Noobs Welcoming Noobs

[i3oilermaker]

I realize that 60 posts is a lofty requirement for the classifieds section, but I don't think the rule is working as intended.


I have noticed a trend where people determine they need 60 posts, and then they proceed to "Welcome" everybody in the new member section.  I'm not sure if this is the intended behavior, but personally I find it a bit spammy and irritating as I'm sure the new members do as well.  Perhaps what we need is less posts, but a time requirements like 20 posts and 1 week. 


Thoughts?

[hashbaz]

Spamming the new members forum should be treated as spamming.  I like the time requirement idea.

[The_Beast]

I don't get the point of either. There is always a chance that someone will screw you over, 20 post or 300 post; 1 week or 2 months; there's always a chance

[i3oilermaker]

Well I think if noobs have a chance to see how things work around here, there is less likely to be mistakes or confusion.

Signing up and making 60 pointless comments does not help them understand how things work around here.

[mars-bar-man]

Hence the reason I'm still at 30 something.. I could have had the 60 2 weeks ago if I said Hi to everyone in the New Members section, come to think of it, I don't remember putting up a hello thread..

[rayuki]

most legit trading forums i have used generally have a specific time period as well as a post limit for access to classifieds. something like 3months is generally good and only use posts that are actually in certain forums for the post count.

[tjcaustin]

This seems even more apropos considering the last spy check I did had a reply to my new keyboard and 12 cut/paste welcomes from one person.

[longweight]

I hate the clutter of new member threads, it ruins the spy feature.

[GMC]

Like the time limit, could also let new folks bypass the post count/time limit in return for a donation to site upkeep?

[funkymeeba]

You can make it so that the New Members board doesn't add to post count. Why not try that?

[i3oilermaker]

That will just redirect the spam to another sub-forum.

I think if we keep the 60 post rule, newbs need to be moderated and spam dumped.  Otherwise we need to re-evaluate the rule.

[reaper]

You can make it so that the New Members board doesn't add to post count. Why not try that?

In my old forums where I used to mod, posting  in New Members & Off-Topic forums doesn't add to your post count so you have my vote there.


As for the 60 posts rule, I agree that it's a little excessive since we didn't have that on the old Geekhack (pre-r00tw0rm era).  How about 30 or 40 post count before you can post in Group Buy/Classifieds?

[MMB]

25 posts seems more reasonable.

[reaper]

Thanks MMB.  Anyone else care to chime in?

[Sifo]

I don't really have any suggestions but I've been noticing it too and it's clogging up my Spy feed :S

Makes it very hard for me to catch up on what's been going on.

[samwisekoi]

I'm  noob here, so none of the comments below may be valid...

First, I haven't posted in any welcome thread except my own.  It seemed kind of unseemly to me.  As a new person here, I assume my credibility will take months to generate, and it will come through my words, actions and behavior.  Once that fuzzy threshold has been reached, I will feel a welcome post from me would be more relevant.  (This is one of the reasons I sign my actual name to my posts here; something I do in no other forum.)

Second, since this is a keyboard forum, one could expect that the members are gonna use those keyboards to post.  Because of that, I was very surprised that the sales-post threshold was so low.  Unless someone is a long-time member, why should they be trusted to buy from?  Personally, I don't think people gain credibility by frequency or by paying to play.  Time, insight, expertise and OT wit seem like better guides, at least to me.

Third, I agree that all the "hello" and "hello to you too" messages add clutter.  But sometimes it is cool to see where people are coming from.

So, some suggestions that should be taken with a grain of salt or tossed in the bit-bucket:

1) Exclude welcomes and OT replies from the experience count.
2) Add membership duration to the sales-post criteria.
3) Exclude new member posts from one of "Spy" or "Unread Posts", but not both.

Again, the ink (dye?) is not yet dry on my membership in geekhack.org, so none of the above may be relevant, insightful or useful.

But man I love typing on my noisy keyboard!  )

 - Ron | samwisekoi

[Sifo]

That's a valid post sam, you've got the right attitude. And yeah, #3 I agree we should have the option to turn off the New Members board from the Spy. And as everyone else has said, membership duration makes sense.

[The_Beast]

That's a valid post sam, you've got the right attitude. And yeah, #3 I agree we should have the option to turn off the New Members board from the Spy. And as everyone else has said, membership duration makes sense.

It makes sense but I could set up an account tomorrow, wait 3 months.....


What I'm trying to say is there is always a risk when buying online. The only way to become trustworthy is by buy and selling and having other members see that

[WRXChris]

This morning I woke up to 2/3 of the spy being posts from one person, and most were just welcoming other noobs. 

I agree that something should be done; lowering the post count requirement and a time requirement sounds good.

As l3oiler said, the 60 post rule has significantly reduced the amount of noobs asking questions that have already been answered because they were too lazy to read the thread, which was IMO much more obnoxious than the new member forum spam.  This makes the GB & classifieds forums MUCH less cluttered and easier to read.

EDIT: Removing the new members section from the spy also sounds like a great idea, as that would solve the problem IMO.

[longweight]

There should be a new member thread not a new member subforum! That way new members can spam away and we only have to see one thread full of it!

[rowdy]

Is there any official policy on welcoming new members?

