... you asked me to offer specific suggestions of how to make newcomers feel more welcome ... I'm not looking for "slams or slights" except to offer you constructive suggestions of how the forum could be more welcoming. If you didn't want to hear anything more from me on the matter, then you really shouldn't have asked. My suggestion was (as I don't think it was clear in the earlier post!) that if as a community you want more constructive members of the forum maybe it would be better to gently push people in that direction, and assume that everyone is capable of changing, rather than writing off a whole section of newbies who don't meet the old guard's standards for inclusion into the community. ... now, while it's very nice of you to go and personally click the Thanks! button under every single newbie post in the newbie thread, I'm not convinced that most of the newbies who post in that thread realise you have thanked them ... it's not the most effective way of making newcomers feel welcome ... hopefully any of them posting questions in the outside world recieved polite and helpful responses, as that's more likely what they were looking for. I'm sorry, you seem to be taking all of my criticisms and suggestions personally ... honestly, I am not trying to pick at you, I am just trying to offer you constructive suggestions for making newcomers feel more welcome, as you asked. However your responses to my suggestions give me the impression you already feel that you do enough, and aren't willing to accept that I don't feel as comfortable here as you would like. I also feel like I'm being blamed for feeling the way that I feel, despite other people indicating in this thread that they've had similar feelings. As such I don't feel comfortable offering any future suggestions about making the forum a more welcoming place, so please don't ask or expect for me to continue contributing ideas to this topic.