The board would definitely be tainted by a large influx of people, even if the forums were seperated on the front page.

I'm not so sure about that... Many people (myself included) feared that the forums would be tainted by the fire sale, and for awhile, there was an adjustment period... But you know what? Many of the folks that joined after getting a $199 riocar are some of our best posters here. To tell you the truth, the user base was getting stale back then, and having new people from the fire sale has made things a lot more fun.

Now, the user base is definitely not stale now, but what about in a year or two or three? I plan on my empegs lasting forever, but over time, there will be attrition as people drop off the scene. We've already had some of our most dedicated contributors leave, even though they might still own and use their empegs.

The Karma happens to be somewhere in a gray area between an empeg-like product and a conventional Rio-based handheld. I'd say that although it's a handheld, it sounds like the closest thing you'll get to having an "empeg in your pocket." So why don't we take a chance, establish some Karma forums, and see what happens? That RioWorld site has *one* thread mentioning the Karma, and I believe it was posted by one of our members from here (there aren't that many Rory's around, are there?) This seems to be the right place for a few Karma forums, and I think would be good for the culture of the BBS in the long run as well.

And if it sucks, we can always trash those forums and point people to RioWorld.. I just think it's worth taking a shot.