I am curious, with all the talk about non-travel posts and flamers and anonymous(MSP?)posts...I am wondering, was there a time when you registered for Fodors and used only your real name and e-mail? If so, how was it and why the change?

I didn't start this thread, as sydney will no doubt come back here and attest.<BR><BR>and I wonder if "never" is the sad little person that did try to break into my LonelyPlanet registered name there, just yesterday - - by requesting a temporary password. Of course, that doesn't work because they mail the temporary password to me e-mail address.<BR><BR>but it's interesting that someone did try over there - - and that LonelyPlanet's registration prevented them from being able to post under my name.<BR><BR>Best wishes,<BR><BR>Rex<BR>

Now listen to me here, Miss Sidney. If you do not have a sense of humour or you can't scroll down to the next message, girlfiend, you got a problem. Having to register for a forum is a sure way of killing the forum itself. So just do not read something that doesn't interest you!!! You shouln't be anymore bothered by "troll" messages than you would be by a boring one. And your message is SO BORING ! Thanks, Luv ya ! Aunt B

It is a good question.<BR>Has there ever been a time where people were required to register at Fodors?<BR>And if so, what made the change?<BR>And was it better or worse?<BR>

Hi Rex...no, I am not you! That's what I mean about the registration though, how would that work, and did it work? I'm not on any other boards.

This question comes up every so often. To my knowledge, registration has never been required on this site. Feelings are mixed, as are mine, about requiring it. I also use www.slowtrav.com, on which registration is required, and it's heavily monitored as well. It's quite pleasant.

I too have mixed feelings about registration.<BR><BR>Could this be done such that Fodors has one's email address but it wouldn't have to be published? I get so very much junk mail and need to retain my email address, I wouldn't want to give it out, but have no problem posting consistently under my name or identifying myself to Fodors.<BR><BR>I have so enjoyed the generosity of posters with so much knowledge and willingness to share it. I discovered this site about a year ago and have raved about it to friends. However, of late, the bizzare, cruel, stupid and off-topic posts have really spoiled it. I don't think it is true that one can cope by just not reading the junk posts. The essential problem is that they are congesting the site overall and spoiling many very valuable threads. Posts now pop up more than one per minute. If I post a question and go to work for a day, I can't find my post as they are not indexed that quickly. It has become very tedious to wade through the junk for the good stuff.

Just a reminder to Leslie: you can always return to your post if you bookmark, or simply writee down the URL immediately after a you see a post you like (whether it was "yours" or not).<BR><BR>This thread, for example, has the following URL:<BR><BR>http://www.fodors.com/forums/pgMessages.jsp?fid=2&tid=1358715<BR><BR>This NEVER changes. You get it by right right clicking the header in the lefthand column (then "Copy shortcut" or "copy Linl Location" - - you get it "out" with an "Edit Paste").<BR><BR>As for sydney's question about how it works, I'd recommend you go look at www.lonelyplanet.com (ThornTree) and try it yourself. And to Leslie's concerns about e-mail addresses, they are NOT disclosed on LonelyPlanet - - though you can have a "pseudo-mailbox" for private messages ON their site, if you choose.<BR><BR>I am actually neutral on the issue of registration. I believe that it would have some modest value; it might also intimidate newbies, and newbies are the lifeblood of this forum. No newbies? - - not much point to this place. Just a bunch of us regulars talking to each other. It would grow stale very, very fast. It's not like any of us are gone off on a new trip every month or anything.<BR><BR>

Oh, and I just now noticed. My reference to "never" doesn't make sense now. Fodors policed up a posting by "never"... something or other. because it was moderately pejorative, as I recall.<BR>

to the top<BR>

What on earth is all THAT about???

Rex - thank you so much for the info about bookmarking..didn't know how to do that.

topping<BR>

oh how will i make a decision if rex is neutured

Huh? Nurtured? Nourished? Neutralized?<BR>

Maybe the word was supposed to be naturalized. But I already am a citizen.<BR><BR><BR>

Instead of going to the trouble of bookmarking the post, I simply do a subject search. <BR><BR>I have found that if I have made a post, I can even search on my name and the post will pop up along with all the others I have made.

The problem, Ronda, is that you cannot find a posting until after the next time that the database is "indexed". they have been doing better, but still a post can "sink" many hundreds deep even in just 24 hours or less.<BR><BR>You cannot - - right this minute - - retrieve THIS thread by searching "ronda". Maybe in a few days (or weeks) you will be able to do so. To be fair, they HAVE been indexing a little more frequently this month.<BR>

Rex is great !

I would be happy to register with Fodor's to use this site if my email address were not displayed. As it is I post consistently under one name. I could, of course, use a throwaway "real" email (from yahoo or whatever), but I'd never (never ever) check it, so there'd be no point except to keep somebody else from posting under my name. <BR><BR>