Forum etiquette when asking for help - a mild sort of rant

[Mark Harmsworth]

I've been disappointed recently by posts asking for help or advice - to which several helpful members have responded (yes, including me) - but where the original poster has not returned or reacted to those responses.

 

Examples are where the original poster didn't sign on to the forum again after making the first post and another where they return regularly to the forum but not to their post asking for help.

 

My view is that this behaviour is pretty poor. It won't stop me trying to help where I think I can - but I'll certainly think twice before helping those particular members again.

 

There. I feel better already. Time to get back to my long-term joust with a Classic Airframes kit.

 

all the best

Mark

[Mike]

There are some extenuating circumstances to this sort of behaviour.

1. They have a terrible memory like me and forgot they asked
2. They forgot to follow the topic and suffer from a bit of 1) above
3. They were involved in a hideous yachting accident on the high street and are dead or unable to operate a computer any more
4. They found the answer elsewhere and are too idle, rude or forgetful to come back here, see 1) above

Hopefully it's not just ignorance, but who can tell?  We're just a subset of humanity, after all, and there are some pretty awful people out there, as we know.

[trev1973]

Hello

 I don't seem to receive notifications when folks reply to my topics. Is this because I need to manually click the "follow" button my own thread? 

 

Edit.

Answer: yes it is. I missed the setting that says "Automatically follow my own threads" which was, by default, disabled. 

 

Edit2:

For anyone else who may have missed the setting:

At the top of the screen next to the word "Create" is a bell icon. Click this. It opens a small menu window which has, at the top, "Notification Settings". Click this. This takes you to a series of settings. Click where it says "Followed content" which opens some more options, one of which is to "Automatically Follow New Content I post"

Edited November 6, 2024 by trev1973
More detail

[stevehnz]

I know where Mark is coming from on this but have to admit I've been guilty of taking a while to get back to an asking advice post. I've been caught out relying on reactions & finding someone has replied to a thread I started or a thread I posted a reply to, both sides of the coin. I now try to check my activity in threads I started & threads I posted in fairly regularly just for this reason.

Steve 

[Duncan B]

13 hours ago, trev1973 said:

Hello

 I don't seem to receive notifications when folks reply to my topics. Is this because I need to manually click the "follow" button my own thread? 

 

Edit.

Answer: yes it is. I missed the setting that says "Automatically follow my own threads" which was, by default, disabled. 

 

Edit2:

For anyone else who may have missed the setting:

At the top of the screen next to the word "Create" is a bell icon. Click this. It opens a small menu window which has, at the top, "Notification Settings". Click this. This takes you to a series of settings. Click where it says "Followed content" which opens some more options, one of which is to "Automatically Follow New Content I post"

I've been on here since 2010 (and still haven't been found out ) and have never realised that I could follow my own threads, doh! The number of times I've spent ages hunting for old threads of mine to check how I did something or what paint I used etc should have been spent checking the settings instead lol.

 

Duncan B

[ArnoldAmbrose]

15 hours ago, Mike said:

We're just a subset of humanity,

G'day, I thought we WERE humanity, well the dominant set anyway. Us and the lower-order sub-species that don't make models. 😁

 

15 hours ago, Mike said:

and there are some pretty awful people out there, as we know.

Yeah, the lower-order sub-species that don't understand the joys of modeling and hence criticize us. 😁

 

Regards, Jeff.

[trev1973]

1 hour ago, Duncan B said:

I've been on here since 2010 (and still haven't been found out ) and have never realised that I could follow my own threads, doh! The number of times I've spent ages hunting for old threads of mine to check how I did something or what paint I used etc should have been spent checking the settings instead lol.

 

Duncan B

It does seem odd that the user accounts have this feature disabled by default. It should be a simple task for admin to switch it on for all future users - can we put a request in to make this change? 

[Mark Harmsworth]

I did half wonder a little bit (so not really) as to whether this thread might prompt a reaction to those I mentioned. 

 

A bit more : one post asking for help about ten days ago, getting several helpful and genuine replies, and then regularly visiting the site since (including yesterday) but not reacting to any of those replies.

 

8 hours ago, stevehnz said:

I now try to check my activity in threads I started

I think that's the thing isn't it. I look at 'Activity / Content I Started' fairly regularly - or at least I've convinced myself I do 😉

 

 

 

[Mike]

It's easy enough to Follow your own threads when you start them, as there's a tick-box near the Submit button.  That's the best way to establish whether people are replying, but the new members might not know about that, and those with poor etiquette may just ignore it anyway

[scautomoton]

4 hours ago, Mike said:

It's easy enough to Follow your own threads when you start them, as there's a tick-box near the Submit button.  That's the best way to establish whether people are replying, but the new members might not know about that, and those with poor etiquette may just ignore it anyway

I didn't know about this. I just assumed it was an automatic thing.

