Require a Certain Post Count before Submitting Tutorials

Hi HT,

I agree that the people who contribute the most should be ' rightfully ' recognized for their contributions...JupM should realize that and somehow reward those who rightfully deserve it...after all...they are making money off of the site and those contributions.
I also agree that there are some idiots on the site...but I find them humorous so I have no animosity toward them...maybe I'm a little too laid back in that regard. :D

Still...we are never going to agree on the general purpose of this site, or in it's delivery...to teach and inform...if everyone always agreed with me I'd think there was something wrong...because I've yet to see it happen...and it'd be way too boring.

Eg ;)

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if you want to learn, go pay for schooling. AO is, or should be, a security resource. A place to go to find information on a subject and learn... but to learn through reading and asking the occasional question. If you come to this site, you should be capable of teaching yourself or you should be going to school in the subject area. Quite a few people here, myself included, complain about the low quality of posts and subjects discussed. Wasn't there just a rather large addicts thread on this subject? Refering to AO as a teaching site just supports more idiots joining and further lowers the quality of the site.

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is it just me or is that the most self-contridicting posting ever?
it's like saying 'AO isn't someplace to learn things, but we all come here to learn form each other'

like wtf?

just cause someone has a lower level of understanding than you do does not mean they should be excluded - nor does it mean you should 'dumb things down' for them

personnaly I think things here would be just fine if people like HT would get off their whole 'I'm better than you - so i know best trip and start relaxing a little

v_Ln

Hey Hey,


I give up...

nihil, I'm not asking why JupM supports them, I'm asking why you support these people... Why do you respond to threads started by idiots? Will you deal with an inferior tailor or a sub-par auto mechanic? and if you make that mistake once, do you take your car back because maybe they'll learn from it? If you don't, then why do it here.


Eg, I'm not saying JupM should reward people for contributing... I'm saying that it's impossible to find a shed of meaning in threads on this site because the sheer number of bad threads, like this one (and I'm not stopping until you admit you'd rather see some security content than all these stupid little kids asking how to fix their home computers... after all that's why ou came here right?), that keep the good threads from showing up more often.

v_Ln, I'm saying this is a place to learn, but it's not a place where we should have to spoon feed the information to people. I think that's pretty straightforward. Do you expect to go to university for Comp Sci and have the Networking Prof come to your dorm because you have a virus on your computer? Maybe he'll hold your hand and walk you step by step how to clean up after yourself... but that seems highly unlikely... I don't think someone that knows less should be excluded... but we have to dumb everything down, otherwise we get a list of posts from the "stupid" people asking what you mean.

It's not a "I'm better than you - so I know best" trip... It's a why do we continue to put up with idiots on this site... I'd ask you to understand but you're a web designer... which is rather close to a programmer, and I've seen the programmers at a few of the companies in town... Programmers are usually the most technologically incompetent of all when it comes to the actual workings of their computer and how to keep it working properly... I suppose you deal with a lot of these people and have become immune to their stupid questions. I'd prefer to not become desensitized to user ignorance and incompetence and instead get rid of that breed of user.

Peace,
HT

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I'd ask you to understand but you're a web designer... which is rather close to a programmer, and I've seen the programmers at a few of the companies in town... Programmers are usually the most technologically incompetent of all when it comes to the actual workings of their computer and how to keep it working properly...

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That was a pretty low blow .... For someone who has "Phishing Moderator
Know-it-All Master Beaver" ....

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Originally posted here by Agent_Steal
That was a pretty low blow .... For someone who has "Phishing Moderator
Know-it-All Master Beaver" ....

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Hey Hey,

Did you read the rest of it... it was focused at him... but saying that I'm sure he's used to working with people like that and has grown accustomed to it.

In general though, it is the truth... Out of the 350-500 programming students we have, maybe 5 of them are capable of something basic like reinstalling after they format their systems. We also have a Web Design course (which is being phased out) and the graduates of it take CCNA along with the web programming courses and none of them can configure a router and switch when they come out of it... due to minimum pass rates, tests have to be curved, labs dropped... They don't think the same way and aren't capable of the same thing. You get a lot of people that do both programming and networking/operating system/hardware stuff and they're great to work with... but people that only program are useless when you put them at a computer. I've meet programmers where I actual question if they'd know how to open the IDE for the language they use. Whenever a new ASP website is implemented at the college, we have to request between 20 and 30 fixes before it's operational... yet it's supposedly been "operational the entire time".

In some ways it was more of a compliment. A lot of programmers are focused on what they do... so focued that it's all they know.... others are tools, but for many it's a level of focus. You go to different doctors for different areas, because they are focused. Do you think that your dentist could cast your broken leg? It's the same with IT.... I'm just saying that he's dealing with these focused people and the tools and has forgetten that it's possible to have a place without idiots.... AO is not a programming website, at least not primarily... Yet we get a lot of programmers here, and a good number of them tend to be tools with other things.

Peace,
HT

Hi HT,

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Eg, I'm not saying JupM should reward people for contributing... I'm saying that it's impossible to find a shed of meaning in threads on this site because the sheer number of bad threads, like this one (and I'm not stopping until you admit you'd rather see some security content than all these stupid little kids asking how to fix their home computers... after all that's why ou came here right?), that keep the good threads from showing up more often.

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I agree, I came on this site to learn and, therefore, am very interested in ' good threads '...mostly, when I have a problem I attempt to fix it myself from the info I gain here or through google ( which is why I don't ask many questions...3-4 to date I think )...and, yes, there are alot of people posting questions they could fix themselves too if they just did a little research on AO or googled for it...and, yes, there are alot of threads that detract from the ' main focus ' of the site ( some I've started myself )...
are there things that can be done to improve the quality of the site...of course!

