Newbie restrictions (Please discuss forum policy here.)

[WilliamJohnson]

So, how many posts are required? 25?
Doesn't that just encourage newbies to post 25 useless posts in this forum?

Also, I created a new thread yesterday in "Off-topic", which title was "Please, stop having children.", and where we were discussing overpopulation.
Apparently, it got deleted.
I'm not sure what my post count was at that time. Does it have anything to do with these "newbie restrictions", or was it just deleted because some moderator didn't like it?

[1714254843]

1714254843

[1714254843]

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[Light]

I don't think it's unreasonable to ask newbies to lurk for 8 hours before posting. Trolls can easily bypass it, of course, which is why there is also a post limitation. Hopefully mods will notice their spam before it starts getting out of this section.

While, I do generally agree about your measures to reduce trolling/spamming on these forums thus making them a lot more friendly/appealing/nicer overall, however what happens to people who legitimately want to get some help/support/ask about a bug by posting in a thread somewhere else on these forums (and yes I know about whitelisting, however depending on how long this remains, will the mods be able to keep up with whitelisting honest and legitimate people?). I doubt it's very appealing for those who want to get help and support from this community to sit it out and wait for 8 hours.

Thanks.

[kajoman]

What you don't seem to understand is the Internet is Open and Free. But each individual site is private property.

You can go anywhere you want but if you walk into a persons house, be prepared to accept the consequences of what your do there.


No shit? Don't you worry about my understanding. I wasn't talking about what they are according to law CAN and CANNOT do. I was talking about the freakin purpose of a forum.

It seems that people here don't like differientiating opinions...

There is a difference between a public and private forum. And no the purpose of the newbie section was to make it harder for trolls and people who just bitch and don't do anything to help Bitcoin.

If that's not you well you got cut in the crossfire. But I don't see you doing anything for Bitcoin so I'm going to assume you aren't here to help Bitcoin.

It is the way it is, but it doesn't mean I can't express my point of view? Here is the only place I can atm and so here I am.

You can't see me doing anything for Bitcoin? Well, then I obviously should be on my way... Anyways. Your problem apparently lies in the fact that I do not agree with the decision of the moderators, and in ur head that equals me being both stupid and abundant apparently.

[max3t]

I can offer myself as an example.  I have been reading about bitcoins for the last couple of days and have been giving some thought to buying some.  I also wanted to offer some feedback to a forum member who has started a bitcoin giveaway site designed to help people like me 'get on the ladder' so to speak.

This policy absolutely drives me away as a matter of principle.  This forum appears to be THE source for BTC related information and you are shutting people like me out who may occasionally want to contribute or offer feedback.  I have no intention of making 50 posts just to 'earn' the right to play with the big boys.  

Do you want bitcoins to gain wider acceptance or do you want it to be an exclusive club that can be entered into only by those 'in the know'?  I get the impression of the latter at the moment.

I agree about the two leading paragraphs. But the exclusive club thing is meant to be exclusive in the sense of "no trolls". I think you as a "non-troll" will be whitelisted in minutes.

Maybe the following mechanism would be better: Anybody can post, but messages can be flagged as "bullshit" by "seniors" and when a member got a say 40% bullshit-rate it gets to this playground here. But then again someone would need to implement this.

Edit/PS:
Of course this bulletin board thing here is so 1990 at all...
It should be no problem to collect some 1k btc (The early miners got them in buckets, don't they?) and pass them over to a nice company which makes a nice page out of this, with automatic trade-reputation or even middle-man-system and stuff.

[ironwolf]

Yes, people *should* read stickies, FAQ pages etc- this is a struggle for every forum. The issue was not people asking the same questions, it was stopping them from posting specific uncomfortable or inconvenient questions and statements. In order to do that, they simply dismissed all new questions and prospective users into an unproductive ghetto.

I'd say the fact that you're getting a reasonable debate on your points here brings into question your assertion that a Newbie area is "unproductive."

Rather than simply allow posters to decide for themselves to ignore a repetitive or negative threads they made the choice to make it unlikely they would see them at all- that kind of censorship is a mistake and it undermines the credibility of the Bitcoin. If Bitcoin can't survive a few people saying mean things about it, then it's not much of a currency.

You are conflating Bitcoin as a technology and a currency with this forum. They are not one and the same. No one here is stopping you from opening another forum where anyone can post anything at any time, on Bitcoin or off of it... 4chan needs more competition.

[d1ng0d4n]

Not sure if this has been posted and I haven't got the time to go through 8 pages unfortunately;

Why not just ban the trolls? Or a mild 1/2/3 day ban for first offense? This has made it rather difficult for us who do have decent posts that we wish to put on the forum.

