Not wishing to entangle the "Concerns" thread where the topic was touched upon, I'll mention here that Private Messaging (and published e-mail addresses) has a number of drawbacks, such as :-
* Specific Trolling unseen by the rest of the "Room".
* Stalking ditto.
* Sometimes leads to cliques forming.
These could be partly overcome by Moderation, but that's an enormous task not easily done. Basically, the evil few spoil it for the others (like with so many cyber-social features).
You touch on most of the points that ended it on here before and sadly you're right. I also doubt anyone would want AB Moderators in on their PMs. They get enough flak as it is.
Cliques form anyway. I have quite a few ABers on Facebook but we don't ask for backup if someone disagrees with us on here.
Private messaging is a bad idea.
I had someone post on here that I had an ugly ginger bloke in my pics (my OH is ginger) and I had to point out it's a pic of Luke Kelly, the lead singer of the Dubliners!!! Stop stalking my Facebook!!
Ummmm you don’t ask for backup because you are a nice person,but it’s a pity they are not all like you on here as some have,rockrose and I know this to be the case,