Some time ago, I was hired as a news writer. I have since submitted several articles, which have been published. My question is, does this qualify me as a content contributor or staff member? And, if so, why can I not access the forums pertaining to either of these?

Matt you are not currently on the staff of Armorama, also even if you were on staff it would not give you access to the contributors forum. In order to gain access to the contributors forum you need to have a review or feature published. When a feature is published it gives you access to the forum for 1 year and when another feature or review is published the 1 year period starts again.

News stories do not qualify for access and as such Kevin and I regardless of how many news stories we publish do not obtain access to the contributors forum, and we also have to write a review or a feature to obtain access to that forum.

Darren nailed it, the only way for anybody to be granted access to the Contributor forums (all staff members included) is to have a review or feature published. This will also only provide access to the contributors forum on the specific site, for example, I have no access to the CF on AeroScale since I have nothing published there.

Most of our contributors don't need to worry about the one year cut-off as submitting content is quite addictive.

Staff forums are, of course, for staff members only. No open bar or dancing girls in there so you're not missing much