To me it seems like we already have easy and hard sections; Discussion and Main. I’m fairly new so that may not be how others treat them. I do think it would be beneficial to dedicate some discussion areas to specialty topics. Some of the recent articles (the theoretical UDT ones for instance) would benefit from being grouped in a separate section to preserve context since related articles may be few and far between. I imagine the meetup notices would benefit as well.
If LW does implement a newbie discussion section I think it will be important to ensure that the majority of users actually migrate to the normal sections so that a newbie subculture doesn’t form its own mini Eternal September. I don’t have any good ideas for how to offer incentives to users to move out of a general newbie section into the more appropriate sections for the topics they want to discuss; I think it may be demand driven. By the time a site grows large enough to need separate sections posters will be motivated to choose the most appropriate section to reach their target audience. When a site is small (or slow) enough one section generally suffices. So we could try an experiment and create a few new sections and watch the ratio of new articles in the Main/Discussion sections to the specialty sections. If there are few articles created in the new sections then LW may still be small enough to operate efficiently with only one or two sections.
As I see it, main is not a discussion area, it’s a blog. If you post in main you’re publishing an article. Discussions are discussions, they have standards there, but I don’t think the idea is to post articles. I’m also new.
If LW does implement a newbie discussion section I think it will be important to ensure that the majority of users actually migrate to the normal sections so that a newbie subculture doesn’t form its own mini Eternal September.
I don’t. That would completely defeat the purpose. The whole idea of a newbie forum is to sandbox the endless September.
I don’t. That would completely defeat the purpose. The whole idea of a newbie forum is to sandbox the endless September.
So in essence you don’t really want new users unless they didn’t need the newbie forum in the first place? Maybe I’m misunderstanding you. Do you think it’s beneficial to host an eternal september solely to keep it from leaking into the “important” parts of LW?
No, it’s because anybody who comes that’s willing to learn should have a chance to learn. If we prevent them from joining the regular discussions, they don’t get a chance to learn. If they do join, everyone loses their chance to learn—the old members will leave due to tedium (because that’s where THEY go to learn and they need to be around people who can give them a challenge in order for that to happen) and so there will be no one around to explain everything. Essentially the newbies will be in a forum of their own in any case. If they’re in a forum of their own HERE though, then we can at least figure out a way to explain things to that many people at once, or people will explain as they have time for it, which is slower, but it’s better than the old members leaving the site.
Maybe I’m too optimistic in thinking that most users could eventually migrate into the normal discussion areas. If so, then you’re probably right that just containing the eternal september is the best solution.
Well, eternal September, by definition, means many won’t completely acculturate. If they all acculturate and move up, then the beginner area will be a temporary place for newbies to learn, and there was no eternal September. If there is an eternal September, then it’s purpose would be to contain the eternal September. Those who acculturate would move on, but not everyone would acculturate.
To me it seems like we already have easy and hard sections; Discussion and Main. I’m fairly new so that may not be how others treat them. I do think it would be beneficial to dedicate some discussion areas to specialty topics. Some of the recent articles (the theoretical UDT ones for instance) would benefit from being grouped in a separate section to preserve context since related articles may be few and far between. I imagine the meetup notices would benefit as well.
If LW does implement a newbie discussion section I think it will be important to ensure that the majority of users actually migrate to the normal sections so that a newbie subculture doesn’t form its own mini Eternal September. I don’t have any good ideas for how to offer incentives to users to move out of a general newbie section into the more appropriate sections for the topics they want to discuss; I think it may be demand driven. By the time a site grows large enough to need separate sections posters will be motivated to choose the most appropriate section to reach their target audience. When a site is small (or slow) enough one section generally suffices. So we could try an experiment and create a few new sections and watch the ratio of new articles in the Main/Discussion sections to the specialty sections. If there are few articles created in the new sections then LW may still be small enough to operate efficiently with only one or two sections.
As I see it, main is not a discussion area, it’s a blog. If you post in main you’re publishing an article. Discussions are discussions, they have standards there, but I don’t think the idea is to post articles. I’m also new.
I don’t. That would completely defeat the purpose. The whole idea of a newbie forum is to sandbox the endless September.
So in essence you don’t really want new users unless they didn’t need the newbie forum in the first place? Maybe I’m misunderstanding you. Do you think it’s beneficial to host an eternal september solely to keep it from leaking into the “important” parts of LW?
No, it’s because anybody who comes that’s willing to learn should have a chance to learn. If we prevent them from joining the regular discussions, they don’t get a chance to learn. If they do join, everyone loses their chance to learn—the old members will leave due to tedium (because that’s where THEY go to learn and they need to be around people who can give them a challenge in order for that to happen) and so there will be no one around to explain everything. Essentially the newbies will be in a forum of their own in any case. If they’re in a forum of their own HERE though, then we can at least figure out a way to explain things to that many people at once, or people will explain as they have time for it, which is slower, but it’s better than the old members leaving the site.
Maybe I’m too optimistic in thinking that most users could eventually migrate into the normal discussion areas. If so, then you’re probably right that just containing the eternal september is the best solution.
Well, eternal September, by definition, means many won’t completely acculturate. If they all acculturate and move up, then the beginner area will be a temporary place for newbies to learn, and there was no eternal September. If there is an eternal September, then it’s purpose would be to contain the eternal September. Those who acculturate would move on, but not everyone would acculturate.