[cratylus]

I'd like to thank Xerihae for restoring the deleted posts
in the thread:
Noobiest noob that ever noobed

I can see that the intent was good, and I'm delighted that
everything worked out.

-Crat
LPMuds.net - Index

[Brody]

Indeed. I know the tenor and the bickering in the posts didn't exactly scream "This is a fantastic tool for helping newbies," but it's good to keep the thread alive for posterity's sake, I think.

I was reminded, if nothing else, that text doesn't convey mood well all the time (and that some people can jump to conclusions that I'm just being a jerk, when in fact I'm just not being a huggybear - there IS a difference ).

Ask anyone on the jointhesaga.com games: When I want to come across as a hard-nose, I come across as a hard-nose. There's no maybe about it. I really WAS showing some restraint in responding to that thread.

[Lasher]

The whole incident just confirms what we'd established in another thread last week - that we need more help here for people completely new to MUDs.

Can only solve one thing at a time however and right now the most frustrated group of TMS users are MUD owners trying to navigate the MUDinfo/voting databases and flaky links between the two.

[scandum]

The impression I get is that people aren't overly concerned (myself included) when it comes to helping newbies, unless of course it's their own mud the newbie wants to connect to.

I'd reconstruct what happened as following:

1) Newbie wants to play a mud.
2) Newbie fails because the website isn't working.
3) Newbie googles for info but being a newbie he fails.
4) Newbie googles for newbie mud help and finds TMS.
5) Newbie bothers to create an account and posts a message.
6) Newbie sees a lot of people view his message but do not bother to respond.
7) Newbie gives a shout out
8) Newbie is told he's impatient and is told to google it up.
9) Newbie gets ****ed. (see 3 and 4)
10) Newbie gets a link to the broken website. (see 2)
11) Newbie gets even more ****ed. (see 9)

This all could be avoided if people actually try to be helpful and do not assume total and utter incompetence on the side of the newbie.

Since I have nothing better to do I give a reconstruction of the possible existence of a Good Scandum:

1) Good Scandum sees a newbie who needs help.
2) Good Scandum googles up the webpage and tries to connect.
3) Good Scandum double checks the telnet addy on TIC using a proxy to bypass his ban.
4) Good Scandum posts a reply giving the correct addy of the mud.
5) Evil Scandum takes over and adds to the reply that the newbie should use tintin++ to connect because all other means to connect suck.
6) Newbie thanks Good Scandum and Evil Scandum for their lovely advise and quick help.

[Brody]

Originally Posted by scandum The impression I get is that people aren't overly concerned (myself included) when it comes to helping newbies, unless of course it's their own mud the newbie wants to connect to. I'd reconstruct what happened as following: 1) Newbie wants to play a mud. (etc.)

There's only one thing wrong with your reconstruction of this specific situation, though: That's not at all how it happened. If we had a post from a newbie who had exhausted every avenue before posting, I don't think it would have been received in quite the same way. Instead, it went something more like this:

1) Newbie wants to play a MUD. Posts a vague how-do-I-do-it question on TMS.
2) Newbie doesn't get an immediate response. Posts a bit of a whine about that.
3) Newbie still doesn't get an immediate response. Posts ANOTHER complaint.
4) Brody (neither good nor bad, just Brody) happens upon the thread. Yeah, Brody's a tad irritated by the impatient textual jumping up and down of said newbie, but Brody doesn't unload on the guy. Brody first tries to explain the local standards a bit, just in case the newbie hasn't really used forums much before. And then Brody suggests Googling for the MUD website.
5) Newbie makes a post suggesting the Brody post isn't helpful.
6) Brody, so far the only person even trying to help the newbie, reiterates that he's trying to help.
7) Newbie calls Brody a jerkoff.
8) Brody, despite being called a jerkoff, investigates the MUD website and determines that said MUD appears to be broken or, at the very least, has bad information on its main site.
9) Some people post to say it's wrong to call Brody a jerkoff.
10) Some people post to say it's true, Brody's a jerk.
11) Thread is off the rails.

I don't care much for the suggestion that all sweetness and congeniality must flow first from us. It may sound a little snobbish, but I don't react well to people who are clearly 1) impatient and 2) rude about their impatience, as if they're entitled to something from a total stranger just for existing.

It goes both ways.

