Spiff

General statement. While I may have quoted you, I was referring in general to others' actions.

Anyone who chooses to respond or responded to the decision to stop Omni post counts by breaking the TOS should accept the consequences of their actions and perhaps not act childishly (yup, childishly - and that is not directed to any one personally but in general to anyone who pursued this course of action) in the future when things don't go their way.

In so many words, some people decided: "I'll show Randy - I'll break the rules!" or "How dare Randy make a decision without consulting me? (Doesn't he know who I am?!?)" or "Randy, *I* am the membership and *I* am unhappy, so *you* better snap to and reverse your decision, mister!" Some folks chose to engage the TalkBoard with the latter two and got even more indignant when some members of the TalkBoard who did not agree with the concept of badgering Randy to change his mind didn't jump right up and say "Yassir! Is there any other pandering you would like me to do today?"

In my opinion, those actions merit the Teddy out of the Pram responses (thank you Jenbel! ) and that's why I made them. Other FlyerTalkers may react differently, but I think there's a fair number of FlyerTalkers outside the vocal minority in this thread who feel similarly.

Mary2e

I can't recall if I responded previously, but I believe posts in all forums should count and TOS violations should be enforced. I'm sorry the motion wasn't put forth as such.

Or, alternatively, all forums that are not miles and points related shouldn't count either.

IMHO, what has caused this to boil over is the lack of enforcement of the rules. My apologies to Randy, but someone had to say it

itsaboutthejourney

I fully support you in denouncing anyone using the above tactics. ^ Randy is very fortunate to have you watching his back.

nsx

Well, sort of. As a practical matter the posting rules are different for OMNI. OMNI wouldn't be as fun or addictive if every post needed to meet every letter of the TOS. This leniency adds value to FT, IMHO. It also means that posts in OMNI aren't equivalent in (average) value to posts in other forums. So the current policy makes sense.

IMHO anyone who is post padding for the purpose of bragging about post count is subtracting value from FT. Yes, even if the post padding occurs in OMNI. If the current policy discourages such activity, that's a benefit to all of us. There may, however, be more surgical methods to discourage post padding.

Spiff

It's not even so much watching his back. It's common sense and courtesy, as well as realizing that volume/posting frequency does not necessarily translate to "what the membership wants".

Imagine someone who throws a Tupperware party with reasonable frequency has about 1000 people come over to his house. Occasionally, some of these people buy Tupperware, not all do. The host decides to change the wallpaper in the bathroom and 2 of the guests go ballistic. They go to the person who sits on the local Tupperware board of directors and tell him that he better straighten out the host - how dare he pick new wallpaper without consulting everyone? Some people liked that old wallpaper! Nevermind that some other people hated the wallpaper, many didn't care, and still others really like the new wallpaper. "I use that bathroom!" "It's the principle, damnit!", 1 person says. "I occasionally buy Tupperware or think about Tupperware in this guy's house! Nevermind what a great place it is or how there's lots of other amenities - that wallpaper change should have been run by me!"

Do you think the guy on the local Tupperware board of directors is going to tell the host "ya know, some people really think you're incapable of making decisions on your own. Why don't you put the old wallpaper back up and let the people who come to your Tupperware parties decide how you decorate your bathroom."?

Meanwhile, a couple of people (possibly the angry ones who approached the Tupperware board of directors member) decide to start using the host's kitchen as the bathroom to show their displeasure.

RichMSN

My goodness. Which one of these best describes your analogy?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fallacies

ClueByFour

If you are going to have the Talkboard ask it's boss to reconsider himself, I might pick something a bit less, well, hammered-into-stone than a 4 year old decision which was recently affirmed and implemented.

Much less one that has zero negative consequences for Randy, and a ton of upside as time rolls on.

Spiff

I'll go with "none of the above".

Do feel free to pick one or more and add further value to the discussion...

Mary2e

I'm going to have to partially disagree with you. The posting content rules are more lenient, but I definitely remember a few people being suspended for post padding in 1 single thread one Saturday evening. The reason was post padding, not another TOS violation. I believe Randy has also said that the FT TOS apply in Omni too.

I will also differ with you about the general value of a post in all of FT. I value the information I obtained in Omni equal to the infomation I receive in Hyatt, or any of the other miles & points forums I frequent. It's simply information that I prefer to get on FT versus another board. because I feel the participants are a pretty knowlegable and well rounded group not found anywhere else. Plus, I owe the FT Legal Clinic a small fortune for their help

PTravel

I still don't understand what are the perceived upsides of this policy decision.

SAT Lawyer

I am a latecomer to this thread. Did Randy publicly announce a decision not to count OMNI posts somewhere on FlyerTalk? If so, could somebody provide me with a link.

Assuming he made this decision, I applaud it. I, for one, think it makes sense to restore an exclusive and solitary focus on posts likely made in advance of FlyerTalk's core purpose of furthering our collective understanding of "miles and points." I hope to see my aggregate post count reduced accordingly to discount an embarrassing number of OMNI posts. While I will continue to partake in the debates and discussions in OMNI going forward, I have no problem in not having my post count artificially inflated by my dalliances there.

I will avoid repeating my earlier-stated position on this matter as I believe I have discussed it ad nauseum in this thread.

Spiff

The electron trail is here: http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=789784

ClueByFour

Said best in the post below yours. But beyond that, there is no downside, except for the people who (as Spiff pointed out) chose to toss temper tantrums in other forums over it. I'd submit that's not a downside to the decision per se as it is a liability brought by those very members (which would rear it's ugly head at some point or another anyway).

FT, at it's core, is about miles and points. What Randy really ought to do is whack post counts out of everything that's not miles and points. Including this forum.

nsx

Yes, the official rules are that the TOS applies fully in OMNI. But that's not the practical reality. It's like a 55 mph speed limit sign in the middle of the desert with only one cop to patrol half the state. People tend to speed.

Yes, OMNI threads can be very valuable. OTOH, nobody's post count is going to change much based solely on valuable posts in those threads. People are (I assume) upset because their post count will go down a lot, and that didn't happen because they handed out detailed legal advice to thousands of people or otherwise providing high value to other members.

Speaking of which, maybe we should drop posts in this forum from the count as well.

Mary2e

Hey, I've always said that I don't care if my post count drops. It's just a number. As a matter of fact, when I was about to cross 10k posts, someone pointed it out. I had no clue.

But I've never seen any major board's off-topic post areas posts not count, nor treated like the poor stepchild of the forum. FT is unique in this regard

If it is truly to be only for points & miles, well, let's either get rid off all those unrelated and pesky off-topic forums, such as community and the regional areas, as well as Omni. Then counting the posts won't matter.

I have 2 gripes with this whole thing... dealing with a problem by removing a feature instead of dealing with those who cause the problem

AND

Treating Omni like a second class citizen, when it's just as valuable as any other non-miles & points forums. In some cases, it's more valuable