Hi Folks, First of all, this is with out a doubt my favorite railroad forum on the web. There is sooo much information here and sooo many really nice people. However, I have started noticing a trend that has me a little concerned so I would like to address it. There seems to be an increasing number of "put out" posts. By that I mean the unspoken content is "I cant believe you asked THAT." or "if you had read your bloomin' manual". Granted, these are few but still more so these days than in previous ones. I have a DCC system and all the accompanying books but when I open any of them it feels like I'm reading Russian. I've learned how to get around it but it's just not my bag. If you find someones question to be redundant (it's in your manual on page thus-and-such) please just let it go without stating the obvious. Sometimes this stuff just ISN'T obvious to us. We already feel dumbfounded and don't really need to have that feeling reinforced by someone who is impatient. With that said, I want to thank all of you who are so very helpful to those of us who struggle with this wonderful hobby. You are a great bunch of guys! Best regards, John
Know what you mean, and I agree 100%. Your example was posted in my thead, and I noticed it too. But, simply ignored it, even though they were right. Like yourself, I have the manuals, but to be honest, it kind of overwhelms me. DCC does so much, and much of it I am not concerned with right now. Maybe someday I will bite off more. But I am taking it in baby steps because it can get very overwhelming all at once. So, yeah, I see allot of my info in the book, but burried in allot of other stuff, and I simply get overwhelmed, and find it easier to just ask someone that has already done what I want to do at any given moment. It's not being lazy, it's just trying to be effeciant IMHO. I have info to help others myself. I do allot of research on things, and love to share it to make someone elses life easier, so they dont have to reinvent the wheel. The foam and stowage threads for instance. I have done soo much research on different foams trying to find the right one for my equipment, and have actually spent ALLOT of money buying foams to test out. I started posting this stuff so someone else don't have to spend all the money I did to learn what works and what doesnt. I am happy to do it.. That said, at times, I DO understand where someone might get frustrated answering the same questions over and over, or answering something that should, or is in a book somewhere, but sometimes like you said, even though the answers are out there, some dont know where to look. And then new people come on board that may have missed it, and you have to say it again. I do it, and sometimes get frustrated, but try not to make the person asking feel bad about asking. that is what clubs, and these public forums are all about since the begining, and what makes them so great, and convenient..
I wasn't trying to make a RTFM post in Tudor's thread. I was referencing the manual to show I wasn't pulling it out of my ying-yang. I apologize if I was taken different than I was intending.
Tad.. You were very helpful on several counts, and I thank you for the info you provided in that thread.. You gave info and referenced the manual, that was helpful to support your statement. The post I noticed was the post that for the most part (and I paraphrase) "Just read the manual" from another user... Basically just said it's in the manual and provided no other helpful info..
I would add that saying to search through all of the previous threads is also not very helpful, since the search function is not a native thought process to many. In addition, a lot of the documentation is pretty sketchy and without the understanding needed to support it, it will always be more helpful to put on the mentoring cap than offer a demeaning pointer. Well put post John! While I am mostly ATSF, my #2 road is SP!
This hobby can be hard enough without the added frustration of not getting questions answered. I wonder how many people have been steered away from the hobby because they couldn't get their new questions answered. We should all strive to welcome the new ones and do our best to answer all of the questions to the best of our ability. We owe it to ourselves if we want to be stewards of the hobby and help it flourish.
This could go either way. A blank statement like "read your manual" is more helpful than nothing at all. Though its sort of a blunt way of putting it, it does point you in the right direction. I'm reminded of a side topic that came up a while back in the N scale "Whats on your workbench?" thread in reference to new members and "typical/repeat" questions... Read in thread here
Another possibility is simply that this site has grown and continues to do so. More and more people taking an active part- And so many diverse personalities amongst them. Thus it seems on occasion like rough edges might be happening a tiny bit more often. Boxcab E50
I appreciate John's comments, and those that followed. Forums are complicated communities. There are many models of social interaction within any community. I've studied these interactions for a number of years now. And I've come to some conclusions. The speed of the Internet makes it easier to ask a question than to research answers to questions. The code 80 versus code 55 rail question is a great example. The question has been discussed thousands of times on many forums. Yet, rather than searching for these discussions with search tools that are inefficient (at best), it's just easier to ask the question again. The Internet has an institutional memory of about six hours. Anything inactive for six hours is forgotten by 99 percent of forum members. That other one percent, however, will keep topics going, sometimes for years. Newbies have no efficient way of learning about the past. Beyond inefficient search engines, they do not have mentors to show them where to look. They have entered a dark, underground cave, with only an occasional match to provide some guidance. Even experienced forum members get tired. They get tired of inefficient search engines, newbie questions, redundant threads, hard-to-find previous posts, and pointless wars between posters. There is too much shallow information and not enough in-depth knowledge. There is too much repetition. If it's on Wikipedia, it's also on Ask.com and probably hundreds of other sites. And some of the information is just plain wrong, repeated one hundred or more times by cut-and-paste. I have more, but it's getting late for this old geezer.
i find Pete Nolan's reply well thought out and well researched. Additionally, it seems to me that nobody really has to answer a question unless they really want to help and, therefore, the comment about the manually really does not need to be written. It would seem that, rather than make a cursory answer, one could let someone who might be more enthusiastic about helping, answer.