[theymos]

Also, I created a new thread yesterday in "Off-topic", which title was "Please, stop having children.", and where we were discussing overpopulation.
Apparently, it got deleted.
I'm not sure what my post count was at that time. Does it have anything to do with these "newbie restrictions", or was it just deleted because some moderator didn't like it?

Restored. It must have looked "trollish" to whoever deleted it.

Let me know if there were any other false positives like this.

[swusc2]

What you don't seem to understand is the Internet is Open and Free. But each individual site is private property.

You can go anywhere you want but if you walk into a persons house, be prepared to accept the consequences of what your do there.


No shit? Don't you worry about my understanding. I wasn't talking about what they are according to law CAN and CANNOT do. I was talking about the freakin purpose of a forum.

It seems that people here don't like differientiating opinions...

There is a difference between a public and private forum. And no the purpose of the newbie section was to make it harder for trolls and people who just bitch and don't do anything to help Bitcoin.

If that's not you well you got cut in the crossfire. But I don't see you doing anything for Bitcoin so I'm going to assume you aren't here to help Bitcoin.

It is the way it is, but it doesn't mean I can't express my point of view? Here is the only place I can atm and so here I am.

You can't see me doing anything for Bitcoin? Well, then I obviously should be on my way... Anyways. Your problem apparently lies in the fact that I do not agree with the decision of the moderators, and in ur head that equals me being both stupid and abundant apparently.

Your in a Bitcoin forum not discussing Bitcoins. Your busy preaching politics, we are here to discuss Bitcoin not start political movements. You can go ahead and preach here but when your in someone elses' house we don't have to listen.

I'm sure there is somewhere in the internet that supports your point of view you find your people i guess? We are here to get people to use Bitcoin, and talk about Bitcoin, this forum isn't a forum about talking about forums so you are out of place.

[bcearl]

Most newbie spam is new threads with stupid questions. Maybe it is necessary that you need 50 postings before you could start your own threads.

But is it the same with answers to a existing thread? I don't think so.

[swusc2]

The question you ask yourself if the goal of a poster is to detract and hurt the community and the system the community is trying to promote is it not in their best interest to get rid of him? If people are going to hurt you do you not protect yourself? I'm not referring to people who say "bitcoin is flawed, should have this change that change this."

Uhm, this is a question for you? What community do you live in where they "get rid" or silence people who disagree with, or question the consensus?

And the Ponzi scheme argument was answered there is sticky about it. There is no need to repeat a question over and over again. Then the only purpose is subversion.

Just because YOU have answered it over and over, that does not mean that the person whom is asking has heard you answer those other people. It is "over and over" for you- but not for them. This may make the question annoying for you, but it does not make it less relevant for them- and you have the option of ignoring the thread.

The advantages of having an open forum with censorship limited to true spam, IMHO overrides the inconvenience of some posters having to scroll down the page a little bit.

Yes, people *should* read stickies, FAQ pages etc- this is a struggle for every forum. The issue was not people asking the same questions, it was stopping them from posting specific uncomfortable or inconvenient questions and statements. In order to do that, they simply dismissed all new questions and prospective users into an unproductive ghetto.

Rather than simply allow posters to decide for themselves to ignore a repetitive or negative threads they made the choice to make it unlikely they would see them at all- that kind of censorship is a mistake and it undermines the credibility of the Bitcoin. If Bitcoin can't survive a few people saying mean things about it, then it's not much of a currency.

Any community. If you walk into a house they are not obligated to let you stay and speak freely. The great thing about forums is there are so many and you can start your own. People don't understand forums on the internet are private not public. Just like how highways are public but home aren't. The means of getting you to a home is public but the house itself is not.

There is an FAQ about it. I mean comon...not everyone needs to ask what 1+1 is. If there is something that says Beginners Read This and it answers the questions your bring up. People aren't obligated to answer and especially if you have an answer for them that says READ THIS BEFORE CONTINUING.

If a forum is overrun with trolls an Open forum is no longer better than a Closed, one as has occurred, some limitations must be applied.

Also this is a Bitcoin forum. We are here talk about the development of Bitcoin. If you want to complain about forum etiquette I'm sure there is a forum out there for you to so do. If it detracts from what this forum's purpose is then we don't have to provide you the means to detract. That what troll prevention is. It's the same reason I don't let any person rob my house whenever they feel like it.

[Light]

Patience....it's not the end of the world.  It's 50 posts or 8 hours of time, both of which are really nothing in the grand scheme of things.  They have made the rules, and we must abide by them, this is normal life.

