Webupon

With the rise of the internet, internet culture has emerged. Communities and means of communication have formed each with their own etiquette and expectations.

From java based chat rooms and IRC channels to emails and message forums, while highly different have the same basic guidelines if you want to fit in and be accepted to the community.

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First of all, keep away from the caps lock. If you find yourself ignored on the forums it’s because you maybe haven’t phrased your question or opinion as well as you may have. Or perhaps the community just hasn’t got to know you that well. Capitalising an entire post is the number one way to annoy people and you’ll find yourself on a lot of ignore lists.

Secondly, do not go overboard with the emoticons. The occasional smiley or sad face is acceptable and even pushed further than that pretty often. But try to resist the urge to post half your messages in punctuation smiles.

Thirdly, don’t spam. What I mean by that is if you’re going to post? Post something relevant to the conversation or start a new topic the community might be interested in talking about. Most forums keep track of your post count and the internet saying ‘postcount is not important’ is not true. Most members (especially new ones) will respect the opinion of someone with a higher number of posts. This does not stand in your favour, however, if the majority of your posts are useless one word spam. Seek to add value to a thread, not reduce it.

Forget the old ‘Talk once, listen twice’ proverb. When you’re new to a forum you need time to get used to the community so while you do that adopt a more ‘Post once, read twenty posts’ attitude.

Always read the rules. Every forum will have at least one thread outlining its rules and regardless if this is your first forum or your hundredth, each community may have different rules so it never hurts to check.

A good guideline to follow is to try and keep to the language of the community. Some will provide sections of the forum for other languages or you could try to find another community on the same subject who speaks your native tongue. If this is not possible you could try to have your post translated (by human if possible… the online translators tend to gargle everything a little) and post it. Don’t get frustrated if people don’t understand you, just try rephrasing the question and post it in the same thread.

If you’re going to a forum to ask a question then try and do the work yourself first. Most forums have a search function to search available threads and you can also use search engines to try and find the solution before you ask the forum. If it’s a question many people have had in the past the forum community will likely hear the question a lot. If you can’t find the answer elsewhere then by all means post. That’s what many forums exist for. Try and provide as much information as possible and be patient while waiting for a response.

Insulting, ridiculing or ‘flaming’ as it has become known on internet forums is something you will encounter daily. The (partial) anonymity of the internet has its disadvantages and one of those is to occasionally turn the meekest person into a rude and obnoxious ‘know-all.’ Someone can ask a question clearly and politely after searching for the answer himself and there will always be one person who ‘flames’ them. Ignore it and resist the temptation to flame back. It’s really not worth it.

Don’t feed the trolls. An internet troll is someone who causes drama and looks for attention. People will post on various topics trying to get you riled up and give them attention. Ignore them and the rest of the community will and they won’t stick around. By ignoring them you are ‘not feeding the troll’.

If you follow these guidelines you’ll get along fine. Forums are a great way to communicate so enjoy your new community! Be sure to check out Http://www.gotlulz.com here.