Victorian Speleological Association Inc.

[vsa]

By direction of the VSA Committee, changes have been made to the VSA Forum that restrict access to certain areas. In summary, only the Chat (open access) and For Sale forums remain open to non-members of the VSA. All site visitors may read the content of these two forums. Registered users, even though they are not VSA members, may also post, reply and vote on those forums.

All unregistered and registered non-members are still welcome to participate there in caving discussion.

To access all other areas of the VSA Forum it is necessary henceforth to be permanent (ie. non-introductory) members of the association. Visit the VSA web site for information about the VSA and how to join.

[vsa]

Registered forum users who are VSA members and therefore expect to be placed in a user group that allows access to restricted areas are advised that a certain minimum standard of identification may be enforced in future. While it is understood that some people are reluctant to reveal their full name on a widely viewed internet space, a minimally informative web-name will allow the forum administrators to properly judge whether that registered user may be safely added to a user group with greater access.

For example, we would prefer 'John Citizen' rather than simply 'John'. However, 'JohnC' would be OK, as would 'JCitizen', or even 'JC' as long as we don't already have a member named, for example, James Carpet. And so on.

We invite users, especially VSA members, to review their current user name and consider making it more identifiable. Contact Peter Freeman by forum-based personal email if you wish to do this.

[vsa]

As foreshadowed some time ago, it has been deemed necessary to impose a minimum level of identifiability for VSA Forum users. This requirement will be implemented over the coming few weeks. It is especially important for those users who wish to remain in the group 'vsa'. Membership of that group is what enables access to the restricted areas of the forum. Therefore the tightening of identifiability will apply first to VSA members, but may later be applied to all Forum users.

Identification is best achieved by having a recognisable username. For example, mine is Peter Freeman, so there can be no doubt as to who I am when you see a post by me. In addition, my profile contains relevant information which assists in this identification. However, we have usernames that bear little or no relationship to the user's real identity, and their profiles typically contain no additional information. Such usernames are unacceptable as members of group 'vsa' after a deadline of 31 March 2010, and may be removed from the group.

The best way to ensure your continued access is to re-register with a compliant username ASAP. Compliance requirements are a matter of common sense: use your judgement. For example, the existing 'PaulB' is OK - VSA members know who that is. 'Bat', 'Zad', etc, are not clear enough.

Experimentally, we may allow identifiability by other profile information, without abandonment of your current non-compliant username. The only option I see in this respect, since the profile area does not provide a field specifically to contain a real name, is to use the 'Location', 'Occupation' or 'Interests' fields, with the 'Occupation' field perhaps being the most appropriate one. You may wish to enter your real name, affiliation, etc, in there. If significant numbers take this option, the Forum administrators will later assess whether the identifiability requirements have thereby been fulfilled satisfactorily.

By the way, the changes that we are requiring will not involve loss of data or loss of your posts to the Forum so far.

Comments on this issue are welcome, as are any ideas that would achieve our aim by alternative means.

[vsa]

My previous posts suggested that you RE-REGISTER with a more acceptable username. Instead of this, I suggest that, if you fall into the category of users who need to become more identifiable, then email Peter.Freeman@hotmail.com, stating your current username and your desired new acceptable username. I can then change it for you, and advise when it is done. Your password will remain as-is, and all username links to previous posts will remain intact.

If you merely wish to add or change information in your profile, then you can do that yourself by selecting 'profile' from the usual forum menus.

from Peter Freeman acting as Forum Administrator

[Peter Freeman]

Alterations to names are almost complete for non-compliant VSA members, and it has been a smooth process.

Alterations for non-VSA-members are optional at present, but are recommended. If you expect later to join VSA and gain access to the members only areas of the Forum (which constitute the majority of activity, and are the most interesting and informative areas), I suggest that you adjust your username acceptability in advance.