No, it's only 8 hours of time, you don't get the 50 posts option any more (unless I have extremely bad English)! I know that everything in the world has it's place and rules, however regardless there are nearly always exceptions (e.g back when you were a kid and you parents left you alone in the house to get some milk or whatever and told you not to leave the house but then your house started catching on fire, what would you do? I certainly know)

Edit by Maged:
The requirement is no longer 50 posts:

[WilliamJohnson]

Thank you

It seems there was a "clean-up" (a few useless threads aren't there anymore).
And I admit that the title alone may not make it look like a constructive thread ^^

[kajoman]

Your in a Bitcoin forum not discussing Bitcoins. Your busy preaching politics, we are here to discuss Bitcoin not start political movements. You can go ahead and preach here but when your in someone elses' house we don't have to listen.

I'm sure there is somewhere in the internet that supports your point of view you find your people i guess? We are here to get people to use Bitcoin, and talk about Bitcoin, this forum isn't a forum about talking about forums so you are out of place.
[/quote]

we're in a thread called "Why this newbie system is lame"... So...

Remember what you said? "You can go anywhere you want but if you walk into a persons house, be prepared to accept the consequences of what your do there." So.. Yeah, you shut bite your own tongue right about.... Now. No offense but you don't seem too clever to me.

[wegotpickles]

I agree being confined to a single section is a little off putting, but I understand the need for it. I've been lurking for a month or two and in the past few days the post quality has really suffered.

Rather than complain about what i hope to be a temporary solution, why don't we discuss more effective methods of troll control? A few have already suggested more vigilant moderation. While this is always helpful i think that with a topic under as much controversy as Bitcoin it becomes difficult to sort trolls from legitimate posts from users with extreme or uneducated opinions/predictions. Some might be satisfied that all of the above get banned, but I feel it would be closed minded of us to ban users for opposing opinions, and it opens the doors to group think.

The best solution I can think of would be to disallow new topics, allow replies, but disallow replies containing certain key words and phrases. Maybe disallow post all together on a couple of key boards, but not all of them (excluding Newbies) as it is now. Until a certain post count is achieved or you are added to a white list of course

I'm still not happy with that solution, but its the best I've got for the moment. Input?

[sebdude420]

A newbie forum is where people go when they first start out to get help.

If people are in a mining forum and talking about of big boy stuff, then a bunch of newbs roll in and ask what to buy and if their shopping carts a good choice or not. yea its annoying so they made our newbie forum. let them make some sub categories and people will start helping each other. they are not forcing us, they are merely giving us a nudge.

[RobzInadE]

Alright, lets post some shit up hehe

[Light]

Any community. If you walk into a house they are not obligated to let you stay and speak freely. The great thing about forums is there are so many and you can start your own. People don't understand forums on the internet are private not public. Just like how highways are public but home aren't. The means of getting you to a home is public but the house itself is not.

There is an FAQ about it. I mean comon...not everyone needs to ask what 1+1 is. If there is something that says Beginners Read This and it answers the questions your bring up. People aren't obligated to answer and especially if you have an answer for them that says READ THIS BEFORE CONTINUING.

If a forum is overrun with trolls and Open forum is no longer better than a Closed one as has occurred.

I hate to disagree with you on something so trivial (but this issue bugs me quite a lot), however private refers to either 2 or 3 (I assume, however feel free to correct me ), and thus meaning that it is confined to a small group or for people immediately concerned.  If so why hasn't this forum been blocked off from people to whom it doesn't concern? The reason is that there is no actual good reason why it should be blocked off, thus anyone and everyone who want's to may view and participate in active (or inactive for some) conversation.

As for the rest of your points, I'm pretty much in agreement.

pri·vate
[prahy-vit]
–adjective
1. belonging to some particular person: private property.
2. pertaining to or affecting a particular person or a small group of persons; individual; personal: for your private satisfaction.
3. confined to or intended only for the persons immediately concerned; confidential: a private meeting.  

Thanks.

[max3t]

As far as I read, the restrictions were only introduced because of heavy trolling. And my experience tells me that a troll can find even better satisfaction in screwing existing discussions than in establishing new ones.
Don't think this is such a good idea... But the mods/admins will have more experience with them trolls

[newmont]

ug - I have sold items for BTC on the forums, participated in multiple exchanges facilitated by the forums - really disappointed this scorched earth approach to newbie vetting was taken. It Immediately turns off new community members who might have a great deal to contribute and makes bitcoin look like even more of a cabal.

[kajoman]

Yeah I agree wegotpickles. It would certainly require more from the mods, but I think their currently looking for more mods? But yeah, the concept of banning trolls rather than condemning all of "us" i totally concur with.. But yeah, prolly need more mods