It would be a shame not to have access to the comments from the wealth of experience that must exist with most of the retired Professional Pilots.

First post for me. In the U.S. there is a very useful forum along what's been proposed here. It's called Bluecoat, this is for airline pilots (& retired) ATC, avionics engineers, safety analysis people, and I think, regulators - its main focus is aircraft automation issues, but the topics stray every once in awhile, all quite useful though,and somehow they keep out the extraterrestials, but I forgot how. (Now I remember, it's a e-mail thing, so maybe that's much easier to manage). Myself, I'd like to be included even if I'm not a current airline pilot (but was) and have worked more than a decade at a not to be named US government aviation human factors research center. So if I'm included, however its done, then I can make a second post.

Chaz

Interesting conundrum, how to bring in the wealth of experience that's out there while still filtering out the silliness. Thinking slightly outside the box, would not retired pilots and ATC staff be amongst the most worthy contributors? More time, experience and less axes to grind?

Then, current (verifiable) license holders, flightdeck and ATC.

All have to register and describe qualifications, confidentially and accepted on face value at first, with the proviso that your moderator(s) will be harsh with anyone suspected of posing. Free for first x months, then a questionnaire of the "is continuing on this forum worth £10/50/100 a year to you?".

Later, when the dust's settled and if you then think the contributions would be constructive, allow in others, engineers, IT etc, with the same proviso.

Easy to say all this off the cuff. We're going through something slightly similar in my own company. Have to be wary of cannibalising the existing structure. Good luck!

How someone else resolved this questions
 

First off let me say that I have nothing more than a passing interest in avaiation. I fly a sim ocationally and have a fondness for complex and mechanical things. I read this formum ocationally because I am interested in how people approach problem solving, particularly in time critical situations. The 'infomed' speculations are as interesting as what eventually turns out to be the facts.
Ok, having said that, I also read a forum for professional photographers at http://www.sportsshooter.com/index.html
They faced a similar problem of wanting to exclude non-professionals and how to vet the appropriate people where "appropriate" is hard to define.
There approach is to make the forums viewable by all but only approved pro's can post. There veting process is what I think might be of interest. They use a referal system. Esentially, you must be "sponsored" by an existing member. If you "sponsor" someone that is not appropriate, both of you loose privilege. Presumably, you would have some way to seed the population.
I would hate to see this new forum not be viewable by myself because I think that only the Un-informed speculations would be left for public viewing.

Good luck in finding a solution to the excess bagage.

From first page I don't mind sharing my name with the forum administration. I spent many years on Avsig using my real name, but have shied away from exposing my name to ridicule on this forum in a free for all.

I don't have a license, but you may care to know that I do have a significant influence on both the investigation and the safety related corrective actions.

I would be happy to particpate in the discussion, but I would not bother to be an observer since it would only upset me even further than by reading regular Pprune postings where at least I can act as a devils advocate. :)

If you want to ensure the qualifications of a participant in such a forum, probably the only way is to obtain some sort of positive referal from an employer or professional organisation. As has been pointed out, licences can be borrowed and copied, like it or not! Once an application has been made in this way, there would need to be a disconnect between those details and a username "handle", to ensure anonymity.

Danny

Why not keep it to a regulated PPRuNe forum? Just 'invite' all current airline forum members, they are already regulated by each company 'mod'.

We could then work out a way to invite ATCOs, engineers & the retired.

I would contribute to such a forum.

Chaz,
When I joined quite some time ago, Bluecoat (named after the UK school by the way) required a potted bio which was vetted by the Moderator. If you were deemed acceptable you got the password. I beleive that most PPruners already have submitted something very similar and a quick search of previous posts would soon show if they had the requisite knowledge & experience (pilot's license or not).

If you followed that methodology, you'd find that my colleague, Mad (Flight) Scientist, far from being left out, would be welcome as he has provided quite a lot of technical input to the Flight Testi & other forums.

I would second those suggestions which look to a referral filter for the existing membership .. that way, any invitees have an auditable track record in the wider forums of PPRuNe and the lunatic fringe could be restrained (regardless of whatever qualifications and experience they may have). One would envisage the hierarchy having an over-riding say so that non-PPRuNe folk of distinction could be enticed into the particular forum.

Restricting such discussions to one or more segments of the Industry would be counterproductive, I suggest .. the Industry now is a very multi-faceted, multi-disciplinary sort of animal and the discussions really need to be in a similar vein.

To Exclude Retired ATP's and Service Pilots?
 

Where would this leave retired ATP's - and Service Pilots who may have many tens of thousands of hours on Transport type a/c?
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Excluded obviously.

Thinking about this some more, it seems to me that because most of the posters keep their identity anonymous - myself included - for a variety of reasons it also permits one to play devil's advocate (or just devil) - myself included - from time to time without fear of retribution.

If we want a truly professional forum to discuss important matters of relevance to our business, there is no place for anonymity. Perhaps access to the forum should be predicated, amongst other things, on names and profiles being 'correct'.

