OK there are a number of things here.
- The mention of the eBay auctions is new - I was guilty of the first mention, vis a vis the Gaggia TD I saw. I considered the competitive bidding issue, but in a small group like this didn't think it an issue - especially as I didn't think it likely anyone would bid for that machine anyway. Again I was guilty of "outing" the Super Jolly. Not used to there being so many of us. Sorry. I've been on the lookout for a Mazzer for a while, but I think I'll eventually buy a new Mini Electron from Another Coffee.
- On the SM list for example it's considered bad form to advertise the existence of an auction that members might be interested in. I think that should be our policy too, and I'll consider my wrist slapped.
- On the subject of closed forums, it's a piece of cake to set forum permissions to keep out non-members on a per-forum basis. If we want to have a members only forum, I can arrange that in moments and I'm very happy to do it. I'll run a poll later.
- On the subject of closing all of the the forums off altogether, I'm strongly against that. When we originally converted the old blogging environment into a forum and then a full blown Postnuke site, the original members went through a process of considering whether to hide everything. We decided we didn't want to.
Why?
If we want to be a usable coffee resource (albeit with our own unique flavour and emphasis) rather than just a private club, I think that means the site must be readable to non-members for two reasons :
- There's a wealth of information and opinion in the conversations of groups like ours, not just idle chit chat. I think that anyone should be able to read that and benefit from it. The fact that it might improve our search engine rankings is not lost on me either.
- How do we expect to attract new members if they don't know what they're getting in to, especially with our membership-by-invitation model?
I know we've had a conversation amongst some of us in the last few days about whether some of the things that had been said in a review and a review comment were actually defamatory and actionable. Notwithstanding that I've decided this is not worth worrying about in this case,I should point out that these items are not inside the forum anyway and are covered by different permissions. I could hide them too, but if I did what would be the point? We'd just be a cliquey little group of no benefit to anyone except the elite membership. Sorry that's not my style.
TMC is a community and a democracy, but I must say I haven't invested so much of my own time and money with the intention of making something that's a closed clique.
Oh and finally, there's always the group mailing list if you want to talk to everyone is the group. Anyone can use that. I won't mention the name for security reasons, but I'll send you all a quick note as a reminder of the name.
Geez that was a bit of a rant wasn't it?
Sorry people, but I hope this informs the discussion anyway.