I was thinking about posting something along these lines yesterday, but held off. But I'd like to throw my 2 cents in.

As someone who's been a member 2 or so years, and reads several times a day, but rarely posts, things seems to have gotten a little bit hostile, especially towards people who are new to FT.

I completely understand that there are TOS for this board, and on top of those, an unwritten code of behavior. Still, it seems that some long-time members expect a lot of people who have recently joined and are still learned the ways of FT.

My theory is that if a question in a post could easily be answered by searching, or by checking continental.com, then let someone who has the time to respond to the OP do so. If it is such as waste of someone's time to read the question posted where a solution could easily be found, then it seems counter-intuitive that someone would spend the time to write a nasty response telling the OP to do a search.

I can honestly say that most that I have learned about the ways of FT I have done so by mostly lurking, and learned from the mistakes of other posters. Moreover, I have resisted posting things in the past, both here and in the MR forum, that I thought others may have found interesting (even after searching), because I did not want to be berated for my post.

The above being said, I think that this is a great community. FT is one of only two or three forums that I find to be a truly valuable resource, and I read regularly. I think that for the most part the members of this community are knowlegable, welcoming, and helpful. I hope that FT can remain this way, not only for the members with 3,000 posts, but also for the members with 3 posts.

Thanks for making FT a great environment and resource,

Mike