Basejumper.com - archive

As entertaining as it is to see 90% of the redundant content being posted in the Beginner forum, I suggest that newly registered members have a time-out period - where for the first 10 -15 days they are only allowed to look in the forums, but have no posting privileges. After another ~~15 days they should be allowed to post in the Beginner forum only. And after another predetermined period of time they get full posting privileges. (obviously # of days is just a value I put in, we may be better off making the period longer or shorter)

This way if is someone is really anxious, this may settle them down a bit and have them be forced to read instead of post. A silent treatment of sorts that forces their hand.

This of course may not be the easiest to implement, and may also result in mods being flooded with PMs from those users complaining about inability to post :(

thoughts ?

I concur.

I also recommend a post-registration e-mail (that they would most likely ignore) detailing what you suggest.

Both are very good ideas/easy to implement!!

It would reduce our traffic/entertainment/trolls

but definitely increase the signal to noise ratio.

+1000000

Makes good sense but dammit the entertainment would go way down hill. I really enjoy reading yours and others 'civil' replies.

There are some problems with this though.


Totally holds merit, but for example in the incidents threads there are often times when users register to give first hand input on the incident.



One needs to remember though that being a new user to bj.com doesn't mean that they're new to base. Experienced jumpers will definitely be put off by having to sit in the beginners threads for X amount of time.


And of course, our goal, while having quality content is to achieve new registrations and have more users using the site. Such a system would likely put many new users off posting, regardless of their experience. I have belonged to some forums that implemented something like this and it was reversed in the end due to lack of new user input. Regardless of how legit you may be, if you don't have posting privileges you end up registering, and just forgetting about the site altogether.

I agree that there's a lot of crap in the beginners area and maybe more moderation needs to be taken - perhaps a rule should be implemented where if someone is posting the same stuff as has been discussed a million times, the post is removed and a private message is sent to them. Maybe even creating a "I want to start BASE" thread and sticky it in the beginners forum and just force users to post the generic "I SAW BASE AND WANT TO TRY IT" inside that thread. Posts in that nature that aren't in that thread are deleted, and the user messaged with a link to the thread and told to go post there.

Considering that you propose keeping an open forum with the mods PMing the user to let them know of their mistakes, wouldn't my access model still keep things tidier if you implement it with the user being able to PM the mods letting them know that they are an experienced jumper, where in turn the mod will give them the "regular" as opposed to "newbie" access level of the bat ?

Alternatively a few other BASE forums on the web required registration and the access needed to be manually approved. That weeded out bots and journalists. How many new user accounts are created here on daily/weekly basis ? What I am getting at is that we do get automatic spam bots posting unsolicited crap on the forums, and do get scammers phishing in the classifieds, which leads me to think the approval process is too simple. And the steady stream of ignorant newbs marching straight into Beginner or worse of Technical forum since the are so special and want the their handheld (and I don't mean a PDA) seems to be picking up pace and loosing braincells in the process. If you implemented a moderated user approval process, the content of the simple "write a few sentences about yourself" textbox can signal the moderator as to deny/allow and the access level the user receives.

just thinking out loud ...

I'm not convinced deleting the bad threads is wise.

the bad threads serve as talismans. those who bother reading them will get a warning about correct behavior. (we get these sort of newbies as well. far too few...)

plus, I've seen "bait the moderator" become a game. it's easy to post obnoxious, offensive crap when you know the mod will just pull it. (new credentials have been created to troll.) social penalties seem the only accepted method of punishment here because of the strong anti-authority streak.

I think that it's the very existence of the Beginner forum that encourages wannabe's and trolls alike to post all this stupid shit. This designated place removes all the barriers to entrance. It's like having Anton Chekhov's "Ward No. 6" in your house and having door wide open to the street where any imbecile can walk in and feel at home.

There's no Beginner forum on dz.com and it's doing fine, even with much larger traffic.

(I can't create or delete forums, so I only have opinion, and no authority.)

at least the uninformed are blasting the Beginner's forum and NOT General. BASE jumping users are free to ignore any forum, so it at least has met that goal.

On another forum that I am on, I have seen the moderator close threads that are asking the same old questions that have already been answered, and the OP is asked to use the search function for the answer. This seems to minimize the trolling, and forces people to use the search function and read the stickies.

It might be hard to do, but what if there was a series of forums that had to be read, and acknowledge ( like the itunes agreements) before there ability to post and start new threads is activated. This would give them something to do while they are in the "time out" phase. As for the experienced jumpers this process could be bypassed with references and an ok by a moderator? Just my .02.

But that's because there are far less retarded posts on dropzone.com from people sitting behind their computer going "Skydiving looks cool, I'm going to do it". There's a lot more of a known structure to skydiving so people get most of their information easily by going to their local dropzone.

As wwarped said, the beginners forum keeps it out of the general area. That was the reason why the beginners section was created, because users were complaining that they had to search through 50 retarded beginner posts to find 1 post relating to something they want to see.

The beginner forum keeps them nicely out of the way, and no one is forcing people to visit the beginner forum. I think the level of segregation works, you have the n00bs all in one area for the most part. They're going to be on the forum regardless, rather keep them in a single area.

I do think that some guidelines on posts should be put in place and made sticky though to keep from the "I saw basejumping on youtube and I want to do it, how can I start" threads.

May be worth having a few simple threads stickied in there too that can avoid cluttering the forum, for example a thread for those looking for mentors where they have to write their location, skydiving experience, base experience and then if someone wants to mentor they can PM that person. Would highly restrict the amount of retarded posts.

I was there once too, but what about having it do whenever someone new joins base jumper.com why doesn't the first thing it directs then to is the article section, so a lot of places you sign up at it says thank you for joining blah blah blah, why not send them directly to the articles "getting into BASE" it may make people read right away verse asking the question hey how do I get into base I have 71 skydives and I'm ready!!!!!