The first result that comes up on anything related to the profile picture is log out and in.
I feel something should be done either to make users aware of how to update their profile pic, or some more extreme moderation action against repeating posts when there is already a high volume or existing people with the same issue.
I think the best thing to do is just deal with it.
Engineering effort is likely required to do anything to explain how this works in a non-hideous way, and this doesn’t seem important enough to warrant that, it also seems incredibly out of place. Adding a punishment or moderating harsher will not translate into people magically learning to search instead, because people making these topics already have a faster mind to “just post about it” than to try googling or searching for it; they’re already likely new to the forum and wouldn’t have heard that posting these topics is bad, they’ll just do what they’re inclined to do already: post.
Maybe eventually we’ll build up enough of them that the " Your topic is similar to…" section in the composer will catch them? We do usually lock them when they appear so they don’t run away with dozens of redundant replies but still show up in this section.
Im pretty sure in the new user tutorial part of it involves using the search bar? And while it has been suggested before I feel making that tutorial compulsory to complete in order to post would greatly reduce the issue in a non hostile way.
Wouldn’t it then be more justifiable to add a punishment since they would have no excuse for not knowing how to use the search bar, and it could prevent something similar happening from them again in the future.
As my science teacher says, a bird lands once an an electricity cable, burns its feet and never does it again, ive always found I follow this sort of mindset and I feel most people do in general .
We need to be a little bit careful around this. Punishing harshly for posting duplicate topics discourages people from posting at all; some people may not be able to find the dupe using search so they’d rather not risk posting, or they may not fully understand why they’re getting in trouble even if it’s explained to them (e.g. language barrier, too young to fully understand, etc.). Since the forum is meant as a community resource, this seems counter-productive. I wouldn’t put it off the table entirely, but we need to be cautious doing things like this.
Mhm, this is why I put an emphasis on the post the title is referring, since there is literally no excuse when the only thing the search bar tosses up is exactly the same topic, obviously if there is only a few posts / old posts surrounding the issue then the mistake is entirely reasonable and plausible and no moderation action should take place.
Ok, thats a valid point. Still if they are fluent enough to write the post on the topic id imagine they are fluent enough to read the ‘similar’ posts section / use the search bar.
I believe (although ive been told like 10 different things from 10 different people) the forum is 13+ which is imagine is an acceptable age to be expected to understand to read similar posts / use the search bar.
Also, right now the current system is just the post being unlisted and locked, I feel a feedback message is a more appropriate solution to the problem.
What I meant by “not being able to find the dupe” is that sometimes people (especially non-native English speakers) will have different words for things and may not know alternatives to look up (e.g. profile picture, avatar, image, photo).
Unfortunately failing to even look at the “Your topic is similar to…” section while writing your topic is hilariously common. The average forum user just reflexively closes it because they need to see the preview pane. Sometimes it doesn’t show anything useful either, or one useful result is at the very bottom.
Unfortunately not true. People mature at wildly varying rates.
Bear in mind I’m referring to what appears to be the average forum user (and there are a lot of them). Because of this, punishing people harshly for posting dupes will discourage a lot of people from posting at all. I would personally rather stick to locking dupes and telling them not to do that.
Also, we leave feedback in the lock/unlist message most of the time, or else a reply.
I still feel a message, similar to when your post is taken down from flagging is a lot more visible, especially given the text when you get a post taken down can be hard to find / see.
Also it amuses me that I found an entirely different issue for users not even reading any of the post content before replying
Look like you are finding same problem as me but not anymore!!
because i update my profile pic and it did not upload but after few days it updated so i do it again and in my opinion it take 1 or 2 days to update pic or stats etc…
So in my opinion you must wait after you update your pic or anything and just wait like 2 days if it did not work then tell me or message to @developerTeam i wish you don’t pass this problem never again!!
@YouFoundLev Thats what I told him but he said this: Thank you for being polite in your responses, and please don’t take this as aggressive, but I do recommend you read posts before you reply.
@bhanking I was just trying to help, as I imagine you were! I imagine you read the post as well, I was just replying to someone who was saying it takes a while to update when there is an easier method.
I agree that the moderation team should take more aggressive action against duplicate posts, but I think another solution would be for staff to create a topic that gets pinned like the category guidelines that will include links to topics that answer commonly asked questions, such as this. Speaking from experience of advocating for harsher consequences or revoking privileges entirely in some categories, staff and volunteers do not want to take on anymore work than they already have, and also don’t want to expand their teams any larger than they currently are. So, let’s just create a “dumping ground” of information for commonly asked questions in all the categories, pin them to the top of a categories topics, and then refer anyone who asks to that thread. Then there truly is no excuse for them not knowing, because it’s right at the top of the category.
I imagine you read the post as well, I was just replying to someone who was saying it takes a while to update when there is an easier method.