I would like to propose renaming the homebrewing forum to allow it to include discussions on beer, wine, and spirits. I propose changing the name to "The Cellar Wine/Beer/Spirits" or some variant of this. We have a large population on the forums that like to discuss these topics, and the lack of a subforum has prevented the forming of a community of enthusiast, as well as a "go to" point for questions and post about the subject. Establishing the forum would allow for sharing and tacking of reviews, reviewing templates and tips, FAQ about the different types of adult beverages, sample swaps for those that want to try before buying, recommendation guides, distillery/vineyard/brewery tours, and even more casual subjects like sharing pictures of our favorite bottles or taking part in community reviews of commonly available drinks. Another thread on this subject can be found here as well as the countless threads that pop up weekly on these subjects. Some great ones of which have fallen into archives, due to people not knowing where to find them. Please vote on whether or not you agree with this change. I will be contacting TBK1 with the results.

V/R,
Navy

Well, you know I'm in!!

As a beer brewer only, I would have thought that "Homebrewing" would have been the obvious place for discussions regarding homemade alcoholic beverages.

I only pop in there every couple of months for a quick lurk, so I guess I haven't experienced this problem.

But call it what you will. I'll vote yes.

Yes for sure! I'm surprised there isn't one on this forum. I mean come on, we're the home of the "Friday/Saturday what ya' drinking" threads.

We need a forum that includes discussion for spirits.

We're wanting to discuss alcoholic beverages made by others, but currently GD is the only place for this. With the high thread creation rate over there, even great threads get dropped off and lost, then repeated, after a few weeks or sometimes even days.

This is exactly the point.  I have nothing against home brewers.  Hell, I used to do it myself, but I suspect it is a much smaller portion of the hive than those who are interested in drinking, new spirits, trades, recommendations, wish lists, etc.  Unless I can find a way to spend MORE time on ARF, I miss a lot of stuff I suspect is funny or beneficial just by not living on GD 24/7 given the thread turnover rate.

Plus, it has worked out well for a few of us originally pushing for it.  I have done an admirable job (I think) of helping Defender3 keep his bourbon cabinet stocked with stuff he wanted but could not get where he lives.  I met Thugbuster, who lives likely less than five miles from me, and I introduced him to a new place to look for booze.  I now have a friend in Finland in STI_Tactical9mm I may well use to get me some Finnish whisky.  I also have SkeeterTZX and IS2's bourbon wish lists, along with D3's, and I am actively hunting to help them out.  Unfortunately, I would have to sell my house, my truck and all my guns to help STI_Tactical9mm with his wish list if I come across it.

And, if the home brewers need their own space - no insult intended - between the thread IS2 started and my follow-up (not dupe...follow-up), they already have a higher thread count than the "shaving" AND "grooming and haberdashery" subforms.  

Remember MBGA (Make Booze Great Again)!!

Signed,
Lonnie-Dog's human servant

Got my "Yes!" Vote

Bump for Friday night crew!

Yes.

Bump for the post inaugaration hangover crowd!!!!

Bump again!

For the "No" voters, do you mind weighing in as to why? Genuine question.

Yes

Well I voted yes, but now that my thoughts have been addressed, I'd change my vote to no.

Like I said, I drop in there periodically. Just as you don't want to sift through GD, I don't want to sift through to find actual homebrewing threads. (To be clear, I thought you were talking about adding wine making and distilling at home to the forum)

I think there's a big difference between making something and consuming something. If they can have a vaping forum and a cigar forum, I think a separate forum would be a better choice. Or, perhaps if we're combining things they could make a forum just for life's finer things. Include cigars, alcohol, etc.

But not vaping though. Vaping is not one of life's greater things.

I agree with you. I personally wanted a new forum for it, but site staff recommended we just started posting in the homebrewing. I thought it would be inappropriate to just start bombarding the homebrewing with booze talk, so staff recommended instead a name change. The homebrewing isn't a super active sub but it is still a used one. Although I could see this as a boost to the homebrewing forum as well, by increasing traffic and the amount of people that see the brewing threads it could only serve to up the number of people interested.

You might be right about bringing in more traffic.

Perhaps site staff was confused as I was, thinking that you were talking about home made wine and distilling.

I guess there's nothing wrong with trying it, and then if it causes a problem it could be dealt with later. Perhaps mods could sticky a few dedicated brewing threads, or set brewing threads not to archive, if they start to get lost in the mix.

No, we had a few different conversations on the topic. I think the general consensus from staff is that we have too many subforums so they are looking at ways to combine them now as opposed to creating new ones. I get it, I'm sure appointing new mods, and keeping track of what's going on in every sub forum isn't fun. We have some that are hardly used at all (no offense grooming and haberdashery) so maybe a general "cleaning house" is in order, but I don't view an alcohol and home brewing forum as a bad idea either. Tacked threads at the top in my mind would be TBK1's share your recipe that's already there, a good guide and template on reviewing wine and spirits, a FAQ that would have links in it to different popular threads like the ongoing meade thread, as well as links to distillery/brewery tours with pictures. It seems there is a lot of good crossover between the two communities that wouldn't cause issues. I wish we could talk about distilling our own spirits, but current laws would make that super illegal, so we are left to talk about what others make.

Another bump. I'd like to get more opinions before sending it back up.

I think the problem is exactly what you mentioned in an earlier post, there is such a high turn over of posts on GD, this just raced to the bottom like so many other good threads.

I voted yes, but in reality we should have a Whisk(e)y sub.

Whisk(e)y and home brewing have nothing to do with each other.

No one disagrees, but we have to work with what we have.

Bump for freedom!

Another biggity bump. I want more data for when this goes back to the boss man.

Bumpity bump

And another bump

Bump for FREEDOM!!

We have our forum - General >> The Wine Celler

Come on in!!

Whoo, we did it!

I can't vote so I probably already did:  NO!

The Homebrew forum discusses distinctly different topics/subjects that does the (commercially-made) Wine & Spirit forum.

Just my opinion.