It would be unenforceable, in practice. When signing up for an account, a new user could enter anything in the "Real Name" field. Any means that could be used to reliably verify the name would be excessive.

Jay

AARP card perhaps?

After the recent drama between adatesman, management, and others (who shall not be named), something was brought up that I was curious about.

I can't remember who said it, but a point was made about long time, knowledgable climbers don't bother to post on here any more. With the exception of rgold, I am not sure that is incorrect. There are a whole lot of n00bs, trolls and gumbies, but I have to believe that there is also a large collection of climbers who contribute to quality content here on rc.

I have intentionally mentioned rgold and left out other long time climbers who are just as well known, because unlike them, each of rgold's post are with the intention of being helpful.

What I would like to know is twofold. How long have you been climbing?(if you have been climbing x amount of years but you only go once in a while, let that be known) and what percentage of your posts you believe to be helpful, of good quality and relevant to actual climbing threads?

I have no interest in your number of weird campground posts, inflammatory soapbox posts or other such drivel you create to up your post count.

I will start: Climbing 8 1/2 years. Although I like the witty and sarcastic remarks as much as the next guy, I prefer to be involved in informative, well thought out, climbing threads. I am going to be conservative and say that about 60% of my posts are quality (at least I hope so).

Sure, if you also want the discounts at IHOP.

Curt

Similarly, the amount of moderator activity required to enforce a "high signal-to-noise" policy would be far too excessive. Too excessive for me, certainly - and, I suspect, too excessive for you.

The only way that the culture of rc.com is going to change is via a grassroots movement.

When I was a Senior Moderator, I initiated some pretty strict policies in an attempt to improve the SNR: locking threads with non-descriptive subject lines (if I'd have had my way, I'd have deleted them); adding "moderator notes"—clearly labeled as such—to posts; and locking threads asking repeat questions. In spite of the fact that these very practices are what I have observed ensure like 9.5:1 SNR in some forums much larger than this one, users rejected them. Like I said, most users here actually want a low SNR.

It's taken me years to realize it, but this site will always just be a playpen for the subantz's of climbing.

When I was a Senior Moderator,

It's taken me years to realize it, but this site will always just be a playpen for the subantz's of climbing.

Jay

If a noob has a question about whatever, you either answer it if you have something useful to add, or don’t. [...] Then maybe the poster will get some useful information and the post will pass through quick.

Even if the same question gets asked day after day? In even a modestly, but well-moderated forum, the poster would be informed that his question has already been answered and that he should go look for the answer; then the thread would be locked. In the most strictly moderated forums, his post would be intercepted by a moderator, and simply never be approved for posting. That's how you defend a forum's signal-to-noise ratio.

Your post is further evidence for my point that the majority of users (including you) actually want a low signal-to-noise ratio.

Jay

We certainly don't want you to control the signal, that has been made abundantly clearly about 1,000 times over.

DMT

We certainly don't want you to control the signal, that has been made abundantly clearly about 1,000 times over.

DMT

It would be unenforceable, in practice. When signing up for an account, a new user could enter anything in the "Real Name" field. Any means that could be used to reliably verify the name would be excessive.

Jay

When I was blue I considered that very thing. And nixed for that reason among others. There's also virtually no way to enforce it on pre-existing members shy of requiring everybody to re-register. I also felt that, even if it were feasible, to put it into practice midstream would be so traumatic to the userbase that it would negate any usefulness it could provide... and then some.

Started climbing (I think) in 1979 and it's been one of the main things in my life ever since. My wife and daughter both climb and basically all my friends are (or have been) climbers.

I generally tend to avoid the serious, technique related climbing threads like the plague, although once I got involved in a bowline thread that turned out pretty good. I like rgold's posts OK and usually take the time to read them, if I see them. But I think this site would be worse than boring if there was some kind of attempt to get all the "experienced" climbers to emulate the rgold style.

I might have made a couple of helpful posts, who knows? But I really don't think it's such a good idea to come to internet forums (like this one) to try to learn something important about climbing. The best you can hope for is maybe some kind of connection, or maybe something you can recognize as meaningful from your own experience. That's the nature of the forum beast. I don't think agressive moderation can fix that. Plus you gotta love those threads that go like this: "I might be traveling to South America. Is there any place to climb there?"

On the other hand, when people have contacted me (through this site) with a sincere interest to climb in my area, I've had no problem taking them out and showing them around, and even inviting them to sleep in my climbing gym, if they have nowhere else to stay. So I guess I've been helpful in that way.

I come here more for the human drama, the humor, the fights, the gossip. That's what interests me. I like the different personalities and the tensions that can occur. After not looking in for a few days, is it any wonder then, that I lost a whole day of work today, catching up?

Every now and then (not too often) someone (dingus comes to mind) actually does say something about climbing that surprises me and that can I recognize as true from my own experience. Those moments are great, but I don't see any recipe for making this happen more than it does now.

Did anyone else just hear a faint buzzing sound?

I've conceded that elsewhere. The majority of users here have gotten not only what they deserve, but what they actually prefer: garbage.

Jay