[Mike]

12 minutes ago, scautomoton said:

I didn't know about this. I just assumed it was an automatic thing.

Tis not.  Imagine someone that starts a lot of threads, such as me.  Every time someone replied to a review, I'd get a notification, and I'd be overwhelmed by all the notifications.  More so than I am already

[Mike]

However, you can set it up so that you get a notification automatically for all your posts, by following this link:

 

https://www.britmodeller.com/forums/index.php?/notifications/options/

 

If you click on Followed Content, you'll see a tick-box titled "Automatically follow new content I post" and another "Automatically follow content I reply to".  I think you can figure out what they do

[stevehnz]

3 hours ago, Mike said:

Tis not.  Imagine someone that starts a lot of threads, such as me.  Every time someone replied to a review, I'd get a notification, and I'd be overwhelmed by all the notifications.  More so than I am already

I think the answer to that would be to select to receive "one email per day with all new content from that day" a quick scan through that & you're off the hook.  

Steve.

[Paul821]

In next week's Radio Times Susie Dent is asked to create a new word. She came up with "askhole" for a person who asks for help but then never takes it. All we now need is an emoji, or pair of emojis to express this.

[-Ian-]

14 hours ago, Duncan B said:

I've been on here since 2010 (and still haven't been found out ) and have never realised that I could follow my own threads, doh! The number of times I've spent ages hunting for old threads of mine to check how I did something or what paint I used etc should have been spent checking the settings instead lol.

 

Duncan B

Same here, I didn't know you could either.

 

I do check back on any question threads I start until the responses dry up, but if someone responds a month later I wouldn't know.

[Hunker]

If a person sincerely asks for help on this forum, you'd think that he'd have the decency to check back and see if he has a response to his request. This has nothing to do with not knowing you could click a button to auto follow your own thread or whatever. It's common curtesy, which unfortunately, is becoming less and less common as the years go on.

[flyboy2610]

 

[3DStewart]

@Mark Harmsworth  As a thought experiment, think about this discussion, which you started as a sort of request for views on etiquette.  You've had a number of answers, but you haven't thanked any of the posters.  Why is that?

This isn't a criticism, just an observation.  I think the reason people don't give a 'thank you' is simply that this is an unnatural means of communication that we aren't yet evolved to deal with.  Essentially we are dealing with unknown dehumanised strangers, so normal human behaviour isn't 'triggered'.

There is another point too.  If I answer someone's question, I would prefer that they don't thank me, unless they are adding some new information or viewpoint.  Empty pleasantries just clutter up a thread and make it harder for others to follow.

[Retired Bob]

1 hour ago, 3DStewart said:

If I answer someone's question, I would prefer that they don't thank me, unless they are adding some new information or viewpoint.  Empty pleasantries just clutter up a thread and make it harder for others to follow.

If I answer a question, or find information/photos to help out another member, to click on the like or thanks button at the bottom of the post is enough, it means you know they have read your reply and appreciate it .  I do this for any help or comments to my threads and when members post their photos from air shows etc, It's good manners to thank some one for being kind.

[Mark Harmsworth]

4 hours ago, 3DStewart said:

think about this discussion, which you started as a sort of request for views on etiquette

Umm - but it wasn't really was it? 

 

Trying to think of a difference between my OP and one starting for example:

"Would Anyone Be Kind Enough To Help Me Please?"

 

There must be one.

 

[flyboy2610]

5 hours ago, Retired Bob said:

It's good manners to thank some one for being kind.

It seems as though that is becoming a lost art.

[Mark Harmsworth]

8 hours ago, 3DStewart said:

As a thought experiment, think about this discussion,

Brilliant. Do you have a fridge magnet with that on? 

[Circloy]

What annoy's me most is when, having provided answers or links to information others come along afterwards and get the credit whilst the earlier posts get ignored.

 

It's always the same few people and is as if you need to be part of the clique.

 

Now if their questions interest me I'll still research answers but the OP no longer gets the benefit of that research, unfortunately to the detriment of all.

[Mark Harmsworth]

Thanks for everyone's thoughts on this. Some good points well put.

 

I think this thread has probably run its' course so I'll ask for it to be closed.

 

Thanks again.

Mark

[Toe]

The internet is a cross section of life and it mirrors it too, there are some who completely forget to reply etc, some it never even occurs to say thanks, some who are just plain ignorant and a few that are so selfish that they don't think they need to acknowledge the effort.......

Opening doors to people, letting other drivers out of junctions are 2 of the most obvious scenes in real life, only small things but they and answering queries on here makes their life easier so to appreciate that is pure courtesy surely,