General Nastiness

eBoody · Oct 21, 2014

I really dont understand this culture of being royal pricks to anyone new, confused, lazy etc. whether the HAVE OR HAVE NOT done a search. Perhaps this is the way I grew up, but I think it's an important quality to be nice to others whether they are in front of you or behind a monitor. It seems that there is a competition of sorts to see who can be douchier to the people asking questions, because they think it scores them respect points with a developer, and who's the best at showing appreciation, which in this little dichotomy is a good thing turned sour.

I find that if one wants to show appreciation, one can be an active member in the forums, participating in the answering of questions, so that the developer doesnt have to. Its clear to me that those being jerks have NOT answered many questions and show a disdain for the questioner as if they have. Many online communities are plagued by this behavior and I see that little by little this one is sinking to the likes of other online flame-war communities.

Chill out. Be Cool. Be Helpful. Be Kind. Its a simple mantra that should go a long way in furthering discourse, knowledge and resources.

**Edit** Think of a device you like, other than the device's forum this thread is in, and post this or a similar thread if one doesnt exist. Lets see if we can spread this message.

hungmung · Oct 22, 2014

Well it is actually the first rule in the forum rules to search before posting
While that doesn't give people a reason to be rude like 90% of the time the answer is in the op or within a few pages.
Plus more often than not it's the people asking the same thing over and over about issues that have been talked about a lot that gets people annoyed.

cvsolidx17 · Oct 22, 2014

eBoody said:
I really dont understand this culture of being royal pricks to anyone new, confused, lazy etc. whether the HAVE OR HAVE NOT done a search. Perhaps this is the way I grew up, but I think it's an important quality to be nice to others whether they are in front of you or behind a monitor. It seems that there is a competition of sorts to see who can be douchier to the people asking questions, because they think it scores them respect points with a developer, and who's the best at showing appreciation, which in this little dichotomy is a good thing turned sour.

I find that if one wants to show appreciation, one can be an active member in the forums, participating in the answering of questions, so that the developer doesnt have to. Its clear to me that those being jerks have NOT answered many questions and show a disdain for the questioner as if they have. Many online communities are plagued by this behavior and I see that little by little this one is sinking to the likes of other online flame-war communities.

Chill out. Be Cool. Be Helpful. Be Kind. Its a simple mantra that should go a long way in furthering discourse, knowledge and resources.

**Edit** Think of a device you like, other than the device's forum this thread is in, and post this or a similar thread if one doesnt exist. Lets see if we can spread this message.

While some people have been extra douchey, it doesn't excuse the fact that the people they've been douchey to have been asking questions out of pure laziness. Time and time again these lazy a** people have been given the information they were seeking even though it was readily available for them in then OP.

The two most commonly asked questions in our G3 dev forums are "Is the camera working?" and "Is Bluetooth working?" . Two pieces of information outlined in the original post and provided at various points throughout the respective threads. Its absolutely ridiculous.

While some people probably come off stronger than they should that doesn't necessarily mean they were doing it for brownie points with the dev. I mean, what do they have to gain from these brownie points that we as a community don't gain already?

The reality is, these people who are being scolded for asking redundant questions took the time to come to XDA and to ask a question in a thread THAT THEY SHOULD HAVE AT LEAST MADE AN ATTEMPT AT READING FIRST. All they do is clutter the threads up with nonsense. Stop patronizing them by implying that their hands should be held by us in the good spirit of helping. If you truly wanted to help them then you would teach them how to find the answers they seek rather than just giving it to them.

BACARDILIMON · Oct 22, 2014

I an very guilty of that. I help noobs but when I help and you ignore then you get rude answers. It simple.

NOTE 4

grayfoxmg1 · Oct 22, 2014

My general rule of thumb for myself when joining a new thread is to read the first 5 pages and the most recent 5 pages. If I don't find my answer in there then I'll ask it. I still try and read the whole thread whenever possible, but when they get 100+ pages I might not have the time before I need my issue resolved.

