The question has been asked but not explicitly answered. Will the Bakery replace the existing forums? I am assuming that, since it will be using a new software platform, full replacement is the intent.
 
A new easier to search forum, and a way to focus that search on results that numerous users find helpful is certainly a major improvement.  Making high ranking contributors (assuming the points system actually works) mini-moderators, will probably be useful, since helpful people are likely to be able to help with tagging etc. Those people are not hidden now to anyone who regularly visits the forum, but a first time visitor is not likely to figure out who is giving good advice on a brief visit. Way too much can be made of the apparent status class ranking a good point system will produce, and of the hurtful disaster a bad system might. If anyone is going to get his feelings hurt by earning a lower rating than Scook, then they have my sympathy. I expect any such simple minded system will both help and disappoint the users, and probably will not help the developers or marketers as much as they think it will. Assuming that only truly useless or destructive posts will be hidden, the option to find the least highly rated answers (which may in some uncommon cases be useful) will hopefully still be available. 
 
The main question to my mind is how long it will take to populate a new system with useful content. There are currently many hundreds of thousands of words of useful advice accessible here, albeit disorganized and largely irrelevant to anyone actually looking for help. I expect it will take years to reproduce that amount of content on a new system. Some of that content is irrelevant to the now current (this month?) version of SONAR, but many users are not on the current membership boat. More to the point is the question of what will happen to the current content. Will it be lost like the Library of Alexandria, or will it remain accessible on a server indexed to a Google search? 

FWIW in 2017 Harmony Central is slated to start some communities for manufacturers who don't have the bandwidth to create their own, but recognize the value. We are currently talking with some companies that are much larger than Cakewalk. 2017 is also when we'll be updating the site to be more mobile-friendly, as now over 50% of our traffic comes from mobile devices. 
 
It would be easy enough for Cakewalk to make the existing forums read-only for the wealth of information they contain, and have us start new forums for the Cakewalk community over at HC. All you'd need to do is bookmark a different URL (although you'd probably need a different sign-on).
 
Our goal wouldn't be to compete with the Bakery, because regardless of some early knee-jerk reactions it's a valuable idea that will serve Cakewalk and SONAR users well once it reaches escape velocity. We could cover the hangout/social aspect that a forum like the Coffehouse currently provides.
 
Communities is what we do at HC (on the other hand we write crappy DAWs). Just thinking out loud here, but the more I think about this...hmm...I'm going to send an email to the powers-that-be at Cakewalk and see what they think. I already talked to HC's Director about this, and he's into it. 

So I read Ryan's main post but am doing stuff so am not going to read the rest of the thread (well not yet anyway).
 
Yeah, I get it and actually kind of got it yesterday after poking around a bit.
 
Here are my concerns/suggestions and they may have already been addressed.
 
I will do my best to participate in the new "Bakery" because it seems to me to solve some of the problems with the forum, especially lately when being flooded with new users (not a bad thing but the forum has indeed changed significantly the past couple years). I see the benefit of urging the more serious folks to participate in a "Stackoverflow" type system both for Cake Developers and end users (particularly power users/professionals).
 
My main concern at this point is, and perhaps this has been covered already, is that the "Bakery" will replace this forum. I would much rather this forum remain mostly as is (aside from pretty much the entire Feedback Loop section... that could easily be shifted to the Bakery IMO).
 
By removing this forum entirely in favor of the new model I think a huge pile of extremely helpful regulars may not participate and/or users/threads that are interesting/productive/useful but don't have a lot of "upvotes" (or karma points or whatever) will not get any eyeballs on them. I prefer the current linear timeline threads/comments for general stuff and just lurking/poking around. Even some of the more annoying posts can contain little tidbits about techniques/features/etc that can be learned from. Also we've seen quite frequently that certain posters who are spazzing out at first (which would likely get them downvoted) or aren't skilled enough to convey what they want/are asking a mundane question (which may simply be ignored and thus disappear in an upvoting scheme) can be helped and become extremely skilled/helpful members.
 
