Overview
I would like to suggest a feature to make Virtual Organization (VA/VO) membership clearer, more accurate, and more trustworthy within the Infinite Flight Community.
Currently, users can add a Virtual Organization affiliation to their profile themselves. This can lead to confusion, as other pilots may assume that a user is officially a member of an organization when they may not actually be affiliated with it.
I understand that IFVARB-certified Virtual Airlines already have an affiliation option available. Therefore, this suggestion is not intended to replace or change the current IFVARB certification process. Instead, the focus is on improving how individual pilot memberships and multiple VA/VO affiliations are represented and verified.
Suggested Improvement
Would it be possible to introduce an official membership verification system for existing recognized or verified Virtual Organizations?
For example:
- Virtual Organizations could have an official staff representative or contact responsible for verifying members.
- Pilots could have their membership officially verified by the VA/VO they belong to.
- The system could clearly indicate whether an affiliation is officially verified rather than simply self-added.
- Pilots could add and verify multiple VA/VO affiliations if they are genuinely members of more than one organization.
- A pilot’s profile could include a list of all their verified VA/VO affiliations, allowing other Community members to see the organizations they are officially part of.
- While flying in Infinite Flight, pilots could still select one primary or favourite VA/VO to display as their main affiliation
This would keep the in-flight experience simple by displaying only one organization while giving pilots the option to show a more complete list of their verified affiliations in their Community profile.
Why?
The goal is not to restrict pilots from participating in different organizations. Many pilots are genuinely members of multiple Virtual Airlines or Virtual Organizations, but some people may believe they can only belong to one because only one affiliation is currently displayed.
Allowing multiple verified affiliations would make this clearer while also helping prevent users from representing themselves as members of an organization they are not actually part of.
Having one primary affiliation displayed while flying would also allow pilots to choose which organization they want to represent at that time, without removing or hiding their other verified memberships from their profile.
This could help reduce confusion for:
- Pilots who belong to multiple VA/VOs.
- VA/VO staff who want an accurate overview of their official members.
- Other Community members who want to know whether an affiliation is verified.
- The wider Infinite Flight Community.
I understand that the current tag system may be dependent on Discourse. Therefore, this request is specifically focused on whether Infinite Flight could provide or support an official membership verification system and expanded affiliation options, rather than simply requesting a change to Discourse tags.
Support the Request
If you would like to see an improvement to how Virtual Organizations and pilot memberships are represented within the Infinite Flight Community, please vote for this feature request!
The goal is to make affiliations more accurate, transparent, and flexible, especially for pilots who genuinely represent multiple organizations. The more community support this receives, the more visibility the idea can get. 