Knocked off my LG-D851

Slash8915 · Oct 22, 2014

grayfoxmg1 said:
My general rule of thumb for myself when joining a new thread is to read the first 5 pages and the most recent 5 pages. If I don't find my answer in there then I'll ask it. I still try and read the whole thread whenever possible, but when they get 100+ pages I might not have the time before I need my issue resolved.

Knocked off my LG-D851

That's exactly what I do. I also use the "Search Thread" thing off to the right. If I don't see what i need using those methods, then I ask.

grayfoxmg1 · Oct 22, 2014

I've been a member of XDA for a long time, since I had my HTC Kaiser running WinMo6.5(remember when that was everyone's go to platform?) and I've never had a bad experience here. I've also been a part of a few different communities here and been everything from a non-participating observer, to a standard user, to a beta tester, and a major debugger so it isn't that I stayed in my own little corner of XDA where everything was sunshine, rainbows, and unicorns(shout out to AOKP). About the only place I haven't at least visited is the Samsung and Sony threads because I haven't had one of their devices. No particular reason, something more attractive just normally pops up.

Now while I've never seen anyone go full on douche to someone in the threads, there have been a LOT of noobs that ask questions that could have been solved either one or two pages back. The worst are the ones that only read the OP and then ask a question without reading any other post in the thread(you can normally recognize them because they inadvertently quote the OP). So while a reminder to everyone that we are one of the last bastions of real internet hospitality isn't a bad thing, i think the problem isn't as big as it's made out to be. The biggest problem(which I have been guilty of) is when 2 or 3 members go off on a tangent in a thread for a page or two. The mods have to normally come in and clean the thread. While that is an inconvenience, it isn't something malicious so I am proud that is our biggest problem.

TL;DR: I don't think the problem is that big, everyone just needs to remember 2 things in XDA:
1. Search before posting
2. Treat everyone how you wish to be treated

eBoody · Oct 22, 2014

Im well aware of the circumstances. Those being that people ask questions that have been answered before. My point is, rather than saying "its ridiculous" or completely bash on them, just ignore, or just answer it and point out thats the answer to the question is available in the OP and that one of the rules of this forum is to search first, then ask. Ive done this, and ive seen other people do it, and the response is CONSTRUCTIVE. They apologize, acknowledge and move on.

I just read some people's responses and shake my head.

Plus its the DEVELOPER that should be hot and bothered about answering questions. Not us.

KING SKILLZ · Oct 22, 2014

Been on these boards since around 2007(may have been lurking a little before that), and i have never once been asked/told to search. I made it my business to research how this forum functions and I acted accordingly, at the same instance I have never told anyone to search for the answer they asked, personally i think it takes more effort and space to tell someone to search rather than to just ignore them, but again this is just my personal approach, and if someone was spamming the thread with the same question then i could understand the frustration.

balthuszar · Oct 23, 2014

cvsolidx17 said:
While some people have been extra douchey, it doesn't excuse the fact that the people they've been douchey to have been asking questions out of pure laziness. Time and time again these lazy a** people have been given the information they were seeking even though it was readily available for them in then OP.

The two most commonly asked questions in our G3 dev forums are "Is the camera working?" and "Is Bluetooth working?" . Two pieces of information outlined in the original post and provided at various points throughout the respective threads. Its absolutely ridiculous.

While some people probably come off stronger than they should that doesn't necessarily mean they were doing it for brownie points with the dev. I mean, what do they have to gain from these brownie points that we as a community don't gain already?

The reality is, these people who are being scolded for asking redundant questions took the time to come to XDA and to ask a question in a thread THAT THEY SHOULD HAVE AT LEAST MADE AN ATTEMPT AT READING FIRST. All they do is clutter the threads up with nonsense. Stop patronizing them by implying that their hands should be held by us in the good spirit of helping. If you truly wanted to help them then you would teach them how to find the answers they seek rather than just giving it to them.

your first paragraph and last sentence are in complete opposite of each other...instead of being douchey, tell them "hey...go here to find your answer" and if they still don't get it, by all means help them...but don't be a prick outright...often times you can tell if they've searched for the answer or not before posting...if they haven't and they asked before they did any work themselves, SO WHAT!? what's the point of these forums if they're not to provide a central location for people to find the answers they seek?

