Although I enjoy building and designing website structures and templates, the vast majority of the “Get Rick Quick” and “I don’t care about facts” mindsets people convey incited me to think twice about entering this profession. The lack of knowledge in these circles is astounding. Some ignoramuses who don’t know the first thing about coding websites and designing databases think terms like dofollow and “Off Page Optimization” are legitimate. Other fools still believe Visible PageRank is an accurate measurement tool in anything. And some decide to defend these positions vigorously.

Unbelievable!

If I can take away one thing from posting on “forum debates” and elsewhere however, it’s that conversing with people that have next to no experience on website building and a lackluster understanding on simple concepts like HTML structure is an absolute time-waster.

It’s not about “agreeing with everything I say” or “using only my methods”, doing so for the sole purpose of agreeing with someone doesn’t have any logic to it. But when their views are challenged with hard evidence and facts, they choose to either make personal attacks, bury their heads in the sand and mumble “Blah, blah, blah”, or continue to follow the words of self-proclaimed experts and listen to their gospel like sheep. Seriously, it’s like debating with four year olds.

If you want the state of the industry summed up in a nutshell, heed this quote from Adam Senour (one of the few people online that I still hold a great deal of respect for):

One person starts lie that sounds good.
People believe lie that sounds good.
People promote lie that sounds good as ultimate solution.
If someone comes along and either questions lie or argues that lie is not ultimate solution, people must resort to aspect of lie that sounds most applicable to question.
If no applicable aspect of lie can be found, resort to randomly-selected training-binderesque aspect of lie that has nothing to do with actual problem in attempt to confuse.

In other words, lie, and when called out, create intentionally vague environment.

So the bottom-line here is basically, it’s pointless trying to educate people that refuse to listen or want to be helped. I’ll still continue my WordPress business I started a few months back, and I’ll be happy to answer genuine newbie questions on my forums. However when it comes to forum discussions or other forms of debates on Web Development tactics, SEO, or whatever else, I’m done trying to otherwise “help”. I’m tired of explaining things in a vacuum.

(UPDATE 12/16/2009 = due to some legal technicalities, I changed the domain and revamped my business site.)

Engipress is my professional output for anything and everything related to WordPress. I designed the WordPress Theme, designed the vBulletin forum skin, and I even went out of my way to find great mods to enhance the forum posting experience, all done by myself (to assist in showcasing my skills).

The designs are intertwined to give a great overall similar feel for the new website structure (The vBulletin forum sits atop the WP Theme forum), so the forum doesn’t impair the blog’s CSS layout or font stylings.

Perhaps the main attraction of this new website for me will be to contract freelance website work for those using WordPress as either a Blog or Content Management System. Just visit my hire page to see what services I offer. I’m very flexible with the pricing as I realize different people will require different needs for what they want to accomplish.

Also as a FYI, any posts relating to WordPress or blogging will probably be made on my Engipress Blog from now on. This doesn’t mean I’ll be neglecting Lightning Shock, it just represents the fact that my personal website will be shifting directions in a sense.

I feel I’m doing everyone a favor by providing this great resource to anyone who uses wordpress or plans to.

If you haven’t noticed, blogs and other community-oriented websites (this one being a fringe example) become bombarded with this form of ignorance every single day. On average, I’ll read about ten to fifteen topics a day from clueless people that more or less destroy the IQ of whomever is viewing their messages.

If you’re going to make a post on a forum somewhere, or especially if you’re going to write a comment on this website, adhere to the following tips precisely!

Do Proper Research First

One of the most common forms of online amentia is the dumbass question asker:

Hi Frnds! What is the best way to become popular?

What is a backlink? Can u plz advise me 2 get site in top 10 of Google?

If you’re going to log on to a website and start creating topics that ask very basic questions that a monkey could string together, don’t even bother. Find something more productive to do with your time, like re-reading your third grade text books.

What should you do if you’re in the group that has to put up with this crap? Direct these lazy ass bums to a tool that they can actually use to find an answer (and quit wasting everyone else’s time), a reliable Search Engine!

Titles are Everything

Every now and then I’ll see a subject heading somewhere along the lines of:

Is this Possible in any form?

How to do this?

HELP! I don’t know what to do!

Question: What do all these titles have in common? Answer: They’re stupid and provide as little information as possible!