[Xerihae]

New players/mudders/forum visitors often get frustrated when they don't get an immediate answer to their question, especially if it's on a forum such as this where, let's be honest, a lot of people don't read that Newbie section. As they're new here, how are they supposed to know that though? You go on other forums and replies to topics are flying around every couple of minutes, whereas here it can take a few hours to get the answer you want. Is it their fault if their expectations of this forum are a little high because of their experience elsewhere? You could argue it is and it isn't. At the end of the day though, the Newbie Help section exists to help newbies. If you cannot be bothered to do this in a courteous and verbose manner then you shouldn't really be trying to help. One of my own personal bugbears is people who reply with things like "RTFM" or "Use search n00b". Yes, doing one of those things can often bring some answers, but it can also often bring a whole load of useless information that the person just doesn't want or have time to wade through. People post topics because they know there are people on a forum who will answer the same question a thousand times over without a gripe, the sort of people who make excellent greeters in supermarkets or newbie helpers on MUDs.

To address a few criticisms I seem to have received via reputation:

"I still don't see what the problem with Brody's OP was"

The problem was in the perceived tone of the reply. Brody has kindly clarified what he meant and admitted, as we all know, that text is terrible at conveying emotions and the nuances of speech which make the difference between a rude answer and an informative one. I myself read Brodys original post as somewhat curt and borderline insulting, so is it hardly surprising that the original poster did? Yes, we now know that he didn't mean it that way, but the benefits of hindsight etc etc.

"Horrid moderation." and "totally over the top and unnecessary. noob admin behavior."

As for those, well, where to start? The topic was a thread about how to connect to a MUD that due to what we now know was a misunderstanding ended up being mostly full of replies to do with the argument rather than the question. I removed these. I didn't know this particular forum software would leave behind stubs, otherwise it would have read a lot better. Too many topics on here and other forums wander off on a complete tangent or descend into petty arguments between regulars, and I saw no reason to allow that to happen here. Again, all I did was remove the posts that caused or continued the argument, and left the informative, neutral-or-friendly toned ones that answered the original question. You might not be used to this kind of moderation, which in many other places is considered the norm, but that is down to your expectations alone. It's not the first time I've removed posts that were just arguments in a thread on the Newbie Help section, but it's the first time I've come across a complaint.

I don't really care what reputation you give me to be fair, but I always feel it's nice to have an open discussion about problems as long as it's in the correct place. This thread, for instance, I feel is the correct place to discuss this. The topic I removed posts from was not the place to have that particular argument.

[Brody]

I, on the other hand, think that we can spare ourselves typing the same answers over and over again because I do think our time is valuable. If we can point newbies to resources that are more in line with what they need (such as information about how to log in to a specific MUD, as opposed to how to get involved in MUDs in general), I don't see why that has to be dressed up with long-winded rhetoric to make sure it's clear we mean no harm.

If I say: "Use Google to track down the Dawn of Ages website" - well, that should be taken to mean "Use Google to track down the Dawn of Ages website" before it's taken to mean "Use search, n00b." I refuse to be responsible for the inferences other people make based on their own prejudices

[Xerihae]

I should have been more clear. I didn't have an issue with your suggestion to use Google, just the first point about it being a forum not a chatroom was, to me, put across in a somewhat abrupt manner that could be construed as rude. You and the people who know you on here understand you didn't mean it that way, but as someone who doesn't know you (or pretty much anyone on here) I didn't and it's not unreasonable to assume that others would take exception to it too.

Saying "It's not my fault what they infer" isn't really much of a defence... As a poster on the Newbie Help section you should always keep in mind that a friendly front to new members is needed and try to avoid posting things that may be misunderstood so people don't get the wrong impression or misconstrue what you meant. At least that's my take on things. That's not so hard is it?

[Brody]

Telling an impatient newbie this isn't a chat room and not to expect immediate responses isn't rude. Good heavens, are we supposed to assume people like that are merely Very Special Olympians and pat them on the head?

The fact that you're suggesting I *need* a defense for what I said points to some pre-established notions on your part about what I intended, and I maintain that I'm not responsible for your inferences (or anyone else's) in that regard.

Why we're having a discussion about how nice I should have been as opposed to how the newbie could have been a little less of a spaz is a bit surprising to me. I tried to help and got called a jerkoff by the newbie and, effectively, by at least two veteran forumgoers (including you, by implication).

What message does it send to people who want to help when their words are taken out of context in this fashion?

I daresay it's not any better than what you're suggesting I did through my "terse" (yet oddly not at all insulting) reply.

