Not sure I should be posting this, as I'm about to cancel my (delayed again) pre-order. so I really shouldn't care what happens here. But I do, and I've been reflecting.

Even in the short time I've been here, I've noticed a change in the ethos of the forum. There's a higher proportion of posts I understand - and one or two of them are less than contributory.

I fear this is inevitable. Some of you might wish that t.m.o could go on just being a quiet corner for developers only, where everyone speaks the same language. There were disagreements, sure, but they tended to be technical or about specifications and the like. Or the karma system.

Now the reality is that a whole bunch of us non-techs have shown up, and we've changed the place. Some of us have (hopefully) brought something useful if not technical to the forum. Others have brought things that seem to fit less well.

I don't think t.m.o. was expecting this - or at least, I don't get the impression you were prepared. The fact that you are the first place that shows up on google may be great, but it means you will also attract less desirable posters. Even eventually, dare I whisper it, trolls who have no interest in maemo.

Right now, what we have is a whole bunch of people who're interested in the subject, but very frustrated at the repeated delays and date changes. They want to talk maemo, but they don't have a device to play with. Which probably increases the tendency to talk off topic.

The question is, how to respond. I don't think the 'fun stuff' is a problem (and I doubt you can make it go away completely even if you wanted) but I do think it needs to be kept in its place.

Fluff threads belong in Off Topic. A bit more rigor in moving or merging them wouldn't hurt. Less serious threads which become serious also may need moving: though that's been pretty efficient, I think.

Non-fluff threads need to be kept non-fluff, at least until they've fulfilled their purpose. A bit more nudging onto topic by all concerned would also help. (Once a serious question has been asked and answered, it matter less if the thread attracts spam). It is also possible in vBulletin to extract posts from one thread and put them into another. That can be useful for pulling unhelpful stuff out of a serious thread and into a fluff dump. Somehow, we need to make sure that those of us who are not developers have somewhere we can operate, share, ask questions and contribute without causing nuisance to those who are.

Finally, a word about karma and thanks: is it possible to rescind someone's ability to thank? Because that might be a useful abilty. With 'thanks' actually counting for something, you might also look at your tools for ensuring no-one is registering several accounts and going round thanking themselves. (Yes, I know the limitations of I.P. blocking.... but you could rule 'no giving thanks from a proxy', for example)

I suspect that the suggestion of removing the Off Topic threads from the sidebar was related to this concern about the 'noise', though it might also have come from the removal (since my arrival) of the 'profanity filter', resulting in profanity in the side bar, where it can't be avoided and doesn't look good to newcomers. Other places I have worked/played have ruled simply "No profanity in thread titles" and admins have edited accordingly. VBulletin also has an extremely complex infraction system, should you choose to use it.

Not sure what else to suggest. I should probably start a 'brainstorm' about this - but to be honest I still lack confidence in that facility!

I registered 2006. We had quite a few changes to the culture and tone in this forum. I don't like what's going on here right now either, but my reasons are different. In fact, they're the exact opposite of some of your points. I feel there's too many people atm who run around in uniforms, yelling and whistling and telling people to step off the lawn. (My rant about this is elswhere and not worth searching for.)

i'm and old man and my memory may play tricks on me, but this was a more fun and relaxed place years ago.

Now you are concerned about the signal:noise ratio and suggest even "a bit more rigor in moving or merging", which is what I've had enough of. - Maybe then what they're doing right now is the perfect balance to keep both of us happy?

About karma and thanks: karma is highly overrated. It's nothing new, it was established years ago and it needs a little tweaking every now and then, but overall, it works fine and means little. Now that for the first time (IIRC) karma can equal real money (=discount), everybody gets obsessed with it. This is good in a way, because in makes some members finally link their profiles or register at maemo.org at all, but in the end.... It's just a number. The algorithm to calculate it can change, give more or less weight to "Thanks", who knows? Thanks in this forum should not be restricted because of karma considerations. If anythying, karma calculations could be changed on how thanks are being handled in practice.

And finally: Ordering an N900 isn't a requirement for being active in this forum. Stay. We'd miss you. You make me think of my holidays in Cornwall...

Thanks for the response.

I take your point about moderation. My experience suggests that moderation tends to happen reactively when a community changes, and rules are found to be necessary. If one is not careful, the board rule-book can look worse than the EU constitution, when all it really needs to say is 'post with common sense'.