Meh... probably not explaining that correctly but this forum, despite some of its failings is still top notch and should remain as is so us die hards can continue doing what we do uninterrupted.
 
Might I suggest that some threads that get deemed top tier get moved to the "Bakery" with a link in the OP here so that this place remains the same but the creme de la creme is accessible to those who migrate to the Bakery and the Bakery acheives what seems to be it's stated goal (improved signal to noise).
 
I am also VERY concerned about what would happen to THIS forum's archives and how any full migration/replacement would affect searches. I frequently look up old posts as reference (mine and others) via google. What will happen to this massive resource?
 
aaaand then there is the matter of all the subcommunities/friendships/collabs/etc that go on in the background. A full migration might dash some less obvious community activities.
 
Again... I may not be expressing myself properly (I've got a million things going on right now and of course this is all new so I don't think any real answers are available yet) but I hope you guys are careful not to throw the baby out with the bathwater.
 
tl;dr
 
Leave this long standing forum as is side by side with the new Bakery to avoid unintended consquences.
 
Create a system for the best threads from this forum to be moved to the Bakery based on content/popularity/etc.
 
Make sense?
 
Cheers.

Anderton
2017 is also when we'll be updating the site to be more mobile-friendly, as now over 50% of our traffic comes from mobile devices. 

 
Please resist the temptation to send iPads and other tablets the same view of the site you send to phones. Desktop-style browsers work perfectly well on tablets and there's little more annoying than to be fed a "cut-down and styled for phone version" of a site when you're looking at an ipad-size retina display.
 
Also please resist the urge to copy the "bakery" and use gigantic typefaces and a layout that's shedloads of glaring migraine-inducing white space.
 
For some reason web developers seem to think tablets and phones are the same, and the less useful information displayed at a time the better. Not to mention avoiding the "scoring" system Cakewalk seem to be heading down. It's a troll, astroturfed or disrupter's dream system and I've seen a few seriously big websites ruined that way.
 
Unfortunately my definition of "ruined" - knowledgeable people leaving and being replaced with one-line snarky drive-bys - seems to be someone's idea of "perfect modern trendy forum design".

Beepster, see the post just before yours. Do you see a downside? It makes sense to me.

Well, I made one comment on the "bakery" and now can't find it, or the "discussion" it was in. At least, I can't find it after a few minutes looking and I can't be bothered to fight the software any longer than that.
 

I suspect it is because I changed the topic to more accurately reflect the issue
Click on your user ID in the upper right of the Bakery, open My "Profile" and scroll down to see "Recent Activity"

tlw

Anderton
2017 is also when we'll be updating the site to be more mobile-friendly, as now over 50% of our traffic comes from mobile devices. 

 
Please resist the temptation to send iPads and other tablets the same view of the site you send to phones. 

We don't, it already scales based on the target. We're looking at additional enhancements specifically for mobile experiences.

Is this about the Cakewalk forums or shifting traffic to HC and improve their bottom line. Do I see a conflict of interest here??
Cakewalk is the owner/operator and will do exactly what they want regardless of how many people don't, or do, like it. All I want is to have a good give and take of information. Setting things up so that your value is measured, voted on and judged is nonsense. It will discourage new comers and if it becomes cumbersome we may lose input from some of the really knowledgeable folks. 
And please kill the stupid slogans. - SERVICE GUARANTEES CITIZENSHIP -  What does this even mean, comrade?
I'm offering what I believe to be constructive feedback, not simply complaining, and my comment should be taken as such.

Google "big data"  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_data or "data science" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_science
 
Maybe Cakewalk could hire a "big data" guru to write some software to sift through this forum database and create a usable knowledge base from all the good info contained here.  Instead of manually moving things around to a Bakery.
 
Because it seems that the ultimate goal of the Bakery concept is to make the forum info more accessible and useful.