Still_living714 · Oct 23, 2014

Yes let's help lazy people who want the answer the easy way. I search and search through forums and when i absolutely cant find the answer i ask for help, but no lets help people who dont want to do some research. This thread is the reason people feel like they can ask stupid lazy questions. Good job bro.

wideasleep1 · Oct 23, 2014

Still_living714 said:
Yes let's help lazy people who want the answer the easy way. I search and search through forums and when i absolutely cant find the answer i ask for help, but no lets help people who dont want to do some research. This thread is the reason people feel like they can ask stupid lazy questions. Good job bro.

Simply ignore those people if you don't want to help them...let someone else do it, 'bro'.

Richieboy67 · Oct 23, 2014

There are moderators here. No member needs to tell any member the rules or what they should or shouldn't do.

Sent from my LG-D851 using XDA Free mobile app

---------- Post added at 06:57 PM ---------- Previous post was at 06:54 PM ----------

cvsolidx17 said:
While some people have been extra douchey, it doesn't excuse the fact that the people they've been douchey to have been asking questions out of pure laziness. Time and time again these lazy a** people have been given the information they were seeking even though it was readily available for them in then OP.

The two most commonly asked questions in our G3 dev forums are "Is the camera working?" and "Is Bluetooth working?" . Two pieces of information outlined in the original post and provided at various points throughout the respective threads. Its absolutely ridiculous.

While some people probably come off stronger than they should that doesn't necessarily mean they were doing it for brownie points with the dev. I mean, what do they have to gain from these brownie points that we as a community don't gain already?

The reality is, these people who are being scolded for asking redundant questions took the time to come to XDA and to ask a question in a thread THAT THEY SHOULD HAVE AT LEAST MADE AN ATTEMPT AT READING FIRST. All they do is clutter the threads up with nonsense. Stop patronizing them by implying that their hands should be held by us in the good spirit of helping. If you truly wanted to help them then you would teach them how to find the answers they seek rather than just giving it to them.

That may be so but it is not your job to address these things or any other members job unless they are a mod.

Ignore and move on.

Plus, some people are using a mobile device and search on the XDA app is not always so easy.

Sent from my LG-D851 using XDA Free mobile app

grayfoxmg1 · Oct 23, 2014

That's something I agree too. Search on Tapatalk is finiky at best.

Knocked off my LG-D851

decaturbob · Oct 25, 2014

As some one here that has participated a lot in both the Thunderbolt and GS4 forums I can tell you that too many posters come in here and do not take any time whatsoever to research anything before they start asking questions that have been answered hundred times. Many are so bad they NEVER look at the stickies in the general or Q&A forums where most of the questions and/or links to information exist. I had one poster tell me his time was too fricken valueable to take the time to read threads and he EXPECTED answers to his questions....If you are not taking an hour or two to research an issue then YOU are not doing your due diligence. There is practically no question that an answer can't be found if you take that time. Besides, if will add so much more to your own knowledge of your device instead of seeking intellectual handouts.,

If you don't read the stickies and take some time for basic research then your deserve a bit of ridicule. If you ask about rom updates or release dates or why isn't more being done, you deserve some chastisement. We have a lot of devs who end up volunteering a lot of their time in putting out a product that most users never shell out a nickel for, where most users ask for never ending support with little research on their end, again without shelling out a nickel. We have a lot of others who provide a lot of information to people and we do it gladly to help but you do have to try to help yourself too............

dictionary · Oct 28, 2014

Richieboy67 said:
There are moderators here. No member needs to tell any member the rules or what they should or shouldn't do.

Sent from my LG-D851 using XDA Free mobile app

---------- Post added at 06:57 PM ---------- Previous post was at 06:54 PM ----------

That may be so but it is not your job to address these things or any other members job unless they are a mod.

