No need to thank me Gary....

Glad to be of assistance.... :)

I really think this says it all, courtesy of the owner of the board.

When board "status," in this case by posts and titles, is not linked to the quality of the postings themselves, the inevitable outcome is something approaching anarchy.

I have read hundreds of posts saying that no one is foolish enough to equate knowledge to number of posts.. I agree. I have seen many offer to give up all of their posts, under narrow sets of circumstances that they know will not come to pass. I have seen others directly equate post count with whether their contributions are "valued," which means their only metric for feeling valuable is seeing their post count increment every time they press the submit button.

What I haven't seen is anyone acknowledge that their titles and post counts confer a status on them in the ecosystem of the board, even if it only means anything to the holder of the status him or herself. And indeed, on FT status only means something to the person holding that status, since it confers only the most limited special privileges. But to some people who are status conscious, having it means a lot. So you see hundreds of posts from a few people determined to maintain the board status that they have.

This wouldn't be a problem, except the board incentive system encourages rapid posting among people who are status conscious, and as we have seen many times, including this thread, those conversations degenerate to the lowest common denominator. To the board owner, this degeneration is so ordinary as to barely be worthy of note.. "Hey, we're talking OMNI here."

Remove the incentive, remove the ability to generate status though the incentive, remove the problem.

Vote for the proposal.

I would like to state for the record that I am 100 percent in FAVOR of this motion. I think any TB member who opposes this motion is destroying all that is good and pure about Flyertalk. Baby killers. Father rapers.

How DARE you oppose this motion. :td: :td: :td:



(and NO, contrary to what you may think I am NOT taking this position because, as a fellow FTer pointed out to me earlier today, my support of a proposed change pretty much dooms it to failure, eg, mens forum, open tb deliberations, etc, etc, etc)

In consideration of the above numbers, I think that they have to be looked at with some mitigating considerations:

Many online fora require people to join in order to read any messages whatsoever, much less to post. Amongst the 125k registrants, I would guess that there is a substantially large number of people who come to FT for the first time, register, ask their one-time question, receive their answer, then either return to lurkdom or become dormant members. I for one would find it valuable to know how many of the 125k enrolled members have less than 10 posts - or even less than 50.

Measuring Omni registration and usage would IMHO be much more meaningful if we had the ability to add the above consideration to the mix. Stating that Omni users represent 5% of all-time FT registrants, while factual, loses meaning when dormant members are factored in (or out).

A much more credible and meaningful measurement would be to calculate the percentage of Omni participants as measured to the total number of significantly (and currently) active members of FT.

First, thank you for explaining what you believe to be the "harm" that is to be cured by this motion. I've been waiting for someone to offer something other than the somewhat discredited (IMO) theory of misleading newbies.

Second, having followed this thread for several days, I strongly dispute the insinuation that this threads frequent descents to the bottom of the barrel are being caused by the "post junkies" more so than by those with other motivations. Plenty of mud's been splashed all over here.

Third, what I don't understand is why the "harm" being described can't simply be dealt with the way I've occasionally done. When an individual poster annoys me by repeatedly posting similar thoughts to the same thread, I just click on this link HERE , and then add them to my "Ignore" list.

Problem solved, and no drama. YMMV

I agree. I was under the impression (now mistaken) that Omni posts still did not count in post totals from one of the previous times when Randy tinkered with Omni. I was hesitant to weigh in on this thread due to all the bickering. My personal opinion is that Omni posts should not count in the post total. This is based upon my my personal views of omni and Randy's statements about Omni being something extra or tangential to the true purpose of flyertalk which is miles and points.

FT is a travel related forum and Randy continually exhorts us to talk travel and points. I talk miles and points and do not regularly visit Omni anymore but do not feel this has hurt my ability to be part of the FT community as others have stated. Even though I talk miles and points I still attend do's and meet with fellow fters. I will not achieve evangelist status for another 70 years at the pace I am going. And why won't I? It is because I have followed Randy's advice and talked miles and points.

How have some of the other people who have hundreds of posts in a day or thousands in a week achieved evangelist status? In my opinion it is because they haven't followed Randy's advice and worked for the true purpose of FT, which is miles and points. Am I jealous, not really, but a little part of me does wonder why people who have thousands of posts on omni (and in some cases have deliberately and admittedly gamed the system) are rewarded with a title. Especially a title of evangelist. Are these people really preaching the gospel of FT according to Randy (miles and points) which is what an FT evangelist should be or are they just prolific posters. I guess I wouldn't have a problem with Omni posts staying if prolific posters were labeled as something other than evangelist. To me an FT Evangelist is someone like the people on the Oneworld and *Alliance forums who continually assist people with rtw tickets and itineraries and who follow Randy's admonition to talk miles and points.

I don't know. The number might even drop below 5% if you only include active posters with significant contributions. Randy would be the only one to render a meaningful opinion, as he has access to the numbers.

I'm still of the opinion, based on posts from those that participate in OMNI, that the forum needs to be open to the other 95% of FT that doesn't have access. I base this on statements I've read in this thread, and several OMNI threads, about friendships cultivated on that forum, posters who use it to get away from the stress of travel, and even one poster who says he gets weather information in one of those number counting threads.

