Postage Stamp Chat Board & Stamp Bulletin Board Forum
 

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A man might as well marry ... if he finds a good wife he will be happy ... if not, he will become a philosopher.
Collecting Greater New Guinea & Macropods (Kangaroos & Wallabies).

Had never noticed that line before Hans.

It is part of the basic software - no way it can be changed unless we get a phpBB whizz to do a hack deep down into the source code, and then each version update these hacks gets lost, and generally corrupts something else on the update!

We have learnt that lesson from past sad experience.

HOWEVER - ALL new members get advised the following when their account is activated. 99% follow it, but 1% decide they are above all petty stuff like following this simple process, and barge off and do things their own way, as 'they know best'.

That 1% of members chews up 99% of Moderator time sadly.

It is like being pulled over by a traffic cop for doing 120 in a 60 zone, and using as an excuse you were: "far too busy and experienced to read the posted signs". That will not work either.

It needs to be noted that EVERY new member gets a welcome email that says the following - and this truly is not hard to follow for persons of normal IQ.

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We have just TWO requests of **ALL** new members of the board.

Part ONE is to hit "Forward" - and re-send this entire email to admin@stampboards.com confirming you got this email.

That is then PROOF the email you signed up with, is your real email address - we 100% insist on this for all members

Part *TWO* is to please take a few moments to make a post or two to briefly introduce yourself to the other members. We have special thread set aside for exactly this "Welcome Post" purpose called the: ROLL CALL - "the feel free to introduce yourself to others here" - Conga Line!!

LOG IN first, then click the link below, or add it your browser bar, and you will see that thread. Then hit the "Post Reply" button at top or bottom of all the text, then add your carefully typed introduction post - i.e. just type a short message about who you are, where you are, and what you
collect, and then hit "SUBMIT":

http://www.stampboards.com/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=10277

A lot of folks are new to Bulletin Boards and we have set up a lot of easy to follow "How To" help threads here to address commonly asked questions:

http://www.stampboards.com/viewforum.php?f=18

There is a short tutorial to help new members add images to the Board:

http://www.stampboards.com/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=15603

and also a practice thread where you might like to test your new skills.

http://www.stampboards.com/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=284

We have a detailed "The Rules" post outlining a lot of commonly asked questions by new members, and outlining our Code Of Conduct etc ... please read it carefully - it will help a lot:

http://www.stampboards.com/viewtopic.php?t=2556

Have a look around - we have a ton of forums and discussions on EVERYTHING related to stamps.

Please email us with ANY questions or queries you may have - admin[at] stampboards.com

Thanks - the Volunteer Moderator Team

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Anyone who gets this, ignores it all, and barges off starting the same gibberish thread in 3 or 4 different places as we had today, is an accident waiting to happen!

Thank you for your concern, muruk which is shared by many.

I, along with most Mods, have spent long hours thinking about these problems but solutions are very hard to find. I sometimes think that our letter is too long and too detailed but it has been refined over the years. I have no doubt we would have more troubles with new members if we reverted to a simpler style.

As Glen has mentioned many times, the presentation of this Board is important and something we can all be proud of. For this reason I can see us looking further into your suggestion. For the reasons given in Glen's post it cannot be done as you suggested but perhaps there might be another way. As usual we will try to learn from today's events.

For those wondering what it was all about, I will simply say that I am astonished at how quickly one brand-new member managed to ignore every rule, upset so many people, and, after taking no notice of the advice offered, spat the dummy and decided stamp collecting was too hard.

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Here to learn
Here to enjoy

Yes I accept... for someone new who thinks he has no time to read the rules METICULOUSLY, he is sure to end up doing something wrong... (I did!!!!)..

I donot know how much of this is feasible but in many forums once we sign in the browser automatically directs us to some page which the moderator thinks is a MUST READ.. In most cases it is about the donation for running the site or a few basic rules etc etc..

Is it possible to make the newbie once signed be directed straight to the introduction thread or the rules thread automatically???

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Started to collect post-Independence India, help me complete the voids
http://www.stampboards.com/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=29439

Collecting Canada (just started) and CHESS on stamps.!!!!!!

Well that explains it then!

I went down to have a look at what made up a fireproof box (and a waterproof box) at the local Super Cheap to see what might cause the fading and a train wreck happened (on the boards) on the way back home!

It's a bit diificult at times isn't it? Tolerance, Patience, Learning, Refusal, Flame-Thrower!

I need to go stick my head in a flame proof box for a bit and cool down after wasting some time... Although I did learn that waterproof boxes seem to only come in yellow.

