General Magma

That's important to note. The hobby has actually been made more accessible and affordable for a lot of people. However, I still don't think there should be any separation when it comes to MOCs. For sets? Yes, sure. But MOCs? Let them co-exist in their respective theme forums. If there are going to be so few of them compared to fully LEGO ones as some of you predict, then why does it matter? There's already high tolerance for usage of 3rd party brands across MOCs, making a divide there is just not a good idea. By tags, at most. But that's it.

Perhaps it would be productive to actually roll out some sort of test or trial for some of these options to see them in practice.

It really reads as ragebait, though.

If you can't see why terms like "knock-offs" and "clone brands" are reductive then I suggest you give it some more thought. LEGO doesn't even want to be called "Legos".

Where are you seeing the differing typeface exactly? I'm on mobile, so I'm not sure what's happening as all the text looks the same size for me. I don't recall selecting a different one, in any case.

@Slegengr "How is this factual and not just your opinion? Separating by brand while including a mixed category (maybe used for all non-purist theme forums) is not any more complex than what it literally is: separate by LEGO only similar to how EB has been up to date (with plenty of community-accepted caveats, mind you; I'm not one for strict policing in this sense, just prefer when builders disclose when they used pieces not available from LEGO) or by other brands (grouped together, if that is what is preferred)." Simply put, if you have different forums for different brands, and you also need to make a different forum for whenever they get mixed, that may make it easier for those like you who prefer not to encounter the other brands, but you start creating little islands of separation and forums that may suffer from underexposure. By definition, this is already gonna require some policing to get right, because who's gonna grab the magnifying glass and scan every MOC to make sure they've been posted in the right spot according to parts usage? You may not be for strict policing, but we have already had people using 3rd party customs alongside Lego for years. Where exactly do you draw the line? Especially now that you've not only proposed a separate location for other brands, but a third one for a Lego-and-other-brand-mix, if I'm understanding you right. What about a reasonable way of sorting through different themes within those two categories? It is, without a doubt, more complicated than simply allowing them to co-exist and separating by tags. Add a topic filter by tags if need be.

@Slegengr "Also again in this discussion, you are focused on viewing it as segregation, while I am focused on a reasonable method to sort a large forum to what I find relevant to my preferences." If separated by brand not only for sets but also for MOCs, you start forcing people to tuck their work into some separate corner even though a simple topic tag would do the trick. That's segregation, or division if you want to call it that, and other than becoming an overall mess and reductive towards the people who choose to express their creativity using bricks from a variety of brands, it also becomes an extra hassle for the mods. The themed forums exist. MOCs of different kinds deserve to be presented not on a separate island but in its respective (sub)forum. Where would you even draw the line? For all we know, many people use customized parts already. In the Star Wars forum it surely is a thing what with all the 3rd party customs available. What if a MOC is (hypothetically) a mix of Cobi and Lego, with Lego minifigures used? Where does it go then? At some point you really just overcomplicate things in another direction. "Has anyone here actually made the argument about 'fearing different names on studs in different parts of a build' before your comment? Maybe I missed it; there sure is a lot in this thread to reread." Someone not wanting 'different names on studs in different parts of a build' is a direct quote, the part between single quotation marks at least.

They will have to be drip acclimated!

A lot of people who use alt brands already do it in conjunction with Lego figures, by the way, MOCs are gonna get complex to separate by brand and remain far easier to separate the way it's done now: by theme.

Yes, *you* do... therefore you vouch for segregation for all. As for the second half of your reply, that's so disingenuous and untrue that I'm not even going to respond to it in any way besides this. @Slegengr "I acknowledge these options and am willing to consider, but are you not mostly arguing your own opinion as though it should be considered fact while criticizing others for holding opposing opinions?" That sort of touches on the crux of the problem, doesn't it? If it is but a matter of opinion, why vouch for segregation when co-existing is possible? Ultimately, I am arguing to reach a conclusion that is as close to objectivity as possible.

That's some selective indignation. Only a problem when it affects you, I suppose.

That's... literally the same thing as valuing a brick by the company that produced it. You're really just dancing around it instead of admitting it. Most alt brands use similar colors. Some of them introduce some new colors (just like Lego routinely does!), which you aren't obligated to use. And "fearing different names on studs in different parts of a build" (even though the bricks are functionally compatible, one way or another, and function largely the same) is about the closest I've seen someone get to confessing a xenophobia-esque stance in here. Segregation. What if the Lego brick is yellowed, do you toss it? What if it's a piece that has no logo printed on it because it has an open stud, does it then also matter? What if the brick has color variance due to production, is it only a problem when that occurs with another brand's brick and do you give Lego a free pass? Do I even have to write anything about this? You gave away the contradiction in a single post. Is it about the company or the product for you? Make up your mind, I say.