Limiting the OMNI Community to only 5% of FT, when posters in the OMNI forum see it as a vital part of the overall FlyerTalk experience, seems like something that should be done proactively, no matter what the vote result is.

Let's open OMNI to everyone.

I haven't read that in hundreds of posts. If anything, what I read more often was that it's foolish to equate knowledge to number of posts. That's not the same thing as you said above.

Some think the "status" is a "stigma" and want/wanted nothing to do with it. And some who thought it was a stigma realized it really doesn't matter; while some stuck to their guns.

If that's honestly what you believe, then why even advocate for eliminating the "status" that doesn't mean anything to you?

What does it matter to you that they engage in such activities if you think the "FT status only means something to the person holding that status"?

There are tools/procedures available to deal with that independent of this motion.

Talk about barking up the wrong tree. To me, I read that comment to be about OMNI being a forum that yields discussion about issues that invovle contentious, passionate opinions. If you don't think this motion has yielded discussion that involves contentious, passionate opinions -- even if hidden behind a veil -- then we'll just have to disagree. ;)

Sounds nice, but good sounding rhetoric is about all I see those words to be as of now.

I still don't see why you care about removing an "incentive" for "FT status" when, as you said, "FT status only means something to the person holding that status"? I'm looking for a logical argument, and I don't see it in your words above if you honestly believe your own words that "FT status only means something to the person holding that status".

To let you have your cake and eat it too, let's take the situation where people are very interested in getting the "FT status". Guess what, they'll pursue it regardless of OMNI posts counting or not and this motion won't do anything about that either. If anything, this motion risks incentivizing lower quality posts in the rest of FT. :eek: If that's not a bigger problem than the so-called "problem" being addressed by this motion, then we'll have to agree to disagree on that matter too.

What does it mean to be an Evangelist?
 

First I would like to thank wharvey and Randy for their tolerance on this thread. My views have not changed since I expressed them in post #93. I do not plan to constantly repeat them. :)

However is it OT to ask, what does it now mean to be an Evangelist? When I joined FT 6 years ago, it meant you had posted 150 times. Currently the threshold is 10,000 posts. I remember when OMNI posts did not count to this total. We have many more Evangelists now. An Evangelist used to signify to me, someone who had made substantial contributions to FT, in the airline, hotel and travel fora. I feel this honorary title has been devalued by those whose contributions consist merely of 10,000 posts to the OMNI game threads, and I think this is unfortunate.

Because the kind of conversation that results diminishes my experience of Flyertalk and its value to me, and I believe that of many other people as well.

Omni has many wonderful threads, and many meaningless ones, except to the people who participate in them for a variety of reasons. Eliminating status seeking/maintenance as one such reason, by not incenting people to participate in them for any other reason than the pure enjoyment of the experience that results, will enhance the Flyertalk experience for the entire community.

You know that without a "title" being present and so do I. That's why this whole dance around the "title" bush is so amusing -- we can all make our own judgments about what is quality and what is not, whether a "title" appears or not.

What kind of conversation results? Even if a certain kind of conversation results, just because a kind of conversation diminishes your FT experience (or the experience of others) doesn't mean that such conversation diminishes the experiences of the majority of FTers or even the majority of those observing/contributing to a thread/forum/FT.

Fortunately or unfortunately, neither you nor I have a monopoly in determining what kinds of conversations diminish or enhance the experience of the majority of FTers.

For example, there are threads/posts in some forums/threads that are of no interest to me or that "diminishes my experience of Flyertalk and its value to me, and I believe that of many other people as well", yet I find that to be a demonstration of different people having different tastes, tastes that you can't control, tastes that I can't control, tastes that may or may not be shared by a majority.

One thing is certain: the majority of FTers didn't push for this motion .... and there is no groundswell of support for this motion from the masses. A clique is pushing for it. (Yes, a clique is opposed to it too.)

How will it enhance the FT experience?

I recall one point in the last Talkboard elections where post count was specifically used to judge members. There were a couple candidates with very low post counts (around 300 or 400 IIRC), and some FT'ers posted comments that, while they were pleased to see the participation of those candidates, they felt the candidates needed to get more active posting, create a track record, and then return and run again next time around. The low post count made it difficult to judge those members.

Interesting... I think that would make newbies more conscious of and curious about OMNI, (most are quite unaware of its existence) and make them more likely to stick around long enough to be able to venture over there and see what it's all about. So, in a way, using Droneklax's method could be very good for the growth of FT.

That is how I'm leaning, although I do generally favor the proposal which is on the table. The best for FT may well be if Talkboard rejects the proposal and then comes back with a more tightly focused one, such as (1) move games to an uncounted subforum and (2) do something like Droneklax illustrated above.

What you are leaving out is that this proposal, and it is really the only thing we are talking about, only excludes Omni. If it excluded everything but the Miles and Points forums, and non miles and points threads in those forums (lounge threads, meeting threads, etc) I personally wouldnt be very concerned. Because that would at least be consistent and fair. Im not sure what it would accomplish, but I certainly wouldnt be too concerned one way or another. But that isnt the proposal on the table.

It's not like we were knighted ;)

Besides, that little title, which I didn't have until 2,000 -3,000 posts ago, along with all those posts ain't going to upgrade you or get you squat

The more I read this, the sillier it gets.

I am just going to eat some cashews and enjoy the show