As our member numbers have grown over the last week or so the party has reached the point where we can provide the benefits of membership we promised. Previously policy discussion was publicly available to comment on but now detailed policy discussion will be restricted to the members of the party. Members can now take their role in help shape the party as we go forward.

Non-members aren't going to be left out of the loop, you're the people we're trying to convince to vote for us! Regular summaries etc will become public as policy is finalised.

Luckily it isn't hard to become a Pirate Party UK member so you can easily join in on the debate.

Right now in a transitional stage general chat and  regional sub forums are staying public. Over the next week or so we'll be rolling out some stuff to try and help organise regional parties, and a new site design at that! So the community that has started building up in this place isn't going anywhere any time soon.

One issue that has come up is the case of moderation. I hope everyone is quite content with the situation of us setting up a very active moderation team to clear the forums of any abusive / very questionable content, the situation is that those who are being moderated are trying to say we are censoring them. The party believes fully in free speech, however we have no obligation to host every message on our site and our responsibility is to all users to keep this place functional, especially when this website reflects on us as a party.

You will start to see these changes in a few days if all goes well, just look at how far we've come in a week to see how quickly the party is taking shape.

As you can see the website is all nice, new and shiny! We've updated the looks, added content and now your forum account can be used on the main website. Currently you can use your new website account to comment on blogs! So far, that's really it, but we've got some plans for features that'll use your account so keep a lookout.

Your username for the site should be the same as your username on the forum, UNLESS you had a period, dash, space, [ or capital letter in your name. The characters were removed and all username made lowercase, so if your forum account was "Miss.Ex-ample" your account is now "missexample". Your post count and forum details are still intact so no need to worry too much

Furthermore the passwords weren't copied across at all so you'll have to set a new password for your account,
http://pirateparty.org.uk/accounts/password/reset/
It should be a simple process, I realise some of you guys have already attempted this and you may need to repeat as earlier we had a little trouble with our email, sorry for the hassle, but we both know the Pirate Party is worth another password reset. ;)

Thanks to bavardage and TomL for their part in the website, sadly a lot of what they did is behind the scenes. It's an amazing world back there in the database and admin section of the site let me assure you.

Hope you enjoy the new site,
Gavin.