Saturday, February 8, 2014
Why Forums Aren't Your Friends
I briefly mentioned forums (such as Supramania, Supraforums, or TS.info) as an online resource in my previous post, and often-times, they are! For the complete freshman mechanic, however, they're not. There are several reasons why: for one, in order to actually access the full content, you must first register to be a member of each form; secondly, there's a waiting period before you can post and ask questions--which is hardly beneficial for someone who needs an answer immediately; and thirdly, most of the people on the forums are actually quite rude. For example, I was perusing Supramania the other day, and a freshman mechanic posted a question on changing the alternator, given that there were no guides that he could find. Almost immediately, forum members began posting replies like "if you need to ask questions like that, you shouldn't be working on a car," or, "how dumb are you?" etc etc. With this blog, I seek to remedy the ills of online resources by posting step-by-step guides, complete with pictures and full explanations, but without any of the attitude.
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1. I really liked how well you put the forums into perspective. For tools that are supposed to be helpful, these seem like they can actually be somewhat of a hinderance to novices.
ReplyDelete2. I think you could add some places where people can go to find helpful advice if the forums aren't helpful.
3. I think any automechanic website or links to youtube videos related to some of these easier fixes would be beneficial for people reading this blog who are looking for help.