Hello everyone!<br>I have been unable to post on the ETS forum due to the recent problems. This is now fixed thanks to Chris and Doug!<br>I , however have an open question to all of you out there;<br>I find it rather anoying that there are lots of coments and jokes, etc that take precious space on this forum. I find it hard to find the good, sound advice in among all the chit-chat and non-essential posts.<br>Do I have a point? Would it be to much to ask, if you could just post the important stuff on the forum and use e-mail and direct messages for personal comms?<br>Any comments greatly appreciated!<br><br>Stefan, Sweden

I have not noticed it as too much of a problem. But I think<br>it would be an excellent idea if folks used the 'OT' (off-topic)<br>identifier if they _do_ post something not directly related to<br>the 'survival' concept.

Rockbyte, what one poster states is usually the thought of several others. I am as guilty as anyone ( ten lashes with paracord).. Everyone please, again remember to keep it on topic and courteous. enough friendships have been made to exchange other thoughts via personal message or email.

Stefan,<br><br>Welcome back! The issue you raise is not uncommon in online forums and not all that simple to address. Some amount of "chit chat" is essential to the development of an online community, a real community, which I am very pleased to see happening here. Friendships develop as messages are exchanged. Personality comes though often as a result of the joking around and misc. commentary that forum members include. The general friendliness of this place is only apparent from this part of the postings and that's what helps attracts new members to the community and allows ever more new friendships to develop. I don't think any of us want a sterile forum, it's no fun and boring. I don't really want Chris or I to have to become "thread police" with the regulars either. By and large, I don't see that it has been a terrible problem to date.<br><br>My experience with online communities goes back over a decade, to the original Compuserve when a 300 baud modem was hot stuff. These forums, like AVSIG, are still around today with many of the same members (and thousands of new ones), because of the true community that develops in a moderated, civil forum (as is the case with any neighborhood or community in the "real" world). When I look at my closest friends and associates, most of them came from friendships established on AVSIG. In many cases it was years before I met people in person, in some cases years later I still never have, but they are still good friends and we laugh and cry together as any friends do when things happen in our lives. So, this is a roundabout way of saying that there's considerable value to this Chit Chat. <br><br>By the same token, we all have to be responsible and if things move significantly off topic, we should move them to email or elsewhere. Email is great for some things, but often the conversation/discussion is best when everyone is involved. In that spirit, I'm going to open a new forum section, "Around The Campfire," for all of us to just Chit Chat about life or subjects of interest that have nothing to do with survival and emergency preparedness. Our community has grown to the point where I think it's time and viable. I expect everyone to maintain the same decorum as in here to keep it a family friendly place. I'm sure disagreements will occur, but let's keep it civil.<br><br>Thanks for bring this up and helping the forum to evolve.