Bens post

[RuralWeb]

Glad to see that ben is using my last post on the forum to lay down the law. Unfortunately ben you are the new boy here and have not seen the reason for many comments people find agressive. They at always aimed at people who abuse the forum by demanding help or critising people who don't help them. Many of these demanding posts are by other designers who are being paid by clients to build websites for them - I and others who contribute regularly see the fallout of this when we at contaced to repair the botched work these people do. Actinic loose here because non of them pay for support but rely on the forum for it. Now I personally think that is very wrong and so do many of my clients.

I was voted both the second most helpfull member and the most unhelpfull member of the forum last year and that comes from me bending over backwards to help genuine forum members with problems - over the years I have done much free work for members BUT I always critised other who stole from the forum. Many of the design companies who come on here hide thier identity and it does take effort to find them out but other forum members never see this side of the forum and simply see people like me having a go.

I also suspect that most of the email you get are from these people rather than the people who get genuine hep from the forum which will always be the case. It used to be the case where people like jont, dunc and I would compete to help people on here but ben is correct things have changed and now we are only helping other designers make money.

Any way I've said my piece now and will say goodbye to the forum -

[Darren B]

Interesting points

Mal and myself (plus others )have more than once disagreed and perhaps both been vocal about this, in stronger terms than you have listed Ben, however i dont hold anything against Mal and i take comments made on the chin, i dont have any less respect for Mal and to me its part of life and people need to learn to live with it. This country is turning into a real nany state and this is personally another step in that direction.

The forum itself has many hats.

It's a community that actually has no real say in catagories or the option to vote on specific features or topics - requested many times. So IMHO not a democratic community

Its a place for support - this old chesnut. I dont have the answers to how your resolve the issues as to "is it" or "is it not" 1st line support. IMHO it is treated as support by those not wishing to pay and supported by those that do pay for support.

We have been asking for moderation for years, yet this is still controlled by actinic (with the exception of one or two, how do contract for actinic) but come the weekend no one is around to manage this, unless it seems its a spam post.

The most important part of the communtiy is the laughs to be had. Yet people complain if we have a bit of a joke and a thread goes (for tracey) off topic. So now we have to be selective in what we say and how we say it?

The forum is not like it used to be and it never will be, perhaps its time i took some time away from the forum and leave you guys to it.

[george]

A slightly more comprehensive registration method would help possibly? Insisting on full name, company, website, etc? I know there are people only trialing the software but most would have a company name at least.

I'd also suggest many new(ish) members genuinely dont realise they are being ackward (or whatever), and thus respond in a defensive way (from their own, possibly limited knowledge) as opposed to taking suggestions on board which are perhaps `obvious` to the more learned people on the forum?

Anyway, Bens post was a major dissapointment for me. When I read new era I thought he was going to let us know `what was round the corner with Actinic` as opposed to a spread the love appeal!

*opens his dairylea Dunkers breadsticks thingy*

[chris ashdown]

Bit OTT Ben

Hope I am not an agressor, but some people do abuse the time and effort made for them which must be very frustrating to the main contributers to what is used by all as your free 2nd support service

[parklifeclothes]

Well said!

Ben, just lately there has been an upsurge in 'to the bone' answers, but its down to the sheer number of new users, many of which are, as Mal says designers hiding their true identity and leeching from the forum.
Over the last few weeks there has been so many lazy posts, almost to the point of, "I'm a designer, but how do I switch my computer on?".
Member like Mal, Lee, Jont & many others have given many thousands of pounds in potential business away by helping out but get very little in the way back, and even criticised if they direct people to the knowledge base, something that many new members can't be bothered to look at.
As a result these helpful folk are now giving less time to the forum and as such it will become a less helpful area and support will get many, many more calls.

I would like to suggest that when posting there should be a check box that has to be ticked to say you have read the knowledge base.

[guccij]

Mal

Please don't leave.

I and most of the other people who use this community know exactly where you are coming from and suffer the same frustrations as you do. Your responses are sometimes pretty robust, but I've never seen one of them which has overstepped the mark.

Your input is invaluable to people like me who, even though I have Cover, find the rapidity and helpfulness of the feedback on here far superior to the official support channels.

I'm too inexperienced and feeble a user to feel confident enough to shout down the numpties and rely on the old lags (no offence intended) to do that instead.

I think the Towers might have had a bad day yesterday and anything from them right now needs to be taken with a pinch of salt.

I repeat, please don't leave. If you must, then just make yourself invisible so at least you can browse without being spotted

Jules

[Jan]

I don't think that having fun has been disallowed Darren, just plain rudeness and that goes for the case where someone is rude to the regulars as well, which to be honest is more what happens on the whole these days (saw it only this morning in fact).

I already have a rule that I mostly whereby if I can't answer politely I just don't answer (it's usually when you reply with the correct answer but are told that it is wrong or the one that really annoys me, when the person insists on only having an answer from Actinic).

Regards,

[bamboo]

I am astonished beyond belief that there are people on here that 'Mary Whitehouse' because of someone else's point of view.
People are free to choose to be offended by what others say, if you do not offend someone at least once a day you really are saying nothing, but it is quite wrong to try and influence the owners of this forum into coming round 'to their way of thinking' just because they are offended.

It's sad that the comination of the Towers and the Mary Whitehouses are robbing this forum of at least one and possibly a few members that 'call a spade a spade' and in doing so cut through the utterly pointless PC bullsh*t that pervades so much of life in 21st century Britain.

