Suggestion the first: rework the About page (possibly after a collaborative effort) to offer newbies clearer guidelines regarding what is expected in posts and in comments, what is the intended meaning of up- and downvotes, and so on.
The About Page has now been edited to (a) tell people who are repeatedly downvoted to take the hint (b) suggest that effort can be better spent than in responding to trolls (c) warn people about the downvoting limit at four times karma.
Neat ! Can I additionally suggest that the sentence:
We suggest submitting links with a short description.
be prefaced with something indicating what kind of things new posters are encouraged to submit ? Say, something like:
The typical LessWrong post is a brief essay inviting reflexion on how to think better, or reporting on relevant news; there is considerable latitude in format, topic, and tone. New posters are encouraged to use the Search box to ensure the topics they introduce are original. We suggest submitting links with a short description.
ETA: Forgot something that might be a valuable way to ease the transition from “commenter feeling their way around” to “beginning poster”:
You may want to start by commenting on others’ posts, and noticing when your reasoning or information is particularly appreciated by the community, as indicated by upvotes. A longer comment with many upvotes can sometimes be turned into a top-level post, if it has few dependencies on the rest of the discussion.
That would work, and make a collaborative effort possible on an ongoing basis, rather than a one-off before putting up the new page.
When I say “the About page”, what I really mean is “whatever page the rightmost link in the top navigation bar of LessWrong points to”. I notice this is already an indirect link, via an URL which redirects to an early post of Eliezer’s, so I assume making it point to the Wiki instead is a matter of changing a config file somewhere.
Suggestion the first: rework the About page (possibly after a collaborative effort) to offer newbies clearer guidelines regarding what is expected in posts and in comments, what is the intended meaning of up- and downvotes, and so on.
The About Page has now been edited to (a) tell people who are repeatedly downvoted to take the hint (b) suggest that effort can be better spent than in responding to trolls (c) warn people about the downvoting limit at four times karma.
Neat ! Can I additionally suggest that the sentence:
be prefaced with something indicating what kind of things new posters are encouraged to submit ? Say, something like:
ETA: Forgot something that might be a valuable way to ease the transition from “commenter feeling their way around” to “beginning poster”:
Perhaps we should move the About page into the wiki?
That would work, and make a collaborative effort possible on an ongoing basis, rather than a one-off before putting up the new page.
When I say “the About page”, what I really mean is “whatever page the rightmost link in the top navigation bar of LessWrong points to”. I notice this is already an indirect link, via an URL which redirects to an early post of Eliezer’s, so I assume making it point to the Wiki instead is a matter of changing a config file somewhere.
Welcome to Less Wrong!