I just gotta ask....

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Well said Arro, my sentiments exactly.

 

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Why don't you show me, Arroryn, where I even came close to suggesting the blatantly stupid solution I bolded from your post? I can't believe you even have the nerve to throw out that straw man as a response to what I've said. I thought a little, no, actually a lot, more of you than that.

You too, Pete. I'm really disappointed in both of you.

 

I agree with Freddy becuase I too feel that a certain few posters seem to hop on here asking questions that they could easily find out from a simple search. I seem to remember a very established member of this forum pointing out that a poster's simple questions could be answered from a simple search; I also remember that very established member being subjected to a torrent of abuse by the person he was trying to help!

If these people are incapable of independent thought then what hope do they have in working in an IT industry that requires this trait. Surely we're doing them a favour by telling them (the offenders) how to help themselves. If they get their arse in their hand then, in my opinion, they ought to look for an alternate career path!

I'm a great believer in God helps those who help themselves - a bit OTT I know, but if your not seen to be making an effort then why should any of us waste our time in trying to help!

 

Whoa. Did they say *you* (Freddy) said those things or were they using general examples of how some people on It forums in general have behaved towards newbies? I know Arroryn and especially Pete well enough to know they don't take cheap shots. Let's keep this in perspective one and all.

 

Arroryn I hate to disagree with you on the above but I feel I must point something out!

You are comparing those who help the ignorant to those who ARE ignorant but want to help the ignorant! These posters are completly ignorant to how to go about solving a simple problem - ignorance is a no-no in IT Support. These people need to be told this at the EARLIEST possible stage! If they can't hack it then IT Support is not for them!

 

Oh well Freddy, it's damned near impossible to continually live up to your high moral standards and expectations. I am only human afterall. I am sure Arroryn wasn't having a direct stab at your personal stance on this, rather she was highlighting where such an approach could lead once the general culture of the forum followed suit. To put it simply, it could spiral downhill and in the long run, not offer much help at all.

If you took her comments, that I endorsed, any other way.. well I am sorry, that is not how I read it.

 

Speaking from my own personal experience.. I can tell you for a fact that when I first started studying for my 70-210 exam (The first exam in the MCSE Windows 2000 track), I had no idea at all about braindump sites, what technet was, what a KB article was, what a white paper was, what an RFC was. Things became clear to me over time, because of the help and links given to me on certtutor.net by some of the finest minds in IT on the planet. Sure, they held my hand and showed me the fruit of their labours and how i could also learn to search with a more expert approach and find clear consise answers to the things that puzzled me.

Nowadays I rarely ask questions because i either already know or can find the answers myself. It wasn't always like that. I am living proof that help from others, in the manner that we follow here, can be extremely beneficial to the newbies that seek it.

 

You know... looking at this thread... I'm glad I wasn't able to post on the forums today.

 

Ok how about if we put it like this? If people are willing to help others and if it just happens to be the same people time and again? Who really cares if the ones that are responding to the questions don't? If they don't care, and it is their to do as they please, why should anyone else?

 

Arroryn, sorry if it looks like I've misunderstood what you said. You said in your previous post that CF helping others is like working in IT Support - you help someone who is ignorant to IT. But I felt that you were comparing us - who work in IT Support - to those who visit this board and have the belief that they want to work in IT Support but they - a few - are completly ignorant themselves! And they keep coming back asking question after question without contributing anything to the forum! My next fear is when they do actually get a job they'll be on here constantly posting issues etc.

I know this is not aimed at me but I viewed your previous comments as your opinion. I respect your opinion and I know you respect the opinion of others. Please don't stop contributing to this thread...

 

Well I liked the approach Gav had with one of them in particular. Gav politley pointed out that the poster could easily find the info - that particular poster went ballistic at Gav but oddly enough the majority gathered round and near enough begged the guy not to leave. Trip was also on the receiving end of a tantrum not so long ago when he pointed out the same thing - but again peeps went back in their shells and basically appeased the poster.

The approach was good and it should be pointed out when someone is being lazy and taking advantage of the good nature of CFs members. And if they get their arse in their hand at being told then thats that - they can simply go elsewhere! No need for bannings etc just let them walk!

