Now allstone I hate to beat you up over this one but you really do provide a great counterexample.

viewtopic.php?f=72&t=16422

Allstone here has some 1700 posts; by your metric a "noob" should by all rights pay attention to what he says. But what if what he says is completely and incredibly wrong? (which it was). What if someone else, say some "newbie" like Dauss came in (with only 500 posts) and said Allstone was dumb. If post count is the scale you measure by, Allstone would have been correct and complete dumb would have ensued.

More counterexamples exist, but that one really paints the picture; post count is not a measurement of post quality, and, let's be honest, the vast majority of posts made by noobs are answered within three posts by the same people virtually all of the time. There's no confusion over group consensus because the vast majority of the time the only people offering advice are the people motivated enough to know the right answer.

Alright, I see what you're saying. And I'm going to shut up in this thread now too. But two final points. I just think that it wouldn't be a travesty if we reintroduced them, since there was no clear reason for taking them away. Second, in my opinion, there is no real difference between 500 and 1700 posts. Anyone past say 150 should no longer be considered a noob. But even then, if said person has less than 150 posts, you can fall back on join date and make an informed decision.

Serious post.

I've lurked here for a while and can get some sense of the dynamics here and some of the trustworthiness. However, this is something you must gain over time. Yes a "noob" can post good posts and a veteran can post some incredibly wrong ones. Yes, the metrics would not support this very well. There are instances where postcounts clearly CAN indicate trustworthiness and ones that clearly it does not. So, yes can be a useless statistic. A noob must eventually gain his own sense of who's trustworthy or not. However, it's quite a pain I assure you to look at everyones profile just to get a "ballpark estimate" of trustworthiness. If a noob came in that was like me, he'd be clicking on everyone's profile for every response for a month. I don't get people straight, what can i say?

The biggest issue I have with this is not that they've taken a convenient, unobtrusive feature away, but there's no opt in. Seriously? Just the vanilla forum, no post count at the side, no join date. Maybe I liked to laugh at the ridiculous locations people were in every now and then.

How are you beating me up over it? Your mere mention of the even does not constitute beating me up over it.
Also, more examples:
Zergling are like worms
A crab with a gun that can see an enemy won't fire
Humans aren't affected by pheromones.
You can flip dropships without ill effect. You can't flip rockets without them exploding.
There is an ACraft class.

So yeah, new people will quickly make their judgements as to who is and who is not trustworthy on their own, regardless of post count. If they hold information such as post count and/or join date in high esteem then they will actively seek it out, something they are still able to do. A sufficient amount of lurking is enough to form accurate opinions of members, regardless of whether or not this information is displayed on every post. Using myself as an example again, most people here would know that I don't actually know that much due to exchanges such as the ones above and various instances where I lampoon the fact. Most people would further know that TLB, Grif, Abdul, Mail, as well as numerous others are good at Lua and, as such are to be trusted in their knowledge of it. The same goes for almost every other part of the forum. Knowledge of post counts and join dates can not possibly replace knowledge gained by observation of members.
However, stopping due to the danger of falling into the point I will now describe, we're all talking as if these details have been completely removed. They have not. They have been restricted to the profile page.
If a user has a notably high post count then you will remember them. If a user has a notably low post count you will know because you don't know them.
If a user has been here longer than you, you will probably remember them. If a user is new you will know because you don't know them.
What I am trying to say is that people don't need this information displayed every post and that is the only place these things have been removed from.

Jeez, I'm offline for a full 24 hours and I miss all the fun.
This thread is hilarious. Seriously, everyone go through and read it again. It's like a huge ♥♥♥♥ of whining, sprinkled with rage and insight, starting from page 4.
You guys need to chill more. Suggest, comment, give feedback!
This sums up my thoughts pretty well:
The forum is changing. Transition isnt always never suits everyone. Harden up a little.

Now you know how I feel. I'm always about ten hours too late due to time zones.
So anyways,They already did that. It's just that an unreasonably large proportion of it was acting as if something important was completely removed or otherwise made utterly inaccessible.
Also,I still don't see why this would be such an issue. The numbers are still there and only mildly less accessible. If this is the reaction for something so minor, then a little isn't going to be nearly enough.
I just thought of something though, and it's not evidenced or anything similar, but perhaps some of us might still be apprehensive or unwilling to accept weasel as an authority and hence opposed to changes by him full stop...
Though, as I said, I haven't actually noticed any real evidence of it, so don't mind me.

Uh, I live in GMT+12, currently in GMT+10.
It shouldn't be. The forum is just unused to change/a bunch of sooks.

Oh, right, you live in New Zealand normally, don't you? So that's pretty much the same time zone as me, except now you're in Australia for a while. Mild tangent, but where are you visiting? Sydney, Melbourne, Gold Coast?
Anyway, reading through the thread I realise the people opposed to the change number at, at most, a dozen or so. Out of the forum's active population this is significant, true, but not exactly representative. So yeah, lots of people don't actually care enough either way to post in the thread, which should tell us something on its own.

That's because half those people don't know the Support & Feedback section exists. They never scroll that far down the page or are too lazy to look inside.

Wow this thread is whiney guys. We won't ever all agree whether this decision was good or bad; most people are never gonna change sides, so just accept the decision as it is and quit trying to prove others wrong. :3

Edit: Even though I don't agree with this decision at all. The forum "decisions" have been suckish lately. Yes, suckish.

Melbourne, where I'm from originally.
New posts is how most users get to where the discussion is at. Considering the amount of bumps this thread receives, they likely dont care or want to seem removed and mature, probably the former.

...Or don't want to read through more than 2 pages.

Such a member is likely to be considered "bad at forums" due to them repeating things that have already been said and seeming both stupid and lazy for doing so, invoking anger in other members and therefore being detrimental to the thread at large and the forums in part.
Especially when reading through the thread lets them have a laugh at the whinings of others.

The whole idea of
1.) removing them and
2.) then saying we'll have the option of displaying or not when we've already had that since forever


Is just very....not smart. Taking away something we've already had then implementing it again is just not a wise decision in my honest opinion. Okay so the whole point is to make it off on default. Weasel, no offense but you haven't been answering too many questions, but all I have for you is: why?

There seems to be no logical explanation to have it off by default, seeing displaying these had no negative effects whatsoever. So if there are any I'd like to hear them and again: why? :3

jesus are you still on about this

The whole idea of
1.) complaining incessantly and
2.) then saying you'll leave or something which you could have always done

Is just very....not smart. complaining about every change ever is just not a wise decision in my opinion. Okay so the whole point is to make it off on default. mind (and co.), no offense but you haven't been answering too many questions, but all I have for you is: why the ♥♥♥♥ are you complaining so much?

There seems to be no logical explanation to have it on by default, since not displaying them has no negative repurcussions. So if there are any I'd like to hear them and again: why the ♥♥♥♥ not? :dumb smilie: