Society and Pooh-Bah Updates

The lines between Respect Beer Society and Pooh-Bah were kind of blurry. This was mostly due to the fact the Pooh-Bahs were gifted a Respect Beer Society membership starting on Valentine's Day 2020 as a way of giving something back. And during the pandemic, I extended it to those who supported our Beer Fests in Cyberspace in 2021 and did regular giveaways on Discord in 2021/22.

Long-term, these giveaways aren't sustainable. Why?

• It's hard to sell something that you're also giving away. And the more you give something away, the less perceived value it has.
• We wound up with more nonpaid Society members than paid.
• BeerAdvocate doesn't have any major revenue streams at the moment. I'm talking the sort of signficant revenue we saw with our beer fests and magazine.
  
• Whether people paid or not started to get confusing.

Given all of that, I hope you can appreciate the balance that I'm trying to achieve with the following updates.

Respect Beer Society
A paid account upgrade with perks.

• Anyone can join, including Pooh-Bahs (see below)
• New: Exclusive karma achievement + points
• The only thing that's really changing here is that we're no longer giving memberships away

Pooh-Bah
A longtime, highly coveted title awarded to users who accrued 1,500 points or more. Users who achieved Pooh-Bah status were very active, put in the time, and their contributions to the site and its community clearly showed.

Post-karma revamp, this remains true. After carefully reviewing with the Mod team, I've decided to keep the threshold at 1,500 points as it covers nearly everyone who previously held the title (like 99%) and welcomes some new users too.

I've also added two new Pooh-Bah titles, that some of you may recall from the karma system circa 2005:

• Grand Pooh-Bah (3,000 points)
• Grand High Pooh-Bah (6,000 points)

And Pooh-Bah is now more than just a title.

• Perks:
  • New: Exclusive user banner
  • New: Exclusive karma achievement + points
  • New: Access to the Pooh-Bah-only forum
  • New: Unlock our Profile Posts feature (if you're not a Society member)

Society + Pooh-Bah
For Pooh-Bahs who decide to join the Society, you'll soon earn an exclusive achievement as a thanks for your additional support.

If you're reading this post first, I recommend checking out the following threads:

• Heads Up: Karma System Revamp!
• Karma System Revamp Update Log
• Resetting Society Memberships (Nonpaid)
• New BeerAdvocate Karma Titles

Thanks again for your patience and support!

 

It's tracked as income generated from BeerAdvocate, but we're all one company and projects are prioritized according to their needs. For example, last year I was able to get resources allocated for a much needed and massive forum upgrade. That should be wrapped during the first half of this year.

Anyway. Next Glass' success is BeerAdvocate's success, and vice versa.

 

Yes. If you're already a Society member, you're good to go.

You should be able to view it here: https://www.beeradvocate.com/community/account/upgrades

Otherwise I can let you know or add it to the main Society page, which I might do anyway.

 

I wish. I haven't had a vacation in over a decade.