 

I was keeping out of this thread, but now it's getting to the point where all this tantrum throwing and assumptions that are being thrown around is starting to piss me off. I know I was a part of some of the tantrum throwing, I used to shoot from the hip all of the time and eventually started to learn to ignore a lot of people for my own sanity, not to appease people.

I could always go back to being a cynical and nasty bastard like I was a couple of years back, none of you will have seen that side of me and I hope that side won't surface ever again. I am a very complex person, push the right buttons and you could have WWWIII on your hands.

I only help those that listen, one of my hobbies isn't headbutting a brick wall, I will help anybody, just use the appendages on either side of your head and don't make excuses why you aren't listening to me.

Rant over, I'm going to go and read a book.

 

TU is in poor shape right now, site is on lock down because of spammers so we have no new users coming in and a whole lot of nota going on which is why you all are stuck with me now. We don't require people to introduce themselves. We will get to know them one way or another. We just want people to post so we can help them or they can help others. However, one firm rule we do have at tu is no abusing the newbies! Let then actually break a rule before they are repermanded. Most time even then things are explained to them because they are new and are showed the correct path. Not everyone running for the forest to gather wood for a newbie roast because others do not like the way they handle themselves on the site. Our woodpile for the spammers and dumpers. If it happens to be a personal issue with one of our staff or even admins and they know because of their feelings toward a member they can not be fair or controll their anger, they are to ask another staff member to step in an mod the thread for them.

On the other hand there are those sweet loveable trolls that everyone would just like to get their hands on and choke the life out of. We have one of these at TU. A very well know and seasoned one. Like to push all the buttons, likes to walk the line but is always always very carefull not to cross it. He may stand on it and do back flips but he never crosses it. Because of that he falls under the admins protection because by then he has pissed everyone off so much they all want a piece of him. Why do we protect him I hear you asking.
Because, he has not broken any of the rules.
But why do you allow it when you know it upsets some of your users and you know they some will leave.
Again, because it is his right to enter or start a thread just as it is yours, and it is my responability to protect those rights even if I don't want to. It is your choice though, if you decide to feed the troll or not. If YOU reply to something that you know will only send you into a downward spiral that is YOUR responability not his. It is YOUR responability if you become upset and to controll those feelings. It is YOUR responability to walk away and ignore the bastard that is not breaking any rules except for getting under your skin. No one asked you to enter into a thread and no one asks you to socialiaze with certain people. This is why there is an ignore button or high blood pressure medication. The choice is yours. But know now, we will always side with the one that is not breaking the rules then with the ones who are causing the rukus in the thread causing it to go out of controll. Past threads do not matter, what is happening in the present one does. People if you do not like someone stay the hell out of their thread. Leave the ones that are willing to help them alone. Do not take the thread off course where there are people who I might mention are your peers and friends are trying to help someone. All you do is make it harder on them not to mention disgusted with you and not the person who you are trying to undermind in the first place. Like I told a friend in a privy lately. Who are we to insult our friends by telling them that they are wasting their time with that person because of our own personal feelings? Who are we to judge how they decide to use that time. And who are we disrespect them by trying to undermine what they are doing by turning the thread into a joke? Some of you think you can run these people off in a round about way. What you don't understand is 1. If this person is just here to stir stuff up, well you are doing it for them and they are just sitting there laughing at you because the staff is coming for you not them. 2. Don't insult the staff by thinking they can't do their job or won't do it. It is not that easy. Like the rest of us they have rules they must follow too. Sometimes their hands are tied even more then ours, the users.

Ok, I'll get off my soap box now.

 

Politely show them:
1) that the information in question can be found easily, and
2) how to find the information themselves

Usually, both items can be handled with a single pre-searched Google link so that they can see the info is there, and they can see what search terms you used.

Afterwards, I'll probably be a little less patient each time until it's obvious that they're not listening to what you've been trying to help them with... and at that point, I'll usually just ignore them. After all, why should I continue? They're not listening, they're not contributing to the forum, and everyone usually ends up getting bent out of shape. Bottom line, I simply refuse to act as their crutch, finding easily findable stuff for them that they should be finding (and LEARNING) for themselves.