[Xerihae]

Originally Posted by Brody Telling an impatient newbie this isn't a chat room and not to expect immediate responses isn't rude. Good heavens, are we supposed to assume people like that are merely Very Special Olympians and pat them on the head?

Phrased the right way, no it isn't. I maintain that the phrasing you used could, and was, misunderstood. This led to an argument which had little bearing on the original question.

The fact that you're suggesting I *need* a defense for what I said points to some pre-established notions on your part about what I intended, and I maintain that I'm not responsible for your inferences (or anyone else's) in that regard.

Defense was probably a poor choice of words... Easily done isn't it? I had no pre-established notions of what you intended with that post, though my view of it I've already stated.

Why we're having a discussion about how nice I should have been as opposed to how the newbie could have been a little less of a spaz is a bit surprising to me. I tried to help and got called a jerkoff by the newbie and, effectively, by at least two veteran forumgoers (including you, by implication).

The newbie could have been a little more patient, a little less abrupt, a little more understanding etc etc. The reason we're discussing your reply is because he has yet to contribute to this thread and so rebuffing him seems a little pointless. I should make clear that yours was not the sole post that caused me to prune the thread, as others (including the OP) posted things later on that continued the argument. For some reason we've become locked on the issue of yours though, perhaps because you're the only one willing to discuss/argue it? I also have no feelings as to whether you're a jerkoff or not, I simply felt that your post, along with the others, had no real place in the thread. Whether your original post or the newbies reply started the war has little real bearing on the outcome, I was just trying to point out how yours could have been misunderstood since obviously you didn't think there was anything wrong with it because you knew the original intention behind it.

What message does it send to people who want to help when their words are taken out of context in this fashion?

If anything can be learned from this it should be that a few extra words and a different turn of phrase go a long to towards avoiding these kinds of misunderstandings.

[Brody]

I think I'll just agree to disagree on this. You're the Newbie Help forum moderator and you can run it your way. I'll reserve my newbie helping for other arenas to avoid the problem and leave it to you. Should avoid any further problems about clarity.

[Xerihae]

I'm not particularly interested in "running it my way" and you can continue to post there as much as you want. I'm a moderator, not an admin. It's my job, as far as I've always understood it, to keep threads on track and remove posts that have no bearing to the original question. In this case, with this forum software, it left a bunch of stubs that made the thing look horrible and unreadable. If it hadn't, all that would have remained would be the original question and a bunch of answers to it, without the name calling. Surely that's the whole point?

[cratylus]

Is it their fault if their expectations of this forum are a little high because of their experience elsewhere? You could argue it is and it isn't. At the end of the day though, the Newbie Help section exists to help newbies.

I myself read Brodys original post as somewhat curt and borderline insulting, so is it hardly surprising that the original poster did?

I am a big fan of newbies. I love them,
because without them my codebase does not
thrive. I tend to them, I nurture them,
I bestow upon them the gifts of my knowledge
and code asking nothing in return but that
they enjoy the codebase and help others when
asked. It is a lovely ecosystem of productivity
and mutual assistance.

In fact, among LP oldtimers, I've earned some
resentment for how vigorously I defend newbs
from the depredations of bored trolls. I
went so far as to set up my own intermud
router to help them avoid being eaten before
they had a chance to open their eyes and
gulp the clean, fresh air that is mudding
and LPC. I am, for all practical purposes,
the patron saint of LPmud noobs.

Perhaps most probative of my qualifications
to handle mud noobs is that I am parent to
a 3 year old.

So believe me when I say I have nothing but
warm affection toward those who seek help
on mudding, be it players, coders, be it
LP or Diku, whatever.

The thing is that whether it's a mud noob
or a 3 year old, "he can't help it, he's new"
only goes so far. Eventually some line has to
be drawn, and some correction must be applied.

The newer the person, often the less they
enjoy the correction. But without the
establishment of basic norms to give new
people a sense of how to conduct themselves,
there's no point in talking with them, and
there's no point being anywhere near them.
Noobs are corrected for their own good, and
for the benefit of the entire community.
Worrying about the one guy who runs away crying
because he doesn't like being told the
local standards of conversation is short-sighted.
If he can't handle it, let him go.

Coddling every lazy person who can't be bothered
to read docs results is populations of lazy
losers. Maybe that's something you find
desirable. I do not. Whether it is done gruffly
or syrup-laden, taking a noob by the hand
and walking them back to their homework is
not only good for them, it's good for us, and
if the person doing the correction is truly
out of line, his peers will handle correcting
*him*. That's how a community works.

