Start suspending people who blatantly disregard forum rules.

[fanwuq]

Sometimes it is good to revive an old thread, but it has to be purposeful. I remember some old threads from 2006 that PJK revived in 2007 because he thought the topics were interesting and wanted others to see them. Perhaps it would good if you can only post in threads that were last active after you joined. (For example, I can revive a thread I made in March 2008, but someone who just joined this month can't do that.) Locking all old threads is just ridiculous. I am hinting now that I might revive my advanced pyraminx solutions thread soon to post a comparison of some methods. Revivals have to be meaningful; in fact, all posts should be meaningful.

I don't know about strict punishments for new users. Just send them a PM and delete their posts. Sooner or later they would pick it or loose interest because no one would answer their questions.

 

[KubeKid73]

GOSH IM SORRYYY!!!! I DIDNT KNOW CUT ME SOME SLACK! ANGER ISSUES!

I'd rather cut you a ban
Fortunately, I don't have that ability

Seriously though, what was it you didn't know? Nobody had posted in a topic, and you felt the need to say it was old. How can you possibly not realize that that was a bad idea? Most bumps are because people find a thread through a link or related threads and don't realize the date, but you were clearly well aware of the date. What could you possibly not have known?

Yeah broski, sometimes I don't realize the dates and might accidentally bump a thread but what if you still have a relevant question that still hasn't been answered? And lastly how old must a thread be before you can bump it up? It's not like theres a set number so I want to know how long it would be appropriate before I know not to bump it.

Yes, then an exception should be made if someone bumped a thread just to be annoying.

However, it's hard to tell if someone did something on purpose or by mistake.

That's why you should only make that exception to immediately ban someone when you're absolutely sure it was to be obnoxious.

 

[kjcellist]

Sometimes it is good to revive an old thread, but it has to be purposeful. I remember some old threads from 2006 that PJK revived in 2007 because he thought the topics were interesting and wanted others to see them. Perhaps it would good if you can only post in threads that were last active after you joined. (For example, I can revive a thread I made in March 2008, but someone who just joined this month can't do that.) Locking all old threads is just ridiculous. I am hinting now that I might revive my advanced pyraminx solutions thread soon to post a comparison of some methods. Revivals have to be meaningful; in fact, all posts should be meaningful.

I don't know about strict punishments for new users. Just send them a PM and delete their posts. Sooner or later they would pick it or loose interest because no one would answer their questions.

I really like your approach. Great idea!

 

[PatrickJameson]

However, if you are a native English speaker and you're using bad spelling/grammar on purpose, it's really easy to tell ("wat do u tink i shud use 4 my cube"), and it's just annoying.

agreed. It's pretty obvious that some people just use bad grammar for their amusement, while others, who are not native speakers actually try to type coherently. I strongly support that the users who bump threads for no reason and use incoherent grammar should be suspended. But there really is no need to be complete grammar Nazis and correct everything word for word. That would just make us look like snobbish perfectionist. Just a little clearer and none of these... "wat do u tink i shud use 4 my cube"

I agree that perhaps more moderation is needed, but I don't think people who use poor grammar should be suspended for just one post, especially if it is their first offense. This would just be too fine of a line to draw realistically - sometimes you just can't tell intentional mistakes from unintentional ones. It seems like this could also discourage non-native English speakers from contributing, which shouldn't be the goal of the forum.

I will agree that some posts can be blatantly annoying... but again, it could just be someone who doesn't know better. Perhaps we could have a warning system? 3 strikes, you're out?
1st offense - screen requiring user to agree to rules
2nd offense - week of suspension
3rd offense - ban

A week, thats a little excessive don't you think?

No, it's not excessive at all. We aren't going to get anywhere with this if we be all nice with a one day ban. If someone gets banned for a week, they will at least think before actually doing something.

 

[Deleted member 2864]

if we happen to be bumping an old thread with good reason though (lets say asking a question on a thread that hasn't been quite settled), then is that considered "bad etiquette?"

NVM... read your later posts.

 

[qqwref]

You know, guys, "ban" does not have to mean "permanent ban". Temporary bans are a common fixture at many other forums.

I think the key for spelling or grammar is to look at whether the person is doing it intentionally. If they have a few grammar or spelling mistakes, it's fine, especially if they are not native speakers. On the other hand, if they've clearly disregarded spelling and grammar on purpose, or if the post is just impossible to understand, there should be at least a warning.

 

[Dene]

Use your judgment. If you still have a relevant question, that's okay. "Wow this is old" is not a relevant question or discussion point to add to a two year old thread, no matter how you look at it.

ure to genrous shelly he ddint use a caputal w in da post

 

[ThatGuy]

I don't know how hard this would be but: would it be possible to make auto-corrections like Word? Such as: automatically uppercasing anything after punctuation, capitalizing "i" when it's by itself, maybe also adding a common misspelling -> correct word corrector, and, people, most browsers have the little red squiggly line for incorrect spellings (imagine that last phrase was CAPS).

