[BangPypers] Responding to people who lack the curiosity

[Pradeep Gowda]

On Fri, Jun 12, 2009 at 12:31 AM, Sridhar
Ratnakumar<sridhar.ratna at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Thu, Jun 4, 2009 at 3:22 AM, Srijayanth Sridhar<srijayanth at gmail.com> wrote:

> I don't know the reasons either, but would like to know too.
>
> I often think the best way to handle such posters is to momentarily
> divert the topic of the conversation to their own interest-level,
> curiosity and self-learning .
</snip>..

I think it's best to ignore mails from users who do not care enough to
use their real name/nick while asking questions. The user in question
 introduced himself as prasad, but we scan mail titles before reading
mail content. Most people wouldn't care to  read a mail from
"testing123 test<swtest123 at gmail.com>", let alone answer it.  Online
forums are just like real life communities, where people  judge  you
by what you say and how you say it.  It's hard to relate to a
anonymous, faceless name like "testing 123".  Use your real name. [1]

If the same question is asked by some one who "appears" to be a real
person, it might still be worth answering them, at the same time also
pointing them to a net etiquette
link [2]. In good faith, we can assume that the user in question is
really new to using forums/mailing lists etc.,

Over time, most people do learn how to do their home work and in turn
ask smart questions.

I'll see whether our membership welcome messages can be improved to
reflect this.

Happy hacking,
Pradeep

[1] http://informationarchitects.jp/use-your-real-name-when-you-comment/
[2] http://catb.org/esr/faqs/smart-questions.html