If he breaks *rules*, that's where you step in.
But enforcing *politeness* is on the quick and
short path to a forum devoid of clever people
who won't be subject to your fine sensibilities.

And I think that would be counter to the
potential for general usefulness TMS has.

Again, all I did was remove the posts that caused or continued the argument, and left the informative, neutral-or-friendly toned ones that answered the original question.

You're the mod for that topic and it's your right
to moderate it as you see fit and
nobody (afaik) is disputing your authority to
employ your own your discretion in the
exercise of that role.

Having said that...

I think that selectively deleting posts in
a thread is along the same dark path of
editing the content of a post (which I do
not claim you did here). It undermines the
integrity of the information on the forum,
not only because it disrupts the continuity
of the flow of that particular dialectic,
but because it also serves the more
counterproductive likelihood that experienced,
insightful members of the community will
choose to avoid participation.

That is not good. That is bad.

If anything can be learned from this it should be that a few extra words and a different turn of phrase go a long to towards avoiding these kinds of misunderstandings.

I find this insulting (whether Brody finds it insulting is
up to him). I also find this to be a symptom of the problem.
Technical people answer in technical ways. If you want to
**** them off, tell them that their help is unwelcome unless
they gild it with pink fluffy clouds.

To "avoid this kind of thing" all you need to do is
lay off the Miss Manners RP and let people who know what they're
talking about help people who ask for help. If they
do it wrong, *they* will be corrected. If there is
question about where the lines of propriety stand,
the community is in a position to exert authority over that.

Unless crafting turns of phrase that suit *you* is a
rule, I am free to express my help in a way that conforms
to the rules without your interference. If you interfere,
*that's* how "this kind of thing" happens. Blaming Brody
is a poor excuse for hasty overmoderation.

-Crat
LPMuds.net - Index

[Ide]

It seems that a lot of the friction between the two viewpoints on that thread was caused by two different methods of helping newbies. To generalize, one method has its roots in RTFM, "How To Ask Questions the Smart Way", and to put it more bluntly, think-before-you-speak discourse. The other method has its roots in 'customer-obsessed', 'bend-over-backwards', etcetera.

Now oddly, and I don't really know why this is myself, when I'm asking questions I believe in the first method. When I'm answering questions I like the second approach. This is mostly why I saw Brody's OP as rude to the newbie, and what sparked my reply to the thread.

Rather than going back and forth essentially arguing the correctness of people's personal viewpoints, it seems like this is the perfect opportunity to use some kind of neutral objective reference point.

Maybe what TMS could use is a newbie FAQ, and I think Lasher sort of mentioned this in passing, but noted his priorities. I find it hard to believe that there isn't a newbie FAQ somewhere in mud land that couldn't be donated/submitted to TMS, such that Brody could have easily replied something like:

1. Check out This FAQ Mr. Noobiest.

[scandum]

Originally Posted by Brody There's only one thing wrong with your reconstruction of this specific situation, though: That's not at all how it happened. If we had a post from a newbie who had exhausted every avenue before posting, I don't think it would have been received in quite the same way. Instead, it went something more like this: 1) Newbie wants to play a MUD. Posts a vague how-do-I-do-it question on TMS. 2) Newbie doesn't get an immediate response. Posts a bit of a whine about that.

But how did the Newbie find TMS? Probably with google entering "mud newbie help forum" as a search query. To me it seems more trouble to register to a site and ask than using google. If basic physics apply, mainly the law of the path of the least resistance, you can conclude there's a large probability that the newbie did try alternative means to help himself.

Also, the newbie seemed more annoyed about people viewing his thread and not responding, than the time it took for someone to respond. Even if, truth be told, most people on this site could have helped him out by spending 10 minutes of their time. Image you need directions IRL and the first ten people passing by just ignore you and pretend they don't hear you. Though you probably have to go to Amsterdam for that to happen, you'll quickly find out that 'excuse me' isn't going to help much and try a different approach, which is exactly what Mr Noob ended up doing.

Of course there's blame at the noob as well for being overly vague about what he had tried so far and losing his patience rather quickly. Though I find your response to be comparable to someone telling you to go buy a city map when asked for directions, not to mention it's my own general response to tell people to google it up when I feel like being rude or inconsiderate.

Anywho, Mr Noob succeeded in the end by getting some useful information out of you after all. Not only didn't he take s**t, he made you his b***h while at!!

We should really be more concerned about socially aggressive noobs taking advantage of us and turning this tight knit community's members against each other!

[Brody]