theymos. Please pin the thread "Writing a welcome message" in Meta or B&H

[tranthidung]

I know the boring fact that most of newbies do neither read forum rules nor Help page, etc. but the fact is there are some hidden pages/ features that newbies surely don't know about such. Most does not mean all of them don't read such threads.

The welcome message is the very important message for new comers. It contains informative details, strong warnings and of course it inspires good newcomers to start their journey, adventure and career on the forum.

Look at following dates, the thread looks like a hidden one.

• Creation date: September 23, 2018, 08:58:25 PM
• Date of last post: August 07, 2019, 03:08:13 AM

I'd request to pin the thread Writing a welcome message in Meta board or Beginners & Help or both of them.

Please take it into consideration, theymos.

[cryptoaddictchie]

The welcome message is the very important message for new comers. It contains informative details, strong warnings and of course it inspires good newcomers to start their journey, adventure and career on the forum.

Thats a good idea tranth, this can be helpful if pinned on important section as you mentioned. Since the welcome thread is not locked and if theymos undecided if this request is necessary, some concern users can bump it daily to stay on top on meta section. I think that would be a supplementary solution until your request got approved.

Hopefully this will approved I support the idea but I think it should be only one thread, either on meta or on beginners and help.( which I think suited)

[Upgrade00]

It would be welcome update, but I doubt it would really have much of an impact as a pinned message. There is so much information pinned on top various boards (particularly Meta and B&H) that are useful to forum members, the Newbie - Read Before Posting thread is another excellent compilation, a little similar to the Welcome Message. I think another stickie thread might actually make board headers start to look cloggy with too much information for newbies to digest.

The welcome message was to be shown on the registration confirmation page and would be difficult to miss without clogging the forum.
I would definitely want it to be given more priority as some users register without proper guidance (especially when there is a language barrier) and could get lost in some sections easily. A little guidance would help.

[tranthidung]

The welcome message is the very important message for new comers. It contains informative details, strong warnings and of course it inspires good newcomers to start their journey, adventure and career on the forum.

Since the welcome thread is not locked and if theymos undecided if this request is necessary, some concern users can bump it daily to stay on top on meta section.

It is not official rule but I believe only thread owners are allowed to bump their threads without any contents. Just a post like "bump" and it is limited to 24 hours per bump, old bumps have to be deleted.

So if you are not thread owner, and want to bump a thread, you need to have a reason to bump it with something new to discuss with the others. There is no harm if a thread is bumped like that but if many people post a bump (one or many bump(s) per day), it will become annoying bump.

Hopefully this will approved I support the idea but I think it should be only one thread, either on meta or on beginners and help.( which I think suited)

I'd like to see it in Beginners & Help, as a pinned thread.

It would be welcome update, but I doubt it would really have much of an impact as a pinned message. There is so much information pinned on top various boards (particularly Meta and B&H) that are useful to forum members, the Newbie - Read Before Posting thread is another excellent compilation, a little similar to the Welcome Message.

They are different despite of some points are similar. It can be my thoughts but I feel them different with different messages to readers.

I think another stickie thread might actually make board headers start to look cloggy with too much information for newbies to digest.

It is similar as badges for forum members, I agree. Fortunately, the forum has limited pinned threads and I think there are enough space for other pinned threads (if they are important).

Current N^o of pinned threads:

• Meta: 6
• Beginners & Help: 4

The welcome message was to be shown on the registration confirmation page and would be difficult to miss without clogging the forum.
I would definitely want it to be given more priority as some users register without proper guidance (especially when there is a language barrier) and could get lost in some sections easily. A little guidance would help.

It is a point, I agree with you as well but you are missing another point. Most of newbies ignore the welcome message. They are in a hurry when creating accounts. So later, if they need to find the message again, they probably won't find it.

[SFR10]

but I doubt it would really have much of an impact as a pinned message.

This.

The welcome message was to be shown on the registration confirmation page and would be difficult to miss without clogging the forum.

Most of newbies ignore the welcome message. They are in a hurry when creating accounts. So later, if they need to find the message again, they probably won't find it.

