Should forum posts be public? - POLL

I have noticed that this is something a lot of people have brought up. Let's have a poll about it (apologies Chris, I've tinkered with your title):

I haven't voted yet, partly because some issues are OK to be discussed in public and others maybe best kept within the community. I mean there is currently a topic which I have contributed to and in retrospect I feel that if we continue discussing the issue we might easily turn the topic into a commercial brainstorming session which could easily benefit the competition. Indeed I am not sure whether to reply to that topic or not! best Lawrence

Lawrence, my closing suggestion in the original post was that perhaps we should have a (separate) forum that is for our internal conversations only - this could be in addition to the general (public) forums I guess.

The problem however is that many users post all sorts of comments, requests etc., in the forums and often tend to use them as if they were are an email portal and not a meeting place.

I, for one, will not continue to use the forums for controversial discussions and I'll tell you why: during that Google search for my own name yesterday (referred to in my original post) I found that my conversation with the helpdesk on another photography site had been found by Google and published in full, with my signature, email and full contact address PLUS a subsequent private email exchange between myself and my partner criticising the response of that helpdesk... If I am to be exposed to public scrutiny for comments I make in forums, then I would prefer to be in control of the context. Currently we enjoy no such control. CW

I think it should remain public

Forum
a. The public square or marketplace of an ancient Roman city that was the assembly place for judicial activity and public business.
b. A public meeting place for open discussion.
c. A medium for open discussion or voicing of ideas, such as a newspaper, a radio or television program, or a website.
2. A public meeting or presentation involving a discussion usually among experts and often including audience participation.
3. A court of law; a tribunal.

Chris that's terrible what you write about private emails being in the public domain. I haven't heard this about Demotix though. However, I am still of the idea of have an open forum and a members only forum. Best Lawrence

there were several issues

1 spam. A hidden or more secure forum that only members could get onto would alleviate that problem.

2 Only members with a full profile and 10 stories could access the forum. (newbies with less than 10 have access to a newbie /help forum only) this again would stop spurious posts to the forum from spam bots and advertising/marketing.

3 we can discuss things that are "internal" without telling the whole world. things like internal admin/web/upload problems with Demotix Problems with LEA. other organisations etc and maybe covering events etc where you do't want to broadcast in advance about covering it to the whole world.

It seems that (non)arguments in favour of complete public access are based on a pedantic and limited-in-scope dictionary definition from ancient history, and not on 21st Century, real world conditions.

If all the forums are completely public there will be little robust engagement between contributing members, only bloggish chit chat that will keep our online editor tied up with trifles, instead of developing the Demotix brand and its offering. I can do the chit chat thing on twitter or elsewhere if I want to be frivolous.