fronobulax
Bassist, GAD and the Hot Mess Mods
- Joined
- May 3, 2007
- Messages
- 24,761
- Reaction score
- 8,895
- Location
- Central Virginia, USA
- Guild Total
- 5
I'm getting some snark or missing jokes in some of the discussions about profile fields so...
There have been several discussions where it became important to know where a poster was physically located. Sometimes it is important to know someone is not in the US. Sometimes there is a query about local pickup or inspection. There is also the chance that an instrument can be picked up by one member and transferred by a chain of members to the buyer. So there are LTG members who appreciate when the field is filled out in a useful fashion. No one is required to do so. It is just something you may do that might help someone else or eliminate a "where are you located?" post.
The Guild total field was added in response to user requests for a SWAG of the number of Guilds owned by LTG members. LTG's Information Technology staff is working tirelessly in the background to find a way to add all these numbers up and report the total to the membership. When that happens you may wish to be included rather than suggesting people can read a sig. But that is your choice. Ideally people will be honest but that is also your choice. That said, attempts to vandalize the total may be met with very public requests to tell the rest of us about your collection,
When GAD took over the helm of LTG there were several hundred requests per day for new accounts that were from spammers. The previous policy would catch them when they posted but on the worst days there were 20 or 30 posts that needed to be deleted and the posting account banned. So GAD started trying to automate some processes and reduce both the server load from processing unwanted new accounts and the human load of deleting posts and banning users. The Membership Reason was added as a means to assist in the process. The field is mandatory for potential new accounts but because of software limitations it must be filled out by any existing user who edits portions of their profile. So if you choose to update the location or count fields, you will be required to put something in the Membership Reason. It really doesn't matter what you do, although you should be aware that the Moderators sit around in the Mod Lounge drinking their beverages of choice and commenting on some of the ways this field has been creatively filled out
FYI
There have been several discussions where it became important to know where a poster was physically located. Sometimes it is important to know someone is not in the US. Sometimes there is a query about local pickup or inspection. There is also the chance that an instrument can be picked up by one member and transferred by a chain of members to the buyer. So there are LTG members who appreciate when the field is filled out in a useful fashion. No one is required to do so. It is just something you may do that might help someone else or eliminate a "where are you located?" post.
The Guild total field was added in response to user requests for a SWAG of the number of Guilds owned by LTG members. LTG's Information Technology staff is working tirelessly in the background to find a way to add all these numbers up and report the total to the membership. When that happens you may wish to be included rather than suggesting people can read a sig. But that is your choice. Ideally people will be honest but that is also your choice. That said, attempts to vandalize the total may be met with very public requests to tell the rest of us about your collection,
When GAD took over the helm of LTG there were several hundred requests per day for new accounts that were from spammers. The previous policy would catch them when they posted but on the worst days there were 20 or 30 posts that needed to be deleted and the posting account banned. So GAD started trying to automate some processes and reduce both the server load from processing unwanted new accounts and the human load of deleting posts and banning users. The Membership Reason was added as a means to assist in the process. The field is mandatory for potential new accounts but because of software limitations it must be filled out by any existing user who edits portions of their profile. So if you choose to update the location or count fields, you will be required to put something in the Membership Reason. It really doesn't matter what you do, although you should be aware that the Moderators sit around in the Mod Lounge drinking their beverages of choice and commenting on some of the ways this field has been creatively filled out
FYI