Do you really think we know what you mean when you ask something like “What is wrong with my webpage?”? Sure, you and those closest to you may be able to decipher the general question, but for those of us that don’t have telepathic powers, do us a favor and either A) specifically tell us what the problem is; or B) shut the fuck up.

Bottom line? Write a descriptive title that intelligent people can actually interpret and return information to you as quickly as possible. You think I enjoy playing Twenty Questions with you? I’m not going to waste my time, I’ve got better things to do.

Don’t Use Fancy Styling

If you’re one of those dipshits whom likes to post in different fonts, colors, and sizes, you will only succeed at one thing, pissing me off. Save the blue, tiny, Italian style micro-fonts for your traffic-less, diary blog that no one reads, not everyone has binocular vision.

The worst of these offenders is probably the semi right-wing Bible-quoter. (And I use the term “semi” in the context that the idiot can’t make up his mind on what the hell he’s talking about, however the same could be said about all politically minded individuals.) These verse-hounding loonies love to preach on and on about ‘God loves you, 8:16′ and ‘Matthew 2:14 says something else’ and other extreme, random Christian bullshit, even when the topic has nothing to do with religion. If you just happen to fall under the category of “Bible Bitch”, do the world a favor and seal away your thoughts tighter than a peanut butter jar at a squirrel convention.

Don’t Quote Wikipedia as a Primary Source of Information

Every once in a while I’ll stumble across the odd post where some asshole decides he’ll be clever and rely upon the fountain of misinformation that is Prickipedia for proper fact-checking. All I can do is laugh in their face and give them a swift kick in the ass towards the right direction.

How people can trust a source that is editable by ANYONE is beyond logical comprehension. Someone once wrote that Joesph Stalin actually went through a “homosexual experimentation stage” in college and that the Earth’s Moon was composed entirely of cheese (I wish I were making this stuff up). The ridiculousness doesn’t stop there however, the encyclopedia (I use that term loosely) currently contains pointless articles such as Nazi UFOs and Whale Explosions. Unbelievable.

Write using a clear, proper, and concise approach

Hey DUDE!

Hv U herd the newz??? Do U thnk dey shud hv du dat? lol @ y this iz happinin. i h8 those fagz,dat tink their rulin of the wurld!!! How mny of dem bitchz,like to suk dik? Srsly, wut u thin shud be dun bout dis mess, Ya no???

i’m from China
i wnt to make friends wiv u
thank you
my msn:imamoron@aol.com

You wouldn’t believe how many messages and emails I’ve seen that follow this line of syntax. If the grammar and capitalization mistakes don’t scare you, the misspellings and lack of vowels certainly will.

The Mount Everest of the world that is Instant Messaging Crap, is without a doubt spelling the word “You” as “U” (not to be confused with equally inane “your / you’re” mistakes). If you’re too much of a lazy ass dolt that making TWO EXTRA KEYSTROKES places extensive strain on your fingers, then you probably shouldn’t be using a computer at all! Sell the machine before it gives you a brain aneurysm.

I don’t even bother with many of the comments I read here on THIS website. I grow tired of pissing away time attempting to decrypt the ‘txt spk’ contained within every other message I have the misfortune of viewing.

These are the same sorts of people that type in all caps, write huge blobs of text (break up that paragraph for readability reasons, fool), and can’t even be bothered to properly punctuate a paragraph. Maybe you should have actually paid attention during English class instead of yammering on with your classmates about who’s going out with whom, and whom got laid last night, bitch.

Seriously, do you people even consider what you’ve typed into the textarea before clicking that “Add Comment” button?

Don’t Copy and Paste

If you actually gave two-shits about the place you were posting to, you wouldn’t spam them with duplicate articles and misinformation.

Don’t act like a Crybaby Loser

If someone doesn’t reply to your inquiry, it’s not that we think you’re an idiot (well, that’s an entirely different matter), but members might not know the answer you’re seeking right away, not everyone is a walking encyclopedia of problem solving.

The odds of you screwing up and STILL making one of these mistakes are roughly about ten thousand to one, so here’s the steps you should take:

1. Get Over It.

If you don’t enjoy the replies you get on a certain site, or you’ve got tough issues you absolutely must hammer out and debate on, you can always find somewhere else to hang out. If that option doesn’t do it for you, don’t forget you can always feel free to get bent.

