends with quite a few who post on here & with a heads up would love to meet up with anyone passing through Clt Mo-Fr.(PM shift)

I have yet to see a pattern of such posts in any of the fora. The airline employees who post regularly on FT generally make it pretty clear that they are employees.

There are certainly cheerleaders who believe that their carrier of choice is infallible, but they are rare and, IME, not employees.

If you really think that there is a member using multiple handles to post please use the RBP button on the posts to report those posts to a moderator. It will be investigated appropriately and dealt with if that is the case, as such actions are a violation of the ToS.

I did not expect my post to generate such agressive answers. If I offended anyone, please accept my apologies. Let me just make a few quick comments in response to some posts.

Yes I have met some real posters but certainly not hundreds. But I fail to see the relevance.

Indeed, there are many airline employees posting here with a range of opinions. Actually, they often provide very usefull advice as well as advanced notice on some changes.

But those who believe that airlines (I mean HQ) do not see the interest of posting positive reviews, and actually doing it, are naive. Often airlines have a department/service/outside-consultant devoted to promote the image of their products; posting on various forums is a cheap way of promoting the airline and managing its image. If airlines were not trying to manage their image, then they would be failing in an important management dimension. Being in marketing myself, I can assure you that such behavior happens in many industries with retail consumers. I definitely know one person (not in TG forum) that receives good treatment from the airline (such as free tickets and VIP upgrade treatment) because of his 95%-favorable posts.

For other forums, I am indeed guessing, but there are some patterns that seem fairly obvious to me. Except for rude and outrageous behavior, such free forums cannot and should not be policed and it is certainly not my own objective; but that does not oblige me to be naive.

You know, with that, I think this thread might be done. I don't really think it's appropriate on Cbuzz to get into this kind of discussion, which should be about improving the FT community not about the 'I know a FTer who... ' type discussions.

So I'm going to close this thread. If anyone wishes to discuss this, as always contact me by PM.

Jenbel
Co-moderator, Communitybuzz!