Time to create (kleine)Luchtzak(je).be????

Vinnie-Winnie · Post by **Vinnie-Winnie** » 17 Jan 2006, 22:40

Hi all,

The last few months I have seen many posts that were either irrelevant, useless and with plenty of spelling/English language mistakes. Whilst tracking the culprits down I have noticed that the offenders were most of the time very young. (10-14 years old on average)

I don't have anything against them but feel like something should really be done about this. It has been discussed before I know when some members said that the quality is going down, but i'd like to specifically ask what should be done about this particular kind of members?

I and others have replied more than once to the worst offenders saying that they should check the spelling, stop putting a smiley after each 2 words, think before they introduce a new topic/post something, but they don't seem to stop.

So time to create another website for these people? Write strict rules of conduct like A.net does, and ban anyone who has been told off 3 times? introduce a stricter membership system which would not penalize everyone?

744rules · Post by **744rules** » 17 Jan 2006, 23:19

I am afraid the only way is to delete these messages, but his creates a large workload for the moderators

Post by **luchtzak** » 17 Jan 2006, 23:30

Vinnie-Winnie,

I agree that www.luchtzak.be attracts lots of very young members, trying to explain themselves in some cases very poor English. In our webteam-forum we also discuss about the very young members that appear on the website. Then only thing we can do is to closely monitor these young members: we send PM's to them to use the spellchecker, to have a look at the forum rules and.. in some cases we threaten with a ban. Sure we edit/delete message, but we also need the help of the community to use the 'report a post'-button

.

For me it's a difficult situation: you want to help those youngsters knowing that they could be around here for the next 20 years, on the contrary they are annoying our fellow members.

And Vinnie-Winnie: klein luchtzakje is already here ==> https://www.aviation24.be/article10881.html

abishay · Post by **abishay** » 18 Jan 2006, 00:52

Vinnie winnie i don't know how old you are but what i know now is that if you try to spell everything correct you will be uncool e.g have you ever chat on MSN? people use slang which i use but i am trying to stop. It help you type fast and creating a new english here are some words i have found that are slang in the forums but i don't really mind:

Thnx= thanks
Bro= brother
and more words can be changed like the word life= Lyf , see you= C ya, Good= gud etc.

about your complaint i don't know or care about misspelling and whatever but if you are annoyed i cant do anything about it but all i know is no slang which is misspelling and lots of smiles

and i am improving to stop that

you might find some in my former posts when i did not know

Avro · Post by **Avro** » 18 Jan 2006, 07:16

what i know now is that if you try to spell everything correct you will be uncool

That is the funniest comment I've heard since a long time.

So why not asking people to use some slang, sms language and write with plenty of errors. That would be cool indeed wouldn't it ?

A forum is not a chat. I agree that when chating you want to be quick and you use abbreviations and sms language. But in a forum you have time to compose your message. It's much easier for the "older" people among here (including me) to read normal language than sms talk. We prefer to be un-cool

Chris

elnombre · Post by **elnombre** » 18 Jan 2006, 09:13

Gentlemen
I think perhaps you are being over sensitive here. If you don't like a message delete it. There is plenty of rubbish posted by teenagers and adults on this site but as with much on the net you have to search through an awful lot of trash to find your gold. Everyone has a right to their point of view, after all this site also harbours known racists which is much more serious in my opinion.
Be tolerant. This site is turning into PPRune!!
ElNombre

Glider · Post by **Glider** » 18 Jan 2006, 09:21

I agree with the young age of members who write very poor English, but you can't blame them for all those messages.

Fo a lot of different reasons, there are enough adults who 'suffer' the same 'problem'...

To me, it's not such a problem that these kind of messages are posted on the forum. Just accept the fact that you are better in English. Read those messages, and if something isn't clear, just ask the person. But oh well, that's my opinion of course...

Comet · Post by **Comet** » 18 Jan 2006, 09:52

The spell checker is absolutely useless, it doesn't recognise many common English words ("I'm" is one it will not recognise) and in many cases, the problem is with grammar and not only spelling. In the cases of poor grammar, all the spell checkers in the world will be no use.

And the only way the younger members can improve their English is with practice. Not all the older members of Lucktzak use perfect English either.

Avro · Post by **Avro** » 18 Jan 2006, 12:36

Now that I have some spare time let me participate in this topic as well.

My answer of this morning was only directed to one reply and not to the topic in general.

Anyway, I agree that not only youngsters have sometimes problems with the English language. I don't deny doing mistakes either.
But it would be nice if some members would do some efforts to improve their English. I have nothing against members doing mistakes even grammar mistakes but some could do some efforts.

As for the content of the posts, I agree on the fact that the content is often less constructive with youngsters than with adults. I repeat this is a general trend, there are exception in both groups of members !!!

Solving this problem is very hard.

One way could be to use the report post button more often. Whenever you see something "trash".

Another solution could be to simply try to get over the problem as elnombre said.

There is plenty of rubbish posted by teenagers and adults on this site but as with much on the net you have to search through an awful lot of trash to find your gold.

After all, it's also positive to have a lot of youngster among Luchtzak. It means that we have a lot of young spotters in Belgium (in other countries as well) and that our hobby will get more popular with time.

If one of the members has any suggestions to make don't hesitate to write a comment in this topic.