My Project

Basically I’m building my own Content Management System from scratch. I’m really just beginning to get into the goodness of PHP and MySQL, and the functions they offer, what goes where, etc. I’ve rarely used either besides administering my blog and the conspiracy forums, so I barely had any knowledge of either language directly beforehand.

Why?

Just for fun. I think I’d be good at creating something useful for people. Although from a technical standpoint, I’m making it solely for my own needs, but others may use it too if they wish.

I’m going to do everything for the CMS, program it, design it, manage it, etc. I’ll probably make an announcement when it’s completed, but it’s nothing big or anything, just for people to know about it, if they want to see it, give feedback, or whatever. It’ll probably take months to complete too, given I’m new to most of the concepts I’ll be using.

So, yeah, if I’m not around on the forums as much, or pertaining to blog updates, that’s what I’ve been working on (in addition to my internship that is, which is unrelated).

Even as I’m writing this, I can’t believe there’s people that STILL don’t get it. And it’s somewhat shocking to a degree that I have to come up with a whole other blog post to describe it to them.

News Flash = It’s filed under SATIRE

I’m writing this blog post to explain to those that think I was absolutely serious in every single point I make and to open up the floor for those who want to ask me something about why I wrote the list. And I’m writing this because it would seem as though some people don’t even bother to read the comments anymore (Hint: check comment 26 over there).

Here are the rules for this Debate:

• No Insults. This is a serious discussion.
• Replies with comments like “Your blog Sux, DP RULEZ!!!!” and “You know nuthin bout SEO” will be removed!
• If you can’t tell the difference between one of the “Serious” Points and one of the “Silly” Points, don’t comment. I don’t need idiots filling up my question slots.
• No Duplicate Comments, read through the others first if you do not want to have your response deleted.
• So make sure to read everything, the list, the list’s comments, this post, and this post’s comments (even the DP threads, if you wish, although they don’t pertain to this discussion specifically), before commenting.

So if you have anything you want to ask, either about my reasons why I wrote about it, or the blog post itself, you can ask here.

On a final note, alternatively, if you’re feeling really brave, you can ask about everything over at ihelpyou, more specifically about DP here, and increase your knowledge base extensively.

Don’t you ever get tired of not knowing the answer to something? Or looking for something on the web, but come up on the short end of the stick?

For example, some couldn’t think of the name of a song, so do they do hours and hours of lyric searches, radio listens, among a variety of other activities that will get them nowhere.

So what’s the answer? Join a discussion forum.

I’ll do my best here to explain how to use a discussion forum properly and what is involved with them exactly.

What Forums are For…

This is why online communities exist, for people with similar minded interests to gather and talk about topics that intrigue them.

There are many knowledgeable experts in any given field, who would be happy to offer you there wisdom. The odds are great that if you join the right place, someone will know the answer to what information you are looking for.

Many forums are free to join too, only a few specific ones require you to pay to participate (although I’m not a member of any).

Types of Forums

There is literally a forum for everything, ranging from conspiracies to music to even a niche as specific as a Halo 3 community.

Just do a Google search on the topic and add “Forum” to the end of your query or something. You should find whatever community you are seeking this way.

Seek a community based on what your looking for. If your trying to figure out how to cultivate your farm crops, you probably won’t find the answers you’re looking for on a mobile phone forum.

What Forums Run on…

There are many different pieces of software out there that discussion boards run on: Comparison of Internet Forum Software

Personally, the only type of forum based software I can stand is vBulletin. They have the best options available and they use the cleanest design I know of. All other ones just don’t measure up, from a design and usability standpoint, that is.

But in no way does this mean that those other forums are not useful or have intelligent and knowledgeable members, it’s really up to you on which community you’d prefer to join.

How to Ask

Believe it or not, some people have no clue how to use forums, and that’s OK. My family didn’t understand how they operate, what they involved exactly, among other things, so I taught them about how it is structured and what you can do with them for a small fee (Alright, I’m just joking about that “fee” part ).

The typical discussion board will require a certain amount of steps before you are eligible to participate:

• First you have to register. It usually takes only a few minutes to fill out the required fields and receive a welcome email from an administrator.
• Find the right place to ask your question. Most boards have many different sub-forums, so make sure you post your thread in the right place.
• Also remember that you may not receive an answer right away. Some members may be busy or just not know the answer, and they’ll leave it for other members to look at. So be patient.

Some Forum Lingo

Next you’ll want to know about the different terminology involved when asking questions. These are just the basics, which are required in order to understand how it works.

