I've only read half of what's posted here, the first page and then the last three. In general, I agree with most of what's been posted. I like these forums a great deal, and the obvious problems have already been mentioned - and really, mostly of the suggestions here are standard features on other sites.
Because I do not like Internet baiting, the only forum I spent real time on in the last few years, outside of these ones, is the Lord of the Rings Online forum. Like the forums here, they had a largely adult, mature, kind, helpful, and generous population - though not as generous as the GOG folks, I've never seen so much stuff given away so often. This is really a special place.
Which is why I think it's worth nurturing and treating with care.
When I first joined GOG, I bought a few games - actually, there must have been a kick-ass sale, because I bought a bunch, so probably I read about it on the PC Gamer site. It took some months before I joined the forums; generally I like a store to sell me stuff, and I don't really need to meet the other customers. I started with the Project Eden game forum, which was very helpful, and then ventured into the General discussion tab to see if anything there was interesting.
And it was! This is a great place. I won't say that the forums are a necessary part of the GOG experience; I have friends I've tried to entice in here, and they won't, and they like GOG fine. But for those of us who do partake, they turn GOG from a store into a club. They turned me from a guy who would have bought 30 or 40 games into a guy who just crossed 200 (yep). And I discovered how nice it feels to give games to people who want them, either through GAs or just by making an unexpected gift.
So I'd really like moderation and change to respect the special nature of this group, and I think Judas is a good person to do it.
Most of the changes are obvious: better search, YES. Post history, YES. Last-read, block jerk users, lock dead threads, YES. Preview your post, YES. I don't like sub-forums, particularly, at least not for the General tab - a Giveaway sub-forum, for example, would just be grabby, and an Off-Topic forum would isolate the general gleeful hubbub that is so great in here. I *do* like the game-specific sub-forums, which I think should stay alphabetical; I use them frequently when I'm playing a specific game. I think the great but ghettoized Support posts should be integrated into the game sub-forums more; each forum should probably have a Stickied link to the Support section on that game. I know I didn't even find the Support stuff for ages.
And then there's rep.
I like the down-rep button. I use it, now and then, and I like using it. I use it when people are being rude, angry, or mean. I use it when I am certain someone is trolling. I use it as a non-confrontational way to express disapproval, so I'm not sure I'd want it to be public, but if it were I would still use it the way I'm using it now.
I do think that it should be REVOCABLE. Perhaps no one with fewer than 50 or 100 posts could even use the down-rep button, which would address sock-puppet and inviso-accounts used for down-repping. If a moderator decides that a user has abused down-repping, the mod should be able to turn it off for a user - I'd say 30 days for a first offense, 90 days for a second, and permanent shutdown for a third.
Remember a few months ago when we had that Thorn1 troll, or whatever his user name was? Started threads on hot topics and used them to insult women, Jews, and liberals? Down-repping worked there just as it should. It took about a day for him to go into negative rep, and then his threads were reported for spam, and deleted. That's a community defending itself from infection.
The recent rep attacks in the Ninja Giveaway thread - I've filed a couple of tickets - are attacks that the community cannot defend against. Whether it's a couple of users with a set of sock puppets, which is what I suspect, or whether it's a group that just thinks it's funny to be mean to nice people, a set of targeted users (and some bystanders, like me) are hit with clusters of down-repping by anonymous users, on comments saying thank you, or chit-chatting about how much fun it is to give away games. I am not the only one who has complained or filed a ticket; mods should have responded long ago, investigating and suspending the offending accounts, outing them, or at very least removing their ability to use the down-rep button. This sort of thing should be routine; rep abuse should be met promptly with moderator responses - warnings for overuse, and revocation of rights for abuse. Sock puppet accounts, if they exist here, should be deleted.