lol, big difference between off-topic and meta. I'm talking more like the stack exchange metas where anything
not to do with the nature and improvement of the forums would be considered off-topic. As an example of some things it would be great to figure out:
-The forum has three times as much traffic as it had in January, with 200 posts per day now, and it's only going to get worse/better. We need some pro-active planning to keep the forums usable!
-We desperately need to implement some sort of trust/respect system since so many people come here looking for authoritative answers. For example, can't we at least turn on the "respect" option of the forum software? People need something better than just post count to get an idea of whether people know what they're talking about. And integrated OTC ratings could be a really good idea, too.
-Do we need a designated newbie/welcome zone, and/or a scheme to keep fresh noobs and spiky-shelled oldies from clashing so much? This factor is turning off a lot of potential BitCoin learners/fans.
-How can we keep political and philosophical agendas from hijacking so many threads? We need some good self-organisation so that people can still talk about whatever they want,
without making the forums impossible to use for everyone else. These are the
BitCoin forums, not the "philosophical agendas of people who use BitCoin at the moment" forums.
There are plenty of people, such as me, willing to work on these issues. We just need to start coordinating our efforts. Usability, usability, usability--there's a reason Ubuntu has added more people to Linux than Debian ever has. Without usability, BitCoin will never
cross the chasm.