My concern was not with my experience, so much as a feeling I get in several places that some long time users are a bit hacked off at all us newbies. I'd hate to see this place become somewhere that you had to be a developer to belong.

Again with karma - I don't expect as a non-developer that I shall ever get into the 'discount' category, but I have seen long-time users grouch at the fact that people are being thanked for 'pointless' posts. Which since they've spent a long time building up credit with hard work is entirely understandable.

I also do suspect that the next few weeks may well attract even more problems as people twiddle their thumbs (instead of doing a twirly-zoom) waiting for thir devices.

And finally, thanks. I like it here. The community is one of the major reasons for telling myself to wait in patience and not buy something else (along with the resistive screen, carl zeiss lens and sheer... differentness of the n900). Cornwall is good for holidays. Though not in November.

Cornwall in November? Ouch. Probably almost as bad as Finland.
I used to be in Carbis Bay near St. Ives. That was July/August, though.

I see t.m.o as a place for interested end users. It does have a high number of developers compared to any average user forum, but they do their dirty talking on the mailing list usually. t.m.o. is just a place where they talk to users. Maybe we'll see other, even more end user related places in the future.

About karma again: Don't forget karma measures community involvement, not your skills at a developer. You can easily collect more karma by writing wiki articles, blogging and filing bugs than a developer who writes brilliant code, but otherwise stays away from maemo.org. That's the purpose of karma: involvement. Not coding. Recieving thanks is an indicator for involvement. You can be thanked for pointless posts, yes, but you can also write nonsensical articles in the wiki or publish useless applications. - In the end, very few people do, and you can't make the karma calculator understand what it counts.

If for some future purpose you would need to measure the amount of development work somebody contributed, you wouldn't use karma for that in the first place. You'd simply count the apps he uploaded and the garage projects he's active in. So again, no reason to change the "thanks".

Interesting point about 'not being a developer' - Planet Maemo blog aggregation specifically says "Writers specializing on end user topics are only accepted exceptionally: maemo.org is for developers and power users." (Hence my blog reflection on the newbie's experience doesn't qualify - which neither surprises nor concerns me). And yeah, my contribution to wiki so far has been literally more questions than answers. But I still see people very unhappy with 'thanks' going to fluffly posts.

T.m.o. is rather different, though. But I think some of the developers wish we weren't here - or at least there were fewer of us. The prospect of more end-users doesn't appeal. I think my aim with the thread was about addressing that a little more pro-actively: there are already skirmishes breaking out over how people behave and what content they post.

(And no, I don't want to read the dirty talk on the mailing list. I prefer my dirty talk to be on topics I understand. )

Leaving so soon? Come on, wait until Christmas, at least!

Well, it is Internet. Trolls, mental patients, and idiots have long been significant part of it. The best way to deal with them, as far as I am concerned, is first by trying to convert them to relative sanity, and, if that does not work, by repeatedly dipping them in tar and feathers until they exit the stage. Notice that moderation is not involved in any of these solutions, although I am all for selective banning of people on technical grounds (flood, threats, etc).

That blurb on blog aggregation should be removed, IMO. There are a lot of non-developer oriented blogs on the Planet nowadays. If you feel your blog has something to contribute to our community, I encourage you to get it aggregated.

if this is the impression you get, it should be addressed. - get a different one!

no, seriously, that should never happen on tmo. whenever you see this kind of behaviour, tell the developer on the other end of the line that this isn't what you expected. it may well be that he or she isn't even aware of the issue.

i have to say that personally, i never felt the devs didn't want me here. quite on the contrary, most of them are very nice when explaining problems and reacting to feedback. but this may of course depend on the threads and topics that attract your attention. tmo is quite a big place. there may well be different cultures here meanwhile, depending on which kind of content you follow.

Oh, I don't feel the devs don't want me here! They've all been polite and welcoming in every situation. More a sort of 'not too many non-devs, please' feeling. Hence the concept of 'ratio'.

@Kathy: it's also a time of changes. I remember similar issues when major OS version (chinook, diablo) were released, and also when the n800 and n810 were out.

Give the new device in the hand of all of us geeky children, and we'll stay quiet toying with it for some time and posting useful things like hacks, ports and bug reports for everybody's pleasure.
In December, or in January 2010, these forums will turn into a nice place again

@Benny: I also remind a time of much greater militarization of these forums, at the point that one could be intimidated for merely posting a question, in case the answer was to be found embedded in a 20-pages thread with different words. Now, for heaven's sake, this Efrafa is over