Randy, in the VX thread, perfectly explains the concept I haven't been able to 'forest-ize'. I've argued for and against various fora over the years. The thrust, in my case, is doing what's best for FT as a whole. Yet I stupidly allowed my discussion to become focused solely on the merits of an individual board vs. having the 'light switch' come on and pushing for metrics that would trigger the creation or dissolution of a forum.

This, mercifully, is one aspect of FT usage we can firmly quantify and measure with complete accuracy through post and view activity. Rather than the heated rhetoric we see almost every time a forum creation topic comes up, we should have hard and fast bright-line trigger points whereby fora are created whence a certain mean activity level is reached, and likewise, trigger points for forum dissolution whence traffic drops below a certain level.

The topic of the forum should be immaterial. The only consideration should be accommodating FT traffic as best serves the majority of FTers. We have enough broad-spectrum forums to accommodate just about everything that belongs on FT if a topic/area doesn't warrant it's own forum. Let's stop subjective arguments over what should be objective policy. That way we can ALL reclaim some of our valuable time and put it to better use.

Thanks for the idea, kanebear. I brought up this issue yesterday in the private forum, trying to understand whether something like this is truly feasible.

On one hand I would love to see an end to all the debates we have everytime we consider a new forum (especially the hostility), but on the other hand I really can't think of a better idea. The problem I see with the idea in general is that it'll just lead to abuse. I would be curious to hear what you would envision to be the metrics, and whether it's just a certain number to get initiated, whether it requires a certain number of posts a week/month/year to stay active, etc.

Much like everything else in life, there will be a way to game the system- start useless threads, respond "lol" or "great post" to everyone, have all your friends click in each thread, etc.

Also, if we were to create limits you have to keep in mind the different types of forums we have. For example, I think a forum for an "official" program should have different qualifications than a forum for an interest.

I would be curious to hear more opinions on this issue.

Seems to me that TB spends 99%+ of its time on the twin topics of creating and dissolving forums. So if these TB items were replaced with an algorithm, there wouldn't be much reason left to have a TB.

Hmmm....not sure if this is an argument in favor or against the original suggestion.

True, but there are ways around that. Using rep points is one - only threads and posts of value, by posters of value would count towards a potential forum's "score." Of course, there are other benefits to rep points, as well, but they, too, are a perhaps-flawed system that can be abused (as seen on FW).

Another idea is to open a poll in the closest existing forum or fora, asking for user opinions. Everyone gets a single vote, so there's no issue with "vote padding" except for getting friends to vote. To prevent junk registrations, require a "minimum FT age" (e.g. 90 days & 90 posts) in order to be eligible to vote. The vote may not be binding, but would give the TB an idea of user opinions in a quantifiable (if not scientific) manner.

There will always be abuse of the system, and no system is perfect, but I think one of the above two (or some variation thereof) would help greatly.

I personally do not see all the angst around creating forums... there has been no proof that it taxes our technical performance. For example, many would eliminate the Religious Travelers Forum for lack of use... but I am guesing that it meets the needs of those who visit... sometimes quality is more important that quantity.

Even different airline/hotel/car forums have different levels of activity and participation.

I see no issue with having more forums...

I would actually have an individual forum for each airline/rental car/hotel program.... vs having the catchall forums.

I hope we do not go down the Reputation route again... we saw how successful that feature was... misused pretty quickly and no longer in place.

William

I'm not so sure about that. I can see a possibility of having different criteria in different circumstances. Eg airlines of xxx vs airline yy, or destination forum vs airline/hotel forum.

I agree with that completely, it makes sense.

As for the spectre of abuse; in the short term, yes. Yet that's why I was careful to state mean traffic numbers over a given length of time (perhaps 3-6 months). It's easy to cause a momentary spike. It's far harder to keep people's attention on being disruptive over a much longer period of time.

So, perhaps the easiest way to do it is to look at our least active forums we consider to have reasonable levels of activity for each area (Airlines, Hotels, etc... we'd want to be reasonably granular). We take averages over a timeperiod decided by TB (perhaps the last 3 months, last 6 months, last year, etc) and set that number as the baseline. Obviously that's oversimplified but IMO that's a fair way to handle the issue.

