Those are the ones that haven't hung around long enough to collect all the needed background :p Why do you hate "the new"? ;)
Probably because it is a fairly common trend for new users to read the forums and lurk for a few days/weeks before you ever start posting, to understand the culture/background/rules of the forums.
Probably because it is a fairly common trend for new users to read the forums and lurk for a few days/weeks before you ever start posting, to understand the culture/background/rules of the forums.
Is it really a common trend for new users to read the forums and lurk a while before posting? What evidence do you base this on? It's quite possible this is true, but it seems that even if it is fairly common, it would be the uncommon users who jump right in and ask a "stupid question" who bear the brunt of the antagonistic responses around here.
If this is indeed the nature of the problem, perhaps you should impose some sort of posting moratorium on new users, where they are unable to post or reply for 10 days after creating their accounts.
I should note that even after reading the forums for a long time myself, I didn't have much of a clue regarding the personalities of people around here until I joined the IRC channel. I haven't visited the IRC channel for almost a year now. I've given up on authoring any addons I'd ever want to release for others to use, and therefore don't need the mentoring (or was it belittling?) I found there.
Without numbers and logs with the number of people reading these forums, I can't base it on anything. However, it is usually the polite thing to do to lurk for a few days, or at the minimum read at least the last 3 days of posts to stay updated with the current topics and issues, instead of say starting a new thread on an existing issue, or in the wrong forum causing Phanx to move posts everyday.
Probably because it is a fairly common trend for new users to read the forums and lurk for a few days/weeks before you ever start posting, to understand the culture/background/rules of the forums.
Is it really a common trend for new users to read the forums and lurk a while before posting? What evidence do you base this on? It's quite possible this is true, but it seems that even if it is fairly common, it would be the uncommon users who jump right in and ask a "stupid question" who bear the brunt of the antagonistic responses around here.
Nandini speaks truth. I think most of the moderators have become so accustomed to each other that they're assuming the bulk of the forum users know them equally well. I've been reading wowace forums for much longer than I've been posting, and all I've really gathered with regard to forum posting style about the mods is: Elsia tends to be more mature than the average mod, Kaelten tends to be more overworked than the average mod, Arrow tends to be more gratuitously vicious than the average mod. That's about all that stands out over time.
If you're going to expect that people refrain from posting until they can recognize the personality quirks of any given moderator, you're going to be disappointed.
Without numbers and logs with the number of people reading these forums, I can't base it on anything. However, it is usually the polite thing to do to lurk for a few days, or at the minimum read at least the last 3 days of posts to stay updated with the current topics and issues, instead of say starting a new thread on an existing issue, or in the wrong forum causing Phanx to move posts everyday.
If you wish to "encourage" the politeness you describe here, then a 3 day posting moratorium would be a polite nudge in that polite direction, for those new users who might otherwise be inclined to skirt such decorum.
Or I suppose you could jury rig the forums to force new users to read every post from the past 3 days upon creating a new account, one post per page, with the "Next" button moved to a random location on each page.
If you wish to "encourage" the politeness you describe here, then a 3 day posting moratorium would be a polite nudge in that polite direction, for those new users who might otherwise be inclined to skirt such decorum.
EJ does the same thing, but I forget what the moratorium is.
Or I suppose you could jury rig the forums to force new users to read every post from the past 3 days upon creating a new account, one post per page, with the "Next" button moved to a random location on each page.
EJ does the same thing, but I forget what the moratorium is.
They have a 1 day account creation policy to post your first post, and an at-least-10-posts-plus-1-week-since-account-creation policy to start a new thread. Requires specific forum coding support to get this kind of thing though, and its not really feasible anyhow.
They have a 1 day account creation policy to post your first post, and an at-least-10-posts-plus-1-week-since-account-creation policy to start a new thread. Requires specific forum coding support to get this kind of thing though, and its not really feasible anyhow.
I don't even go to most sections of these forums anymore due to the large number of posts that are either questions that have been answered countless times already or questions that imho don't belong here at all (like questions about addons that are not hosted on WowAce and don't use any libraries hosted on WowAce, we aren't the UI & Macros WoW forums and when I start seeing 'name this addon' threads I will be leaving).
I think the signal to noise ratio has gotten bad since about the time of the WowAce and Curse merger announcement. And most of the threads for specific addons have gotten so long that unless you catchup on those threads every few days you might as well just ignore them.
But I don't think going the full route of the EJ forums is the right way at all. Maybe some kind of guidelines to follow before posting that everybody needs to read should be added (with stuff about what should be posted in each section and to use the search function before posting since ours actually works unlike Blizzards) but the problem with that is getting everybody to actually read it.
Maybe if the forums did clean up a bit some of us wouldn't get as angry that often....
And another thing bringing us back to the very first post of this thread regarding the removal of an entire locked thread. My forum sig has been deleted and nobody even private messaged me to tell me. The ninja moderation has got to stop!
Maybe if the forums did clean up a bit some of us wouldn't get as angry that often....
While I agree with you that the forums are a little messy, and that the EJ route is probably not suitable for here, the "look what you made me do!" attitude won't really fly either. The only one responsible for my posts is me. The only one responsible for your posts is you. No forum noob, no matter how clueless, forces you to spit venom at people. It's not a valid excuse for normal posters, and it's not a valid excuse for moderators. We must do better than that.
And another thing bringing us back to the very first post of this thread regarding the removal of an entire locked thread. My forum sig has been deleted and nobody even private messaged me to tell me. The ninja moderation has got to stop!