But once again I would like to emphasize that, even if mistakes are "tolerated", try to avoid SMS language. There are people out there who don't know that "language"

Best Regards
Chris

PS: I'd like to apologize for all mistakes I've done in this post

EDIT's: An awful lot of edit's for mistakes... That's what happens when you don't sleep a lot

Andries · Post by **Andries** » 18 Jan 2006, 14:29

I agree that SMS-language and slang should be avoided (although I allways use "Greetz" instead of "Greetings"). Especially in the body of the message which actually carries the importance of the post.

Youngsters don't know English that well, certainly not in Belgium. The first lessons English are given in the 2nd (14 years old) or 3rd year (15 years old) of high school. So it is understandable why some don't control the English language as much as others do.

What also bothers me is that some members don't use capital letters and "leestekens" (don't know it in English, if someone could help me here ...). They start writing and simply keep on writing without ever using a capital letter or a "leesteken". Those posts are very hard to understand sometimes and usually are more annoying than posts with spelling-errors !
You can find an example at the beginning of this thread :

abishay wrote:about your complaint i don't know or care about misspelling and whatever but if you are annoyed i cant do anything about it but all i know is no slang which is misspelling and lots of smiles and i am improving to stop that you might find some in my former posts when i did not know

just my opinion ...

Greetz,

Andries

Robin_Bamps · Post by **Robin_Bamps** » 18 Jan 2006, 14:49

Andries wrote:What also bothers me is that some members don't use capital letters and "leestekens" (don't know it in English, if someone could help me here ...)

"Punctuation marks" if I'm not mistaken.

Regards, Robin Bamps.

vliegtuigfreak · Post by **vliegtuigfreak** » 18 Jan 2006, 17:09

Hi, i'm also 15 years old and to my knowledge every teacher English at my school says i control the language very well. Maybe i cannot express this in my posts but i'm working hard on it to improve it. My best friend Spellcheck also helps me with this

Greetingzz
Sonny

Jense · Post by **Jense** » 18 Jan 2006, 17:12

@ vliegtuigfreak: if you control the language so well, why don't you write "i" with a capital letter?

vliegtuigfreak · Post by **vliegtuigfreak** » 18 Jan 2006, 17:15

Jense read my previous post! I speak the language well, but i can't express it in my posts because the typing doesn't go that good. Sorry for misunderstanding.

Greetingzz
Sonny

Jense · Post by **Jense** » 18 Jan 2006, 17:22

@ vliegtuigfreak: it has nothing to do with "but i can't express it in my posts...", but it's the first thing a good English teacher says: " 'I' is always written as a capital letter!". Now, go back and sit on your chair. Read the sentences above carefully and... you'll find the answer and reaction to your own reply!

P.S.: Oh and Sonny, my English isn't perfect (yet) either

.

vliegtuigfreak · Post by **vliegtuigfreak** » 18 Jan 2006, 17:30

Ok, i'm glad you told me. I will keep my eyes open when i type my posts in the future. Actually I don't know why the Spellcheck didn't told me anything about the 'I' problem. Strange...

Have a nice day!

Greetingzz
Sonny

Vinnie-Winnie · Post by **Vinnie-Winnie** » 18 Jan 2006, 18:39

Jense wrote:@ vliegtuigfreak: if you control the language so well, why don't you write "i" with a capital letter?

Jense, why on earth are you getting personal? I did my utmost best not to put any names because that would just be insensitive and careless. I think You have just proved one of my points even though I believe you are not in the age group I'm targeting: Hijacking topics! That happens in all age groups unfortunately...

What vliegtuig freak said was honest. That he believes he is rather good in English for for his age but that it is sometimes difficult to express everything in English is a good point. Same here sometimes, but U'll get better don't worry. And can't say i'm an angel myself!

Not putting a capital to mean yourself is a rather trivial complaint , i've seen rather worse...

Both Abishay and Vliegtuigfreak were rather courageous I believe!

abishay wrote:Vinnie winnie i don't know how old you are but what i know now is that if you try to spell everything correct you will be uncool e.g have you ever chat on MSN? people use slang which i use but i am trying to stop. It help you type fast and creating a new english here are some words i have found that are slang in the forums but i don't really mind:

Thnx= thanks
Bro= brother
and more words can be changed like the word life= Lyf , see you= C ya, Good= gud etc.

about your complaint i don't know or care about misspelling and whatever but if you are annoyed i cant do anything about it but all i know is no slang which is misspelling and lots of smiles and i am improving to stop that
you might find some in my former posts when i did not know

MSN messenger is instant, and doesn't leave any traces, whereas forums do. Grammar and spelling is part of what makes a forum good or bad. Luchtzak will only attract experienced aviation enthusiasts if they think the forum quality is good...

I definitely disagree but the being cool thing. Nothing cool about writing with errors I believe! Looking at the fair amount of replies think I am the only one being annoyed by all this. I must also admit that you have improved loads. But You should still avoid putting smileys in the middle of sentences, and should also put dots were needed and use capitals in the beginning of your sentences.

About my age well I am the same age as Avro, and still hope we are both cool

Jense · Post by **Jense** » 18 Jan 2006, 18:43

@ Vinnie-Winnie: you don't have to be so angry, "big boy"! I've contacted him via PM even before you posted your message. I explained him my reaction and he gave me a very good answer. Sssstttt Vinnie-Winnie, ssssttt.

P.S: if you want me to send the PM, just give me a call