Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Digital Pianos - Electronic Pianos - Synths & Keyboards Forum suggestion/request: Make 'Location' mandatory?

Good morning,

I wonder if there would be any merit in making the the 'Location' field of a user's profile mandatory for new (and existing?) forum members?

I can appreciate the some individuals wish to remain completely anonymous, however stating your country and/or city should not jeopardise this a great deal.

I often see posts from new members noting "X is not available in my country/area", or "I would like to play Y, but I cannot find a dealer", which then requires another member to ask the original poster where they are based etc.

Of course, this is just my opinion, however I believe it would improve the 'forum experience' (yes, I did just write that).

Any thoughts?

Cheers,
James
x

ps. No, I do not work for the NSA.

I understand where you're coming from (ha!), but you're likely to get a lot of Vulcan residents, denizens of Antarctica, and Hobbits from Middle Earth, if it becomes compulsory. But it would help if people were encouraged to pin down their location to, at least, a country.

The Hobbits like Kawai.

Great Deals in the Shire to be had, if you can keep those Sackville-Baggins hands off them.

Nothing like a little piano before second breakfast...

So do Yetis

I read somewhere that men are problem solvers, so when they hear a problem like this, men want to provide solutions and advise. Women are communicators. Women just want to share facts, and may not be so interested in finding a fix. So perhaps having heard something like "I cannot find..." you are frustrated that the poster do not provide sufficient info for you to solve their problem. Perhaps the poster is female and just want to vent for sympathy.

Some self-education might also solve your problem, James. Posters who wish the kind of advice you have in mind should be aware that location is relevant and include appropriate information in their post.

Indeed many do. It's just a few who think that there is no difference between close to home and the whole world. Mistakenly.

Third rock from the Sun.

+1 James

I agree, that should be mandatory, it's also nicer to see where people are from in a forum called pianoWORLD

IMO in a globalised world economy it should not matter where one lives,
and the individual customer posting here could look up any goods in the well known online shops
or should be intelligent use a seach engine.

A little live database on the manufacturers web site (a Goolge map with pointers), guiding customers to actual test-able models available in showrooms, would solve this problem.

JFYI:
In my case I was writing an eMail to Kawai Germany pre sales (that is where the Austrian web site linked me to), to guide me, to where in Austria I could test a CN-34.
No answer.
I ended up telephoning for one hour all dealers in the range of 200km(!)on the list of Kawai's web site, some of them out-dated or non-stockists, to find out, who would have certain models in the showroom.
...

+1 James.

I think it's nice to know where someone lives

I think MOST posters already know the limitations of their access to <list> due to their geographic location.
Expecting posters from OTHER countries/regions/areas/cultures to know those limitations in order to tailor their suggestions/advice seems beyond reason (to ME).

SOME questions e.g. those dealing with local product availability, are best addressed to manufacturers, or their local distributors.

There are better places to address web shopping issues, I think we should keep this forum about PIANOS - music, piano emulation, learning, etc.

I'm another "third rock from my local sun" resident, but I have dwelt on different land masses from time to time.
If I want/need advice specific to my location (unlikely) I can phrase my question to indicate where the answers will be applied.

Other than for MARKETING purposes there seems no point to "require" that posters disclose their location.

I vote "NO".

I'm sure that for marketing purposes our location is taken directly from IP, like google and facebook do.

Yamaha is fo' yo' Mama.
In Hawaii they like Kawai.
In Poland they like Roland.
But the Borg like Korg.

I had meant the marketeers with little/no tech savvy.

Sure, if you assume the tech savvy and lack of ethics of the people that google or facebook employ, then all privacy is already lost.
If you worry about these things you might want to consider cloaking, not everyone here posts directly, etc.

Nippon Silliness Association ?

Don't get me started, James! There's a rant waiting to happen here!! But that would be a political rant in an apolitical forum, so I won't go there.

No, I wouldn't want to disclose which location on Earth the UK is, where I'm currently posting from. That would lose me my anonymity, which I strive very hard to preserve - I'm not on any social media, apart from piano recordings which I've made for a website (which apparently has my name credited on them, but I haven't checked, as that would lose me my anonymity).

In any case, Ben Nevis is just a tiny speck in the UK, which is just a tiny speck from the Space Station (- according to my cosmonaut friend, it's totally insignificant), so, as long as nobody knows which country the UK is, I'll remain anonymous.

As far as I'm concerned, it's very easy to disclose where I live. I am a very insignificant internet troll she somewhere on the western hemisphere of the Internet world. You see, I don't start troll discussions, do not post troll posts, I am a really really insignificant troll. Since I'm so insignificant, my exact location is insignificant and unimportant, too.

In other posts I mentioned I've visited the Frankfurt Musikmesse this year. This is the best hint I can provide you as far as my exact location goes.

You can put anything you want in that field. How would this be enforced? How does anyone know I'm actually in Illinois? (Although I am.)