Your Market Forums Survival Guide!
Introduction:
Hello, my name is Phreak and I recently saw a thread on a different forums that introduced newer members to the basics of that forum. I decided that it would be of great help if I wrote one for Market Forums!
You are obviously brand new to the forums and have no idea where to begin. Well, the obvious thing to do would be to read the Help Documents! After that, you should post an introduction to introduce yourself to the community! This will let everyone know that you are new and what you are interested in. It will also give you your very first post!
After, a great place to start your adventure would be going to the Search Button and typing in what you are exactly looking for, always nice to have initiative. You also have your own profile and UserCP, which I will cover what you can do in it.
UserCP:
The UserCP is your little shell within the Market Forums' community. If you look on the left of it, it has your messenger box, which is all about your PM (Private message system). You can also choose to edit your profile and change what you need to, such as user title and what not. Also, you can edit your account options, like your PM options, make sure you check those, so you can use everything correctly. You also need 5 posts to send a PM. Also, you can check user groups, however, I will get into that later!
If you find yourself thinking one of the following: Registration problem, Stolen account, Banning, Question, Advertising, or Other (careful with that one), use the Contact Form.
After you have carefully reviewed the Help Documents, you can start looking in other areas of the forums.
Post Count:
The post count actually counts the posts you make throughout the forum. We have different sections where you can post, contribute and help members. Members are noticed more when they make HQ posts. HQ posts stands for High Quality posts, which means posting with proper grammar and not by-passing the 25 character limit. LQ means Low Quality and can get you a 10% warning, flaming, off-topic posts and posts that do not meet the 25 character limit would be LQ. Posting HQ posts, will get you in the right track in this forum for sure. High Quality posting will get you farther in the forums than anything else. If you want to know how to create HQ posts, see this: How to make a HQ thread / post: by Rampage2gene.
Reputation and Stickies:
Reputation is basically a user's opinion about another user. However, you gain more reputation points by upgrading your account. The more you upgrade, the more reputation points you can give out, or take away. I will post the following upgrade availabilities below and how much reputation they are allowed to give / take away. The payments are like this:
Normal member to Premium - $10
Normal member to Investor - $30
Premium to Investor - $20
And to give rep, you need to be upgraded, so it works like this:
Normal Member - Positive 1 (+1), Neutral (0)
Premium - Positive 3 (+3), Neutral (0), Negative 3 (-3)
Investor / Staff - Positive 5 (+5), Neutral (0), Negative 5 (-5)
Admin - Positive 10 (+10), Neutral (0), Negative 10 (-10)
Be aware, when you are dealing out your reputation. Abusing your reputation can lead to a number of things, including; rep repercussion, bad reputation around the forums, and being rep-fucked (having all of your reputation taken away). If you feel as if you have been rep-abused, please contact a member of the Staff or an Admin.
As for stickies go, you have to PM either Crayo or LMCampbell, in order to inquire about having your thread stickied. Also, if Staff or Administrators think that the thread deserves a sticky, then no payment will be required.
Staff Team:
You may view the full staff team below. You may contact staff with questions/concerns, don't be afraid, they are here to help you.
Founders:
Crayo - The owner of Market Forums
LMCampbell - Co-owner of Market Forums
Administrators:
Steelmob
Spaz
Sky-
Staff:
OEM
Gameover
Wreck
Bree
Forum Moderators:
Roobik
Phreak
F3aR
C4DVendetta
*Note: Please let me know if I missed anyone. It's a bit hard to tell since there is no official list. Sorry in advance, as I'm almost certain I missed a few.*
Additionally, we have a group called "Support" which is there to assist with any additional questions and concerns. These members are listed below.
