This is a very serious topic. Let me state that this is about forum popularity among the masses as a whole and not about specific people, race, age, gender, sexuality or any other affects that may affect the comments of this post. If this is not the appropriate place then mods please move to where it is more suitable.

This post is not about any one person(s) but, as stated before, about the masses as a whole with jack as an example character.
Lets assume Jack is a new individual, 1 post. He said hi. Now he posts a project. And we have all seen and been a part of this. Jack gets good criticism at first and finds that some of it he is not willing to change, fix, acknowledge for whatever reason. That’s when the big bosses (the popular kids) step in and soon even the little guys are saying something.
Jack feels discouraged and lashes out. Soon the mods are involved.

Based on this information jack feels outnumbered, cornered, possibly bullied and or flamed. How does jack come back from such a thing? Jack was never warned or banned but he feels he was “hurt” (I can’t see how your hurt on the internet but go with it)
Some of things Jack didn’t want to change he really worked hard on, likes, spent a lot of time researching and building and is proud of his accomplishments.

We have seen these users and we have seen users who present us with nothing and get mad when we ask for more details and we see these people evere where. Some are obvious to what they need to change and gladly change it, others start whole wars over the letter T or the grammatical errors of a sentence in their post.

Do we as a society on the internet tend to pick on the new ones? Is forum popularity a thing or is it a word we toss around to appease our over driven egos? Do we find that those with over inflated egos who become moderator abuse their privileges because they are popular? (this questions is not strictly related to this forum). I am looking for serious input and ideas. Jack is a fictional character but maybe you were jack, or you know someone (not allowed to name names) who was jack and has come back or fell even further to the point where there perma banned.

And discuss.

I would put this in site feedback, but seeing as it's a general 'forum' type thread I'll leave it here unless another mod can think of a better place.

Everyone's a stranger when they first come to a forum, and it can be a little confusing where to start. This is why introduction threads exist, so you can get a feeling for the type of forum it is, how people post, etc. Jumping right into a project isn't a great idea to do when just joining an RM site, but I've seen people with low post counts upload some very impressive looking games/demos that people have backed.
The people who are criticized are the people who post projects that have flaws. It's as simple as that. If I opened up RM and made a shoddy mess and uploaded it, then I would expect people to talk me down from the project. They might be a bit more polite because I'm known, but it's not like there cliques in the forum (not official ones anyway) which suddenly makes a bad project a good one.
Hell, I entered a game making contest a while ago and came 5th I believe, which was pretty much the lowest rank, and that was mostly due to a few issues I could have fixed if I'd known about them. If I could have submitted a second draft, I reckon I would have salvaged a decent game out of it (In fact it was originally longer) however I ditched the whole thing after the contest.
Given the same amount of time, most people on the site can make a better game than me. That's just being realistic, so I practice instead, and I'll bring out a project when I'm good and ready. Yes people can be harsh on this site, but they're harsh in any kind of entertainment. If you're making shoddy media then people will tell you about it, mostly because someone has to, and partly because otherwise you'll waste months (maybe years) of precious time on something which wasn't worth it.
Again, it's practice, not popularity, that decides whether a game works.

As for popularity, everyone is a new member at some point. A couple months into my coming here I felt a bit estranged, as this forum has a long history and I really know little about it. Many of the people here have known each other for years, so there will be some loyalty for one another. Not all mods are popular (again, there are no real cliques here or anything like that) and not all 'popular' members are mods. If you hang about a certain area of the forum alot, are generally polite and well informed, and don't have a history of trouble (in some rare cases this isn't even a problem so long as it's in the past) then you'll probably be approached to moderate at some point. Failing that, the staff will allow people to apply, but the criteria is still the same as before. Never, not ever, has a moderator or staff member been chosen based on popularity, not here anyway.

So to answer your question, I don't think we pick on the new guy. I've been the new guy, we all have, and most of us came out unscathed. However, people don't like obnoxious people. That's just a fact of light. If you believe the sunlight shines out of your arse, then you're going to run into trouble, and you're going to get banned or suspended. Because of this, long term members are generally not obnoxious. This means it's usually the newer people who run into trouble, because they're being incredibly annoying.
So again, it's not the new people, it's the people who think they're the second coming of Jesus.
and it has nothing to do with popularity, and has everything to do with being mature.
Of course, I can only speak for this particular forum.

I'm actually really glad to see this topic.

To an extent Sparrow you're right, but in other ways you've missed the mark and likely haven't seen some of the flame fests in GUC. What we on the forums consider to be good, and what a new developer considers to be good don't always see eye to eye. There's several new developers that are using just the RTP for their very first projects, maybe expanding with a few other tiles, they've done research on the program but are still novices with the many ins and outs. I've seen these people upload their projects that they ~did~ spend hours on, they put a lot of effort into and are proud of what they've accomplished, and then people offer 'critique' which borders on flaming the person because their project isn't up to 'their' standards, which many would argue are bordering on commercial standards.

It's like the mentality is, if they're not using custom resources, learned how to properly use scripts (or make their own for that matter), not re-creating virtually everything from the ground up and pumping out a commercial standards game then they're likely going to be subject to abrasive feedback that tells them their project is crap and should be re-made.

