Mixed feelings.
Let the existing "premium members" decide who is worthy of the "inner circle". You'll basically need people to "vouch" for you... ie eliminating the bullshit. If a newb wants to "get in" then perhaps they can pay their way in but at the same time, what is to stop Google or Facebook or anyone from ante-ing up $200/year to get the lowdown on the showdown... the "dirt" so to speak?
I thought we outgrew elitist popularity contests in high school. :error:
No offense, Trigatch, and I see a valid point in your suggestion, but that will only encourage competitors to badmouth each other or [insert various prejudices here].
While capping the subscribers at a certain number is okay, having too limited a forum can also be self-destructive as talent leaves, moves on or stops sharing ideas and a vacuum emerges where rising talent should be.
Everyone was a noob at some point. Few are talented, it's true, but those few will never matriculate if everyone keeps throwing up barriers and catch-22s like:
-- you need a shitload of money to buy into a club to make money (I'm not saying I can't pay $25, I'm saying prices significantly higher than that are steep for forums)
-- you need to know people to meet people who can 'know you'
etc. Just saying. Some of us are just starting to see returns on little-cost investments and still learning programming as we go. I don't mind paying, and I told Jon so -- but we'd better be getting really good info in a paid forum.