To sum up... if all I'm doing is finding things for someone... I take away the one thing they absolutely HAVE to have as a tech: self-sufficiency.

What do I think a forum is for? An exchange of ideas and opinions. Sure, it's a place to go for advice when we get stuck with something. But some people use forums for nothing more than a slow-moving, human Google or Encyclopaedia Brittanica. If you want advice... post to your hearts desire. If you want me to find out some information for you... then we need to have a little training session.

 

OK. I'm back. First a couple of things to say.

Arroryn and I have had a little PM session and have solved any differences between us. She didn't say exactly what she meant to, and I jumped to a conclusion that I should have known better to jump to about her because of her previous behavior on this board. I was in the wrong.

That, however, is immaterial to the subject of this thread. I never had any thought of saying to every newbie that comes along that they should just "Google it". I have been saying all along that only some people, and only those who show a history of unwillingness to learn for themselves, should be treated any differently. However, I never even came close to suggesting that the different way in which they should be treated should be that they should be treated rudely or disrespectfully. You can encourage a person along to start to want to learn on their own by changing the type of help you give them.

My stepdaughter, poor girl it seems I always use her for an example, was one of those people when she was growing up. She never wanted to learn how to solve a problem, she only wanted an answer. Her problem in wanting only answers was that she had me for a step daddy. I would never tell her just an answer. I would walk her through the process of figuring out the problem on her own by asking her questions. She'd get so frustrated by this that she would yell at me. It literally took years for her to accept that I wasn't just going to give her the answers she wanted. She was actually going to have to learn to do her schoolwork.

She finally did though, and she actually got pretty grades by the time she was in high school. And, what's even better is that she earned them by doing the work on her own. She was smart, just very lazy where it comes to putting the forth the effort to learn, when she was small. She wasn't driven by curiosity to learn on her own then.

Now she loves to read. Then it was like pulling teeth to get her to read. Now she wants more of an education. Then she thought education was stupid. It was just something that other people made you do.

This is the process that I see some people who post here need to go through. They may not particularly enjoy the process to begin with, but to take them through it is for their own good, and when they do see the light they will always be grateful for people having taken the time to really help them.

Obviously not everyone here needs to have that done for them. It's actually a very small percentage who do, but the people who do stand out pretty sharply. Just ask yourself who asks the same kind of questions over and over again, so that it almost becomes obnoxious in its frequency.

All I'm saying is the next time you see a question from them, ask them questions designed to make them think and question their own understanding, or lack of it. Don't just feed them the easy answer. Teach them how to Google, don't just give them the results of a Google search you did.

I have to say I'm guilty of doing just that myself. Me though, I'll "accidently" let some sarcasm slip about how long it took me to find the answer. I shouldn't do it. It would take me no more real effort to tell them how to think about finding something, than it does to do what I'll do when I get frustrated with them.

You want Certforums to be a truly great online community? Put the effort forth to help make it a place where people really do learn, rather than just come here to find easy answers that they don't want to put forth the effort to learn for themselves.

Ask people who ask "dumb" questions if they know how to Google. Don't do it sarcastically, ask it in a helpful way. Offer to help them figure out how to phrase their searches. Walk people through a problem they need to solve in a way that makes them take a part in the thinking and learning process, not just a receptacle for what you've already had to learn. Let them share in the fun of learning. You'll find it's a pretty rewarding experience, and you'll find you will learn a lot in the process. In giving you'll get a lot more than you gave in return.

If you will, notice that there are one or two people here that do this a fair amount already. Who are they? One is Harry. Read some of his posts to the more hapless among us, and you'll see that he holds them to a certain level of responsibility for their own learning process. He won't answer more questions until his are answered.

As far as I'm concerned, Harry's almost a saint of some kind in his efforts to help. He has a level of patience to which I can only hope to attain. He's one of the truly good guys you'll find.

The other? Another one of the truly good guys. Trip. He does a lot of educating, not just answering. And, he's another guy that has patience.

Watch these two guys and emulate their efforts. You'll learn a lot.

What ever you do, don't emulate me. All you'll get is exercise in jumping to conclusions.