Ignore and move on.

Plus, some people are using a mobile device and search on the XDA app is not always so easy.

Sent from my LG-D851 using XDA Free mobile app

grayfoxmg1 said:
That's something I agree too. Search on Tapatalk is finiky at best.

Knocked off my LG-D851

Then use your browser .. There is no excuse. Moderators are far and few between, and have their own personal lives. The users are what make a forum, not moderators. We try to encourage people to search and not just ask questions, because that helps the community on a whole. I don't support leeches. How do people not have the time to search, but they can post and wait an hour or so for someone to reply? That isn't acceptable to me.

grayfoxmg1 · Oct 28, 2014

dictionary said:
Then use your browser .. There is no excuse. Moderators are far and few between, and have their own personal lives. The users are what make a forum, not moderators. We try to encourage people to search and not just ask questions, because that helps the community on a whole. I don't support leeches. How do people not have the time to search, but they can post and wait an hour or so for someone to reply? That isn't acceptable to me.

Check my other posts before you call me a leech, I was just agreeing the search on the mobile applications needs to be worked on. Thus I tend to cut people who's posts end with a Tapatalk or xda-mobile signature some slack. If the answer is on the OP or within 5 pages of the post I still get upset.

Knocked off my LG-D851

Richieboy67 · Oct 28, 2014

I don't hear you whining about these posts where people like you spend more time complaining then politely explaining an answer or suggestion.

I'm not saying people shouldn't search but it is bad enough to see all those posts and then on top of it have to read many others just crying about it.

I build and run forums for a living. There are ways XDA could fix this by incorporating some modifications and buy changing search indexing settings.

And by you and others complaining you only make the mods jobs harder because now they have to weed through them too.

Sent from my LG-D851 using XDA Free mobile app

---------- Post added at 07:51 PM ---------- Previous post was at 07:48 PM ----------

And using the term "leech" is just stupid and uncalled for. I guess this is the nastiness being mentioned in the op.

Sent from my LG-D851 using XDA Free mobile app

dictionary · Oct 28, 2014

Richieboy67 said:
I don't hear you whining about these posts where people like you spend more time complaining then politely explaining an answer or suggestion.

I'm not saying people shouldn't search but it is bad enough to see all those posts and then on top of it have to read many others just crying about it.

I build and run forums for a living. There are ways XDA could fix this by incorporating some modifications and buy changing search indexing settings.

And by you and others complaining you only make the mods jobs harder because now they have to weed through them too.

Sent from my LG-D851 using XDA Free mobile app

---------- Post added at 07:51 PM ---------- Previous post was at 07:48 PM ----------

And using the term "leech" is just stupid and uncalled for. I guess this is the nastiness being mentioned in the op.

Sent from my LG-D851 using XDA Free mobile app

I have helped more than enough people, both on here and off. If me calling someone who only cares about themselves and not giving back a leech seriously is a problem, though I've helped tons, then people need thicker skin. I'm not cursing, yelling, belittling people's intelligence, or any of the sort. If someone only takes and doesn't give back, they are a leech. It's honestly very simple.

grayfoxmg1 said:
Check my other posts before you call me a leech, I was just agreeing the search on the mobile applications needs to be worked on. Thus I tend to cut people who's posts end with a Tapatalk or xda-mobile signature some slack. If the answer is on the OP or within 5 pages of the post I still get upset.

Knocked off my LG-D851

Wasn't referring to you, was just speaking about the users who just come, ask questions, then disappear. Sorry for the confusion.

Richieboy67 · Oct 28, 2014

Yes, people search the net and come here to ask a question. That is how most people end up at forums. Not everyone is a tech head and wants to stick around. That is not a leech and try to remember this site makes money by getting traffic.

I don't see how calling anyone a leech is helpful at all.

Furthermore, not everyone really knows how a forum works. Maybe a single person can politely mention a search may help but I don't see how 15 people blasting someone for asking a question helps the site at all.

Sent from my LG-D851 using XDA Free mobile app

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