tsurara

School's winding down, the newbies are flooding in and the threadsuck ratio is getting a bit high. I think a basic grammar, spelling and thread-creation tutorial is in order. Read it. Live it. Love it.

I. Before You Create a Thread

1) Choose the Most Appropriate Category

Please put your thread in the most appropriate category. New users should poke around a bit to see what categories and subcategories exist before starting threads in inappropriate areas.

If your thread gives away specific plot details, please put it in the Spoiler forums.

2) Check to See if an Active Thread Exists

Active threads are any which have recieved new posts within the last 30 days, are stickied, or exist in the "anime" section's series specific subforms.

Please check to see if any active threads exist before posting a new one. Multiple threads for the same topic will be merged or closed.

3) Is it Personal?

Personal topics which can't easily be spun into a larger thread or discussion are not allowed in the forum. Threads about your personal love life, accomplishments, or sorrows belong in your blog or profile.

A good rule of thumb is this: if more than 50% of your post consists of a personal story or personal information: you shouldn't be posting it in the forum at all.

4) Is Your Thread Against the Rules?

Advertisments of products or websites, "Rate My ________", and any information about where to aquire illegal downloads of media are forbidden.


II. Composing Your Thread

1) Creating a Title

Titles should be to-the-point and tell anyone browsing the forum, at first glance, what the topic is.

Examples of Crappy Titles:
-"Ummm... well"
-"Would you..."
-"If you could"
-"Something Interesting"
-"A Great Anime"

These titles communicate absolutely nothing about the topic being discussed. Looking at them gives a viewer no clue what the thread inside is about.

Examples of Good Titles:
-"An Introduction"
-"Skydiving: Yes or No?"
-"Three Wishes"
-"Lolicon vs. The Law"
-"Lucky Star Discussion"

These titles give more specific information about the topic at hand.

*Please take care not to spoil plot details, character deaths, etc. in your titles. ie. "Gintama Dies!" (he doesn't... but you get the idea)

2) Think of a Discussion Starter

Your thread must either provide a service or provoke a discussion! This means you need to include either useful information or a question.

The easiest way to do this is to start writing your thread with the question or point at hand.

If you want to start a thread about what everyone thinks about Lucky Star. Please be sure to include the question: "What do you think about Lucky Star?" Rather than writing a rant about your own stance on abortion: include the central question "What do you think about abortion?" If the point of your thread is to teach people how to use "GIMP", include the statement "This thread is going to teach you how to use GIMP."

Once your thread has a point, you can fill in other details and information.

3) Do Not Copy-Paste

Your posts should be written by you! We can all use google, we don't need you to do it for us. Using another person's words without proper quotations and credit is plagiarism and one of the most serious infractions you can get around here! Don't do it.

You can use brief quotes (properly credited) to back up your statements or enforce your points. Do not copy entire articles, quote without quotation marks, or make posts that contain absolutely none of your own writing.

If you want to include an article please LINK to the article, do not past the body into your post.

4) RE-READ Your Post Before Submitting

Can you understand yourself? If you can't, that's a pretty bad sign.

5) Spell Check

Some of us spell well enough to skip this step... but for those of you with a poorer grasp of English: you need to spell check your work. If your spelling is so poor that it prevents readers from understanding your intention: you need to find some way to improve.

Spell checking can be accomplished by previewing your posts through WORD or a similar word processing program (copy/paste). If you don't have a word processor handy, there are a number of free spell-checking programs available online.

III. Incredibly Basic Grammar

1) Complete Sentences

In the English language, a sentence requires a subject and a verb. That means someone or something (a noun) and an action word (a verb) must be included.

Any sentences missing a subject or a verb aren't sentences at all, but sentence fragments.

2) Capitalization

Use capital letters in the first word of any new sentence, people or place names, or when writing titles.

ex. The dog is fat. Mexico Hamasaki Ayumi "Prison Break"

3) Tense Mixing

There are special cases in which your tense may vary slightly within a post (in a dialogue, quote, stating a hypothetical, progressing through time, etc) but generally speaking, you should not switch tenses often within a single sentence, story or piece of writing.

ex of tense mixing. "This morning I went to the cafe. At the cafe I drink a coffee. Then I went to the movies. I see this movie about serial killers. It was good." (past, present, past, present, past)

better: "This morning I went to the cafe. At the cafe I drank a coffee. Then I went to the movies. I saw this movie about serial killers. It was good." (all past)

to be continued...

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Hassun

And of course be sure to read and experience Posting and You (Free Video - cool!)
Just replace 'Steam' with 'AO' and you're good to go.

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Saionji

Some people cannot help it that they speak "Incorrect english" Because they are more than likely from another country, or just don't know english that well. No sense in being a stickler over something like english skill.

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GallComp

Well sadly, 90 % of those non-native english speakers type way better than the average American AO user. Unlike us they arent lazy and dont use slang to post their responces...

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SasuraiHell

I would also like to point out,

-When making a thread try making sure your thread will have any future value.


nothing more junking than a thread that goes dead after just one or two days
Sticky??...i shall sticky until you feel otherwise. Just feel this should have its own sticky teim

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KuroHime will own you! win>

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360tag-Epicold

aceman67

Once this has run its course, It should be moved into the Introduction thread, just to make sure that it gets read.

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lebasiara

hummm...when is it going to run its course? because it is really needed on the introduction area.... good grief!!!!... I have never seen so much dead threads opened in one single day.....
humm.... I mean.... the Rules/FAQthing is already highlighted.... what's worng with the ppl.... join the place and don't even bother to look up the rules?.... maybe they should be bigger.... lol.... in case the ppl don't see the already highlighted link.....

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Awesome sig Yasmine ^_^ I appreciate it thank you very much ^_^

aceman67

Sorry to be blunt, but you realize that parts of your post pretty much sums up why this thread was started in the first place.

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lebasiara

Yes I figured so... and I think new ppl should be reading this thread... I figured the thread started because of the "reopening" of the threads...
my comment was pointing the obvious....

You know what... thinking about it.... there is already a thread on the introductions part of the forum that pretty much indicates what to do to post and everything. Even there is a "posting and you" video. If people are not reading those threads then to put this one in there is going to just sum to the others that are already there....

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Awesome sig Yasmine ^_^ I appreciate it thank you very much ^_^

Byaku Guy

I started while I was in school, so my writing is getting progressivly better. Even now I'm posting at school. Its fun.

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If I knew what to say, I'd say it. If I knew what to do, I'd do it. If I knew how to act, I'd do it my own way.

NeoDeath90

as all you mods know, i've had some trouble in the past with my posts XD

im glad you guys collaborated on something like this. *reads* got it, embraced it, ready to enforce it! *salutes*

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Thank you, Yasmine, for this badass sig!