Forum Cross Posting - a "no no " ?

[wassaw998]

Are there any "rules" / "guidelines" on what I call cross posting, that is, posting the same question over multiple forums ? I've seen some guys get chewed out on some of the tech forums for doing this. Is that like an unwritten rule, (or, written, and I can't find it !).


I guess the logic behind it is a guy posts the Q on forum A, B , and C. People put in their time to answer based on the thread they are seeing, not knowing the same Q is on other threads. In the tech world, especially, it is anoying as you may put in the effort to solve a problem, only to find out the same Q was already solved on a different forum.

However, in the woodworking world, where you are looking for an opinion, maybe this is not the same ?

Just asking.

Thanks.

[Jim Boyd]

I see that all of the time in our corner of the net. Same questions posted in different forums. The only time I see anyone say someting about it is when it is done in multiple places on the same forum.

[LCHIEN]

not sure whether your def of forums means

Bt3central. Ryobitools and woodnet are different forums (each with individual discussion groups)

or
Getting started, tool talk, around the coffee pot etc are all different forums here on BT3Central.


If the former, I guess its OK

If the latter, that would seem to be bad etiquette as well as
lack of appropriate mental processes.

I go to my favorite discussion groups first and am distressed to find i answered a question that was already answered elsewhere due to being cross-posted as you note. The poster should have a responsibility to check for the most appropriate location to post in, not the first place he stops. If unfamiliar with BT3central a few moments getting the flavor and layout of the land seems to be a reasonable mental process.

I would also like to point out a careful and properly spelled choice of topics/title for a new post is all important. The Reason? Searching later.

While we can understand "delat TP 305 paner" to be a Delta TP300 planer (after a few seconds) the poor search engine cannot. A mispelled post is a lost post after a few days for all practical purposes.

Also I recently saw a post entitled simply "eBay" should have really been entitled "cheap router bits on eBay" or something like that to make later searches effective, since I always search by title first and failing that, resort to full text searches.

FInally, cute and leading titles also fail the usefulness of search engines. I.e. "What I did today" fails to help locate this post later when the post topic was really "I built an Adirondak Chair today".

Post titles should really contain key words.

[tfischer]

Cross-posting within a single set of forums (e.g. BT3Central) would be bad netiquette in my opinion.

Cross-posting a pointer to a thread in another forum might be ok, but only in some circumstances. I'd hate to see every post have cross-pointers in every forum. But in situations where something is extremely time-sensitive (like someone requesting info on a product that's on sale for just another day or so) then it might be ok (after they check the archived posts, of course).

In general, if you post it in one place, you will probably get responses. If you don't get responses in one forum, you can always try a different forum -- but doing it all at the same time is bad form.

Just my opinions, worth 3.5 grains of salt.

-Tim

[wassaw998]

I was refering to forums as in the "Bt3central Ryobitools and woodnet" definition.

[tfischer]

quote:Originally posted by wassaw998

I was refering to forums as in the "Bt3central Ryobitools and woodnet" definition.

Oh, in that case it makes no difference to me. As far as I'm concerned, it's 3 completly different groups of people. For example, BT3K is currenlty the only one of the three that I frequent, so if it isn't posted here, I won't see it...

-Tim

[LarryG]

quote:Originally posted by wassaw998

I was refering to forums as in the "Bt3central Ryobitools and woodnet" definition.

That would not be considered a cross-post, which generally refers to posting two or more copies of the same thing on a given web site considered in its entirety. There will be a small percentage of people who frequent all three of those (or any two of those) but by and large you'd be addressing completely different audiences.

If some sysop or moderator is chewing people out for asking the same question on Forum A as they ask on Forum B ... geez, that's just flat ridiculous. Are people not entitled to a second opinion?

BTW and by way of clarification, I agree 100% with Tim's thoughts on pointer messages. I may not have made it clear that I regard it as something that should be done VERY sparingly, for very good and probably rather unusual reasons. I wouldn't want to see the boards littered with pointer cross-posts, either.

[wassaw998]

Yea, I agree Larry. I think the diff here is we deal mostly with "what do you think about..." type posts (ie. opinions) . On a tech side, if I post "I cannot solve the following programming bug....." and I cross post that, two or more people could be working , spending time to provide an answer, when the answer is already sitting on the 3rd forum. But, yea, I def see folks getting chewed out for it, and in fact, did a google search on 'cross posting' and found a lot of forums discourage it. I didn't think on this type it was an issue, but, figured I'd ask.

Thanks.

[tfischer]

Chris,

Perhaps what you're thinking about is traditional newsgroups, where it's considered bad form to post to multiple groups with the same post (e.g. alt.programmers and comp.sys.programmer.whatever)?

I don't see how if I posted similar posts to techiegeekforus.com and computerguruforums.com (I made those up) that I should get chewed out for it. Simply going to 2 different audiences...

If someone every yelled at me for that, I'd just laugh at 'em...

-Tim