I definitely see your point of view and agree.
I personally was involved in VMKMagic and VMKForums (not as active in as the first), and Xiris was a brilliant admin. I believe over in OVMK I highly praised Xiris (who now runs DisneyMMO) to be some part of the OVMK project, he's amazing.
I believe with the rough bump and transition from OVMK to MyVMK, a community-run forum would've been impossible from the start. MyVMK is already a fan-made game... it started off so tiny, the forums were the only means for Amy to constantly keep us updated with the game's progress and release... and back then she heavily depended on the community's opinion on certain matters (such has how long the Day 1 badges & mickey ears should be given out, etc.) The direct communication between the game developer and community was crucial. Fast forward a half a year into the game's release... I still think that direct communication with the game developer and community is important. My only understanding of the sudden desire of the forums to suddenly become community-run is due to the unsatisfactory of staff or environment? I'm sure you guys are aware it's never too late to start your own MyVMK community-run forums. I think that would be the only solution for those who are unsatisfied with how things are ran here. At the point we are in now, it's silly to even suggest to turn the control of the forums over to the community while funded by the game admins? There's nothing wrong with having an official forum as well as fan-made forums.
I would also like to add, I think the Sims 3 community is a perfect example of a community-run forum (zero moderation or staff interference) yet a very humble environment with millions of users within a wide age range. However, the community is very mature and respectful toward each other... I don't know how they do it. Maybe the fact that their only forum usage requirement is to have at least one Sims 3 game registered? That definitely eliminates trolls/unwanted players. However... it doesn't appear like MyVMK has a serious problem with trolls. It appears we only have problems with a handful of players being highly unsatisfied with the current staff and rules.
I definitely think it was possible from the beginning... because like it's been said before, Amy and Grizzly would have been involved with this fan forum. They just wouldn't have run it - but they still could have posted polls and announcements for the game. I used to be on a forum for a game called "ChitChatCity". There was a fan forum (made by the owners of VFKF) and the game developer was relatively active early on in the life of the game... it worked fine. That fan forum has since closed (all of the VFKF sister sites have) and the owner has his own forum, but I can't state how it's gone over there... it's always been a really tiny community and I've never agreed about the way it was run either. (Children as young as 8 and 9 years old were moderators, there was no report button, etc...)
(And no, as I said before, this has been my stance since day 1; in fact, I PMed Amy about it back when the game was MMK.)
As for having a community and official forum, sadly, it'll never work. People aren't interested in joining two MyVMK forums and since this is the official forum (and if you aren't a part of it, you often miss out on a lot), then they're likely to sway towards this one. It's been tried before, actually, and that's the reason why it won't work. Whispered is also right about not being able to speak about fan forums.
Yes, and like I brought up Meez, which is another game that has a forum. I never said it was impossible, merely that most games don't even attempt to run a forum and a game. I think the difference for The Sims is that it's not an MMO, and I'm specifically talking about those. There's less pressure on the developers when it comes to video games as compared to MMOs. (Also, The Sim's moderators are actually hired and paid for what they do - or so I believe. I think that's a big difference.)
"At the point we are in now, it's silly to even suggest to turn the control of the forums over to the community while funded by the game admins? "
I'm not sure if that was to me or Whispered, because I've already said I don't necessarily agree with that idea.