Actually, with my statistical hat on, that's a very fair point. Momentary spikes would be easy to detect - there are a whole suite of statistics aimed at identifying trends which are different from the norm. Add in standard deviation and median to your mean measure, and you've pretty much got a way of identifying where there have been peaks of interest (you would not be able to tell if it was abuse or some exciting new news for example).

I'm not the greatest modeller in the world - I tend to do it at a very basic level - but basic modelling may be all that is required here. I'll try and find the time to have a play with some numbers...

I am pleased to offer for public consumption the same [slightly redacted] opinion that I expressed in the private TB forum:

Shouldn't we respect the will of previous talkboards by not having formal criteria or metrics but allowing each TB member to make the dertermination of when a new forum is called for for her/him self?

Ok, slightly snarky but still my point of view.

Besides, as has been said, creating formal criteria only begs posters to game whatever system we come up with.

A more fundimental question to me from Randy's post on the VX thread is about fragmentation.

I actually tend to agree with MSP that MYFlyertalk more or less mitigates whatever fragmentation issues we might have faced in the past. By way of confession, I am here in Jamaica with my sister who has been a flyertalker ever since I got her addicted a couple years ago and she was making fun of me a few days ago because I still had some of my regular forums under my IE 'favorites' rather than properly setting up MyFlyertalk. But the point is that either is, to me, an acceptable response to the concerns of fragmentation.

Years ago, I was one of the many people that Randy mentions who felt that flyertalk was becoming too fragmented. But my thinking has come 180 on that. At the time I got panicky because I couldnt possibly follow all of the threads on all of the forums as I did for the first three or four years of Flyertalk.

Since then I have learned to not worry about reading every single forum for fear of missing something.

But today my fear today is that I am missing something because there is not a specific place to talk about it and so people who might otherwise share information are simply not sharing it. To me that calls for MORE specialized forums, not fewer.

One perfect example is wharvey's renewed suggestion for a travel products forum. I didnt realize people were posting in all those different places about travel bags and products and the fact of the matter is that I am in the market for a new rolley so have actually been doing some looking. I missed quite a few otherwise helpful threads!!!

Anyway, perhaps we could engage in a bit of a philosophical discussion about what each of our own visions and criteria are about creating more forums and the issue of fragmentation specifically and see where that leads us?

As I say above my own feeling is that more specialization is BETTER at this point.

And as to new forum criteria, as I posted on the public forum:

My own personal criteria for creating a new forum are (in order of importance):

- a compelling case that the forum has potential for lots of use in the future.
- a cadre of flyertalkers passionate about the program.
- a 'decent' number of posts about the program (this threshold is pretty low to me since its hard to judge post counts for a forum that doesnt exist yet)

Hope this helps.

Kokonutz,

What a great post... would give you reputation points if I could...

As someone who loves organization, I am not a fan of the "fragmentation" issue... I have yet to hear a good argument for why fragmentation is bad... or an issue for Flyertalk. If Flyertalk wants to be the premier place for information for the traveler, then it needs to be easy to find. The upgrade to the search feature helps... but it also helps to have things organized in such a way to make it easy to find.

I know, in my 7 years on FT, it has become much easier to find information as more forums have been created. It used to be that almost everything fell into "TravelBuzz" and a non-functioning search function did not help to find information quickly. However, past Talkboards and the moderators and Randy's team have worked hard to make the Flyertalk experience more enjoyable and efficient.

Again, not sure how "active" a forum needs to be in order to be useful.... The Travel Bidding forum is not very active... but very useful for those use utilize it. Same can be said for the Religious Travelers Forum. The Air Canada forum has become so much more informational as the moderators have cleaned up that forum over time.... and moved off topic subjects to their proper "fragmented" place...

While I am a numbers and data person, I cringe at the thought that decisions on what this community needs will come down to numbers. Not everything needs to be about numbers....

William

My comments here is pretty general. But I think the criteria for establishing new forums for the "core" of Flyertalk (Airlines, Hotels, Car Rentals - even if they don't have a loyalty program yet) should be a lot more lenient than the "other" forums (GLBT for example or for a far out idea "travel with nannies").

