[MJM]

One thing I'd like to address before bowing out of this conversation.
I remember the good ole days, in the early 90's, hearing about the coming information super highway. At that time you were charged by the hour for time spent on the net.
However for various reasons I didn't get a computer till 2000, when it became more affordable. I also got my first digital camera, and as my site/interests are highly image dependent I was at last able to do what I wanted to do on the net.
Instead of creating my 'own' website, I started an interactive community, first at yahoo - that sucked, so I searched extensively for a software application. Knowing nothing about computers, I by-passed all the free scripts and went for a commercial product, choosing vB. Because vB provided no gallery app. I chose PhotoPost because it was 'integrated' with vB.

I presumed that because I paid for commercial products, with annual fees for upgrades, who had staff working diligently to develop the most advanced products on the market, that we would be moving rapidly forward in the development of these applications.
Well, it turns out that development has been rather slow (in my view), and developers have instead relied on it's customer base to develop many of the features and functionalities.

Oh well, fair enough, I cannot afford to have an expert customize my site, so I have learned to be patient and accept gradual progress, and focus on the more important issue of developing actual content for my site.
Content is, after all is said and done, the primary reason for what this is all about.

So why am I here writing this lengthy (apologies) post when I should be addressing issues at my own site?

(Please don't take this as a 'blanket' statement)

Time after time I see a disconnection between what developers are coming up with and it's limited practical application.

It is for this reason that I feel it's important that non-coding dummies like me who are using these applications on a daily basis and know what works well and doesn't for admins, mods and ultimately the end user, are a crucial element in the development of features and functionalities.

I could provide many examples, but here is a recent example with a new function for vB 3.6 that was not hashed thoroughly with it's members prior to release of which I can only hope that brillant minds here at vB.org will be able to improve:
Automatically Remove Thread Redirects

There are other instances when developers come up with a great feature, but doesn't work correctly if you are using another feature.
I don't want to sound too harsh and call it lazy coding, but this is often the result of a developer looking for the easiest way to provide this functionality with out pre-beta testing it with it's customers to ensure that it will work as intended.
I can only guess that the reason why development is so often done behind closed doors is because competitiveness leads to secretiveness.

I guess this is the price I must pay for choosing a commercial product.