Membership Benefits

This forum welcomes any and all constructive contributions. Your editorial comments may be made anonymously or by using a fictitious name for posting, although we require the real names of persons, organizations or businesses who want to use the forum features to promote themselves, a product or service.

* Registering will make navigating the forum easier for you, as each time a new posting is made it will show as “New” when you log in. This makes it much easier to read new posts and not miss any comments. Members can also Bookmark posts. After you bookmark your first post a Bookmarks tab will appear in the green horizontal menu bar. Bookmarking is wonderful for quickly locating important threads. The green menu bar Search feature is another powerful tool used to locate a specific post or thread.

* As a member you may custom design your profile as completely as you wish including having a changeable avatar, a changeable status line under the avatar, a changeable signature line which will appear at the bottom of all your postings. If you choose to you can build a friends list, create groups of friends and follow specified friends.

* As a member you may access the list of forum members under “Members”, and see who is currently online. By using the “Message” feature you may communicate privately and directly with the members you select within the forum itself, without resorting to going to your independent email program. Actual email addresses remain confidential.

* As a member you can edit your posts. Guests do not have that ability. Members may also vote in polls where guests cannot.

* Use the “Help” feature on the main menu bar at the top of the page to access the “Forum Help Guide” which will explain the entire forum features and how to use them.

* Only members may view the Forum Information and Statistics Box at the bottom left of the Home page. You will see:
1) Totals for the number of threads and the the number of posts.
2) Title, author and links to the last updated post.
3) Recent Threads link - this gives you a list of the most recent threads and how many times each post was viewed. It is an ideal measure of a thread's popularity.
4) Provides a listing of the most recent posts in descending order; newest posts first.
5)RSS Feed - creates a simple syndication feed that works with your browser (FireFox, Chrome,etc.) to display the latest posts without having to visit the Forum.
6)Mark all Boards Read - clears the New folder icon from all boards.
7)Users online - shows how many members and guests are currently at the Forum.
8)Users online in the last 24 hours - shows how many members and guests have visited the Forum in the last 24 hours. An excellent measure of how popular the Forum is from day to day.
9)Member information - includes the total number of members, the newest member, most users online at one time and members who have birthdays today.


* If any contributor has other suggestions to make things more functional, or user friendly, please add your suggestions on the Forum Feedback board.