As everyone knows, each forum has its own distinct atmosphere and accepted codes of behavior. Posting etiquette, while generally the same from forum to forum, changes a small amount as well. One of the hardest adaptations to make, when adjusting to a new forum, is the change from old styles of posting to new styles. So, within this post, are a few hints and tips for adjusting your posting style to the style that is generally found on BoolProp. Some of these are hard-and-fast rules, and some are just suggestions. I suppose it's up to you to decide which are which.
Do:
- Write in complete sentences.
- Use capitals and punctuation.
- Run your posts through a spell-checker.
- Separate long posts into paragraphs.
- Quote posts if they were posted a significant number of posts before yours (two or three is fine).
- Trim quotes so that you're only quoting the relevant portion.
- Censor any rudeness; that's not something that's really welcome - and it will just incite arguments.
- Use clean language.
- Elaborate on your thoughts.
- Stay on topic.
Don't:
- Write one long run-on sentence.
- Use chatspeak/netspeak/l337.
- Be rude.
- Use profanity.
- Post one line posts (these are sometimes appropriate, but until you can tell when it's just best not to post one-liners at all).
- Make pointless posts (repeating things others have said, one-liners, posts with just a few words or smilies, posts that add nothing to the discussion,etc).
- Post off-topic things.
- Quote pictures.
- Quote long posts just to say "Wow, you're right!" or "No, I don't agree".
- Double post (posting more than once in a row. Edit your post instead.)
- Post in all capital letters.
An example of a good post:
JustMe wrote:Once there was a little boy named Timmy. Timmy liked to surf the web and play the Sims, so naturally he found BoolProp. His mother didn't want him to join the forum at first, but then she read a few topics and decided that everybody was very friendly and would not corrupt Timmy. So Timmy joined BoolProp and began to post. Timmy loved to post, but he was not a very interesting poster - usually he just said "yeah!", "me too!", or "that's weird!". A lot of people would do this, but Timmy took the cake for sheer volume. He never seemed to have an original idea or anything interesting to say. Other people wanted to be nice to Timmy, because they knew he was only ten, but he was becoming very annoying. So one day some BoolPropians went up to Timmy and said, as nicely as they could, "could you please not just post three words at a time, Timmy?". At first Timmy was very annoyed, but then he realized that they weren't trying to be rude - in fact, they were just trying to help. Timmy took a deep breath and began to post long posts full of interesting and funny things. Soon Timmy was the most popular boy on the block!
Some examples of bad posts:
JustMe wrote:LOL, so once there was this boy named Timmy and he was really little so like he posted just a little bit and then everyone asked him to not post so much silly stuff and he agreed and then they decided that he was pretty cool and so they all went "yay!" and were his friends Timmy's mom gave them all chocolate and then they were all happy.
JustMe wrote:Yeah, I agree.
JustMe wrote:k, so 1nc there was dis boii namd Timii. he wuz lyke rlly annying n so evry1 h8d him. Den all the ppl decided dat they lyked him after all, OMG!
JustMe wrote:1 l0\/3 l337!!!!11! 17'5 50 |=\/N!
JustMe wrote:HAHA OMG THERE WAS THIS BOY NAMED TIMMY AND HE WAS SO KEWL, BUT NOBODY LIKED HIM. THEN THEY STARTED LIKING HIM, THOUGH!
That's all very well and good, though, but it's all about content. How should you format your posts? Well, hang onto your seats and I'll tell you:
Do:
- Use a normal sized font for the majority of your post.
- Use bold and italics to emphasize certain words (it is also sometimes okay to capitalize words - use common sense, though).
- Use a readable color.
- Use spoilers for spoilers.
Don't:
- Post in a huge font, or a very tiny font.
- Use excessive amounts of smilies.
- Use very light colours, or colours that are hard to read.
- Use spoilers for things besides spoilers.
- Make your entire post in either bold or italics.
An example of a good post:
JustMe wrote:I'm showing an example of how to post, so that we won't have any confusion about the subject. I wouldn't want people to be confused; that'd just be horrible. This is just some filler fluff, because otherwise the post looks too short - and I might not have enough space to show all the behaviors I want to encourage. This is something that's a nice readable blue, although I'm not sure why. Anyway, I guess that's enough!
Some examples of bad posts:
JustMe wrote:Haha, look, I'm posting in light yellow! Isn't this pretty?
JustMe wrote:I bet you can't read this!
JustMe wrote:This font is HUGE like the Jolly GREEN giant!
JustMe wrote:[spoiler]Hi![/spoiler]
JustMe wrote:Look at my cool formatting!
Hopefully now you've got some idea of how to post on BoolProp.
