Posted By: NoYellowEnvelope
... by providing better help to get to useful info than the text block in the upper left corner of the Newbie board? I mean, these are NEWBIES! Let's assume they don't know how to find anything without some help. Thus, put at the top of the Newbie board simple, clear directions WITH LINKS to get to the most useful resources for Newbies. And highlight that section with color, font etc so it's (nearly) impossible to ignore.
We could make this fun and start a contest thread to nominate links to place there. Final judge would be the Newbie board Host, perfectstorm.
Some of us have been lobbying for the creation of a REAL faq by which I mean real Qs that are really asked FREQUENTLY, which is what an FAQ is supposed to be. There is a big diff between a self help document that brings newbies to tears when they are feeling desperate and a consensus answer that helps someone right then and there and now.
Personally, I think that TER should host an FAQ writing retreat for the core group of major volunteers that type, type and re-type the same thing over and over, week and week ... Perfectstorm, XYZ, Steph (MatureGFE), GaG, mrfisher, yours truly, kerri, Fancy ^H^H^H^H^H, and you, too. I think that a week in Costa Rica or the Dominican Republic and a followup week in Las Vegas about 2 months later should do it.
I have also lobbied for better and more informative blocks of text on the home pages of the Boards. Most of them are pretty useless: "New York'; Welcome to the New York discussion board." Duh.
I think that each board could be tasked with writing a consensus paragraph (200-500 words) to place under the Board Name. In color, too.
So, yes, I agree with you and I'm in favor of whatever you said
Not that it's a bad thing. Suggestions here sometimes do need to be repeated often. As impposter said we have suggested an actual "FAQ for newbies" that would really be a FAQ list, and a seperate "Newbie Discussion Board" which would be the new name of the current board they call FAQ for Newbies. When most people see "FAQ" they expect an actual list of frequently asked questions with answers. It has also been suggested that before clicking onto the newbie board there could be a brief summary directing newbies to links (please lick here first) to things like the Self Help Center, and the new FAQ for Newbie section, before clicking onto the newbie discussion board.
While they are at it. The Self Help Center could use some updating.
I think I've commented before that the interface is part of the problem; it's far from intuitive. The Self-Help link is in small font, so it's not eye-catching for most users. It needs to be big, bold, and obvious, perhaps right under where it says Newbie, not off to the side under a Contact Admin link. This would be an easy fix.
A real FAQ would be great, too, and it likewise needs to be obvious where to click on it or people won't see the link. I'm all for imposter's proposed trips!!!, but the collective group could easily come up with a nice list of Q&As if TER were to solicit input.
Posted By: NoYellowEnvelope
... by providing better help to get to useful info than the text block in the upper left corner of the Newbie board? I mean, these are NEWBIES! Let's assume they don't know how to find anything without some help. Thus, put at the top of the Newbie board simple, clear directions WITH LINKS to get to the most useful resources for Newbies. And highlight that section with color, font etc so it's (nearly) impossible to ignore.
We could make this fun and start a contest thread to nominate links to place there. Final judge would be the Newbie board Host, perfectstorm.