 

[PCwizCube]

I agree with this point.

Maybe a solution to resolve this for new comers:

When they register, the should be shown a page of the rules, and then answer some questions below it. For example they could be:

Q: What should you include in all of your posts?
A: I, a new user, who should have read the rules, should include try to use the best English I can in the forum by using proper _________ and _________. (spelling, grammar)

Q: What should you not do on the forum unless your post relates to the thread?
A: When I find a old thread (more than two weeks or something like that), unless I have important information that relates to the thread to say, I should not ____ anything new in the thread. (post)

Maybe tell them they can find the answers in the rules where the words are underlined or highlighted or bolded in the rules or something.

My examples aren't perfect but that's just a general idea of what you could do. It would force people to learn the rules, and could also be helpful in keeping spammers/bots away.


And for punishment, users could report stuff and moderators could check it, and the could get a warning. On their second warning, the user could be temporarily banned for like 5 days or something. Another two warnings maybe like two weeks, then maybe a month. Something like that, just a general idea.

 

[jcuber]

I say we try out all of the ideas for a month or so each, and see what works best.

 

[Paul Wagner]

However, if you are a native English speaker and you're using bad spelling/grammar on purpose, it's really easy to tell ("wat do u tink i shud use 4 my cube"), and it's just annoying.

agreed. It's pretty obvious that some people just use bad grammar for their amusement, while others, who are not native speakers actually try to type coherently. I strongly support that the users who bump threads for no reason and use incoherent grammar should be suspended. But there really is no need to be complete grammar Nazis and correct everything word for word. That would just make us look like snobbish perfectionist. Just a little clearer and none of these... "wat do u tink i shud use 4 my cube"

I agree that perhaps more moderation is needed, but I don't think people who use poor grammar should be suspended for just one post, especially if it is their first offense. This would just be too fine of a line to draw realistically - sometimes you just can't tell intentional mistakes from unintentional ones. It seems like this could also discourage non-native English speakers from contributing, which shouldn't be the goal of the forum.

I will agree that some posts can be blatantly annoying... but again, it could just be someone who doesn't know better. Perhaps we could have a warning system? 3 strikes, you're out?
1st offense - screen requiring user to agree to rules
2nd offense - week of suspension
3rd offense - ban

A week, thats a little excessive don't you think?

No, it's not excessive at all. We aren't going to get anywhere with this if we be all nice with a one day ban. If someone gets banned for a week, they will at least think before actually doing something.

I think 3 days would be acceptable.

I agree with this point.

Maybe a solution to resolve this for new comers:

When they register, the should be shown a page of the rules, and then answer some questions below it. For example they could be:

Q: What should you include in all of your posts?
A: I, a new user, who should have read the rules, should include try to use the best English I can in the forum by using proper _________ and _________. (spelling, grammar)

Q: What should you not do on the forum unless your post relates to the thread?
A: When I find a old thread (more than two weeks or something like that), unless I have important information that relates to the thread to say, I should not ____ anything new in the thread. (post)

Maybe tell them they can find the answers in the rules where the words are underlined or highlighted or bolded in the rules or something.

My examples aren't perfect but that's just a general idea of what you could do. It would force people to learn the rules, and could also be helpful in keeping spammers/bots away.


And for punishment, users could report stuff and moderators could check it, and the could get a warning. On their second warning, the user could be temporarily banned for like 5 days or something. Another two warnings maybe like two weeks, then maybe a month. Something like that, just a general idea.

This is an intelligent post but something to add, maybe when they sign up they should have to click an agreement (maybe we should all have to do it) and it's agreeing on reading dates, using correct punctuation, not asking questions that have been answered 200,000 times already "whut k1nd of cub3 shud i get????", and contributing and having knowledge of the topic. Then I believe we should compromise on some reasonable punishments except warning doesn't have to be used in this if they already agree. So lets get some ideas of some good punishments.

 

[Lord Voldemort]

Would it really work? The people who do stupid things are usually the new ones. They probably don't care if they're banned from a forum that they just joined. It's not like this is preventing them from cubing or going to a competition or getting help (though some of them don't seem to know about google...). There's always going to be new people that don't really know what they're doing.

How many people join here on an average day?
I don't know how well it works, but twistypuzzles review of all the incoming registrations (I probably wouldn't support this, but just throwing it out there). The welcome video will probably help too if there's anything on there, because at least a video is easier for lazy people than actually having to read (we really do expect too much of them...). Also, depending on how many new members we have, we could do something like a mentor program. Maybe just someone they can learn a bit about forum rules and save the rest of the forums from the more frequently asked questions. This would depend on the number of new members as well as the number of people willing to mentor.

I think more moderation and harsher penalties could work. However, I don't want new members to feel afraid to post anything for the fear of getting suspended, which could happen if we go overboard with this.

