Private Forum

[Ruralinfo]

Great. I hope we can keep it helpful for them.. Thank you

 

[Ruralinfo]

Looks like keep it public is the winner.. I'm good with that. I was just checking to see what the community wanted..

 

[DB.Cooper]

It would just block the site to everyone unless they have signed up. You would still have your usernames and such. Nothing would change except that the lurkers couldn't lurk.. Anyway, it seems that most are against the idea as I have received a few personal messages also. This being here for new people to find seems to be the biggest concern.. If it were private, searching would not find it..

I just saw a couple of threads that could be detrimental to the poster if anyone in their office happened upon here to read it. Just wanted to gauge what the community wanted to do and it seems to keep it open is the winner..

Anyone -- So what are the main upsides to the site being private??? Or from the opposite perspective, the downsides to a public site???

I do sometimes wonder if peeps are lurking and identifying peeps for retaliation... does anybody else feel that maybe their cover (anonymity) has been blown???

I guess most anything I say here, I'd likely say out loud at the PO anyways...

 

[uselesshasbeen]

I probably am missing something here. Seems to me that lurking meant watching but not participating. Are you all using a different definition? Last September I had a thread dedicated to the fact that over 80% of the registered users had never had a single message posted. Granted, a large number are people with multiple registrations, but still sounds like an awful lot of people have signed up and are possibly lurking as I write. Have no idea how signing up would cause people who had an agenda from being here. Pretty sure that if someone was really trying to identify people that over time it wouldn't necessarily be that difficult if they had access to good information about USPS rural carrier stations across the US. Not sure who they would be looking for though, but easiest thing I could see bad actors doing is encouraging those who are most disruptive and voicing the most negativity. Perhaps that explains an apparent correlation between some individuals seemingly "liking" every post made by other certain individuals. If I was in to conspiracies that is where I would be looking. Oh, sorry, this sounds too much like that Russian election interference hoax. Never mind.

 

[DB.Cooper]

I have wondered about the peeps I see registering as new users... and then I never see them posting... just as an example... @FleetwudSmak went to the trouble of registering last Friday and has not posted at all... but they did customize their account by adding an avatar...

And I'm not criticizing anyone here, but why register and not post??? I mean, can't you just lurk without even registering??? Maybe that's a question, because I thought you could lurk without being a registered member.

On the liking thing... that's an interesting theory... I tend to just give my reaction to any post that makes me feel any sort of emotion... if it's funny I laugh, if it's sad I frown, etc... Never really thought I was using it to encourage others to post, but maybe that is an additional side effect???

 

[uselesshasbeen]

I am probably mistaken, but I think searching requires registration. Search is pretty handy.

Don't know what the difference is between registered and not logged in and not being registered, but about all I can't do while not logged in is "Like", "Reply" and access pictures posted. Can search both Knowledgebase and Forum.

 

[Surprise!]

I am torn both ways.

I think reading the forum is the strongest promotion for the forum. I think people not reading it will finish it.

I don't really see any way to lock any group of people out of the forum. How would this forum know who registered to join it. Also, as has been pointed out, by purchasing the right service any one can be more than one person on the internet and sign up as more than one person.

However, I see that a person trying to discuss pursuing a specific topic ends up with a discussion about the topic and not pursuing it.