What is the demographic breakdown for active users on this site? I'll be shocked if it isn't at least 99% male. If you really want to monetize the site, do you cater to the 99% or piss on them to grow the 1%? I say figure out a way to grow the 1% while keeping the other 99% happy. Take a room full of guys shooting the shi*, bustin balls, and and talking about guy stuff like pinball. Tell them they need to tone it down, be nice, and make their conversations family friendly. Do you think the majority are going to view that positively or negatively? You can hope for the former all you want, but you can expect the latter from most.
The real source of negativity that needs to be addressed is the Jpop/Skit-B crap. I'm a member of car forums, investing forums, deal forums, fix-it forums, and a couple other pinball forums. This is the only forum I'm aware of where numerous members were screwed out of thousands of dollars by other members. That's a problem to address. Read it out loud to yourself. Forum members were screwed out of thousands of dollars by other forum members. I bet those 2 clowns can still post on the forum like nothing happened if they chose to. You want to piss people off and make them say nasty things they probably otherwise wouldn't? Take their thousands and don't give them what they expect in return. Drag it out for a couple years with lame ass excuses for good measure. Threats of violence are never acceptable, but those 2 situations have left a lot of people saying WTF? Pinside's handling of those situations? I'll stop now...... Flame suit on.......