 

[ThatGuy]

Here's what we do. (First if 'wat' is found in a post/thread, it is deleted) If their thread contains 'F2L' or 'look ahead' when they hit the submit button they are redirected to all the pages this forum already has. Or, whenever you visit the homepage there are big links that say: If you have an F2L question click here or If you want tips on getting faster read these first and etc. (this might actually work)
(This would apply to, say, <20 posts)

 

[Paul Wagner]

Would it really work? The people who do stupid things are usually the new ones. They probably don't care if they're banned from a forum that they just joined. It's not like this is preventing them from cubing or going to a competition or getting help (though some of them don't seem to know about google...). There's always going to be new people that don't really know what they're doing.

How many people join here on an average day?
I don't know how well it works, but twistypuzzles review of all the incoming registrations (I probably wouldn't support this, but just throwing it out there). The welcome video will probably help too if there's anything on there, because at least a video is easier for lazy people than actually having to read (we really do expect too much of them...). Also, depending on how many new members we have, we could do something like a mentor program. Maybe just someone they can learn a bit about forum rules and save the rest of the forums from the more frequently asked questions. This would depend on the number of new members as well as the number of people willing to mentor.

I think more moderation and harsher penalties could work. However, I don't want new members to feel afraid to post anything for the fear of getting suspended, which could happen if we go overboard with this.

Of course not, we should make it clear for its only for excessive repeat offenders such as, I don't think we need to give a warning to somebody who does something once. But if we commonly see it happening of course disciplinary actions must proceed. But I'm sure with this new thread people might take this a bit more seriously, users will correct the other ones more and lastly we forgot the worst (in my opinion) of all, the double-posters! I only find it annoying because it's so unnecessary they should add the same feature to youtube I think. I enforce the "Edit" button all over the forum whenever i see a double-poster which might be a "bump" but whatever but what is really so bad about it.

 

[Lord Voldemort]

I also liked Stefan Pochmann's (sp?) idea of having a tag for redundant threads, where we can just tag a repetitive thread and the OP would be directed to a common page with answers to the more frequently asked questions.

EDIT: @ Paul Wagner - So, are we talking more about punishing annoying members after they've committed an offense, or are we thinking about putting up preventative measure to stop the annoying members from being annoying in the first place? I was thinking about the latter more.

Another thing, I think we should make the member introduction page easier to find for new members... I didn't find it for a while after I joined the forums, and I was able to ask my questions like how to look ahead with out pissing anyone off. We have 115 threads in member introductions and 5,000 + members, so that's something we can improve on.

 

[mcciff2112]

I like ThatGuy's idea. I think that if it could be worked out, it could very easily prevent a large amount of unwanted posts. Instead of going into the forum section and finding what you want, or using the search function, they would see a link of exactly what they want on the homepage. People are lazy, don't forget, and they don't want to go through the trouble of navigating through a website to find what they want. If there are links on the homepage to discussions of the most widely asked "noob questions," then maybe they wouldn't feel the need to bother us with a new thread about something that has been discussed plenty of times.

 

[teller]

This happens to every forum sooner or later...

It would be a mistake to fuss over grey areas and the "letter of the law" regarding rules. Just have an adequate number of trusted moderators keep the place clean and have a copy/paste form letter ready for the inevitable stream of noobs that ask "what cube should I get?" And lock those threads with that final cut/paste for the other noobs to see as the example with no further discussion. They'll quickly fall off the front page, but it will be a daily chore. If you ran your own blog you'd have to clean out the Viagra ads each day, and you wouldn't have a debate about it.

Smart mods would sometimes let them slide, knowing that one thread will not serve for all eternity...they get stale after a few hundred posts and new ones can take their place from time to time if the original post has some meat on it. It's just good judgment, without apologies. If you let it get political it turns into a noise-fest. It isn't a democracy...you're pruning a garden of sorts and you just have to weed it regularly. If you care about quality, you won't be overly draconian...

And grammar nazism makes for extremely boring reading...don't fuss over it, it's pointless. If a post is truly incomprehensible, then maybe take action but otherwise, find something more interesting to complain about.

And of course Pochman can alpha-male all over whomever he deems unworthy, because he's senior around here and provides cheap entertainment for the rest of us.

 

[Sg.Speedcuber]

well,Ive banned myself for a month remember?

 

[DavidWoner]

And of course Pochman can alpha-male all over whomever he deems unworthy, because he's senior around here and provides cheap entertainment for the rest of us.

The thing is, he is almost always right. Only one instance comes to mind where he has been wrong, and its arguable that it was not his fault.

 

[Kian]

And of course Pochman can alpha-male all over whomever he deems unworthy, because he's senior around here and provides cheap entertainment for the rest of us.

The thing is, he is almost always right. Only one instance comes to mind where he has been wrong, and its arguable that it was not his fault.

Being right is important, but I think employing a reasonable amount of tact is common courtesy. I hope we can all try to achieve that sort of balance.