Suggestion - Added Rank

[1AZRAEL1]

What irondude said.

I've been around for a while and personally have not seen a "mine's bigger than yours" mentality. Things got out of hand and taken out of context over in the other thread so we need to chill.

Not sure we need a new rank for those that have been around since the beginning, but I'd be curious to see those that are still around.

[Paulbot]

... Not sure we need a new rank for those that have been around since the beginning, but I'd be curious to see those that are still around.

You can see some discussion about that in the thread with the first newsletter.

[griffin]

The current rankings were difficult enough to implement, as implied elitism just to be able to identify the staff, from the newbies, from the more frequent members.

I'd be was once considering having people's first join date (month/year) listed somewhere in their post header-bar, but couldn't figure out how to do it.

[lancalot]

The current rankings were difficult enough to implement, as implied elitism just to be able to identify the staff, from the newbies, from the more frequent members.

I'd be was once considering having people's first join date (month/year) listed somewhere in their post header-bar, but couldn't figure out how to do it.

it actually up there already .... on top of the person post on the right hand side ...
Join Date:
Location:
Posts:

[GoktimusPrime]

No, that's only the date when someone joined this current incarnation of the board, not when they joined OzFormers. My join date is 27th December 2007, but I joined OTCA in 1997. We didn't have an online forum then, but griffin did issue out membership cards. I think I was member #48 IIRC.

I don't see the harm in having a special rank for longer time members. It's not exactly elitist if those ranks don't even have any additional board privileges/entitlements (so it's nothing more than an ornamental title). Why can't we have a sort of superficial "reward" system for people who've stuck with the club for longer than some of the younger members have been alive? Surely reward point systems like frequent flyer points and loyalty cards are more 'elitist' because they give members privileges (e.g. discounts) over those who don't have them. I personally don't care if it happens or not. I don't need titles/ranks to tell me who the long time members are; if anything it'd be more relevant for newer members, but it wouldn't really affect long time members.

[lancalot]

oohhh i see...me still noobie

[Seraphim Prime]

No, that's only the date when someone joined this current incarnation of the board, not when they joined OzFormers. My join date is 27th December 2007, but I joined OTCA in 1997. We didn't have an online forum then, but griffin did issue out membership cards. I think I was member #48 IIRC.

I don't see the harm in having a special rank for longer time members. It's not exactly elitist if those ranks don't even have any additional board privileges/entitlements (so it's nothing more than an ornamental title). Why can't we have a sort of superficial "reward" system for people who've stuck with the club for longer than some of the younger members have been alive? Surely reward point systems like frequent flyer points and loyalty cards are more 'elitist' because they give members privileges (e.g. discounts) over those who don't have them. I personally don't care if it happens or not. I don't need titles/ranks to tell me who the long time members are; if anything it'd be more relevant for newer members, but it wouldn't really affect long time members.

Rewards systems like Flybuys aren't elitist as they're open to anybody who wants to take part.

Providing a special badge or something similar for people who were here at the start only causes segregation because it's not something that is open to all, which I think has always been the strength of this forum as a place for fans to gather - it's open and equitable to all, no matter whether they're a long term fan or a relatively new one.

People get recognised for their name and history among those for whom the history is important. I think as most people still go by original board names, or have made it clear one way or another what their former names were, such that it's fairly easy to tell who's been around a while without a need for a special badge or member rank.

[griffin]

We have post counts there to highlight who are more frequent members here, but it can be inaccurate and unfair to those who are newer to those who are older. The best method to use, which I often look at when updating ranks, is the "per day" count on the profile page... which ignores how long you have been here, just how much you interact here.

I do have records of when members first joined Ozformers for most of the members before we moved here, so I'd like to have the "original" join date next to the "current board's" join date... but as I noted above, this doesn't appear obviously easy to do (for me).

[BigTransformerTrev]

No, that's only the date when someone joined this current incarnation of the board, not when they joined OzFormers. My join date is 27th December 2007, but I joined OTCA in 1997. We didn't have an online forum then, but griffin did issue out membership cards. I think I was member #48 IIRC.

Out of interest, when did the club actually start? And then when did it subsequently turn into an online forum? My interest is piqued

Oh, and on the subject of added rank, consider me Switzerland - I'm totally neutral on the issue.

[GoktimusPrime]

Club started in 1996. I first set up a forum that was used by members in 1999, but the first "official" forum set up by griffin was around 2005 IIRC. We also used to use a channel on IRC; #transformers on austnet; although we didn't set that up. In 2000 I came across it and it was already established by some other people who weren't even TF fans and when I tried to talk about Transformers with them, they initially got freaked out, even mad. Then started kicking me off the channel. I messaged one of the ops and eventually he agreed that a channel called #transformers should be better off in the hands of people who want to talk about Transformers (duh), so he deregistered the channel and it was either myself or dirge who re-registered it.