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Newsgroups: rec.motorcycles
Subject: A DoD Guide: How to Transcend Newbieness in Rec.moto
Message-ID: <CE2wCC.IM5@bigtop.dr.att.com>
From: car377@torreys.att.com (131AA0000-RogersC(DR8926)273)
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 1993 19:19:24 GMT
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Organization: AT&T GBCS Denver Labs
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In article <CE2rrx.13nB@hawnews.watson.ibm.com> (Dan Snider) writes:
>
>What's the next rank above "newbie" and its rules for acquisition?

Newbie isn't a rank, it's a condition.  .edu-breath is a rank.

You can progress out of newbie by various mechanisms:

1. Get people to remember who you are.  Do some really good flames.  
   Do some really bad flames.  A really spectacular faux pas now and 
   then helps.

2. Be really obnoxious.  Even though newbies catch a lot of heat, it's
   not really malicious heat, because everyone knows that newbies get
   better.  If you're obnoxious enough, you lose the innocent, sitting
   duck aspect of a newbie and progress to something more unpleasant.

3. Fool everyone.  Refer now and then knowledgeably to past discussions
   that others may remember only vaguely.  This is easier to pull off
   if you were really there, but if you're clever, it can work.  You
   can hedge your bets by lurking for a few years and taking lots of
   notes.

4. Feign nationality in a country with its own net and long r.m traditions, 
   but which has just recently been connected to the internet.  Proclaim 
   yourself a warrior prince in that realm, and behave as if you should 
   receive accolades. (Wear nomex.)

5. Spice up your postings with Monty Python quotes or lines from popular
   (or disgusting) movies.  Put in a confusing or really obtuse .sig.

6. Pretend that you're really from r.m.d, r.m.h, or r.m.r, and that
   you're slumming.

7. Act as if you've just returned from a long absence or recovered from
   amnesia, or regained your lost net access after many years of isolation.
   Ask about the whereabouts of several fictitious old friends who used
   to do a lot of posting here.

8. Don't ask all the standard questions that are answered in the FAQ.
   Don't start anew a thread that just ended two days ago.  Don't start
   your posting off with, "I'm new around here ...."  Don't complain about
   the lack of a r.m.{your preferred subgroup here} and start agitating for 
   yet another split vote.

9. Don't say too much about motorcycles in your postings (a dead giveaway).
   Instead, ally yourself conspicuously with one of the sub-interest-groups 
   within r.m.  Like the Ducatisti, the gun-freaks, the Olde Phartes, the
   pilots, the Californians, etc.

10. Get a subtle public endorsement from somebody who's omnipresent.  
    Like me.  That'll be $25.00, please.  Thank you.

    "Say, Ralph, didn't we do that at the first R'n F back in '87?

			     or

    "Yo, Ralph, what did you do about your carbs when this came up
    last year?  I seem to have lost your posting.  Repost? "
    
11. Get a DoD number.   Conspicuously reject DoD affiliation.  Invent
    an MC organization, give yourself titles and a number, and advertise
    it all in your .sig.  Declare yourself keeper of something weird,
    and append Kot{your specialty} to your postings.

12. Be Right(tm) all the time.

13. Attend a Gather.  Host a Gather. 

14. Snap up every piece of bait that gets trolled by.  This won't help
    at first, but after awhile, you become a sort of fixture, and people
    will think you're just stupid rather than new.

15. (List To be continued by other interested, benevolent motoheads)

:-)

Chuck Rogers
car377@torreys.att.com