And yet you vouch for segregation by brand. You base the value of the brick on which company it was produced by, but still seem to insist that it's not about the brand or the company to you. Something is not adding up. "I don't hate other brands, I just don't want to see them anywhere near the MOC section no matter how hard someone worked on it. Go put it in a segregated subforum!" Right? Galidor, Modulex and Duplo are Lego and don't fit the standard system, but nobody brings those up as issues. Alt brands still use the interlocking brick system, some even moreso than Lego themselves as a whole, so your argument makes no sense.

So if it's not based around your favored brand.

No worries! It happens

Huh? I understand which post you might be trying to quote, but those words shown within the quote here do not come from me even though it appears as such, here. If that drives away LEGO fans, all while a large number of MOCs shared are still LEGO-based, then that is just filtering out the folks with xenophobic-esque tendencies. What if they used a LEGO part that's hard to get, or very expensive, especially in that color? If anything, alt brands make it MORE possible to then re-create that MOC. And if then you still bring in the "but then it's not Lego" argument, then you're just being completely fixed on your own emotional bias and relentless brand loyalty.

My answer: no. The folks voting for segregation are purely doing so based on emotion. Have you ever heard them give a peep about custom parts being used throughout MOCs? I surely haven't, but now they're suddenly coming out of the woodworks with purity tests and entirely missing the original point of things here. And that point wasn't "Lego" because of the brand, but because they were the leading brand and the sole reasonable option for the longest time. Not anymore. Lego has lost their spirit, their motto has become a poor match for them, and competitors are doing the things that Lego refuses to do, and for fairer prices, too, at that.

LEGO has serious competition. Their corporate greed is becoming all the more prevalent and competitors are out there providing better value for much better prices. On top of that, the competitors align more closely with the spirit of LEGO, as has been, than LEGO themselves nowadays. So another question that stands: how to preserve that spirit while paving the way for the future?

Can you look at any MOC and build it without instructions? I thought sharing MOCs was for sharing creativity, not just so you could possibly stand to gain something from it.

There seems to be this prevailing outdated notion that alt brands are all "bootlegs" or "copycats"... Lego is the original copycat, just ask Kiddicraft.

I have never heard of a painter who made it the point to only use paintings from a single brand "because brand", so I wouldn't go as far as to say that that is "the point". It's not. It may be your unique challenge (even if to me it honestly just reads as an attempt at justification for brand loyalty), but the medium is not synonymous with the word Lego, even if it having been (largely) a monopoly of sorts for a long time may have made it seem as such. The points about quality are also getting more and more outdated, I ordered plenty of bricks off of AE and there's virtually no difference from Lego's quality. You just gotta find the right brands and there are many of them out there nowadays. I don't understand the points that keep being made about limitations either, with alt bricks, too, you are building within certain limitations and it's not like you're 3D printing specialized parts on demand. The moment Lego makes such a piece it's suddenly fair game, but otherwise it's "creative limitation". Again, totally fine if that's your unique challenge, but Lego designers have new parts made for themselves all the time, too.

This is almost getting xenophobic.

Sets can be divided by brand. MOCs belong in their respective themes, not on a separate island. This would be an adequate modification of #4. Exactly. It would also save the mods the hassle of additional moderation. For topics, it can be made mandatory to select one of several pre-set tags, and then the poster can add any additional tags of their own manually. That's all you'll need, really.

On the argument of building within limitations: nobody here is talking about 3D printing your own stuff on demand, alternate brick brands offer more possibilities that still exist within limitations. None of that goes away when you expand into alt bricks, you just get more to work with, so this argument on its own is a bit of a moot point. On the argument that Eurobricks started as a LEGO site and that introducing other brands is somehow some sort of huge deviation: brickbuilding is brickbuilding. People came here not for the brand, but what the brand did, and now the avenues are expanding. So yes, I would still very much pin this on "brand loyalty", because by this same logic you should hunt down 50% of all the Star Wars MOCs and put them into a dedicated subforum because of all the 3rd party items they use. Some of the points you folks have made are somewhat understandable, but ultimately, the sole limitation you point to is "Was it made by this brand or not?". Perfectly fine to do, if you want to for your own stuff, but you're effectively still swearing loyalty to one particular brand, whether you'll admit to it or not. Because by this logic, strange Galidor and Duplo pieces are fine to use in MOCs "because the brand LEGO made them" but pieces that look far closer to actual LEGO aren't to you just because another company made them. That's literally brand-based filtering.

Right, I thought that was what you meant. And I fully agree. Separating by brand in different subforums would be a mistake. Don't have to go fully option #4, but an alteration of it where topics are tagged would be an excellent way to do it. And since you have experience running forums, I think your two cents here should be weighed more heavily. Themes are an important aspect, being able to share space MOCs in the same dedicated subforum would also allow for discovery across the board, same for MOCs for any other theme.