Games - Newbie

	Games - Newbie

A newbie (written in 1337 as: n00b) is a newcomer to a particular field, the term being commonly used on the Internet, where it might refer to new, inexperienced, or ignorant users of a game, a newsgroup, an operating system or the Internet itself. The term is generally regarded as an insult, although in many cases more experienced/knowledgeable people use it in purposes of negative reinforcement, urging “newbies” to learn more about the field or area in question.

Variant spellings, such as newb, noob, nub and, in Leetspeak, n3wb are numerous and common in Internet use.

Social rejection

In some contexts, such as on Usenet and in multiplayer video games, newbies are discouraged from the group. Newbies may ask questions that seem extremely simple to experienced users, or disrupt normal order with their lack of skills or etiquette in a certain type of technology. For example, video game players may dislike newbies because they think newbies will hurt or bring down the collective efforts of a team game. Usenet posters may dislike newbies for bringing up off-topic discussion or violating netiquette. Noobs also ask questions, with answers that can easily be found in the options menu of the game they are playing.

In some groups, the term "newbie" is used by experienced users to refer to any newcomer, whether the newcomer acts ignorantly or not. In this case, the regulars assert their position with a sort of hazing (sometimes called pwning in video games). Even if a newbie is actually a veteran of a particular game and has just started to play online, they may still be considered a newbie.

In some MMORPGs a newbie is anyone who is lower-leveled than the person making the remark, regardless of actual time spent playing the game. (For example, a level 30 player in World of Warcraft may consider a level 10 player a newbie.) Some forums and MMORPGs have banned some of the more common spelling variations ("newb", "knob" , "nub", "noob", "n00b", "nib", "nibblins", "Frodo Nibblins", "nub sauce", "nubz", "nubcakes", "nublich," and "nubalicious") in an attempt to reduce flame wars. This has, of course, led to more variations, such as "s00b", "ch00b" and "gl00b".

Referring to regular members as newbies is often considered to be highly insulting. The implication is that they are behaving as if they do not know the rules when in fact they have had more than sufficient opportunity to learn them.

Because of their social rejection, some games allow places or servers for newbies to band together, giving them chances to interact before going on, becoming veterans.

Social acceptance

It is often a personal choice within a community whether to discourage or encourage newbies. For example, some GNU/Linux users may discourage non-technical users who try to install GNU/Linux, because supporting these users will be difficult and the newbies may be dissatisfied in the long run. On the other hand, some GNU/Linux users may prefer to encourage newbies, because it grows their userbase and may help the newbies learn more about computing.

Sometimes newbies are recognized as the most important members and received with extra attention. Some chat rooms, for example, have established rules to ask "oldies" to first answer the newbies' questions or concerns before resuming their ongoing discussions. Large Internet forums such as 2channel and Gaia Online have special boards for newbies to learn the basics of chatting on that forum.

Other communities do not treat newbies with a significantly elevated status, but do greet most of the friendly newbies with welcomes informing them of methods to receive assistance. In these situations, the term is basically synonymous with newcomer and is meant with or without affection. For example, Wikipedia has a firm policy of welcoming all new contributors whether or not their first edits are helpful to an encyclopedia. This way, users who make mistakes will be encouraged to learn the rules and keep contributing, rather than provoking censure or anger.

The positive interpretation is probably the more recent but has become quite common. The only way to determine the intended connotation is to examine the context.

Individuals may refer to themselves as newbies in a self-deprecating manner or in acknowledgment of their newcomer status, which may (or may not) lessen the amount of harassment they receive. This may have negative or positive connotations, depending on the standards of the community. However, highly skilled individuals also tend to refer to themselves as newbies to make others think they will be an easy kill, only to be shocked when they find out how skilled the "newbie" really is.

Internet Relay Chat

In IRC, newbies are both discouraged and encouraged, depending on the particular channel. There are channels on any of the major networks dedicated to catering to newbie questions and getting into the IRC community. However, beyond the scope of these introductory rooms there are many channels where common newbie mistakes are not tolerated. This may include, repeating the same sentence, begging for pirated software, immature insult slinging, attacking an operator, usage of color, and the use of channel bot search and file list commands (such as !find or @search). Most channels have rules that are posted as a link in the topic or sent to the user as an on-join message. Breaking said rules or established policy by someone who does not take the initiative to find out the rules can result in an instant kick-ban.

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