Post = States what you want to say. It is basically a form used to communicate with other members of the forum, raise points, quote others, etc.

Thread = A series of posts, you’ll start one of these to ask your question.

Reply = Just a response to the first (or last) post in a thread.

Quote = A response to a particular portion of the thread, it could be other replies, a specific thing another member says, etc.

How to Behave

You’ll want to keep in mind that once you join a forum, you can’t just do anything you please. Forums have rules, and not all are the same.

Many places basically are anti-spam, anti cross-posting, and anti-flaming. Spamming is basically creating posts that serve no purpose or just for the self-promotional reasons. Cross-Posting just involves asking the same question or giving the exact same response in multiple areas of the forum. Flaming means just insulting other members and their viewpoints. Don’t do it.

Some Forums I Use…

The following are the primary forums I use. I have the same username at the first two, jamestl2.

Webmaster-Talk

This is where I go to learn about web design, internet marketing, blogging, among many other web-based topics. The web is an ever-changing place,

It’s the primary place where I hang out. Plus my main fields I’m studying are blogging and information technology, so it’s only natural I’d want to join the best webmaster community on the net.

Steve Pavlina Forums

This forum is packed with a bunch of friendly people who are interested in personal development and increasing their own levels of growth.

I’m there also to assist others out with their web issues they may have. Plus it’s a great place to seek relationship advice, manifesting your intentions, and achieving a sense of personal enlightenment.

Conspiracy-Forums

Of course I had to include the forums which I own and operate. By no means am I saying I accept everything that I learn, or that “Big Brother” is behind everything that is wrong with the world. But I feel it is a perfect niche for my one of my favorite interests, and so far some of the smartest and nicest people have joined.

I’m currently the administrator of the conspiracy forums, so feel free to drop by sometime.

Other Reasons to Use Forums…

Not only is there tons of knowledge to be gained, they can be fun to use. Most forums have a general discussion area where you can play games, have debates, and learn about your fellow members’ personalities.

Also along the lines of learning about and socializing with others, you can also network with them this way. When you build up a positive reputation and contribute your knowledge on a discussion board, others will want to know what you have to say. This can lead to website traffic, blog interaction, and even in the seldom case, sales and conversions.

Last Thoughts

Discussion Forums can be fun to use, and they’re a valuable resource. Most people on them are friendly and know their stuff. So don’t feel dumb if you don’t know the answer to something that’s been bugging you, as we’ve all been there.

Who knows maybe one day you’ll be able to help others out, that were previously in a similar situation as yours. Or maybe you are already an expert in a demanding field, where others could benefit from the wisdom you have to offer them.

So in conclusion, I highly recommend you take advantage of them!

To help potential “Page traders” understand what these are, I’ve drawn a few diagrams for illustration:

This is what is what it’s suppose to be like. But there’s always idiots and schemers out there that can’t create decent enough material themselves.

In my opinion, if you literally have to ask others to “Digg” your article, or “stumble” across a few pages from your site, then it is not worthy of the so-called rank, or whatever SEO Experts, PageRankers, etc. are seeking. What’s so hard to understand about that?

