Forum Policies & Announcements (LEGACY POSTS FROM OLD FORUMS)

[Ryan Jordan]

Introducing BackpackingLight.com Discussion Forums

We introduced a limited forum discussion interface in November 2003, for the sole purpose of offering readership the opportunity to provide useful commentary on issues and topics published in articles at BackpackingLight.com. We really enjoyed the reader feedback, were very pleased by your levels of insightfulness and personal resonsibility, and we’d like to move forward with more comprehensive discussion forum topics.

How the Forums Work

This forum interface is not a conventional “BBS” style discussion board. The interface is simple and based on a flat discussion architecture(replies appended to the ends of threads rather than nested).

To view a particular thread, you may access it via the index below. In addition, you will find some of the threads (especially those in the Editors’ Roundtable Forum) embedded at the end of articles related to the thread topic. For example, to enter the thread LED Lights, you may click on that thread from the ‘LED Lights’ topic in the Editors’ Roundtable Forum, or you may view the exact same thread at the end of each of the following articles: “The Weird Science of Night Vision”, “Buying an LED Torch”, and “LED Lighting Technology”.

Forum Policies

Policies for each forum may be slightly different. In general, our default forum policy requires login for posting, with all forums moderated by the BackpackingLight.com Editorial Staff.

Posts containing profanity, unsubstantiated claims that are perceived to be defamatory or slanderous, or off-topic posts will be deleted.

While you are welcome to debate and challenge manufacturer marketing claims here, discussion forums are not an environment for airing customer grievances about your gear arising from using your gear in situations clearly beyond what the manufacturer intended (e.g., this silnylon pack really sucks, it ripped to shreds when I slid down a talus slope). Further, flames and personal wars with other companies or persons will not be tolerated here.

NO COMMERCIAL POSTS IN THE FORUMS. Keep your signatures to a bare minimum. URLs posted in the forum should be useful and valuable to the readership in context with the post, not intended to provide trolls to drive traffic to your site.

Enjoy the forums, and feel free to provide us with any feedback.

Ryan Jordan
Publisher, Backpacking Light

[Richard Sullivan]

Ryan, thanks so much for finally getting us to a full forum! It will be interesting to see how the flat structure works out. Cheers!

[Anonymous]

I have every reason to trust that your policy will show the same integrity as all your other endeavors. So just an encouragement and perspective from a person who watched other forums deteriorate into flames, slander, and genuine harassment.

Due to the fact that a portion of responses will come from people short on facts and long on dogma, and who utilize insults as a form of persuasion, and that email and computer forums tend to “grow” misunderstandings, your policy WILL be tested, believe me.

If you get caught in the net of worrying about losing customers whose messages get deleted, as have many other forums, despite having strong policies and then not enforcing them, their will be a very chilling effect on the entire forum. This is analogous to and a form of harassment, in that a hostile environment ensues, that stifles reasonable disagreement and the expression of ideas.

Please due err on the side of keeping things positive, even when the extreme folks accuse you of preventing their so called free speech rights are really harassing us.

Thanks in advance,
A grateful outdoor person who loves that you all bring more light than heat to discussions of these matters, something in very short supply in this area.

[Anonymous]

Ryan,

None of these forums fit a key topic that is most useful– “READER TIPS FOR LIGHT WEIGHT HIKING”.

[Ryan Jordan]

Great idea, I’ve put one up, under the Campfire section.

[Ben Fortson]

I’m logged in as Blanton Fortson. ‘blanton’

I still can’t access reviews. There are no contact emails for staff. What’s up?

Kind Regards, Blanton Fortson; Anchorage, AK
please respond to:
[email protected]
http://homepage.mac.com/blanton
360 243-0690 (vonage.com)

[Ryan Jordan]

Blanton see this page to submit a support inquiry:

http://www.backpackinglight.com/cgi-bin/backpackinglight/contact.html

Search the knowledge base first. There are several articles there to help you troubleshoot membership access problems, which are most often a result of not using the same username/password that you used when you purchased your subscription.

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