Advise on asking questions about anything

[boscoebrea]

Think! What I mean is this: think before asking, and make it easier for people to give you a better answer by "thinking" about what you really want to know.
What air gun, what scope, what power, what, what, and what. Not a good way to ask something.
The More information someone gives,the better response or answer you will get.
If you do not know anything, you may be better off doing some homework on your own to better grasp the subject you're asking about.
Being lazy is like not aiming; how the heck are you going to hit your target if you do not take aim? Your target is to get the best information you can about what you want to know, right?

 

[thevinoman]

Using the search function is handy as well…

 

[Avator]

The less info you give about the question you are asking the the more diverse answers you will receive.. especially on an airgun forum. We airgunners span broad range of platforms, prices, quality and purposed use of airguns. I mean heck, it's not uncommon for airgunners to have differences of opinions with all the mentioned parameters exactly the same.

 

[Rondo]

I understand the frustration and respect your view.

Remember being a noob. I’m still one and I’ve always been one to research and over research. After lurking a few months and active for a handful, I still find myself looking up more and learning new terms.
I come back because others have been very helpful.
Let’s not make asking questions be stressful.

 

[Avator]

I understand the frustration and respect your view.

Remember being a noob. I’m still one and I’ve always been one to research and over research. After lurking a few months and active for a handful, I still find myself looking up more and learning new terms.
I come back because others have been very helpful.
Let’s not make asking questions be stressful.

LOL... it may be better posing the question be a bit stressful then weeding through all the unrelated answers.

 

[Ezana4CE]

Some folk are trying to respectfully qualify 10 quality posts. Every so often this topic comes up as waves of new members abound. This cycle has been and is going to continue.

 

[Motorhead]

Yup ... for some the question comes as they unknowingly sit on the precipice of a huge rabbit hole they have no idea of ... Thus, a simple question lacking a simple anwser in many such cases.

 

[Avator]

Some folk are trying to respectfully qualify 10 quality posts. Every so often this too c comes up as waves of new members abound. This cycle has been and is going to continue.

Good point.

 

[wamf]

New people may not have any idea about how broad this hobby can be and thus may ask broad questions. If you give advice to them it would be helpful if you quantified your response. They may not yet know that bell target exists or just shooting paper or about the different power sources etc. Answers need to be helpful

 

[WorriedMan]

Can't argue with thread and sympathize with OP's frustration, however, won't be surprised if a "what, what, what," question shows up soon, kind of the nature of things. Appreciate members who restrain from disparaging questioners, poor souls may be nervous enough about joining in. WM

 

[imtrigerhapy]

As myself new to pcp and i live in an area where a bb gun was always seen as a crappy $20 gun from walmart. I did not have the knowledge to ask the so called better questions. In fact on of my vague earlier posts about the .30 to .35 opened my eyes to a bullpup by a member. I would have never even looked at them as i thought they were odd looking. I appreciated all the knowledge shareed on this site and i belive that when ypu jump down newbies throats for asking simple or stupid questions it could turn them away. As the saying goes sometimes nothing said is better than mean or insulting comments. Its not hard to read a question and pass without answering.

 

[Lt.Dan]

I've found it helps me to ask a "general specific" question first. Don't laugh, for example.

Say, "I'm having a problem with my Weihrauch springer. Who should I ask?"


The general (springer) the specific (Weihrauch.)

Hopefully one of the 'experts' will follow up.

 

[plinker52]

I'm fairly new on this forum; this reminds me of doing tech support at a university. People would call in and say my computer is doing so and so, and I would have to play 20 questions with them to find out what it's really doing. They didn't even know the proper terminology to describe the problem. I learned to never take their question at face value.

Frustrating, but maybe that just comes with helping people.

 

[Ezana4CE]

I'm fairly new on this forum; this reminds me of doing tech support at a university. People would call in and say my computer is doing so and so, and I would have to play 20 questions with them to find out what it's really doing. They didn't even know the proper terminology to describe the problem. I learned to never take their question at face value.

Frustrating, but maybe that just comes with helping people.

We all have to start somewhere. I guess you don’t know what you don’t know until you talk to someone that knows, hear, or read something informative.

 

[jkingrph]

I recently asked about resealing a FWB 602, a single stroke pneumatic target rifle. Got several replies say it was easy and a link to some videos. I decided not to do so myself, because of some small springs that if lost in my carpet might be very hard to find.

 

[boscoebrea]

I know,I know, the truth is the more you learn on your own, the better you remember it.
I think I have become jaded because I had to do so much studying on my own.
I like helping people,I can help them better if I have a better idea of what they want,it is a partnership.
I stopped helping people that ask ambivalent questions, there are many others here that have the time and are " nicer" than me.
As far as getting ten posts in,I don't care; they still should take the time to post meaningful questions that can help others.
Maybe this new year has caused me to become a grumpy older man; being older is the keyword.
I also think I post too much; winter may have something to do with that or not.

 

[Vana2]

Anybody who has frequented Wikipedia appreciates the value of the "blue words" that are links to definitions and explanations required to understand the rest of the text.

When teaching IT (Information Technology) I would prefix every chapter with a list of words/terms as homework that needed to be understood for the next day's lecture. A brief "blue word" test was done and checked at the beginning of class. Initially the students hated these daily tests but quickly realized how beneficial they were.

I hear the OP, the vague questions can be frustrating. But for a newbie, it's really hard to sort through all the jargon and acronyms that we use in our discussions.

If I walked into a room and said that:
My .22/500mm Crown was shooting .375 CTC groups (5@50M), ES=7, SD3.2, @ 33 fpe with 18.13 JSBs.
Many people here would nod and say - nice! ...as a newbie my first reaction was WTF is this all about.

Guess that I'm sensitive to newbies at the moment. I'm just getting into watercolor painting ...l don't know what I don't know yet. Thank heaven for the YouTube University and endless tutorials! LOL!

I like mentoring people, it forces me to think through things that I do out of habit and don't always remember why I decided that was the best approach.

Cheers!

 

[Gerry52]

Think! What I mean is this: think before asking, and make it easier for people to give you a better answer by "thinking" about what you really want to know.
What air gun, what scope, what power, what, what, and what. Not a good way to ask something.
The More information someone gives,the better response or answer you will get.
If you do not know anything, you may be better off doing some homework on your own to better grasp the subject you're asking about.
Being lazy is like not aiming; how the heck are you going to hit your target if you do not take aim? Your target is to get the best information you can about what you want to know, right?

THANKS for posting that! Love it when people ask questions like "what's the best airgun for me?" Period! No details, no preferences, etc. What ARE these people thinking (or NOT thinking). I really want to help people out here but the ineptitude or downright laziness of others is becoming a pet peeve. I'll work on MY part of that but would like to see the posters of those types of things work on their part too! Maybe I'm old & crotchety, I'll try to repair my "crotchet"

 

[Sleestak]

what gun should I get?

 

[Avator]

what gun should I get?

All of them... just like the rest of us.