How do I make a signature?
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septembern
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How do I make a signature?
How do I make a signature and a post layout?
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compguygene
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Re: How do I make a signature?
Forget that graphical stuff. Type some witty text! That is what sigs were originally.
Armagetron: It's a video game that people should just play and enjoy 
https://bit.ly/2KBGYjvCheck out the simple site about TheServerPharm
https://bit.ly/2KBGYjvCheck out the simple site about TheServerPharm
Re: How do I make a signature?
Go to "User Control Panel" -> Profile -> Edit Signature
Proceed as compguygene suggested.
Proceed as compguygene suggested.
Never trust a species that grins all the time. It’s up to something. —Terry Pratchett, Pyramids
Warum sage ich überhaupt was? Das ist, als würde man seinem Navi widersprechen —Bernd das Brot, Kika-Lounge
Warum sage ich überhaupt was? Das ist, als würde man seinem Navi widersprechen —Bernd das Brot, Kika-Lounge
Re: How do I make a signature?
And make sure to make it a big one, with
a) a random witty quote by a famous person everyone knows already
b) another quote that was funny in context, but completely makes no sense without
c) several 'userbars' at least 1920 pixels wide, everybody is entitled to horizontal scrollbars
d) an additional picture of some video game character, preferably the Overlord, with your name in an unreadable font written in front of it, so everybody realizes immediately how important you are. The bigger the better!
e) a broken link.
a) a random witty quote by a famous person everyone knows already
b) another quote that was funny in context, but completely makes no sense without
c) several 'userbars' at least 1920 pixels wide, everybody is entitled to horizontal scrollbars
d) an additional picture of some video game character, preferably the Overlord, with your name in an unreadable font written in front of it, so everybody realizes immediately how important you are. The bigger the better!
e) a broken link.
Re: How do I make a signature?
lol Z-Man 
Reigning champion of: Sir-spam-a-lot 2011apparition wrote:You being able to kill so many players that quickly and efficiently is evidence that the community skill level must be dropping... Sad
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compguygene
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Re: How do I make a signature?
sinewav wrote this essay on the Wild West Forums about forum signatures
Your forum signatures are out of control. Some of you are aware of this, but most of you are not. Don't worry, by the time you finish this article you will see the error of your ways!
First, what is a "signature"?
There are several meanings for the word signature, but we don't need to list them all here. You can look it up on dictionary.com if you want. For the purpose of this discussion, let's define a signature as "a unique mark serving to identify or distinguish a person." Sound good? Ok, let's move on...
A brief history of the forum signature.
Many of you aren't old enough to remember a time without colorful forum signatures - but it happened! In the early days of the Internet, text-based information was the norm because of restrictions on data flow through the nation's infrastructure. Most forums had very few, if any pictures or graphics at all...they were just too costly in bandwidth. Later, as Internet speeds increased, forums allowed users to pick a small graphic to associate with their usernane.
Although this added a small degree of personalization, it was more functional than anything. It provided an easier way to scan the forum page and break up the monotonous stream of text. Users weren't able to upload their own images until sometime later. That's when graphical personalization really began on forums (and probably should have ended too).
The signature itself was a little something extra to help identify the user, in addition to the username and avatar. Although a username is somewhat descriptive, not everyone can get the username they want on every forum - and an avatar doesn't say too much more, especially if you have to choose one instead of adding your own. Traditionally, the forum signature was text only and often contained links to the user's personal website, or possibly a website related to the forum topic. Then one day, someone got the idea to put a small image in that space, thus the userbar came into existence. Although people still use userbars (which have a popularly accepted, fixed size), they have been largely replaced by the huge, hideous signatures we see today.
OK, I got this far, and I still don't get what your point is...
A forum is a place to share information. Content is key. Even the visual layout of a forum is designed for readability; to enhance the experience of the users and readers. Colors, text size, graphics; all of these play a part in the transmission of valuable, informative content through your eyes and (hopefully) into your brain. When an Internet forum fails to be pleasant to the eyes, content starts to get lost. In fact, this is true of any media. Some people attribute the massive success of Google over Yahoo to the trim, minimal look of Google's homepage. Some of the best looking movies, TV shows, and magazines, are successful because of brilliant art directors and designers. But too many cooks spoil the soup...and nowadays everyone with a copy of Adobe Photoshop is an "artist".
So, what happened? What went wrong?
It seems to be a natural human instinct to "1-UP" another person at every given opportunity. Internet forums are a perfect place to do this since many discussion boards have topics that get people fired-up. It's all about getting the last word, or at least being heard. Forum users will do anything for attention because what they say is so much more important than anyone else. After all, they are right and you are wrong! And since you need your eyes to be "heard" on a forum, all sorts of visual abuse ensued.