They have a 1 day account creation policy to post your first post, and an at-least-10-posts-plus-1-week-since-account-creation policy to start a new thread. Requires specific forum coding support to get this kind of thing though, and its not really feasible anyhow.
What isn't feasible, specific forum coding, or the idea of new users having to wait some amount of time before posting? What makes it unfeasible?
EJ is known for its class/game mechanics discussions. Those topics don't need bug reports or alpha release feedback.
wowace is a developers' site. Having to wait a week after registration to post a bug report in one of the official addon threads would be a pain in the ass.
EJ is known for its class/game mechanics discussions. Those topics don't need bug reports or alpha release feedback.
wowace is a developers' site. Having to wait a week after registration to post a bug report in one of the official addon threads would be a pain in the ass.
That's exactly right. And the point is, it's a pain in the ass for the user, and not the moderator who finds the poorly documented bug report in the wrong forum and has to move it to the correct thread, and after all that adds a (justifiably) cranky response.
Because not everyone who joins the site will immediately find the correct addon thread and post a perfect bug report (or question that hasn't been answered already) just minutes after registering.
I'm just suggesting to give them 24 hours to get over their new-forum-euphoria, during which time they may get upset and just leave. Or they may use the time to read some threads, see a few good bug reports, use the search feature, and go over the posting guidelines.
My point was that using EJ's "week before new thread" would be way too long for a developer site. Some kind of delay would probably be (socially) acceptable; I have no idea if it's technically feasible. Probably an hour or two delay would be enough, if the registration message linked to new-user threads and told them "you can't post for an hour anyhow, spend the time reading these so you don't waste your time and ours."
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And those ones that don't get it are the ones I hate.
Probably because it is a fairly common trend for new users to read the forums and lurk for a few days/weeks before you ever start posting, to understand the culture/background/rules of the forums.
Is it really a common trend for new users to read the forums and lurk a while before posting? What evidence do you base this on? It's quite possible this is true, but it seems that even if it is fairly common, it would be the uncommon users who jump right in and ask a "stupid question" who bear the brunt of the antagonistic responses around here.
If this is indeed the nature of the problem, perhaps you should impose some sort of posting moratorium on new users, where they are unable to post or reply for 10 days after creating their accounts.
I should note that even after reading the forums for a long time myself, I didn't have much of a clue regarding the personalities of people around here until I joined the IRC channel. I haven't visited the IRC channel for almost a year now. I've given up on authoring any addons I'd ever want to release for others to use, and therefore don't need the mentoring (or was it belittling?) I found there.
Nandini speaks truth. I think most of the moderators have become so accustomed to each other that they're assuming the bulk of the forum users know them equally well. I've been reading wowace forums for much longer than I've been posting, and all I've really gathered with regard to forum posting style about the mods is: Elsia tends to be more mature than the average mod, Kaelten tends to be more overworked than the average mod, Arrow tends to be more gratuitously vicious than the average mod. That's about all that stands out over time.
If you're going to expect that people refrain from posting until they can recognize the personality quirks of any given moderator, you're going to be disappointed.
If you wish to "encourage" the politeness you describe here, then a 3 day posting moratorium would be a polite nudge in that polite direction, for those new users who might otherwise be inclined to skirt such decorum.
Or I suppose you could jury rig the forums to force new users to read every post from the past 3 days upon creating a new account, one post per page, with the "Next" button moved to a random location on each page.
EJ does the same thing, but I forget what the moratorium is.
Whoa, it's the BOFH forums! :-)
They have a 1 day account creation policy to post your first post, and an at-least-10-posts-plus-1-week-since-account-creation policy to start a new thread. Requires specific forum coding support to get this kind of thing though, and its not really feasible anyhow.
I jest :p
I could enable the Reputation system, I'll discuss it with Kaelten later today.
Yeah sod that :p
I think the signal to noise ratio has gotten bad since about the time of the WowAce and Curse merger announcement. And most of the threads for specific addons have gotten so long that unless you catchup on those threads every few days you might as well just ignore them.
But I don't think going the full route of the EJ forums is the right way at all. Maybe some kind of guidelines to follow before posting that everybody needs to read should be added (with stuff about what should be posted in each section and to use the search function before posting since ours actually works unlike Blizzards) but the problem with that is getting everybody to actually read it.
Maybe if the forums did clean up a bit some of us wouldn't get as angry that often....
While I agree with you that the forums are a little messy, and that the EJ route is probably not suitable for here, the "look what you made me do!" attitude won't really fly either. The only one responsible for my posts is me. The only one responsible for your posts is you. No forum noob, no matter how clueless, forces you to spit venom at people. It's not a valid excuse for normal posters, and it's not a valid excuse for moderators. We must do better than that.
It seems someone thought he could help you against your will. A secret fan maybe ? :)
Moderation guidelines are coming.
What isn't feasible, specific forum coding, or the idea of new users having to wait some amount of time before posting? What makes it unfeasible?
wowace is a developers' site. Having to wait a week after registration to post a bug report in one of the official addon threads would be a pain in the ass.
That's exactly right. And the point is, it's a pain in the ass for the user, and not the moderator who finds the poorly documented bug report in the wrong forum and has to move it to the correct thread, and after all that adds a (justifiably) cranky response.
Because not everyone who joins the site will immediately find the correct addon thread and post a perfect bug report (or question that hasn't been answered already) just minutes after registering.
I'm just suggesting to give them 24 hours to get over their new-forum-euphoria, during which time they may get upset and just leave. Or they may use the time to read some threads, see a few good bug reports, use the search feature, and go over the posting guidelines.