WARNING -- Use Proper Capitalization and Punctuation!

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Lynx
Celebrate!!!

Post   » Sun May 28, 2006 4:16 pm


Guinea Lynx is here to help people with medical and care questions concerning their guinea pigs.

PLEASE NOTE: Posting on Guinea Lynx is a privilege, not a right.

Due to the recent influx of new members who are not taking the time to write readable posts, I've edited the introductory email. It includes this text:
Thank you for registering. If you are new to the forums, please read https://www.guinealynx.info/healthycavy.html
This page answers many of our new members' general care questions.

Forum members appreciate good writing habits. If you wish to post questions on the forums, be sure to write readable posts with proper capitalization and punctuation. Break long posts into separate paragraphs. Avoid starting multiple threads on similar topics. Do not write in all caps. You'll find links to common topics on these two pages:

https://www.guinealynx.info/sitemap.html
https://www.guinealynx.info/main.html

Please do not write in all caps. Do not use chatspeak. Use standard capitalization and punctuation. If you are talking about yourself, it is I not i and I'm not im, etc. If you are writing a long post, break it up into smaller paragraphs, separated by a line of space to make it more easily read. Do not abuse ellipses (these are the strings of dots that look like this: ....). They are intended for use when one is quoting someone but leaving out part of the material, not as an indicator of stray thought processes.

We are not looking for perfection but we do expect you to try to write readable posts. I also do not expect we will have to remind you to write readable posts. If we have to remind you, you may find that your account has been deactivated.

It is understood that there will be mistakes, typos, misspellings and more -- but putting some effort into writing more readable posts is essential to good communication.

If English is not your native language, just do your best to write readable posts. As a reminder to us, you may request a nick immediately that identifies your location (like ~ Singapore ~ ).

Remember: Posting on Guinea Lynx is a privilege, not a right. The members who spend hours of their time answering your questions deserve your consideration. If you fail to give it, your posting abilities will be removed. You will still have access to the care guide, which will answer the vast majority of your questions should your account be deactivated.

Becky pointed out:
"Punctuation and capitalization are important markers for the written language. When someone like Pinta or Josephine, who often don't have much time, need to quickly find something in a post, these markers (particularly capitalization) make that job easier.

This really isn't about the poster's preferences. It's about making it as easy as possible to get help for sick guinea pigs.

I'm a teacher, too. It's hard enough to get kids to use captial letters and proper punctuation without teachers condoning it on publi boards.[/quote]
[b]PiggieMamma[/b] wrote:[quote]Personally, I'd like to think of the Guinea Lynx forums (other than general chat) as a valid medical reference that can be utilized by veterinarians and laymen alike.

It is difficult enough to convince a (non cavy savvy) vet to treat a guinea pig appropriately without referring to a print out from a forum in which 'medical advice' was given in a way that would make the vet think that the writer was uneducated.

And besides, everyone should show the common courtesy of adhering to the rules of the forum. [/quote]
[b]Dribble[/b] commented: [quote]I'm not sure if it's been said earlier in this thread, but proper grammar, spelling and punctuation really makes a difference in how quickly people can read posts and help/answer you.

I think it makes a huge difference in finding threads about specific topics in Medical. I'll bet I've missed valuable threads due to bad spelling, and if a post is too hard to read I'll skip what might have been helpful.

It's not just priggishness at the heart of this: It's to make communication easier for others. [/quote]
[b]Amy0204[/b] commented:[quote]...I also agree that it's not too much to ask people to be respectful of each other by attempting to watch their p's and q's, etc. My own little bad habit are ellipses. I've written with them for as long as I can personally remember and I have to make a very hard effort to eliminate them. They just occur too naturally. But, at the same time, I know how it bugs people here, so it's a small price to pay to be in good standing with everybody else. I'm not perfect; I wouldn't do very well in an environment that demands perfection, but I'm willing to make an effort. I fail to see why this becomes such a big issue for some people. And besides, as others have said: Those are the rules. [/quote]
[b]2Pigs2Teens[/b] wrote:[quote]I personally appreciate the grammer and punctuation rules here, this is my preferred site because of them. I hate having to decipher the chat speak used elsewhere.

Thank you, Lynx, for these rules. [/quote]
[b]JC[/b] commented to another poster:[quote]Unfortunately, writing all in caps is very hard for most people to read and always comes across as if you were shouting...

Nobody has to use perfect grammar or have perfect spelling, but the effort to write as clearly as possible is not only very much appreciated here, but will mean that your posts get read by more people. The more people who can read your posts, the more responses you will get.

I believe that in the guidelines to which you refer, it does actually point out that this is a free forum where (often highly knowledgable) people give up their spare time and energy to help people with their - frequently sick - guinea pigs. If you write unintelligbly, it will be hard for those people to understand the problem and give advice.

Nobody gets into trouble here if they are clearly trying their hardest to write clearly. Dyslexic people, non-English speakers and so on are welcome! But if U strat rightin like THIS and have lots of OMG!!! and :-)!!! in your text, you will not last long.

So yes, your piggie IS what matters. There is a wealth of information here for you to read. The search facility is particularly useful. But if you DO have a query which you would like an answer to, please try to write as well as you can. That's all that's asked of you.

Now, is that really too much to ask?! [/quote]
As posted previously, [b]please note that posting on Guinea Lynx is a privilege, not a right.[/b] Members of this site contribute to the costs of running Guinea Lynx. I (Lynx) spend untold hours of time maintaining it.

The internet is a big place. Feel free to find another forum if this site does not suit you.
Last edited by Lynx on Sat Mar 17, 2007 8:40 am, edited 8 times in total.

User avatar
Lynx
Celebrate!!!

Post   » Sat Sep 08, 2007 1:01 pm


The above post has been edited and comments excerpted from the previously unlocked and unedited thread.

Earlier comments on this thread were broken off into a separate thread.

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