I noticed CLiB's user comment used to say "Official Geekhack Welcomer" or something along those lines.

I think it's kind of nice to welcome new members, otherwise some of them pour out their story, which subsequently appears to be ignored.  At least responding indicates someone has read their story, and I try to add an extra comment for each new member.

But I have found the last day or two that the new member threads are full of other new members just posting "Welcome".

[jeroplane]

Personally I liked the idea of the 60 post rule. I joined a month and a half ago, and it was only until about two weeks into my membership that I reached the 60 post count. In that time, I was able to gain a greater understanding of keyboards, keycaps, trends in the market ("what is this whole 'CC' thing???"), as well as an understanding of the "standing" of members around here - i.e. who are the veterans, which people around here have specific knowledge or skills, who owns what store, etc. Once I had enough posts to make a Classifieds thread, I had enough knowledge of the market to have a rough idea of what items I could expect to easily find and what were rare/limited, estimated prices, etc.

Honestly, I didn't even think of padding my posts with welcomes, until the few times I've logged in and seen the Spy and the last posts in the New Members subforum clogged with the same username a dozen times. One of those "why didn't I think of that?" moments, but I could never do it myself.

I agree that, regardless of what other course of action is taken: a. the New Members subforum should not count towards post count, and b. the New Members subforum should be removed from the Spy (I think it is fine for them to remain in the "Unread" list).

Just my 2c. I've really loved the community since I've been here and I've found that people are generally really nice, trustworthy and keen to help people with problems or impart knowledge when a query arises.

[samwisekoi]

So I had a 4th suggestion, but I self-censored because it seemed harsh.  But oh well.

4) Why not include welcome replies in the sales-post limit?

That way all we dang newbies won't waste everyone's time welcoming each other. And it would prevent the whole welcome-spam thing.

Consider the above covered by my previous disclaimers; I am using  a dad-gum tablet with a picture of a chicklet keyboard, so I am NOT enjoying typing. (Want to make a chicklet keyboard worse? Make it two-dimensional!)

 - Ron | samwisekoi

[MechKey]

Welcome to Geekhack!

[longweight]

So I had a 4th suggestion, but I self-censored because it seemed harsh.  But oh well.

4) Why not include welcome replies in the sales-post limit?

That way all we dang newbies won't waste everyone's time welcoming each other. And it would prevent the whole welcome-spam thing.

Consider the above covered by my previous disclaimers; I am using  a dad-gum tablet with a picture of a chicklet keyboard, so I am NOT enjoying typing. (Want to make a chicklet keyboard worse? Make it two-dimensional!)

 - Ron | samwisekoi

Because they won't read the rules so they will keep posting without realising it.

Just have a new member thread and they can all post in there about how happy they are to be new members.

[absyrd]

Is there any official policy on welcoming new members?

I noticed CLiB's user comment used to say "Official Geekhack Welcomer" or something along those lines.

I think it's kind of nice to welcome new members, otherwise some of them pour out their story, which subsequently appears to be ignored.  At least responding indicates someone has read their story, and I try to add an extra comment for each new member.

But I have found the last day or two that the new member threads are full of other new members just posting "Welcome".

You hit the nail on the head. Many people just post "welcome" or spam pics and don't bother to actually read the OP and ENGAGE in conversation with them. I think it is very important to do so when posting in new member threads.

This falls under the same general forum etiquette that you should post something more than "ditto" or "+1" or a single emoticon.

[Glissant]

People should be able to post "welcome" or a picture indicating welcome if that is how they choose to interact with the new member. Like the rest of the forum there are different personalities that want to interact in different ways.
I don't believe in forcing people to post in a certain way just because you want the content to be relevant. Of course if the entire forum consisted of people just posting "+1" and a single emote as replies, that would be a whole different discussion. But as we all can see there are more people that post sentences as replies.
Forum etiquette doesn't have to be policed by the mods as I am pretty sure the userbase will pounce on any chance to teach someone how this forum runs.

When it comes to the question of post count I think 25 is a good number that will limit the amount of "spam" in the different forums.

And one last thing. It's not like post count really matters if you are known as a perpetual spammer. A person can have ten thousand posts, but if 90% of those posts were "lol" and "YGPM" then people will know that person is as useless as a topre keycap on a cherry board.

[samwisekoi]

as useless as a topre keycap on a cherry board

Very nice.

Now, if you will excuse me, I need to go install the MX keycaps I got from i3oilermaker on my Model M. 

 - Ron | samwisekoi

[YoungMichael88]

I agree that we shouldn't be discouraging people to welcome new members. I was a new member not that long ago and it was comforting to have a quick reply to my "hello I'm new" post. Even if it was a stock "welcome to Geekhack". However I don't think I would know enough about GH and keyboards/caps in general after only 25 posts. I myself am only nearing 60 post now and still don't feel I know enough about all of this stuff to host classifieds. Therefore in my opinion I think 60 posts is fine and the only way to stop people abusing the "welcome" thread in an attempt to boost their post count is to have those posts not count towards it as mentioned before. At least then noobs will be welcomed with genuine welcome posts with no alternative motives. Also I think the fact that moon took the time to make a nice welcome drawing should count for something. Even if she uses it more then once. I wouldn't expect her to make a new drawing for every new member. That would require actual moon power.