Wow. I have been thinking about this a lot and just can't see how we, and our community, could ever be quantified.

Back in 1998 I wasn't much of a traveler, but I had a whole bunch of miles and wanted to take my family on a trip to Spain, in style. I jumped on the internet and searched "frequent flyer miles". That led me to the information I wanted, but, moreover, it led me to the smartest, funniest, most joyful group of people I could imagine. Those people are what kept me coming back.

All of that intelligence, knowledge, generosity, humor, and happiness hooked me right from the start. That core group was the foundation of FlyerTalk as we know it today.

As the years went by we were joined by many other very smart, very knowledgable, very funny and generous people, who continued to to shape and build the totally amazing FlyerTalk core group that we enjoy today. I am not talking about the 158,894 users who jumped in, registered, posted a few times, got a quick bit of information and moved on, but instead the 1,000, 2,000 or 3,000 of us who have found/made a home on FlyerTalk. We are what make FlyerTalk so amazing.

I have this funny feeling that none of us can be measured. Most of us probably don't even land on the charts. We are wild, adventurous, slightly crazy, people who think way, way out of the box. We are among that tiny percentage of human beings on this planet who think that, "Hey, would you like to go to Singapore for the weekend?" is a totally reasonable question.

Sure we have our debates and disagreements--could you expect anything else with so many divas in one place. But, in the end, we have connected with one another and, in a strange way belong to one another, even when we disagree. We have experienced one another's lives--marriages, births, deaths, divorces, educations, promotions, failures, successes, totally crazy travel schemes, and even wars. We are probably among the most unique, creative, exciting, fluid, stubborn, inventive, creatures on earth.

The best thing on earth that we all have to offer FlyerTalk is the sharing of all of our individual and wonderful ideas, mixing them up, arguing them out, and coming out with even more fantastic final solutions as a team that any of us could ever arrive at on our own.

I just can't see how we, or our brilliant ideas or joint conclusions, could ever be quantified?

I don't particularly want to go to Singapore for ANY period of time (now, Bangkok is an entirely different story), but your points are very well taken regardless!

From what I can see, there are 5 TalkBoard members who are willing to vote to establish new forums even before any criteria have been established.

They are: Punki, Lucky9876Coins, Cholula, and Kokonutz (all of whom said they have voted, or are expecting to vote, for the VX Forum). In addition, we have bhatnasx who made a motion to establish the Travel Products Forum.

It is also my understanding from the thread started by Jenbel that TalkBoard is discussing overturning its previous decision to make Travel Photography a sub-forum and establish a new, full, Travel Photography Forum.

In the thread concerning the Travel Photography Forum, I asked if TalkBoard has decided not to follow Randy's advice as stated in this post:

I said that I take the "etc" to mean all kinds of forums, but perhaps I am wrong about that. If so, is TalkBoard now willing to consider non-core miles and points forums but not those which are the heart of FT?

Or does it prefer to continue establishing forums until the criteria suggested by Randy are established and, assuming that they ever are, apply them only after that date?

Having had (as noted in another thread) some unsuccessful experience in trying to get such standards established in he past, I would not want to put all new forums on "hold" pending their passing, but am interested in knowing how TB members feel about this.

Jenbel declined to answer my question there, saying it would throw the thred off topic, and suggested that I repost it here. I am following her advice.

I should like to point out that if even 4 members feel that no forums should be established until/unless these guidelines are put into place, it will be impossible to have any forum approved.

I'm happy to continue to consider forums on an ad hoc basis. I've said I'll have a look at some modelling/statistical techniques to see if they might be of any use - but I've not had a chance to do so yet, and am unlikely to get a chance over the next couple of weekends. However, I also have to remember that there may not be always someone with statistical training on TB - so anything which does look suitable must also be fairly simple to use and intuitive - which not all stats techniques are! As a result I don't know how possible a purely data based approach would be the right approach to take - and whether ultimately, even if something like that is developed, people would still vote their gut!

At the same time, on a point of correction, we are not talking about establishing a new Travel Photography forum, but effectively re-ordering it. Just as the rearrangement of the World Destinations forums did not create any new forums, but merely re-ordered them.