Should we let foreigners in as members?

[roller]

who knows what type of viruses these foreighners are carrying

well done internet customs

[Robzy]

I tend to agree with the majority of people in this thread... keep Ozformers local!

I also agree with Gok - If I want to read pages and pages of material that may or may not be relevant to me, I can go to any one of the major TF sites!

I come to Ozformers because I can discuss "local" issues, read "relevant" topics, ask questions which get helpful responses and great advice, and even buy stuff of other members (Alternators Rodimus for example) that I wouldn't otherwise be able to!

[griffin]

Since I got one very angry responce from an American who was refused access, I thought that maybe I can post here the details of the person who is not local and why they want to be here, and give a week for people to say yes or no - that way I can show to them that it wasn't my choice if they are refused entry, and I don't have to get the brunt of their abuse.

[springah]

I say thee nay!

Or let them in.. maybe with a flag of where they're from?

[jaydisc]

I can't imagine why a foreigner would want to join rather than hang out at seibertron, tfw2005, etc., but also I can't see how it would hurt us either... again, unless it's an issue of spamming, which I'm pretty sure we're not too into regardless of origin.

[GoktimusPrime]

Or let them in.. maybe with a flag of where they're from?

They already do that on other international forums. OzFormers is meant to be an Australasian forum for Australasian fans, and I don't see any problem with keeping it that way.

There are plenty of other board communities which are regionally exclusive such as for Nordic fans, Dutch fans, Transformers New Zealand, Transformers Hong Kong etc. - most Japanese boards have a policy stating that users can only post in Japanese (posts in other languages are expressly disallowed).

If people want to go on a more international community, then there are plenty of international boards out there for them to join.

[jaydisc]

I'd love to hear why this person wanted to join.

[springah]

They already do that on other international forums. OzFormers is meant to be an Australasian forum for Australasian fans, and I don't see any problem with keeping it that way.

There are plenty of other board communities which are regionally exclusive such as for Nordic fans, Dutch fans, Transformers New Zealand, Transformers Hong Kong etc. - most Japanese boards have a policy stating that users can only post in Japanese (posts in other languages are expressly disallowed).

If people want to go on a more international community, then there are plenty of international boards out there for them to join.

So what happens if i move to the US for a few years? :P
Or i might just like Aussie fans better? I dunno, just seems dumb to say "no foreigners allowed!"

[dirge]

If people want to go on a more international community, then there are plenty of international boards out there for them to join.

As Gok said, there are international board. The reason for this boards existance is an Australian focus.

If someone from (say) Canada has a specific reason for joining a forum with an Australian focus, ie they're looking to migrate, they're an expat or they lived here for a while and have a lot of friends within the Australian fandom, that's different to someone who just wants to join our board.

The person who is joining specifically because of the Australian focus has a case - because their inclusion wont dilute the local content.

I don't think we should say "lets allow 5%". What if that 5% are vocal troublemakers banned from international boards?

As for a vote, I'm happy to leave griffin to make the call. I don't know that calling public vote and having someone publicly voted against is the way to go