Okay, so I’m trying to come up with the Commandments for Newbies (I’m also thinking of writing a self-help book for us). Any more experienced dopers - hell, even other newbies - got anything to add to the list?
Thou shalt not be a jerk.
Thou shalt learn how tO use the caps Key properly.
Thou shalt not be intimidated because thou art a newbie. People around here are actually pretty welcoming (look, ender even wrote a song about us. They care).
Thou shalt create no sock puppets. In fact, thou shalt throw out all thy socks, lest thy succumb to the temptation to glue/sew little plastic googly eyes to them and hold amusing conversations with them.
Thou shalt provide cites for thine arguments, especially in General Questions and Great Debates.
If someone calls thee a [deleted][deleted]horse’s [deleted], thou shalt not respond, "Oh yeah? Well, you’re a pile of [deleted][deleted]pickled [deleted]. Instead, thou shalt respond with wit and style, as deepbluesea did over here. Scroll down and thou shalt find it.
If thine aim is to become known as a raving loony on this board, then remember thou art competing with some masters of the art. Thou wilt have to be very good at it, and that means either an incredible monomania or a considerable sense of style. Better to leave it for now.
Thou shalt not argue with the mods. It’s a losing game, bubba, because (as we all know) they are superhumanly smart, possessed of unearthly powers and good looks, and all have free, special mods-only SDMB coffee mugs.
Thou shalt read the boards at least a little before posting. Thou shalt read the faq and do a little testing in ATMB to get the hang of vB code. Incidentally, thou shalt preview before posting.
Over to you guys. What did I miss? What can you add?
I was actually thinking about this earlier, and while I appreciate the cooperative smell of “Don’t be a jerk”, I always thought the boards’ first commandment to us should be:
Well, that sounds good, although I probably broke almost all of those in my first few posts.
How about: Thou shall not write a pit rant about the more experienced members until you, oops I mean thou, understand what constitutes a good pit rant.
[list=1][li] You shall have no other gods before me.[/li][li] You shall not make for yourself an idol.[/li][li] You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain.[/li][li] Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy.[/li][li] Honor your father and your mother.[/li][li] You shall not murder.[/li][li] You shall not commit adultery.[/li][li] You shall not steal.[/li][li] You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.[/li][li] You shall not covet…anything that belongs to your neighbor.[/list=1][/li]
The religous commandments don’t really apply here. #1 is inapplicable to those of us who don’t believe in any gods (a large portion of dopers). #2 is pointless; even if my making idols did bother the administration, how are they going to find out? #3 is irrelevant, seeing as some of the stuff that gets tossed around in the pit makes the name of the Lord your God taken in vain seem like a pleasant greeting. #4 is right out; there’s no way I can go a whole day without the SDMB.
The moral ones don’t work any better. The admins don’t care what I think of my parents, so #5 is right out. #6 is a very nice commandment, but it’s meaningless here, because you can’t murder anyone in cyberspace. #7 would be impossible to enforce without a significant increase in moderator presence in MPSIMS; all those flirt threads do add up. #8 is also very nice sounding, but ultimately irrelevant; just as one cannot murder in cyberspace, one cannot steal things in cyberspace. #9 is unnecessary because everything that’s said is documented electronically, so bear false witness as you might, you can be easily disproven by anyone who reads the thread in question. #10 is a total non sequitur; what one covets does not affects one’s cyberspace presence.
All told, I think I’d have to say that the original 10 are probably not the best guides for newbies. At best, they wouldn’t be relevant, and at worst they might be confusing.
Damn, you’re right. I had never even thought about that. Well then–out of the ten commandments, one is relevant to this board. Still not the best place to start.
Cecil Adams is thy Lord and thy Master. There shalt be no other authority-not Marilyn Vos Savant (sp?) and especially not Ann or Abby-thou art thy devil and thou shalt be cast into the Pit of BBQ.
Yeah, but. You’re talking about taking these as a basis for SDMB Commandments, not about replacing them verbatim [sub](although obviously I think that would be a great idea!)[/sub]. Therefore the Lord would be replaced by the mods, or ultimately by Cecil himself. So No. 3 would become “Thou shalt not diss the mods”, and No.4 would be “Thou shalt post constructively as often as possible.”
It probably applies to a lot of the others as well.
My post was meant as a tongue-in-cheek shootdown of the oft-touted suggestion that everything would be all peaches and cream if we all only followed the Ten Commandments. And I imagine that anyone who follows the spirit of the Ten Commandments (which I think follows from the two greatest commandments that Jesus laid down) probably won’t be a jerk anyway.
Now that I’ve got all the seriousness out of my system, here are my suggestions for the Ten Commandments of the SDMB:[list=1][li] Thou shalt not hold Marilyn vos Savant, Dear Abby, or Ann Landers above the Great Cecil.[/li][li] Thou shalt not be a jerk.[/li][li] Thou shalt not dis the mods or admins.[/li][li] Thou shalt post constructively whenever possible.[/li][li] When flaming an authority figure, thou shalt give them the respect they do deserve (but see #3).[/li][li] Thou shalt not character assassinate.[/li][li] Thou shalt not flirt too much (but who’s to say what’s too much? ;)).[/li][li] Thou shalt not post copyrighted material.[/li][li] Thou shalt not quote other posters out of context for the purpose of character assassination.[/li][li] Thou shalt attribute clever quotes to the proper source.[/list=1][/li]
Well, it’s not all that great, now is it? Anyone who thinks they can do better is more than welcome to try.