Lmao. You have to spell out the initials into full words on your locos/tenders! Being a newb in almost every respect to this hobby I have the viewpoint from the other side. Want to thank you guys who are willing to deal with the same questions over and over again with answers that may well be spelled out in Aramaic in the manual.:thumbs_up:
I might add that on several occasions I have read the manuals / books / threads / etc. and possibly understood what they are explaining; yet I still find I don’t have a clue about what I am doing or how to implement it.:tb-confused: This feeling is present due to a total lack of experience. That is where TB comes in as a mentor and guiding hand.:thumbs_up: My questions are about gaining reassurance and confidence on tackling the project as well as expanding my knowledge. Jerry
i think the problem is that most of the readers don't know why someone is asking. whether he simply doesn't understand the manual or if he's too lazy to even read it. in my opinion these are two completely different situations resulting in the same question. if someone is too lazy you can reply with rtfm. (imho lazy people should be kicked in their a.. for every question) if someone doesn't understand a thing you should explain it. human communication consists of sender and receiver. a receiver can only interpret/understand what he reads/hears. no way of knowing about the circumstances/thoughts/ideas why the sender sent the message. therefore the receiver is always right. if his understanding doesn't match the meaning/intention of the sender then the sender should clarify his message. these are the basics of human communication. what does this have to do with this post ? well, if we (as the readers) don't exactly understand why someone is asking we should ask for clarification before we reply in a rather blunt way. then there's another important aspect. we recently had the pleasure to welcome modelers from russia. as you know from history differences between east and west were huge. language, culture, politics. i followed some of the posts of these two guys from moskva (iirc). sometimes their posts were difficult to understand. why ? english is not their mothers tongue. and english is not my mothers tongue. translate twice and you got the mess. see, i work in IT since 1987. i could have replied 'rtfm' thousands of times. did i ? mostly not. did i always take the time to explain ? nope. most of the time i returned other questions instead of a clear answer. why ? because people learn more if you (as the expert) are able to influence the way of their thinking rather than with a simple reply. but that's a completely different story and probably out of focus in this topic. to clarify : this post was not meant to offend/attack anyone out there. neither newbies nor 'old-farts'.
woo woo woo man...I'm really put out and have to disagree......I always thought they read like Greek! (add smiley....)
The "RTFM" mentality isn't unique to this hobby. Try going to any Linux newsgroup or forum and asking for help installing Linux, or getting a particular piece of equipment to work properly. It happens everywhere. Some people genuinely like to help, others are there to show how "smart" they are, and still others are just blunt by nature. Not to belittle the issue, but my warped sense of humor is forcing me to use "RTFM" for a railroad name. My layout has two as-yet-unnamed towns. I've decided to name one "Riverton", and the other one "Totherone". The railroad will be a fictional private enterprise known as Riverton-Totherone Freight Movers, or.... The RTFM!
I understand the mentality, because myself I was in IT for lots of years (now retired). I was 3rd level engineering support and I tell ya, it really gets frustrating some of the questions you have to deal with in IT. So, yeah, I do understand the RTFM concept. But, again, I always tried to refrain from letting that show. Another issue I have, especially being fairly new to DCC is the manuals are in many cases a generic manual that covers many models or variations of the product, and in many cases, even though the manual states something, I am not 100% it pertains to the exact one I am dealing with. So, that will spark the question for clarification, or confirmation that I am understanding correctly, or on the "right page" sort of speak.. These forums are here to interact with people of like interests, and help when needed, and to have a live resource of help when you need it.
^^^This. Sorry fellas everybody isn't going to follow "your way" of navigating these forums. It's the way the message board business works. We're having fun here. People are inquisitive and are in a hurry to get answers to questions even if there are 1200 threads on the same subject. Again it's the way ALL messages boards operate whether some like it or not. In their haste to add their opinions most people are not going top read a 100 page thread to see if something they wonder about is there somewhere. It just doesn't happen. Seems to me this thread is really going nowhere..
