New forum needed?

Originally posted by mwmiller
If you want a private clans forum, would this work?

1. Start a new clan and name it the "forum clan", or some other name that suits you.
2. Whoever starts it is the leader and the policy is that it is a forum only. No clan games.
3. Send out a pm to all prospective participants and invite them to apply for membership, advising that it is only for the ...[text shortened]... I assume that only subscribers can join a clan so your forum clan will be for subscribers only.)

That sounds like a good idea.

Originally posted by Ghost of a Duke
That sounds like a good idea.

Apparently there is a limit on clan members, so it would have to be a club instead. It would be worth trying anyway. Worst thing that could happen is that it doesn't work.

I think this is the best idea I've heard for solving this problem. The only thing I'd add is about the creation and ownership of this forum-only club.
One person would need to be the creator of the club and therefore the club leader, doorkeeper and only moderator. I'd have a rule for this club that the club leader title and tasks must be passed to another one of the group on the first day of each month or some other desired frequency.

the solution is very simple, just give is our forum back and limit the number of alerts that anyone can do, this will solve the problem of alerts being abused and we can leave everyone else in peace and get back to what we like to do best, taking the rip.

Originally posted by Kewpie
I think this is the best idea I've heard for solving this problem. The only thing I'd add is about the creation and ownership of this forum-only club.
One person would need to be the creator of the club and therefore the club leader, doorkeeper and only moderator. I'd have a rule for this club that the club leader title and tasks must be passed to another one of the group on the first day of each month or some other desired frequency.

Not really interested in joining a club. Starting to feel at home in the general forum. Being a general forum basically anything can be discussed in there including clan stuff. May have to be toned down a tad but that's OK, we'll live with it. Got 20 or 30 threads in mind to start tonight.

Originally posted by mwmiller
Apparently there is a limit on clan members, so it would have to be a club instead. It would be worth trying anyway. Worst thing that could happen is that it doesn't work.

The club thing - whilst probably working in principal - requires whoever wants to be the admin to have the overhead of accepting all the members who want to join - one by one. And whoever wants to partake would have to actively join.

The old clans forum was just there. No need to join or be accepted - you could just wander in and be offended straight away. I'll bet there were many more readers than posters of that forum (of any forum probably). Putting a block in front of the readership (i.e. having to actively join a forum - is only going to reduce the readership).

If you go down the club route then those that want to partake have to apply and whoever is "in charge" has the burden of accepting, one by one the people who want in. There's also the perceived bias of whoever runs such a club.
There's a very real possibility that there would end up being multiple, competing "clan" clubs.

This clearly needs a proper site-wide fix
It's not just the clan peeps that want an outlet - there's the general forum to consider also.

Creating a sort of super-club that all clan members are automatically enrolled into would allow the clan people to get their forum back without any administrative burden on the site admins or moderators.
Everyone wins (well ... except Russ - who'd probably have to do some coding 😛)

Originally posted by orangutan
[b]The club thing - whilst probably working in principal - requires whoever wants to be the admin to have the overhead of accepting all the members who want to join - one by one. And whoever wants to partake would have to actively join.

Well I really don't have a dog in this fight. I'm not in any clans and never used that forum.
There seemed to be some genuine concern about the loss of the clan forum and I gave it a little thought and offered up an idea to help solve the problem.

As you point out, "The clan forum was just there."
And now it isn't. I have no idea if or when it will return.
I offered up a possible solution that might help until something better is made available.
It can easily be done right now but would require someone to step up and get it going.

Yes, that person would need to approve each and every membership application. How many would that be, do you think?
It doesn't look to me like that many. I see less than a dozen members actively discussing it at this time in the GF.
(I could be mistaken on that number as I did not actually count them.)

It would provide a less-moderated forum that is not subject to moderation by the public forum moderators AFAIK.
But yes, it would become a job for someone who would have to start the club and approve each person wanting membership.
Once they're in, everyone can chatter away as much as they want.

Since each and every member of the site could participate in the now missing clan forum,
it would make sense that the owner of this club would not exclude anyone who asks to join the club.
It would then be 'open house' as before.

What is the worst thing that could happen? If it doesn't work out, at least nothing further has been lost.

Originally posted by radioactive69
Not really interested in joining a club. Starting to feel at home in the general forum. Being a general forum basically anything can be discussed in there including clan stuff. May have to be toned down a tad but that's OK, we'll live with it. Got 20 or 30 threads in mind to start tonight.

Oh, I'm looking forward to these lovely new threads, Radio.

Maybe we can throw in an anagram or two to keep the very brightest GF crowd on their toes?

Originally posted by mwmiller
Well I really don't have a dog in this fight. I'm not in any clans and never used that forum.
There seemed to be some genuine concern about the loss of the clan forum and I gave it a little thought and offered up an idea to help solve the problem.

As you point out, "The clan forum was just there."
And now it isn't. I have no idea if or when it wi ...[text shortened]... worst thing that could happen? If it doesn't work out, at least nothing further has been lost.

Your attempts to help are truly very much appreciated. 🙂