Originally from http://www.joehobart.com reposted with permission. All credit for this work goes to Joe Hobart.

A Beginners Guide to Expert Forums on the Net

 

The purpose of this guide is to help you understand how to utilize the net to seek knowledge and fellowship in a technical forum on the net. There are lots of reasons for participation in a forum, from a passion for the subject, to camaraderie with fellow enthusiasts, or a place to participate in the exchange of information. This is not always an easy thing to just dive into. Expert forums are a place full of deeply entrenched cliques, running jokes 10 years old, and strange words like FAQ and STFW. I see a lot of new folks who jump into some of the forums i participate in, and stumble, so I wrote this guide as my way of welcoming you into the fray.

There are some things we need to get out of the way.


    Alphabet soup, as it were.. Bookmark the online dictionary at NetLingo for a place to go lookup that odd acronym.  Start out with AFAIK, FAQ, and IMHO. The locals are the frequent posters to a board. A lurker is a non participant. A tourist is someone new to the board.
    STFW Search the Fine Web. Google and Yahoo are your friend. if you need help, type in keywords. There's a lot of good info out there, just waiting for your mouse click
    Netiquette Go visit Netiquette Online and WebFoot's Email advice or Yahoo for some general how not to be annoying tips, LIKE NOT TYPING IN CAPS or SHINY COOL FORMATTING. I highly recommend you spend some time with these, it will help you a lot. First impressions and all that.
    Types of People: Flame warriors -spend some time here, darn entertaining, and surprisingly true to life. I could place most of my forum friends easily into one of these categories. Those illustrations are great, too.

 

Ok, on to the good stuff. Here's a few absolutes about the forums. 

Perception is the only reality online. We can smell a lie like a fart in a car. 
Pictures are worth 10 pages of typing.
We are not being paid to participate in this forum, and the advice is worth what it cost you.
Opinions are not facts, but are always deserve respect for the time I took to type it in to help you.
Your detail-rich and specific question will ensure the same kind of answer.
You should not argue with the locals if you are a tourist.
Relax, its only a forum.

 

Perception is the only reality online. We can smell a lie like a fart in a car.
   You are what you speak here. This is the world of the written word. Poor grammar, bad spelling, incoherent ramblings, and attitude all make up a bad image. If you can't even take the time to make a complete sentence, you should not expect me to take you seriously. Not all of us are windbags or communications majors, and that's ok. A brief logical post is just as welcome as a four page thesis on the merits of negative polarity heisenberg compensators. 
    In the same vein, I do not know you by anything other than what you say. A common newbie blunder is to embellish their accomplishments, skill level, or station in life in a well-intentioned, but poorly calculated ruse to fast-track respect from the locals. Please understand, your complete and utter lack of subject knowledge is not embarrassing. The locals are always thrilled to see new blood, a passionate but ignorant newbie is always welcome. Most locals hang around simply for the joy of helping others with our hard earned experience. Feel no shame, and post your question. We will help you without condescension, and will try very hard to make you feel welcome in our community. Failure to heed this warning will result in you being mocked and shamed, just for the sport of it. Your claimed expert status will quickly become revealed to the locals when you ask a question that we all learned in 'Basic Skills 101'. Frequently this is an unrecoverable error in most communities, your credibility is shot, you are an idiot; go away or i shall taunt you a second time. Please delete your account, go get a hotmail address and register under a new name, and never look back.
    If you have made a mistake to get yourself into the bind you now face, do not be ashamed to admit it as you ask for help in correcting it. Honesty will help us to help you better. Generally, you will get ribbed, in good clean natured fun, but only because we have been there ourselves, and face it, if it wasn't you, you'd be laughing too. Its not the last time someone pulled a bonehead maneuver.  Your feeble attempts to conceal the truth will distort my ability to understand the scenario and help you devise a solution. Ill stop laughing eventually, I promise. If your mistake is truly noteworthy, your name might even be immortalized as a verb in the lore of the board. "So i pulled a JoeHob last night. After i cleaned up the coffee, my caps lock key is STUCK ON. ONO!!!"

Pictures are worth 10 pages of typing.
    Go buy a digital camera and take a picture of it. Trust me its worth every penny. I can tell you exactly what's wrong if I could see it. Also, learn to resize your pictures. Try paint shop pro  or the  image resizer from microsoft You are shooting for an image smaller than 640x480. 

 

We are not being paid to participate in this forum, and the advice is worth what it cost you.
   
