Model forum veterans, let me bend your ear.

I'll take Devil's Advocate position and defend the statement as being "advice."  The constructive tips are good, but we don't want the newbies to become so bogged down in "improving" that they literally stop for fear of screwing something up.

That's why I phrase my answers as "Well, I use this or that technique, or part, or paint," whatever...  Gives them an out...

Where the newbies are posting questions/starting topics is getting annoying as well.  Here is a sample of what is on the armour thread at the moment:  (This was a site that used to be about armour-related questions, and  armour WIP threads)

Paint question                                 Cyberhobby sale

Reorganising my workbench               Applying filler

AMPS convention                             Airbrush question

Cyberhobby store                             what do do with models

Atlanta Model Show                           sealing paint.

 And this was only the most recent page.  Dont people realise there are specific topics for this stuff ?

I know some of the senior members of the forums patrol the "techniques" pages, to answer questions about paint, decals, airbrushes, tools, etc, but why would they continue to bother when people just dont use them  (oh well, since I hang out with the armour crowd, I'll post my non-armour topic in the armour section...AARGH)

Just my worth.  My Granma always said, " a place for everything, and everything in its place".

It is a syndrome we all suffer from or have in our earlier days...get something new and right away we tear into it without as much as glancing at the packaging let along the instructions. Newbies arrive at the forum and start posting on the first page they come to. It happens. It seems that we have had a recent wave of new guys lately, that's a good thing.

Back in the early days of the Internet there were certain etiquettes to be learned before you jumped into forum conversations. Most sites publish rules, which no one reads, they just check the box so they can get the ability to post. Heck I've done it too.  

Maybe it might be a better idea to reorganized the forum topics so the Odds & End and General are at the top, then list the rest in order. One forum back in the day required you to post three post on an Introduce Yourself page before the moderator granted you the keys to the city so to speak. This was pretty effective at settling the new guys into the proper routine and introduce them to the rules.

If someone, anyone asks a question I'll answer it. It does however twist the torque meter when the very same question was asked by someone else just two posts down. It makes me wanna scream "HeyNG can't you read? Look before you leap." This usually only happens after a very stressing day of building models Or having answered the same question on two other website forums asked by the same person...because apparently he needs and answer NOW! But didn't bother to wait for a response first.

Now if it were me, and I know I'm different than most of the rest of you ducks I would read through the posts to see who might be the best person to ask directly, them PM him. I try to wait to see if I get a response to my question on a forum before asking it again and again elsewhere...but that's just me Given that many of us frequent several forums, this is redundant.

So my friends we must gently guide these newbies to how it should be done properly...if they don't listen then the powers to be will no doubt exercise the ritual of expulsion. Let's work together to keep the house in order and cultivate the newbies into old farts like the rest of us.