A Panel of Experts (PLEASE READ!)

[steeleclipse]

I was thinking... ouch

Um... there is so many MacRumors members that have a lot of knowledge/expertise in many different aspects of the Macintosh platform, and at certain times EVERYBODY needs help in some sort of field.

ie: audio, video, desktop publishing, unix, hardware, OS knowledge, web, etc.

In order to express what field we have knowledge in, maybe there could be a field added to our profiles or some other way of listing this info (something like an on-line directory) so members have EASY access to this. This would be helpful so we could know who exactly we should be directing our questions to. I believe that MacRumors could be a very powerful and organized help tool, does anybody agree?

I, for one, believe that we can all help each other out, and with organized info, maybe we can be that much more effective.

Who is with me???

 

[rainman::|:|]

not a bad idea

i'm pretty good with 802.11b hardware--

that's my contribution, i guess.

also clustering and multiple processors...

pnw

 

[MrMacMan]

Panel of Xperts.

Good idea but how is it gonna be implemented?
After helping certain about of people on that topic?
Some sort of test?

What about 'general stuff' ?

 

[steeleclipse]

How would it work??? Uh... Good Question

Maybe something a long the lines of another field in the members area, where you can look up which members have signed up to specific topics. Then maybe you can rate them on how helpful they were, and beside their name is the average rating they have from mebers they have helped. Example ****1/2 stars. This offers a small incentive for being a help. Kinda like (member,regular,demi-god) etc.

I don't know how I could implement this idea, but I would definitely be willing to help in any way I could...

Would that work??? Or is it just a possibly good idea that would be excruciatingly painful to execute???

Go ahead... Tell me the truth.. i can take it

 

[steeleclipse]

Originally posted by paulwhannel


i'm pretty good with 802.11b hardware--

that's my contribution, i guess.

also clustering and multiple processors...

pnw

Well that makes one of us... I will definitely be msging you

 

[Mr. Anderson]

Good idea, but it would also have to be people interested in helping. A few to many pm's about newbie problems and most Xperts will turn off that field.

I think that the current system where you ask for help in the Help Forum and get responses from people who know what they're talking about and willing to help works as well as can be expected.

D

 

[steeleclipse]

Originally posted by dukestreet
Good idea, but it would also have to be people interested in helping. A few to many pm's about newbie problems and most Xperts will turn off that field.

D

Actually, I was just thinking the same thing, and maybe it could be a service for members and above. That way, problems that are brought to the forums are less "switch" type questions (not that there is anything wrong with those) and more specialty subjects.

The existing help forum would be more for general questions.

Don't get me wrong. I am not hung up on seeing this happen... I jsut think it would be neat

 

[Doctor Q]

Why would you need to know ahead of time who is knowledgeable about a particular topic? If you post a question, people in the know tend to answer. That's been my experience here.

 

[steeleclipse]

Originally posted by Doctor Q
Why would you need to know ahead of time who is knowledgeable about a particular topic? If you post a question, people in the know tend to answer. That's been my experience here.

But I have noticed that some people concoct answers for the sake of post counts

 

[losfp]

I think the forums thing works perfectly. People can browse the topics and if they happen to know an answer, they can speak up.

For example, I may not have a lot of experience with cars in general, so I wouldn't put it down as an area of expertise. But if someone has a question about the specifica car that I use, I might be able to chime in with my experiences. IMHO it's limiting your audience to only PM a couple of people when you have the combined knowledge of the forums to help out with.

 

[Tommy!]

I happen to be really good at getting people to buy macs!

 

[Winston Smith]

Good idea but a lot of info already exists here just use the search facility.

I'm currently looking at replacing my aging iMac with a powerbook and a search for desktop replacement produced an excellent thread with some tips I'd never have thought of until to late like "take your watch off when using a Tibook!"