How about a "members buy-out"...instead of "management buy-out"...just kidding...

A positive ID system is a ridiculous suggestion. But yes, it might pacify the few here who can't seem to ignore the bait.

I disagree completely with any positive ID suggestion.

Any chance for a response with some substance in it?

wwhat is getting lost here I THINK, is that Randy has been very clear whenever thtis has been brought up - that he does NOT want to make FT a paid site. Whenever you charge money for something you have the repsonsibility that goes with it. If you pay a fee can you request your $$ back if the site goes down? Seeing as Randy has no staff dedicated to FT specifically (witness how weekends are an issue if the site goes down or flames explode) I can't imagine he will change his mind and change his business model because we can't work it out.

And there ARE hassles with a paid site, just in terms of administration and maintenance. There ARE people (not any current FT'er of course) who would complain if the site was slow for a few hours...

[This message has been edited by squeakr (edited Feb 01, 2004).]

Yes they would

That is the reason why I am suggesting a moderator for this forum and maybe some more tools for all moderators, like the one that we have in OMNI

I really don't think paying is an answer, positive ID would be a turn off for many new members.

Keep things they way they are, and use your available resources.

Call me nuts, and chances are you already have, but don't we have a huge amount of people already volunteering, and more that have applied that want to help?

Why not tap this and just control things that way?

But that is just my humble opinion, what the heck do I now anyway

I think having too many moderators and giving them too much power makes it more difficult to enforce consistent standards and to check that the character of those individuals qualifies them to do their task properly.

If anything, this whole thing here has shown that more power to the moderators would not really solve anything, but create more problems. I am not surprised that some of them would ask for that, though.

I totally agree with attorney28. He made good comments.

Well, it might be difficult to implement but I still think that paying (initiation or yearly fee) for FT won't be that bad if we got some kind of additional bonus just like ordering a real magazine subscription and getting an additional gift,

like the 10000LH miles for my mothers new Focus subscription.

While well-intentioned, I don't think that credit-card verification would be int he best interests of flyerTalk.

These trolls represent a very small portion of our community, and they inflict their damage on fairly limited scales. 95% of fT has no clue who some of these people are, and don't care.

It would be a travesty to scare away a good portion of those who come to learn about points and miles in the name of weeding out a few bad apples (who, by the way, would almost surely find a way to defeat the verification, anyway).

So what exactly do you base your claim on that this "travesty" would actually scare away a good portion of the members, as you claim?

Robb, why do you believe it would scare them away?

Maybe I am wrong, but I believe that most people who use the internet on a regular basis have given their credit card details to Amazon.com, hotels, airlines, Paypal, gambling sites, etc.

As much as I love FY and its people, a pay system would drive me away.

I'd rather donate than be forced to pay.

I'm not a big fan of a paying system. Not because I don't want to pay for FT, but because I think it would scare off a lot of new members.

Whenever I see boards that I can't post on, or worse - even preview - without paying some kind of fee, I keep moving. Boards like that may keep annoying people out, but they also keep a lot of people who probably have something worthwhile to add to the discussion, meaning we all lose out.

d

I am with Anonplz on this one. I would risk a 2% troll rate that gets cut off than to lose even 2% of contributors to the substance of the board. The information is more valuable to me and more thoroughly available when there are no barriers (not even minor ones) to participation on matters of substance.

Ironically (or by design in the minds of the paranoid), this latest wave of hacking has pushed forward a postive ID agenda?

Strange timing.