Laser Engraver Forum Etiquette
If you belong to a laser engraver forum then you have for sure experienced what I’m about to mention. And I feel a little “dirty” mentioning this. I don’t want to discourage anyone and I don’t want to seem like I’m not helpful. But here goes.
You stumble across something cool, maybe a bit artistic. Through some trial and error you figure out how to laser it and your results are so cool you decide to share it on a laser engraving forum. Then, here it comes.
- Where did you buy that?
- How much was it?
- What were your settings?
If you fail to properly answer the last question you’ll be chastised. By golly, it is their right to have you do all the artistic work and sacrifice materials and just give it away to them to become your competition. I’ve even seen people start new posts on every laser forum I’ve been on saying that if you don’t share your settings when posting photos then you’re just not a very nice or helpful person.
This is all observational to me. I’m not the guy that very often comes up with something new or artistic.
But I personally cringe when I see demands for settings. I want to be clear here. There is a difference between asking politely and insisting someone share their settings.
Let me provide an example: “That looks awesome. What a great idea that is. Do you mind sharing your settings?” That is the antithesis of: “Everyone that posts a pic should have to provide their settings. Just showing off your design without settings isn’t helpful.”