In Forum: General Discussion
By User: mrpijey
Hi and welcome to the forum. I'd like to take the chance to comment on some of your concerns and the reason why we have certain procedures in place...
I think this seems like a fair place, but I can see where the poster is coming from that said it seems quite strict. It does. Now, I'm not saying there's anything wrong with that - rules are good. However, I can understand when you are a newb and faced with:
How can it be daunting? It's quite simple really. Make 10 decent posts and you got a chance to apply for FTP access. If you want to make sure make 20 posts. Or even 50 posts. Because if you come here only to get access to the FTP then you've become the very kind of person that we want to avoid, the so call "hit and run" members that come here, grab what they want and then leave. This is exactly why we have this requirement for posts - we simply want to make sure that you're serious about becoming a member and not only for FTP, but also to participate and add to the discussions here on the forums.
I agree that "contributive" is a bit fuzzy and undefined, but for the absolute majority of the members this hasn't been an issue. It's easy to see if a member comes here just for a quick grab off the FTP or to actually be a member of the forum. So you don't need to worry.
Back to the FTP access... I find the whole applying for access thing really daunting. I must have 10 contributing posts. The contribution rules ask me if I am SURE that all my posts are contributing and that I must make this decision for myself before applying... and I only have 3 attempts to get access. That makes me doubt myself. Are my posts REALLY worthy of being considered a contributing post? I started a discussion on a beta game based on some old photos I found that I took... that's pretty good, no? I discussed some disks I have that are probably undumped for RM Nimbus and I'd be happy to dump them when I find them again! However, I also posted a member introduction - that doesn't count. I've requested someone fix some dead links to source code... that probably doesn't count (although they did). So yeah, I end up questioning myself. And then I'll question my posts in the first place... should I really be replying to this thread? Will I be able to make a contributing post?
I actually go through threads and find them interesting, but there's no way I'd be able to add anything of value to them... so I refrain from posting. Sometimes there's a thread I really enjoy, but I don't post to say so, as that's just a post of thanks and against the rules. So I get where the person was coming from who mentioned a "like" or +1 system. It makes sense to make a poster feel valued. The one thread I posted about the beta pics had 1,289 views. Three people replied, there were a total of 12 replies, which included myself and one guy quadruple posting information that could have been in one post! I'm happy that anyone replied, but there was obviously a reason why more people didn't.
Well as I said before, just be active in some of the threads and show us that you're not one of these "hit and run" members and you'll be just fine. But to be sure make more than 10 posts. That's why we have the "max 3 attempts" rule as well, processing a member takes a significant amount of time as we need to check your posts (it's all manual labor), and if a member just keeps spamming in applications after each post then it will be a lot of manual work wasted. So we want to make sure that you're really serious about your application and don't abuse it.
A +1 system would be great yes, but that would require some modification of the forum which would cause a lot of extra work, as it's already modded quite a bit. We are still looking into a similiar system but can't give any promises when and even if we implement such feature. And the "thank you" posts are forbidden just to avoid unneeded bumping and post increase. You can do it nicely tho by adding a thank you to an another comment of yours, that's fine. But mere "thank you" posts? No.
Another problem IS the FTP... by which I mean, you guys have access, we don't. We don't know what's in the FTP. So I've seen newbies offering something, only to be told (sometimes a bit impatiently) that you already have them.
So yeah, that's my viewpoint. It's a nice place, you seem to have some great stuff and knowledgeable people, but it can be a bit daunting for a new user... they may not feel worthy enough to contribute.
We have a database in the works that will allow new members to preview what we have in store, and see if they can contribute by adding a new or upgrading a current release. But this is a lot of work developing and we've focused mainly on other aspects of the forum lately. I am currently coding such database but at the moment I am repacking the entire FTP to fit this very database, so nothing can be done on the DB without the FTP being fixed first. And it takes a lot and lot of work doing this repack. I am about half-way through now though and I try to add some time to coding as well, but as you mentioned yourself we all have personal lives to deal with as well, which limits the amount of time we can work on these features. Remember, Andy and I as well as all the skilled moderators here work for free, so we add the time we're allowed to without it interrupting real life duties and interests.
I hope you'll enjoy BetaArchive and you will see changes in the future, some or all that may "fix" the concerns you have. If you got any questions about the site don't hesitate to ask me or Andy about it, we'll help you in any way we can.
Enjoy!