Gollevainen said:
I find this decicion that new members are not allowed avatars very weird. I just cannot see any bases of it. Avatars are important part of forming our online identity and new members joinig in may feel it very important as they have almoust nothing else to lean on. It's like in everyday life, the first impression makes a lot of difference.
Setting up some post ammount that you need to achive to order to get these privileges is bit hazardious as it will couse posting rallyes and lots of useless oneliners as people want to achive the "status" of real membership as fast as possiple. I remembering that we made unanimous decision to forbid posting rallyes and useless postings for some status in mind? This regulation against avatars and PM features is bit in conflict in that decision.
So making these decisions with out informing us mods is also bit hazardious and I fear that we might end up like in the keypublishingforum, where local webmaster destroyed two popular subforums whitout any notice to mods that usually have to deal whit the members inqueryes and fustrations.
I'm sorry to "open" in publicly like this, but i think this limitations of new members privilegs should be discussed openly, let all have their obinions been heard...
Goll, new members ARE able to have an AVATAR but not a custom one until they show interest in the forum and by the time they get as many posts, they are regular participants. If users post one liners and useless BS to get higher post rank, then that is why we have moderators and if we feel we need more, we will get more in order to control one liners and other unprofessional stuff which kids do to increase their post rank. Of course, in forums such as member's club room, one liners would be an ideal choice for writing a post in many cases. However, in others forums it may not be and we need to be strict about it.
If we are going to be a professional chinese defence forum, then these restrictions must be in place in order to single out the bad apples. If not, then SDF will turn into a defence circus just like many other country based defence sites, and we do not want that nor is that the interest.
I would rather have 50 quality posts a day than 200 of which 150 are one liners or useless BS.
Member's should remmeber that your post count does not mean anything. It is only used to control your access (on things like PM, avatar, profile picture, number of PMs you can store in your PM box, etc.) because most members think post count is a factor for them.
I don't have any problem with opening up the forum... but then you will see more ads and ads where you don't like them. :nono:
We have rules and regulations here, let's implement them to the 99.9th% create a quality forum.
Frankly, I DO NOT want a KID who joins the forum thinking he can have a 200 KB avatar on the site or a HUGE picture in their signatures, 500 PM storage box, 2 MB of attachment size limit and think that a smily should be considered a POST...etc.etc.etc. That is childish and old stuff and I do not value that in a member, they can join some other forum and spare SDF.
We want a member who can contribute to the Sino Defence community and global defence community in general in a positive and PROFESSIONAL way, even if they are not related to Defence industry. Forums are successful because members are loyal to them not because forums open up their resources to the members so every harry and tom can come and abuse it.
:coffee::china: