Welcome to the staging ground for new communities! Each proposal has a description in the "Descriptions" category and a body of questions and answers in "Incubator Q&A". You can ask questions (and get answers, we hope!) right away, and start new proposals.
Are you here to participate in a specific proposal? Click on the proposal tag (with the dark outline) to see only posts about that proposal and not all of the others that are in progress. Tags are at the bottom of each post.
Post History
Some amount of jargon specific to the site domain is expected and necessary. However, "home improvement" is very broad and not a specialized niche. You don't go to college to get a degree in Home...
Answer
#2: Post edited
Some amount of jargon specific to the site domain is expected and necessary. However, "home improvement" is very broad and not vary specialized niche. You don't go to college to get a degree in Home Improvement.- People tend to overestimate how universal an acronym is that they happen to be familiar with. Maybe it is largely universal in their geographic region. This site is international, so unless you're really sure, err on the side of assuming your abbreviations are unique.
- I've done a decent amount of home building. I've added a lot of stuff to an unfinished basement, created rooms with finished sheetrock walls, including plumbing and electrical items, built an outdoor utility shed from scratch, and the like. Of your three abbreviations OSB, MDF, and PVC, I only immediately recognized PVC, assuming you mean the material used for "plastic" pipes. Now that you've defined OSB, I have definitely used it, particularly in the utility shed. I don't remember what it was called back when I bought it, but "OSB" doesn't sound familiar.
- It may be that it has a different name around here (New England), or maybe it was sold as a specific tradename. For example, I've seen many people use the term "Masonite", although that's just a particular brand name of "hardboard" or "tempered hardboard". Lots of hardboard isn't Masonite, but yet that's what it's often called.
- The point is, this site has a particularly wide audience, so you should define any terms that you aren't really sure are common and universal. Just because you and everyone around you knows it doesn't say much about whether most of the audience will know it.
- Expanding an abbreviation in parenthesis after its first use is cheap and easy. The extra second is well worth not alienating possible members by appearing snobby and elitist.
- Some amount of jargon specific to the site domain is expected and necessary. However, "home improvement" is very broad and not a specialized niche. You don't go to college to get a degree in Home Improvement.
- People tend to overestimate how universal an acronym is that they happen to be familiar with. Maybe it is largely universal in their geographic region. This site is international, so unless you're really sure, err on the side of assuming your abbreviations are unique.
- I've done a decent amount of home building. I've added a lot of stuff to an unfinished basement, created rooms with finished sheetrock walls, including plumbing and electrical items, built an outdoor utility shed from scratch, and the like. Of your three abbreviations OSB, MDF, and PVC, I only immediately recognized PVC, assuming you mean the material used for "plastic" pipes. Now that you've defined OSB, I have definitely used it, particularly in the utility shed. I don't remember what it was called back when I bought it, but "OSB" doesn't sound familiar.
- It may be that it has a different name around here (New England), or maybe it was sold as a specific tradename. For example, I've seen many people use the term "Masonite", although that's just a particular brand name of "hardboard" or "tempered hardboard". Lots of hardboard isn't Masonite, but yet that's what it's often called.
- The point is, this site has a particularly wide audience, so you should define any terms that you aren't really sure are common and universal. Just because you and everyone around you knows it doesn't say much about whether most of the audience will know it.
- Expanding an abbreviation in parenthesis after its first use is cheap and easy. The extra second is well worth not alienating possible members by appearing snobby and elitist.
#1: Initial revision
Some amount of jargon specific to the site domain is expected and necessary. However, "home improvement" is very broad and not vary specialized niche. You don't go to college to get a degree in Home Improvement. People tend to overestimate how universal an acronym is that they happen to be familiar with. Maybe it is largely universal in their geographic region. This site is international, so unless you're really sure, err on the side of assuming your abbreviations are unique. I've done a decent amount of home building. I've added a lot of stuff to an unfinished basement, created rooms with finished sheetrock walls, including plumbing and electrical items, built an outdoor utility shed from scratch, and the like. Of your three abbreviations OSB, MDF, and PVC, I only immediately recognized PVC, assuming you mean the material used for "plastic" pipes. Now that you've defined OSB, I have definitely used it, particularly in the utility shed. I don't remember what it was called back when I bought it, but "OSB" doesn't sound familiar. It may be that it has a different name around here (New England), or maybe it was sold as a specific tradename. For example, I've seen many people use the term "Masonite", although that's just a particular brand name of "hardboard" or "tempered hardboard". Lots of hardboard isn't Masonite, but yet that's what it's often called. The point is, this site has a particularly wide audience, so you should define any terms that you aren't really sure are common and universal. Just because you and everyone around you knows it doesn't say much about whether most of the audience will know it. Expanding an abbreviation in parenthesis after its first use is cheap and easy. The extra second is well worth not alienating possible members by appearing snobby and elitist.