Hi,
One of the things that distinguishes this forum from many others that I visit (and some that I no longer visit) is the civility, as well as the friendship that has developed between many of us over the last several years. We've shared in the excitement of hearing about wedding plans (and seeing the pictures later), house warmings, illness, etc. We make it a point to find out how each other are when disasters--both man-made and natural, take place in far away areas of the world that a few short years ago we may never have paid much attention to, but now we immediately think of our friends who live there. Along the way, I've learned to trust the advice that I get because I know who's giving it--and because it's not uncommon for many of my TS friends to followup with each other off-list to make sure that the problem has resolved or to add some additional information.
So, to get "on-topic", my thoughts are that while you don't need off-topic posts to get advice, it's been many of these off-topic posts that have changed TS from a forum to a community. Everyone's entitled to their opinon, but to me, describing anything here as "inapproprite and waste of bandwidth" is the complete opposite of how I'd view what goes on here. BTW, we do encourage people to mark "off-topic" posts with "OT" in the subject heading so that those who don't wish to read them (or those who don't wish to read them at that time) are aware that the post is "off-topic". Nobody forces anybody to double-click on that thread.
Just my $.02.