Do not make demands of the locals. We will help you if we can, and if we have time. If you need help on a timeline, go hire a professional. As soon as the check clears for my consultant fee, you can begin barking orders, until then, take what you get, and be thankful. This is another common newbie blunder; Posting a half-assed question and then 20 minutes later replying to the empty thread with "WHY WONT YOU JERKS HELP ME". The expectation that I have nothing better to do than sit around monitoring the forums every 5 minutes waiting to serve the newbie crisis will win you a penalty. The locals will get around to it when they can. Its most likely that you asked such a bad question that it will take time to write-up a list of questions you need to answer before your issue can be addressed, and we didn't have the time, patience or inkling to do it right now. Expecting help is reasonable, but three or four days between question and answer is not uncommon on many forums. If your thread gets missed, give it a bump after a few days (that means reply to your own thread, adding details, begging or offering bribes or flattery heh). The more interesting the problem or scenario, the faster the response.
    My advice is based on my own experience, knowledge and skill level. Frequently you will receive advice of dubious or overly technical direction. It is always acceptable to post thoughtful follow-up questions. It shows respect that you read, and tried to understand the advice, but needed clarification. Sometimes people will give you bad advice. It happens. We try to 'fact-check' our community by reading most posts. If you are given glaringly bad advice, expect one of the other locals to contradict, especially if the error could cause injury or high cost failure. When this happens on your thread, your newbie radar should go on high alert. Dissention among the locals means you have strayed into the land of opinion or a bozo replied to you. When in doubt, trust in post counts. You are much less likely to be misled by someone with 1000 posts vs someone with 20. This is not an absolute. I have seen some salty folks throwing around old wives tales as fact. Use or request references if you cannot figure out what's true. 

Opinions are not facts, but are always deserve respect for the time I took to type it in to try to help you.
   
Most locals will preface opinion with IMHO, 'in my opinion', or 'I think' or something along those lines. Treat those statements as opinions, but respect them. Some are well-founded, learned with 30 years on the job experience, without a doubt opinions, and other times an off the cuff, my best guess in 30 seconds, shot in the dark thoughts. Most locals will take great pains not to mislead you or warn you if here be dragons
    Note that i took to the time to consider your question, and type in a response. If you don't like my advice, you are not under obligation to follow it. Note that i will not be hurt if you don't listen to my sagely wisdom, it is your loss. Do not question my opinion or disparage my statements. I gave you the opinion that you solicited. Respect my time and consideration by reading my post. Locals will retaliate swiftly and with much flaming if you come into our board, ask an opinion question and give the posters grief. This is a quick way to get yourself blackballed or labeled an inconsiderate idiot.

Your detail-rich and specific question will ensure the same kind of answer.
    Learn to ask good questions. Many of us are professional problem solvers. We can divine the tea leaves of your post and provide sagely advice that will instantly resolve your problem. We need a baseline level of information to work our magic. Give us the details and parameters in your scenario. A good question will have all the information an expert needs to answer your question in a single post and ensure a speedy reply. Listen to CarTalk on NPR. These guys are a good example of how we work. We delve into the nature of the phenomenon, and get the relevant details to understand what you meant to ask. "My car makes a lot of noise, what do i do to fix it" is a bad question. "My 1992 ford f150 with the v6 makes a loud clunking noise while turning into parking spaces from the front passenger-side wheel when i have four wheel drive engaged" is an excellent question with all the right details. Your experience with the topic will help you ask better questions, as will reading other posts, especially from the locals. When a local asks a question, look at what details they provide, and mimic until you understand why.

You should not argue with the locals if you are a tourist.
    Here's a friendly piece of advice. Us locals consider this forum our home. We support, contribute and are passionate about it. You are not 'us' yet. You are a guest in our house. You should be on your best manners, even if grouchy Uncle Joe makes fun of your haircut. He was doing this before you were born, and earned the right to mock you young folk. Besides, we love him, he's part of our family, and you are not. Be assured that a major mistake in forum participation is to too quickly put your shoes on the coffee table. As you stay and participate, you will earn our respect and become part of the family. Positioning yourself with overtly hostile posts about the locals will make the rest of us 'pick a side', and you will lose every time. Mistakes are made in this written world. Misunderstandings, bad days, and nagging wives all can contribute to a faux-pas or a hot temper. Apologize quickly and sincerely and all will be forgotten. 
    I am an expert. You do not know me or my depth of skill, but expect that i know more than you about the subject if i can answer your question. You do not want to debate me, because i am much smarter than you, and have copious amounts of free time to write disturbingly harsh and critical posts about how poor your skills are and bulleted lists on why you don't know squat. I have a hundred links in my bookmarks that I can cite to show your ignorance, and they are the same ones all the other locals have read. You may not agree with my opinion, that is your right, but you will not win an argument about it here. I developed my opinion back in WW2, while walking uphill to Iwo Jima in the snow, and its battle-tested, kid-loved, and mother-approved. Accept that and do not argue with me.

Relax, its only a forum.
    Its human to take things personally, and get worked up in a discussion. When you find your blood pressure rising, its a good idea to push your chair back a little, and remember that the forum isn't what life is about. You should enjoy yourself in the community of the forum, and if you feel stressed, get up out of your chair and go do something else. A lot of social blunders are made in the heat of the moment by someone who is too worked up, or taking a conversation far too seriously or personally. Remind yourself that the guy on the other end of the post doesn't know you personally, and is probably just being rude for sport, at your expense. Have a laugh and relax.

Conclusion

I hope that this guide helps you in your adventures on the forums. Most of the lessons here were taken from stuff i did as a newbie, or the cringingly painful public mistakes of others on the boards i hang out on. Good luck with it.

 

-joe