1. It’s Spammer infested
2. They think Google’s Toolbar PageRank is important (which it’s not)
3. They think submitting to Web Directories is important
4. They think Reciprocal Link Building is important
5. They think Article Submissions are important
6. They think Press Releases are important
7. They think submitting via Social Bookmarks is important
8. They actually applaud participation in Link Programs
9. No creative Forum Icons
10. They think “Google is Evil”
11. They promote splogs
12. They promote Espionage
13. They promote Link Scheming
14. They promote Blackhat SEO techniques
15. They promote Stumble Exchanges
16. They promote Digg Exchanges
17. They promote Clickbank Posts
18. It sits on a sub-domain
19. It’s too big
20. Members have tried to sell their accounts
21. Trying to filter all the good posts from the bad posts is like finding a needle in a haystack
22. They actually have an “Interesting Junk” dropdown menu in their forum toolbar (Under “Fun Stuff”)
23. Reputation is disabled in the “Members List”
24. For DP: Quantity > Quality
25. Their “Greenish” Color Scheme reminds me of Vomit
26. Their Link Exchange / Sales Forums have over 460,000 posts
27. They banned Alexander the Great
28. They have an entire forum devoted to Keyword Tracking
29. The Administrators don’t care about the quality of the forums
30. The Moderators don’t care about the quality of the forums
31. They hire paid forum posters
32. Just look at some of Nintendo’s Pictures
33. They ban members for silly reasons (like thread bumping)
34. They got banned from Stumble Upon
35. There’s a”Politics and Religion” sub-forum, it’s suppose to be a webmaster forum
36. Everything is about links, links, and more links to them
37. Insults seem to be tolerated (like here)
38. Just looking at the site hurts my eyes
39. Threads often go off-topic
40. Don’t Piss off Crazy_Rob, he’ll ban you
41. They actually have a “Personal Attacks” Sticky, as if insults weren’t obviously bad.
42. Copy and Pasted Articles flourish
43. Too many self-promo threads
44. Too many link-drop threads
45. Some members are arrogant, and believe competing communities are jealous.
46. They condescend towards Doug Heil as if his IHY community is second-rate
47. Lots of cell phone spam
48. They overvalue “Article Marketing”
49. Many new webmasters get sucked into their logic
50. Profanity filter is turned off
51. Their logo’s odd
52. You can’t even make out what’s underneath their logo (it looks something like a barcode)
53. All their “Google” Stickies relate to PR
54. People who generally try to help others out go relatively unnoticed
55. Their membergroups are insulting (Peon, Grunt, etc.)
56. They have over 500 self-proclaimed “SEO Experts“
57. The forums look nothing like the main site
58. Their forum design is uninspiring
59. They don’t care who they ban, even high-ranking contributing members
60. HTML isn’t a sub-forum of programming, like the rest of the web languages
61. There is no moderation accountability
62. There is barely any reputation accountability
63. They actually have a marketplace for website traffic, as if having something to unique to offer your visitors isn’t enough
64. Sorting through the filth gives me a headache
65. Members get super freaked out when DP goes offline
66. The guy who wrote the Reputation FAQ is banned
67. “Who’s Online” options are severely limited
68. The forum’s “Get-rich-quick” logic undermines the purpose of the web and internet
69. Some actually try to sell blackhat methods to newbies
70. It gives off a “Creepy, Slyish” vibe
71. Definitely not enough moderation for a board their size
72. They don’t welcome new members well (usually you get a welcome PM from an admin, but not from DP)
73. They are arrogant enough to have their own “DPified” Google FAQ
74. Allowing users to switch between vBulletin styles makes the site look unprofessional
75. Many threads aren’t even posted in the right forums
76. They have no Design & Development stickies. Wouldn’t some coding resources be useful for creating a “good” website?
77. They have a “Legal Issues” forum, anyone else detect the oxymoron?
78. The site’s owner (Shawn) isn’t even active much on the forum, (I doubt he even has that much influence anymore)
79. Popular ≠ Valuable
80. Absolutely no forum for “Site News and Updates” can be found
81. There’s no specific DP copyright info for the forums (it should be at the bottom, near the vB copyright info)
82. It’s server is often slow
83. Limited selection of “Digital Point Solutions Tools”
84. “Forum Jump”, for the most part, is *pointless*
85. Everything’s about money over there (with entire forums dedicated to affiliate programs and PPC advertising, not to mention the 2,000,000+ posts in the DP marketplace)
86. They have two seperate sub-forums for Google Adwords
87. Whitehat SEO is virtually nonexistent
88. Web hosting is also virtually nonexistent
89. Read this post
90. Or read this post
91. Many members’ signature links are filled with pointless links with anchor text such as “PR4 Link Exchange” or “Hot Thai Girls”, etc.
92. Their Directory forum is underneath the “Search Engine” Category, do they even know what a Directory is?
93. No web marketing advice for long term site stability
94. For allowing usernames like FuckingPirate and Shittywall to exist
95. They tend to be hypocritical (they don’t mind manipulating sites like Digg and Stumbleupon, but when it comes to Ethical Legal Issues, there’s nothing pertaining to internet marketing)
96. Their spammy ideas and link schemes sometimes spill over into other forums
97. Difficult to understand the site name, and how it relates to the web
98. The community doesn’t collectively care about long-term website worthiness
99. Did I mention it’s a spammer heaven yet?
100. A community containing that much filth isn’t worthy of all the backlinks gained from this blog post

I could probably have come up with more, but I’m too tired to think right now.

(UPDATE 4/20/2008 = I’ve opened up a new blog post about this list over here, so all questions and comments should be directed there.)