But that is what the AP system is for...if you come across a thread that has no intrinsic value then neg it and the message will be clear...if you come across a script-kiddie or someone mouthing off then neg them and get your message across...if you come across a person who asks a question that he obviously has taken ' no time ' to figure out for himself then neg him and tell him why...if you come across someone who revives a thread and has nothing new to offer then neg him too...but...you have to be careful because sometimes people neg just because they disagree with another person's point of view...

aside from those four things negging serves no useful purpose...and besides those four things there is nothing you can do at this point to change anything.

If you are that committed to making this a more security oriented site and less like a computer help forum then...utilize your AP system to instigate that change...just don't abuse it ( and I don't expect that you would ).

Eg

;)

Hey Hey,

Finally an agreement...

Now our only difference is how we see that it should be dealt with.... I'd rather limit new users so that they're forced to learn the rules, rather than see them make a bad post and be negged until banned and not really learn because they never even got the chance to log in and read the AP assignments.

But I'm happy with that... and I'm fine with the negging... To me they make AO like a video game... I come here... I laugh at the majority of the threads and then I spread around the red.... It's rather entertaining, and cheaper than my buddies that pay for WoW.

Peace,
HT

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but you're a web designer... which is rather close to a programmer, and I've seen the programmers at a few of the companies in town... Programmers are usually the most technologically incompetent of all when it comes to the actual workings of their computer and how to keep it working properly

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my god it must be sheer luck this machine actually turns on then - seeing as I obviously dont know how to install my OS...nevermind I built the machine am currently sitting at. ;)

HT - yes i may not be as involved with networking as some people, however that does not mean i dont know anything about it. I've done my time as IT support / admin for a large company network (at a contact center - so was looking after everything from the syntelate server and GTX dialler - down to the 150+ win98 agent stations and the CTI machine)

I dont claim to be a guru....not in the slightest - but am not an idiot either when it comes to things outside of web dev / programming.

But we are going off on a lil tangent here - ok lets break this down to the most basic idea.....

every newbie is dumb until proved otherwise.

thats pretty much what your saying - and i disagree, newbie at AO does not mean newbie at everything. So you want to put-off new people form posting...i know i wouldn't bother with a site where i had to hang around and do nothing for ages before i could post - i would just go elsewhere ithout the restrictions.

And new members are the life's blood of a forum - without them there is only so much knowledge the current members can have - new members bring additional edxperiences and knowledge and increase the depth of the current knowledge pool.

v_Ln

Hey Hey,

Perhaps the tagline for AO should be AntiOnline: Where people take things out of context.

I'm also not saying that I think every newbie to AO is a newbie to the world of computers and computer security. I'm saying that they are a newbie to AO (this can't be argued). I think they should be limited in what they do until they've had a chance to see how things work around here and what is and isn't acceptable.

If no one likes the idea of limiting access based on post count. What if people were forced to read the FAQs and some of the stickies...

When you join you have the ability to post in non-technical forums.
If you want to post in technical forums there's a quiz for you to take... not a technical quiz, but a quiz that asks you like 10 or 15 questions from points in the FAQ... They can open a second browser and do it open book style.. it still means they at least have to look at the FAQ.
There's more than enough stickies and tutorials on writing and posting a tutorial, before they're allowed to start new threads in the Tutorials forum... have another quiz that has questions from one of the tutorials stickies...

This way you aren't limiting people that are capable of posting, and you aren't discriminating... you're simply ensuring that they read the proper documentation

Peace,
HT

This would only give the impression of "We think we're better than you, so you need to prove otherwise", which is not the point of this place.

The original topic of this thread seems to have been lost in all the argument. It was orignally limited to the tutorials forum, not a wide-ranging post limiting policy. Despite the fact that no agreeable solution has yet been found, HT has still made a valid point in that there are simply too many shitty tutorials which make it difficult to find the good ones. Personally, I actually use tutorials here regularly as a reference source. Unfortunately, I have to usually wade through two or three crap ones before I find anything decent. Now, while this may not seem like a lot of work, and in reality, it isn't, it gives the impression that this site has shitty tutorials (and maybe we do). This unfortunately prevent the quality tutorials from gaining the recognition they deserve when guests are looking for them.

There is one, and only one reason why there are so many of these floating around. And everyone is afraid to say it. With regards to the tutorials forum, the moderation on this board sucks. If moderators would simply delete tutorials not deserving of being published there wouldn't be a problem. We could all rest assured that it would be gone by the next day. But for some unkown reason, moderators seem to believe that deleting posts is some kind of carnal sin. To improve this board requires work, and apparently, none of our current mods are willing to do this work. Perhaps they are busy with other endeavours, have lost interest in AO, or are too liberal in allowing this crap. Either way, moderators are needed who will put a stop to it.

I can put up with trolling, flaming, name calling, cussing, and whatever crap may appear on this board. It's nothing new, and the moderation in those areas is outstanding in my opinion. But the tutorials forum should be held to a higher standard. Whether this is accomplished through minimum post counts, AP status, length of time here, stricter moderation, or, more than likely, whether nothing is done at all, is up to moderators and Jupiter Media. But the low quality of tutorials this thread is attempting to find a solution for is the whole purpose of having moderators in the first place. Finding a way to have a computer program replace those moderators is not, has never been, and will never be a solution.

But I think that if anything was going to be done about this problem, if you call it a problem, it would have been done already. Everyone is aware of the problem, including moderators. They simply aren't doing anything about it.