For the record - this was the, for the record statement referred to.

And how long ago was this request made?

For the record, I have already asked Max to make Members-Only posting in the "BS" section, and I think membership should be granted only to those with verifiable e-mail addresses (you register, and then get a password sent back to you). So far, Max hasn't said anything about being ready to make the change
Joe Offer

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For a long time, I opposed members-only posting, because I didn't want to scare away visitors or make Mudcat a closed, exclusive club. And yes, we have a lot of that exclusivity already - I feel like an outsider myself when I go into the "BS" section. But our nastiness has been too much, and it has gone on far too long, to the point where it's impossible to carry on an intelligent discussion on most non-music subjects nowadays. I have three Mudcatters on 100% review much of the time, and I have to do partial review on a number of others, and then I have to deal with all sorts of petty complaints about so-and-so saying this or that - and I deny about half the deletion requests I get, and undelete a fair number of messages deleted by JoeClones.

And despite our best efforts, Mudcat is no longer a pleasant place to hang out and goof off or have a good discussion. So, I think something has to be done. Ebbie's suggestion about putting Secret Santa in the music section is a very simple answer to one major objection I had to members-only BS posting - duh, why didn't I think of that?

So, short of members-only posting, what can we do to bring peace to this place? I'd rather have another solution, but I haven't been able to think of one.
-Joe Offer-