I'm glad no one brought up the need to add a paragraph every now and then...hehehehe.



Maybe the welcome email should have a "5 simple rules and etiquette to follow" PDF attached so new members can read?

And also start a "Practice your English spelling and grammer posting" thread much like the practice posting an image thread?

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Greg - Looking for Goulburn Australia Cancels and Grangemouth Scotland Cancels and Covers
Member of the S.T.A.M.P Club for Slightly Twisted And Mad Philatelists - Motto: "Bring back the lick!"

I don't think a pdf is the answer but I do agree with Kevin that the welcome message and the rules are too long. (Yes, I know, they are there for a reason!)

Points to consider:

1. Stampboards attracts many people who don't have English as their first language. We accept them for their contribution, tolerate some of their foibles, and accept that sometimes (or even often) they will use the wrong word.

2. Any of us who do have English as a first language, recognise the difficulties, and re-word our (private) emails to ensure that our customer or correspondent absolutely understands the message we are trying to get across, the point we are trying to explain. I often re-write, avoiding idiomatic language, common abbreviations (don't, haven't, can't they're) so that each word is spelled out and can be understood.

3. Clarity and conciseness is the key to understanding. Make it short sweet and to the point - but not cryptic - and the message will be understood. Even that well-used term "you are what you write", which we understood well, is very cryptic and some will not understand it. Punctuate, the comma is your friend!
Modify, change, amend and add to it, in the name of clarification or explanation, and you make it more complex. If it ain't right, scrap it and start again.

Discuss!

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Ian Billings - Norvic Philatelics GB stamps info: http://www.norphil.co.uk - also /catalog for our ecommerce site, blog.norphil.co.uk, shop.norphil.co.uk and Ian_norvic on twitter

Having just turned 64 so the losing my hair is no longer "many years from now", I am reminded every day by my two teenage children how "stuffy" I have become. When I send a text I use punctuation and correct spelling and am locally considered to be quite wierd for doing that.

However, having said that, how I choose to communicate is no longer the norm. Many of my children's teachers are appalling spellers and even emails I get from the school are full of "Newspeak" and abbreviations.

When my eldest boy was in school in the 1980s, our enlightened? government brought in a new method where it was considered that if you could be understood, spelling and grammar were secondary. We have to remember that there was a flow of migrants then who spoke little or no English. My son learned to spell phoentically. (That word had a dipthong when I was at school but we don't have them any more either).

After a few years, the whole programme (note the spelling) was scrapped with the result that my son's generation never learned to spell correctly.

The point I am slowly heading towards is that we often talk about how we need to attract young people to the hobby. Young people do not care about the Queen's English in the way we older ones do and it worries me when this issue frightens people away from the hobby. The English used by today's young seems to be as different from mine as mine is from the letter Glen had translated in onother thread. Is it really so important?

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I'm John. I collect Italian, particularly the Mussolini years.

Ian -- trust me it is NOT members for whom English is not a first language who create 99% of the issues. We all make allowances in those instances.

That is a fact. Near all are Australians, North Americans and Brits who give us grief, as they assume rules do not apply to them.

Some of our most valuable members today started off on the head-butt path.

Glen

As a Noobie myself I can say 100% that this statement is true.

The internet for my generation is a fun, free for all superhighway that we have already payed money for each month along with the telephone bill, and everything we see or do on it is FREE ! That's the way we are.

What was unclear to me upon joining Stampboards is that PASSION exists here. The work that passionate people do and all the time it takes to answer a single question was unknown.

This site is a one of a kind.
This site is rare.
It's as unknown as a Tête-bêche 1d red kgv joined pair die 1 and 2 inverted LMWM Cooke printed GEM !


If new members had a 1 week ' look and see period ' ( same as the selling / buying topics ) then maybe the excitement rush , and the ' need to know NOW ' bit of us would settle down, maybe we might see the passion and work that members put in and REALIZE that it is not a free super fun highway.
As mentioned once before , maybe set up a charity where we could donate for the passion and knowledge most of you share.

I'd personally like to thank all the kgv' experts for putting up with my dumb questions ( mobbor / gutters , you guys are fantastic ! )

The last thing I feel I need to say, please don't belittle us beginners. We are the ones buying your stamps on ebay, delcampe, quicksales , ect.. We are the ones that will continue collecting, that's why we come here.
Internet etiquette, I know I've a lot to learn ...... but don't we all need to work on that a bit at times.

Barry.

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People will like you more if you stfu.