+st.Support:
Android
Zammyslave
Rampage2gene
Wiggles
Donating:
If you wish to donate, please PM Market Forum's owner Crayo or LMCampbell and tell them how much you wish to donate and he will get back to you on the donation link. Otherwise, there is a link at the top of the forums that reads, "Upgrade!" It will give you payment options.Awards:
Awards are given out at Crayo's discretion. Do not PM staff/admins for them, if you want to learn more about awards, you can find out on the awards page, found at the header of the forum. However, there are awards you can donate for, these being:Investor - Upgrading to Investor
Show me the money - $30 (Not including self upgrades or stickies)
Diamond - $100 (Not including self upgrades or stickies)
Additionally, you may visit this thread, in order to nominate yourself for additional awards: Nominate yourself for an award! However, threads like these don't last long and you must meet the requirements for each award before nominating yourself.
Usergroup Colors:
Light Blue - Founder, the main staff of the forum.Red - Administrator
Green - Staff, they are global moderators for the forum.
Light Purple - Forum moderators, they are a moderator for a specific section.
Peach - Investors, high contributors to the forums.
Pink - Premium subscription group
White - Groups or normal members (including support)
Red - Limited, the user of this group has limitations and can only do certain things.
Black - Banned account
Grey - Unregistered account
Warnings and Reported Posts:
Warnings are given out if you break a rule, you can see how the warning system works in the Help Documents!. When you come across a post that is in violation to any of Hack Forum's rules, report it as such, with the "report" button on the post. To learn more about reporting posts, view Reporting Posts in the help documents for full details.Non Subscribed User Groups:
Non subscribed usergroups are other groups that you don't have to pay to get. There are both non official groups, which do not have a userbar, just a group formed by a member and then there are official usergroups, which come with a userbar you can use. The following groups are official and have their own bar:
+dd.Dot Design - Graphic Designers
Gaming Crew - Those who love to game should think about applying for this group.
Official Reviewers - These are select members who review eBooks around the forum.
The Defenders - This elect group of members fight off LQ posting and strive to teach others about various topics.
The Barons - This awesome group of members participate in debates around the forum.
To join any group, visit the Recruitment section and follow the instructions on their threads, if their thread is closed, that means they are not recruiting. Once you have been accepted into a group, you can edit and change your userbars in the UserCP, going under the tab on the left hand side called miscellaneous and going to Group Memberships. Scroll down and set which ever bar you want to display. If you are accepted, you should get an invitation to apply through UserCP > Group Memberships, in order to gain access into that group. However, if you apply through UserCP without consent, you are subject to being rejected forever.
Market Forum's Sections:
There are various sections all over Market Forums, that cover many things. It is very easy to navigate around, using the tabs above. You can see for yourself if you click on each of those tabs, what section is for what. It's pretty straight forward. It really is about what you are looking for and your own ability to navigate around the forum. Before you post, make sure you understand what each section is about. I will cover 3 main sections of the forums that I see people come here to use.Rules, Announcements, News and Feedback:
This section is important to keep up to date with what is going on with Market Forums. You can find various things such as the Official MF News. This will be your key to finding out the latest information on MF.
The Hut:
This is where the majority of the people hang out. This section is for general discussion and you can post just about anything in here, as long as it remains HQ and isn't spam. Flaming will once again lead to punishments.
Marketplace section:
This is a touchy area of the forum, for many reasons. You are doing deals with strangers over the internet and have the risk of being scammed or having a deal dispute. There are ways to avoid it and the use of common sense as well. This is what our forum is all about and I suggest you dabble in this area every now and again. Once again, what you do in this forum is strictly up to you and MF will not be held responsible for money scammed. The Defenders and the Support group are here to help monitor this section, in order to decrease scammers.
Code:
1. Link to the scammers profile. This is to prevent confusion if a username change occurs.
2. Link to the thread in question if it exists where you may have been scammed.
3. Search Scam Reports area for any existing threads with the scammer. Search by username and also uid. If everyone adds the users profile then UID will be very effective.
4. Post any images/screenshots that you can provide as evidence of the scam. Best option is to use the spoiler tags for images.That was a brief guide to start any new member off, on the right foot. If you feel this guide was useful, feel free to refer others to it. Everyone was new at one point, it only takes a small amount of dedication and will to learn and you can become great members.
- Phreak