I think the point should be made that nothing Danny's proposed will change or affect Pprune's existing forums, as far as I can tell. There would still be every opportunity for the mischief, mayhem and, yes, serious comment that already exists here. However, I think what Danny is looking for is a forum with a greater sense of purpose and gravitas than exists in the current structure, but with (geographically) wider participation, and probably a wider remit, than the current officially-sponsored print forums (such as the afore-mentioned Chirp).

I think that such a forum's membership would probably become more or less self-selecting once its character is understood. Chirp is open to all aviation people, but its nature discourages the frivolous and the mischievous which are a feature of R&N. Tech Log is an example of a forum already existing here on Pprune which has established a more (though not totally) serious-minded atmosphere, yet it has no bars to entry. Moderation, at least in the early stages, would have to be tighter than it is now, but that's relatively easily achieved in a closed forum (we already have the technology to pre-moderate all posts before they appear on a forum).

Membership based on the current airline forums isn't as simple as it would first appear - some are open to all employees of that airline, not just pilots or other Ops professionals. Thus I think it inevitable that membership of any new forum would be initially by invitation, and subsequently by referral. This would successfully exclude those who just want an elitist airline-pilot 'club' and allow in those who are known to add value to discussions, whatever their role in aviation.

I have to say that I still reserve judgement as to whether such a forum is necessary or desirable, but I think the organisational issues aren't insurmountable and, given a lot of TLC in the early stages, it could be valuable if its discussions become influential in the industry. I happen to think that that's already the case, despite the sometimes high noise to signal ratio on R&N.

I think its a very good idea.

There are times when safety related issues need to be discussed, and we all know that the press reads these pages. I think that an airline only forum would be a great help to aviation professionals from all over the industry. I don't think that access should be restricted to airline pilots only though. I think it should be open to all professional pilots (instructors, biz jets ect..) and also to ATC personnel, Flt Engs (any left?). We all have a vested interest in our industry and a new forum would help us debate the issues and challenges what are facing us with other professional within our industry. And I hope that comment can be made without causing the hysteria that can be seen on R&N from time to time.

But how you would restrict access is beyond me unless you could get the CAA to confirm who has professional licenses, or set the forum up in conjunction with CHIRP.

It seams that there is great need for a professional aviation debating platform which may exceed CHIRP in itself. As it was mentioned several times above, aviation is a system, encompassing pilots, engineers, ATC etc.

I think we could separate aviation into two categories; people in leisure aviation i.e. GA, students etc. and people in professional aviation, employed by an official, recognized company.

Those of us that earn a living working in this industry may have a need for discussions such as CHIRP on a professional level without any distraction from the medias or wannabes. However, the leisure aviation people could learn a great deal from such discussion and thus increasing the overall safety of aviation – they should be able to read-only.

For the verification process to stay as simple and cheap as possible, weeding out the pros from the amateurs one could use the professionals business email. Anyone that wishes to be verified for such forum must give the work email address to receive an access code. When the address ends in something like @lufthansa.de, @delta.com @boeing.com @it or nats.co.uk it should be evident that it is a pro.

Just put a copy of the license or busines card under the posters name or trough a link to his/her profile.


Do not expect the boys from the CAA or manufacturors etc......to post, they will never be critical of a potential custumer or political friend.

Or maybe we should do as most pro's .... shuffle it all a couple of meters under the ground.

Good idea I reckon, far to much bull**** from unqualified, know-it-all types on the open forums.

I take it the plan would be to open it to ALL qualified Professional Pilots, including those of us who don't fly for airlines?

Cheers

I think your plan is great Danny. As has been pointed out, it does not change the existing forums but merely guarantees some degree of sense from poeple who are genuine professional pilots. I personally would probably open it to retired pilots but would disclude those who have not flown for a recognised airline even if they have a licence.

Sounds like a good idea but I think read only access would be useful for those of us on the fringes of the industry. PPL’s etc.

Alternately perhaps some form of accreditation so that posts on all boards could be flagged to show which credentials of the individual posting have been verified, perhaps with the grade of licences or whatever shown allowing some judgement to be made as to the veracity of the post.

Danny, as a pax with a professional interest in the management of risk, I would be sad not to have access to such a forum, though I fully understand the need to avoid excess muppet input.
I like the idea of entry by sponsorship to allow posting - this puts a lot of inertia in the way of people who, once banned, seek to re-enter under a different moniker. I'm not sure whether the idea of restricting readership to avoid duplicate threads holds water - I would have thought forum mods would be in a position to stamp on any threads duplicating flight safety subject matter.
Having said that, I wouldn't want to be any part of a hindrance to proper discussion among professionals, if entry by license or whatever seems to be the only practicable solution.

I think the private forum is a good idea. I have not read all the comments yet so I apologise if I am repeating anything. I personally think it should be open to all licenced Commercial Pilots/ATCO's/Engineers. Aviation is about safety and CHIRP is produced for that reason. If we all work together it will continue. A private forum limited to pilots only is all and well but input from others (ATCO's/Engineers) should be welcomed.
On the negative side it would be difficult to validate all applications and I'm sure someone who was not licenced would find a way in and then all is lost.
Rgds
ILS 119.5