Like Flying Lawyer I would not qualify for the "new" forum / forum section as I am neither currently employed by an airline nor is my license valid at this stage. But I think that there should be some things considered on a broader basis then the "them and us" discussion that has evloved over recent threads.
I started in Fora as a member now almost 20 years ago, and I have seen this discussion about unwanted members come and go. In recent years, I saw exactly the same thing you now contemplate happen in several other forums. Trolling went out of control, people locked out by the dozens, many of them long standing members who lost their control over the trolling. In the day and age where everyone can open a new forum at the touch of a button, fora split into fractions over such things, most of the time with considerable damage to both those who left and those who stayed.
The shouts for a strictly moderated and seregated forum with only "qualified" people were to have access, to restrict this by paying access, e.t.c. tend to become very loud at times like this. In some instances loud enough for some enterprising soul to go ahead and do exactly that. Restricted access, paid forum, open to people with credentials only, strictly moderated. The result in 2 of the experiments I saw happen over the last years was sobering to say the very least.
- Of those "elite" specialist screamers who went bonkers on who they perceived as trolls (and had helped to sustain them by feeding them), not a fraction joined the new place. Why? Part reason they had nobody there to shout at and to let out their frustrations and prove how clever they really were when amongst "peers".
- The new place became a totally sterile environment, there was no life to speak of, because everyone became scared to appear "unprofessional" to those who decided what professionalism was. While the old places lost some members, it kept going at the usual rate, the trolling actually decreased and it's still around today. The new places either become a 10 member closed society or shut down within a few months out of pure boredom.
I've seen some of the same, not the same extent, happen in AVSIG, the old compuserve community. It still exists to my knowledge, it's paid access and most of the classic members are gone. The list goes on. Whether we are talking cat's lovers or nuclear power issues, fan forums of the music industries (in comparison to which this forum is TAME
) or medicine forums, you see the same happening all over.
I personally think that the only way a member can "earn" his place in a forum community is by merit of his postings, not by his / her professional position. I much prefer a world whereby the membership of a forum grow together. Excluding large portions of an industry on suspicion that anyone who is not lucky enough to be a flight deck crew member is not "qualified" to even talk to the ones who are, would in my view be the loss of those in the new shell as much as the loss of those who remain behind. There will be trolls on both sides, make no mistake, and I am almost sure that those who openly seek confrontation with them will continue to spin 10page + threads on the love live of the pavement stones on both sides of the fence.
PPRUNE is today, in my consideration, one of the foremost aviation fora in the world. I think the new forum would be it's and the membership's loss. Excluding whole groups of aviation professionals so that the pilot talk can stay between pilots will not bring the result you aspire any more than it did it in other places.
Danny, what good does it do if you tell those of us who are not "invited" into the new place that the old one is still here? So basically, while you experts do the serious stuff in the new sections, we low life can play out here without annoying the pros? What a place would this forum then become if it went the way you hint at here? All the pros gone to Xanadu and just the "jurnos" and other "smelly people" like 80 % of the aviation industry here?
My own prediction is that while in the initial phase of enthusiasm the closed section might prosper briefly and the rest of the forum go a tad quieter than it is now, many of those who scream the loudest today will be back here to tell the ones they are upset about now how wrong they are, along with those who seek true dialogue across the industry rather than within a closed group.
You are hosting one damn nice forum here. Don't change that by taking the wrong turn at Albuqueuque here.
Best regards
An2 Driver.