I can understand the frustration of reviewers and other members that spend the time to download new projects, only to find the same glaring mistakes or similar issues that seem to follow new developers. We do have to remember that not every single person on this site has a crack team of professionals at their whim, not everyone can sprite, not everyone can script, not everyone can compose, not everyone can draw and not everyone can make their own tilesets. Some developers are working with what they can find in the community, and when they can't ask around to see if it's possible to be done.

I'd like to see more quality, or higher quality in certain areas of the forums as well, instead of threads where it seems the person just went "LOLGAEM" posting for comments and not actually making anything (I think we can all think of a few people that fit this).
But the attitude of pissing on new developers for their first game is something that I don't think should continue; it breeds elitism in a community that's already bogged down with egotism and superiority complexes (not speaking solely of RRR here). Most peoples' very very first projects from when we first got our program of choice were absolute crap! Once upon a time I couldn't map my way out of a wet paper bag.

I suppose my point is this: being rude and abrasive isn't going to change how people develop their games, it simply makes them defensive and more likely to shoot down any potential feedback in the future. Supporting new developers and pointing out the flaws in a way that isn't directed in a rude manner, is more likely to encourage new developers to keep working and perhaps take a second glance at what they're trying to create and delve into it deeper. I've already seen this happen personally, so I know it's possible. No one wants negative feedback on their projects, but especially when it's your first project and it's your 'baby'.

There are those however who can't take feedback at all, unless it's "OMG THIS GAME IS GREAT!" - which is an entirely different point altogether.

"applause"

There are ways and means of giving advice, and to be honest comments such as "euuk RTP" or "rubbish" achieve nothing apart from making the member look childish and being of no use to the topic starter..

There are occasional comments that are just flaming, but I like to think most of them are caught by Mods. I have to admit, I rarely look at threads in the GUC, and may make more of an effort to do so in future if this is a problem I'm unaware of.
Perhaps I am overly optimistic, but somehow there are plenty of incredibly competent and capable game makers on this site and others who made it through the fire of criticisms. I myself intend to get back into game making at some point, but I know it means I'll have to read every guide there is, do a crash course in Ruby, mess about in logic + photoshop, and probably spend a massive chunk of time just to be told it's 'so-so' at best, and I'm prepared to do that when I'm good and ready. That's just a realistic approach to it. That's not the view I had when I first picked up the program, but it's what I've had drilled into me over the years.

However, if this message is being given in a purposefully offensive manner, then it might do good to remind some of these people that we've all been that naive before.
That said, criticisms people receive on their first projects has very little to do with being popular on a forum or abusing staff powers, which was the problem I thought was being addressed...

In a way it is connected - because those who reply rudely to criticism-make themselves unpopular.

However I can state as a fact that any member of staff who abused their powers would be instantly removed. Mind you staff are selected for how they interact within the forum and with it's members, rather than their own popularity.

Of course some people take a warn as a personal insult from the Mod, rather than the fact the a rule has been broken and the mod is just doing their job.

A forum is like many other situations, first day at work, at achool- the new kid on the block- takes a while for people to suss you out- but in time you are accepted.

I'll just add something real quick:

When you initially receive some very harsh comments on a game project, it's generally as a test. It's your reaction and your willingness to improve which is tested here, and if you understand that and take the comments well, not only the project thread won't degenerate into a flame fest, but you'll also gain a good deal of respect from the authors of aforementioned comments and incidentally, further comments will be nicer.

We do have genuine trolls though.

If Internet communities like this one were as hostile to new users as you appear to believe they are, then why would our community constantly be evolving? It's true that there are plenty of new users who can't take criticism and see it as hostility instead. But there are a lot of users who come to terms with criticism and integrate well into the community.

As someone who's been at this forum (but mostly the chat) for a few years, I've seen a lot of people come and go. In fact, the group of people who are in the IRC chat right now have only one or two members in common with the IRC chat regulars back when I joined. My point is that our community goes in a cycle--new users join, get acclimated, and become the "older" users. And the fact that this continues to happen month after month, year after year, means that there are plenty of new users out there who do see this community as an inviting place. There are plenty of new users who can take criticism well, and the ones who don't stick around (for the most part) are those that can't take criticism well.

Any community is bound to have older and more respected members, as well as new ones. But it's rare that you find a case where the older members are so hostile that new members aren't able to fit in. And this community certainly isn't one of those cases.

Well, I do get status as a "new guy" here (at least opposed to most of the other guys here, anyway), so lemme try and put out my two cents.

I think a lot of the feedback us new guys get is... well, it seems brutal, sometimes, but it's brutally honest. Some people don't realize that and take it out on the people who bash 'em, but what they have to get is that it's a lot like politics - don't get even, get ahead. When people say something here, even when it's harsh, then they're going to say what you need to do and often how to do it. Don't complain about their tone or "flaming" (and how do you judge somebody's tone on the Internet, eh?), realize that they mean no harm and take the advice. If you do this, then you'll start getting less criticism and more praise.

Of course, there are people out there who simply say something like "this is just horrible" without any real context, and there are more than enough people on the Internet in general who will try to hurt you as much as possible with the sole motive of having some fun, but most people are going to give you something you can really use.

So, long story short, take Chris Matthews' advice and get ahead instead of getting even.