A small pole, and a tip for newbies.

[Karmaman]

Hi guys.

Thankyou for participating in my little survey.
It was made in an effort to find out how to improve the forum, and one of the mayor complaints among senior members was that many posts are off topic or repeat questions.
For further reading on this discussion on rules and posting guidelines Click here
Anyway, my theory was "the 30 day rule", (which basicly means that the default display options for new members are set too low), is the reason why we get so many of the same questions and off topic posts.
The result is now in and it is useless, the results are 50-50 when I boil them down.(12 people have " a month" or "don't understand", and the rest are people who have found out how to change the display options).
However, since this was posted we have had less off-topic questions than usual, so I believe I am on to something( or perhaps I have scared some off, I hope that isn't the case).
Anyway the buttom line is that there really isn't any reason to bother theBanker on this issue.

Another reason why we get the same questions over and over again is that the relevant information can be difficult to find.
I can understand that any member will post in the forums that are active to make sure that their questions are read by as many people possible.
The problem is that we get a very confusing forum and have "monster threads" with lots of off-topic info.
An example is the thread [thread=14123]" Where is best in Prague now?"[/thread], it has now ended up in Dubi, Teplice and Brno.
How the hell is anyone going to find information on those cities when it is hidden in a thread about Prague?.
So my small request is this: Try and keep it at least a little bit on topic otherwise we will end up drowning all good info.

Wintertime in the Prague section are usually very quiet, so it is the perfect time to get a little off-topic on how to improve the forum and perhaps gather info on future trips to C.R.
This is why I have made General info posts on Prague in the general info section and one on Big Sister here in the Prague section, and created this thread..

I hope this helps some of you to get a nice trip to C.R and hopefully you will make interesting reports this next year.

mandrake

 

[Elissa]

some great advice... also use the search option ;-)

mange tak "mandy"

 

[The Joker]

Mine says show threads from the beginning, I don't specifically remember changing it to this, but I did register a while ago (almost 2 years, and 7 posts later hahaha) and I am known to be an anal bastard about changing these sort of things....

Best would be to register a new profile and check out for sure!

 

[preppychick44]

I think the default setting is that only the posts written in the last 30 days (1 month) are displayed.

When I was a new member I didn

 

[d i a n a = ]]

Thats a useful tip Mandrake, thanks for that old boy!

 

[theologynut]

I agree, a few days ago we had a discussion about the best clubs in Prague, and then a newby askeed if we could recommend a good club in Prague.

I didn't want to be rude, but I wanted to answer, READ THE POSTS.

 

[worldwide surprise]

Totally off topic but please bear with me.

Hi guys, I have often wondered why we always more or less answer the same questions, mainly from new members.

Why can't they read some of the old post, before the ask question that was answered just last months?.
Why do so many newbies post off topic question?Questions that belong in the General info forum for example?
Well I looked in the display options and saw that my options was set at "beginning". This got me wondering!!
What is the default setting for new members?
To answer my question I created a new profile, and the default setting is a month.
When you only see messages from the last month, there is a lot of forums that appear to be "dead" and nobody would post in these forums.Instead they post off topic questions in the active forums.
If you only see threads from the last month, you are missing a lot and the same questions will come up over and over again.

This can be quite irritating answering the same questions.However the solution is simple. Raise the default "display options" to two months instead of just one.

This is what I want you to do:
Click here
Look at the new opening page to find Display Options. You might have to scrool down the page a little bit.
Then come back and tell me what you see by voting in this poll.

My guess is that most of you still have the default setting of a month.
If I am right, I will write to theBanker and ask him to change the default if this is possible.Since that will reduce the number of offtopic and repeat questions considerably.

For newbies who has a default setting at a month, I suggest you change it to "beginning". Sudddenly a whole lot of "new" messages will appear.