Perhaps going a step further by automatically redirecting newly registered members (every time that they log in ^{[for their first 30 days]}) to "this thread" might have a better impact.
^{- I know it'll be a bit annoying.}

[hilariousetc]

Any Global mod or sub mod of that board (if it had one) can sticky threads, but it needs more than stickying as many Newbies will either miss it or ignore it so they need to be directed to it. Having too many stickies can also have the opposite effect as if there's loads of them new users are even more likely to not bother reading them as it's often confusing or just an overload of information. I can speak from personal experience when you join a new site and you're instructed to read the 5 stickies in each board that contain everything you need to know and it's often confusing and a headache hence why most people wont bother or gloss over it at best. That's why I suggested the welcome message to be as concise as possible with the basic information and links to other threads in further detail so they can read up on that stuff if they wish but aren't bombarded with it right away which is always going to be off-putting.

[o_e_l_e_o]

I agree with hilarious - there are already too many stickied threads, and it is blatantly obvious that most newbies don't read any of them. Adding one more to the list is not going to achieve the desired outcome. I also cringe whenever I see a newbie looking for advice on Beginners and Help, and in response they get a bunch of users throwing huge lists of links to other threads at them. No newbie is going to sit and read them all. All this achieves is to either turn them off from the forum altogether, or mean they get so bogged down with unnecessary information that they don't read the important stuff.

Newbies need a concise welcome message (I think the one theymos had written was too long) with a link to the search function and a link to the rules. That's it. That's the minimum they need to know to be able to post and contribute to the forum. Anything else - trust, merit, activity, ranking up, reporting, etc. - can all be read about at a later date.

[TheBeardedBaby]

I was so disappointed to find out that the welcome message is not yet available to the newbies when I created my testbuddy alt.
The message already looks complete, why is not implemented already?
Even not 100% finished is still better than a totally un oriented newbie banned for some foolish mistake.

[Upgrade00]

Fortunately, the forum has limited pinned threads and I think there are enough space for other pinned threads (if they are important).

I share the same idea with other members who have explained this.
It's more a question of; how receptive the reader would be to the extra knowledge than, how much space there is to include more important information. The goal of the welcome message is to make it easier for newbies to navigate the forum and discover the most useful info quicker (the rest can be learnt with time - to avoid overload), rather than oversimplifying this information, an additional stickie can lead to too much details for a new member to digest, and lead them to switch off.

It is a point, I agree with you as well but you are missing another point. Most of newbies ignore the welcome message. They are in a hurry when creating accounts. So later, if they need to find the message again, they probably won't find it.

According to theymos, they would still be able to find it in the HELP page after registering;

Here's a draft of a welcome message for new users. The user will see it on the screen confirming their registration, and it'll also be available in the help center at any time.

[DdmrDdmr]

<…>

The Help menu, just before "Introduction", seems like the best place to leave it, denaturalizing it from any specific board, although I figure that the main reader’s source (or skim reader rather) would be an email upon registration.

The aspect to consider is whether the message should be translated into multiple languages or not. Ideally, it would, since there are plenty of people that struggle with English, and the content should be made accessible to everyone, regardless of their command of English. That would nevertheless bring along a few factors that make things a bit more complicated: The Welcome Message would need to be translated, maintained (content wise), and perhaps be pinned to the main section in each local board (thus asymmetrical from the Help menu entry).

[tranthidung]

The Welcome Message would need to be translated, maintained (content wise), and perhaps be pinned to the main section in each local board (thus asymmetrical from the Help menu entry).

I agree. The Welcome message should be translated to as many local languages as possible, like that thread Unofficial list of (official) Bitcointalk.org rules, guidelines, FAQ. I am going to try finish my translation. It is a big thread so need time to translate it correctly (partially because of I've spent not enough time for it).

I don't know whether other translated versions are pinned in their local boards but I agree with your proposal. They should be pinned.

Regarding to the Welcome message, yes I translated it to Vietnamese. Viết một thông điệp chào mừng!.

[lovesmayfamilis]

If you take the rules of some other forums as an example, the welcome message may appear right on the registration page. It will also be useful for the user to agree and read all the rules of the forum. Thus, in the future, if the user breaks any rules, then all his appeals no longer play any role. Accidental plagiarism is perceived as a deliberate act.
I think that if people come here for knowledge, then reading the rules of the forum and accepting these rules will be a good help for mastering the forum.