Change always happens whether we want it to or not but not all change is for the better. This change falls into the latter category IMO. Sad day.

[Jan]

but come the weekend no one is around to manage this, unless it seems its a spam post.

I tend to moderate during the weekend and in the evenings (voluntarily) however until now, I have only been allowed to remove spam and approve postings, once I get my new guidelines I will be able to moderate posts out of office hours.

I fairly sure 2 or three of the other moderators also check out of hours.

Regards,

[parklifeclothes]

Typical thread http://community.actinic.com/showthread.php?t=41542, useless thread title again from a 'designer' wanting exacting help that couldn't be bothered to renew cover but now needs getting out of the sh** before his client realises he knows naff all about the software he's using. This is what ruins the forum, lazyness!!

[grantglendinnin]

Unfortunately there's only so many times somebody can give the advice of RTFM (myself included, many things are covered in there that I didn't know even existed, my own ignorance really).

I know as a genuine fact of one member who is a 'designer' but pleads ignorance as if they are an end-user. Stricter control needs to be introduced for forum registration, however, should somebody have a mission critical issue which a forum member may be able to solve at the weekend - they're stuffed.

It seems the day of euphoria from helping others on the web is long gone, spoilt by those out to make a quick buck off the back of others, such as all the forum regulars who contribute a hell of a lot and get very little back.

I started off as a proper noob - not knowing what those blue circles and pink swirls did. Now that I've (partially) been through the design process and overcome many issues within the software, I feel there are times where I can offer advice on areas where I've been before - as they say, "not always right, just trying to help"

[george]

Typical thread http://community.actinic.com/showthread.php?t=41542, useless thread title again from a 'designer' wanting exacting help that couldn't be bothered to renew cover but now needs getting out of the sh** before his client realises he knows naff all about the software he's using. This is what ruins the forum, lazyness!!

Perhaps, but what avenues of help (that will answer his question) are available to this person? Other than on here, is emailing support the only alternative?

[Rich Brady]

Could it be arranged that new members couldn't post until they've read at least 5 posts?

This way there is at least a fighting chance people may search for the answer instead of asking why their sites not running on fasthosts for the 100th time.

Jan, I think the "having fun" element that Darren talks about is where several establish members may have a bit of banter over say 4/5 posts only to be told to "STAY ON TOPIC". If there's an opportunity to make light of something that may bring a smile to peoples faces then go for it I say. It makes an intensive 10 page thread on perl scripts bearable IMO.

The problem with Ben's post on insulting language is that what's insulting to one person may not be to another, to compound this issue it's difficult to gauge the tone in which it is meant through text.

I've not once come across anyone malicious on this forum, you're all great

P.S Don't leave Darren, you're the only person with spelliong worse than my own LOL

[leehack]

I think much of the confusion surrounds the word community, a community is not in fact what is wanted here. A community involves all walks of life, varying levels of knowledge, varying age groups, different personalities, different patience levels and varying levels of helpfulness & common sense. We all have or have had neighbours who are not our favourites, online is no different, it's the same people involved! Cyberspace doesn't exist as a different place with different people, honest guv.

How one person handles a situation has no bearing whatsoever on how the next might, so providing advice in that area is rather pointless, we are individuals not sheep. Some people can turn a blind eye to someone saying something, some have to get involved and reply, neither approach is wrong and both belong in a 'real' community each and every day.

Like any real community, the police have to step in at times and calm things down and take people to task, there of course has to be levels of acceptance. The levels of policing are important and fluctuate over time. Maybe this is a 'focus in on non seat belt users' kind of a time, ride the waves as they say, it will change in the future.

I do find it a shame that I have seen two posts on the forum over the past week or so about how posts should be approached, yet i've only seen one about 9.0.4 developments in the past 3 months, that's something i'd like to see changed.

The feelings and atmosphere on the forum is also directly correlated to the performance of the software without question, the worse it is, the worse the forum is, so Actinic themselves have a big part to play in helping us all get the Actinic Community turned into the Actinic Walton's Mountain instead. It's been a tough 2 years for actinic users, workers and designers, so let's group hug and spread some hippy love instead.

[Darren B]

I tend to moderate during the weekend and in the evenings (voluntarily) however until now, I have only been allowed to remove spam and approve postings, once I get my new guidelines I will be able to moderate posts out of office hours.

I fairly sure 2 or three of the other moderators also check out of hours.

Regards,

Jan this was my point, i was not having a dig at you guys as i know you do it to help all of us. My point being Actinics stand on what you can and cant say that annoys me. It is a known fact support cant handle the problems they currently have let alone a load more when people decide not to help here anymore.

I don't think that having fun has been disallowed Darren, just plain rudeness and that goes for the case where someone is rude to the regulars as well, which to be honest is more what happens on the whole these days (saw it only this morning in fact).

I already have a rule that I mostly whereby if I can't answer politely I just don't answer (it's usually when you reply with the correct answer but are told that it is wrong or the one that really annoys me, when the person insists on only having an answer from Actinic).

It has been mentioned many times about people making "off topic" comments and that it needs to stop - to me the off topic comments are 99% funny

I completely agree with you about the OP telling you your wrong until someone from actinic agrees. Had it more than once and it really gets me. This normaly results in making a comment that now mean you cant according to Ben as these must be avoided.

sorry "RTFM" or "search the community" or "read the knowledgebase if you dont like it" are all valid replies to someone who is basically saying you dont know shit and im not listening to you.

George has made a good point - change the registration process to insist on names and real email address, no hotmail, gmail or yahoo. But doubt anything will change