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A man might as well marry ... if he finds a good wife he will be happy ... if not, he will become a philosopher.
Collecting Greater New Guinea & Macropods (Kangaroos & Wallabies).

A bit off topic , sorry. There is 100 pages ( max ) of google web sites devoted to the following paragraph:

"Aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoetnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be at the rghit pclae. The rset can be a toatl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe."

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People will like you more if you stfu.

Accept your point entirely: but that doesn't negate the fact that conciseness and brevity can sometimes be beneficial. Those who can read tend to skim-read, and eyes glaze over when faced with a whole screen or more of 'thou shalts' and 'thou shalt nots'.

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Ian Billings - Norvic Philatelics GB stamps info: http://www.norphil.co.uk - also /catalog for our ecommerce site, blog.norphil.co.uk, shop.norphil.co.uk and Ian_norvic on twitter

I have a really thick book here filled with exactly that stuff, and it has been read pretty closely for 2000 years by several million people.

It is called the Holy Bible.

A few sensible rules never goes astray.

Blimey, don't bring religion into it! There is more than enough trouble in the world caused by the different interpretation of the different translations of the bible by different people, and those who believe that every word in it is true and holy law. The best rule (doubtless paraphrased) is "do unto others as you would have them do unto you".

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Ian Billings - Norvic Philatelics GB stamps info: http://www.norphil.co.uk - also /catalog for our ecommerce site, blog.norphil.co.uk, shop.norphil.co.uk and Ian_norvic on twitter

This is nice read, even more since there appears to be few quite different opinions regarding subject.

I'm not native English speaker but I'm giving my best to write up to required standard, if I sometimes fail to do that sorry Somebody mentioned government policy about importance of understanding above the linguistic form. That is, for good or for worse, trend in linguistics in general, and it does make sense. It is better to spend time learning new words and phrases then to waste it on breaking your head about a/an and the use IMHO.

I also belong to younger generation (just turned 30 ) and it is true that most people my age and younger tend to write as short as possible due to faster way of living and information exchanging. Some things are usually acceptable (like IMHO, Tx etc.) but question is where is the line and above all is there one at all? I don't think that the way people communicate will go backward, especially in sense of use "thou shalts ", and before anyone tells anything about Bible be aware that I used to go to Catholic classic gymnasium seminary

The fact that I perfectly understand English, some German and Italian an can communicate (in quite good English if you would agree?) is perfectly enough to me. Off course, it is true that my written and spoken English could be better but it would require more practice than I currently have, or even have time for. My girlfriend is nut for language, literature and grammar and she is known for warning people about irregularities, so to speak, when talking to someone, and when that someone is me it makes me boil!

Point is, we all should be more tolerant about this matter since it is about to go only worse, and I think there is nothing that can be done to prevent people from "downgrading" language (actually it could be seen as improvement since more concise in this context is better, easier to learn).So, try to be relaxed and not to get annoyed of something that is going one and will continue to happen.

I had once problem with guy from London, highly educated dude, who spoke so distorted English that it was barely understandable to some of his colleagues from USA and I asked him in front of few people if he speaks English, I could not understand not a word of what he was telling. Aussies are easy to understand, at least it is my experience.

Two stories.
I went to Texas with my band (Australian). People there could not understand me yet they could understand our banjo player who had a strong Irish accent. Who was speaking the correct English?

My sister, born and educated in England, like me, and living in Australia, married a man from Croatia near the Italian Border. This is apparently some sort of global crossroads and as a result, despite coming from a small rural village, he could read and write in eight languages and make himself understood in three others. His English isn't perfect by any means but we all understand him. On the other side of the coin, none of us, apart from English, had anything other than a smattering of schoolbook French.

I agree with pitronix. The speed with which young people communicate these days leaves me uncomfortable. I watched a film with my eighteen year old son the other day and the dialogue was so fast I couldn't keep up. Adverts on the television flash so many images onto the screen so quickly (even on the ABC) it gives me a headache. Even so, that is the way things have changed and whingeing about it fixes nothing.

The Age newspaper printed a survey that said the people others least wanted to work with was baby boomers - and that included other baby boomers.

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I'm John. I collect Italian, particularly the Mussolini years.

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A man might as well marry ... if he finds a good wife he will be happy ... if not, he will become a philosopher.
Collecting Greater New Guinea & Macropods (Kangaroos & Wallabies).

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A man might as well marry ... if he finds a good wife he will be happy ... if not, he will become a philosopher.
Collecting Greater New Guinea & Macropods (Kangaroos & Wallabies).