Who becomes the arbiter of what is and is not a "game thread"?

That problem has been corrected.

UP, both you and GUWonder believe that theere are ulterior motives/agendas at work here. As the TB member who made this motion, I would greatly appreciate you telling me what my ulterior motive is.

As far as the "TSA Sucks" threads are concerned, a careful read of the debates on this issue will show that I preferred extending this to TS&S and Newstand and would not at all mind going even further and including all other non points and miles forums and, yes, even the Lounge threads.

This was discussed on the private TB Forum before I wrote the motion and it became very obvious to me that even restricting it to Omni meant it had only a small chance of passing while including the other forums as well would have made it impossible.

Then instead of singling out OMNI, you should've bagged the whole thing.

As someone who has posted often on the counts games thread, may I offer an explanation for my behavior?

I think doing so is a great way to reduce my stress levels at work. I've gotten to chat with some very interesting people as we go along. We have also shared information on weather, news and gas well explosions.

I have a relatively long history on FT and I believe a decent reputation for accuracy in my 'serious' posts.

I'm sorry if playing the games is a violation of the rules. I had no idea....

Just blowing off some stress during a very difficult time of the year of me. That in itself has value, yes?

As noted, that would have been impossible. I would also like to get the Alitalia Forum passed but have not made a motion along those lines because I do not foresee it as having any chance of passing.

Right, and with this motion you will be able to continue to do this. All this is saying is that the post count acquired through OMNI will go away, but you will be able to continue making those posts and "reduce stress levels."

Certainly. Would that be affected by removing the post counts for those threads? Perhaps- people who post just to pad counts might not participate; however, would that diminish the content in those threads which you enjoy?

I don't think anyone has contended that the games are harmful. I also don't think that anyone has contended that Omni is harmful.

(As we have crossed paths there many times, you know that I am a heavy Omni poster.)

TB is not considering getting rid of either the games or Omni. It is only voting on whether posts made in Omni (and not just its games) should be included in post counts.

I personally could care less about the post count issue per se, but I think this argument for removing them are stupid. There are a number of forums on FT that have nothing to do with displaying travel-knowledge. Security comes to mind, Trips Report comes to mind, CommunityBuzz, this forum, etc. etc. etc.

If you want post counts to reflect travel knowledge you'd be better off restricting post counts to accruing in only a select number of forums (such as airlines, hotels, car rentals, etc.), not restricting post counts to one forum. In other words, the system should be revised from the other direction. Get rid of post counts for only certain forums.

Or better yet, give out a test if you want a real measure of how worthy folks are with their travel-related knowledge. :)

Finally, anyone who is basing how much someone knows by how much they post, then the problem, dear brutus, lay with them, not the post count. @:-)

One has to hope that, should this proposed action pass, the board does not experience a sudden, exponential increase in the number of "me too" posts in the Miles/Points and Travel fora.

There are many times that I start to post a response, but decide not to actually post it, because the information I am considering adding is superflous (splitting hairs). For example, earlier today I was going to post a response to a transit routing question, but on reflection, my suggested route was so close to one that had already been posted that the difference would have been lost (and therefore not really of value) to the first-time visitor.

Hopefully the Board will render its decision soon, and will be free to move on to more pressing issues of greater impact to the general membership.

I completely agree with almost everything you say and completely see your point, but what I just don't get is how people are being penalized? People can continue to do as they have, but it just wont go towards their post count.

Also keep in mind that if TB votes YES on this measure they are indirectly validating the argument that high post count = more travel knowledge. Is that really a position that TB wants to take?

Great post by the OP! ^


(We'll see these in the United Forum if this passes).

I'll have to go with you sharing your motivations because I even now, as a "FlyerTalk Posting Legend" :o , don't have mind-reading skills.

You certainly seem motivated to do what you can to get this motion passed, for whatever reasons.

"Hail Caesar." :D I think you said it well, and agree with the concerns/sentiments noted in the following too:

Does anyone have a copy of any TOS language related to post-padding? Can that please be posted here? And if it exists, wouldn't it be applicable to OMNI too?