The abuse followed the same progression as the development of the forums themselves. First, it was text only. When you wanted to be heard you did it in CAPITAL LETTERS! It wasn't long before you lost credibility when typing in capitals. But of course, there was always huge, colored, bold text. That was sure to get people to notice right? And they did notice, but you didn't get the recognition you felt you needed. So, maybe an animated GIF for an avatar would make people like me? Nope. Didn't work either. The signature is the last place you can 1-UP someone. And because there is a limit on how amusing you can be in what was intended to be a small space, the only thing left to do is make more signatures, and larger ones too.
Well, you're just a jerk. Who cares what you think?
Wait! I'm just getting to the good stuff! Right now this looks like I'm some anti-signature *. This couldn't be further from the truth. As a creative individual myself, I understand how fulfilling it can be to create avatars and signatures and personalize your forum experience. What I protest against is the lack of genuine creativity in signature design and ignorance to the purpose of forums themselves.
As I said before, content is key. The visual ratio of signatures versus written information is appalling these days. Think of it this way: When you turn in a 10 page paper for a class, the cover page doesn't count as page one. Using that same analogy, this forum looks like a 10 page paper with nine cover pages! All the excess graphical noise detracts from the integrity of the forum. For another example, consider the types of CAPTCHA that introduce or overlay noise to a series of characters. Not only is it difficult for bots to read, but many humans too. The excess graphics on this forum work the same way by making it difficult to read.
Imagine one of your textbooks in school What if every paragraph of your history book included a random picture of a duck, or a hammer, a satellite, or a cartoon character. How easy do you think it would be to concentrate on studying for that upcoming quiz? (And I'm not mixing apples and oranges here, so don't tell me a textbook and game forum are not the same. Yes they are the same, because they exist to communicate information. In fact, it's more important for the Internet forum to communicate effectively because it is two-way communication!)
Now, besides the visual mess signatures create, there is also the little matter of bandwidth to consider. The number and size of signatures greatly increases the page load times of forums. Not everyone has a super-fast connection and you should be considerate of others. Imagine you have a slow connection and the disappointment you might feel when someone replies to your topic/comment. You wait for 30 signatures to download just so you can read what the last person said - and all they said was "rofl". What a waste of time!
Fine, I get your point. Now what?
Luckily, I've come up with two ways for you to keep your signature, but use it in better taste!
The first one has to do with the ratio of written content to signature size. A good size paragraph might be about 150 words and could take up a screen area roughly 600px by 300px, or 180,000 sqpx (square pixels). All you have to do is make sure the amount of screen space you take up is at least 4x larger than the size of you signature. (You don't really need to do the math, but your forum comments should be much, much larger than your signature.) If my signature is 400px by 200px, I should probably write about three healthy paragraphs before I attach it to the post. If you are just posting "LOL!", then you should definitely skip the signature altogether. Of course, the alternative is to make the signature much smaller.
The second way to have better taste with signatures is much easier. You add your signature the first time you reply to a thread, and not again. When you think about it, this makes perfect sense to do. Your signature is redundant information. Why do you want to keep repeating yourself over and over and over again? It makes you look crazy!
My final point about signatures deals with the lack of creativity. Unfortunately, I have no solution to this except "don't do it". A lot of people think signatures are a form of creative expression. I balk at this notion. A vast majority of signatures follow a very common, simple workflow: Download a picture of something you like (a sport, game, character, car, whatever), place it in Photoshop and crop or retouch. Next, use another image and/or Photoshop filters to create a background. Add some text in an uncomplimentary typeface, and wow! A "cool" signature to put on a forum. You can't get any more uncreative in my book.
However, someone might take the following approach and have great success: Think about your avatar and signature. Are they in visual harmony with each other? Do they say something about you without looking too cliché? Do your avatar and signature compliment the colors and style of the forum you are posting on? Finally, does your graphical representation overshadow or detract from your writing?
Thanks so much for reading, and good luck with your signatures in the future. I'm sure they will be much more tasteful! And for more interesting reading about signatures, try this blog entry by Adrian Miu.
Best forum post ever, anywhere, about signatures.
Your forum signatures are out of control. Some of you are aware of this, but most of you are not. Don't worry, by the time you finish this article you will see the error of your ways!
First, what is a "signature"?
There are several meanings for the word signature, but we don't need to list them all here. You can look it up on dictionary.com if you want. For the purpose of this discussion, let's define a signature as "a unique mark serving to identify or distinguish a person." Sound good? Ok, let's move on...
A brief history of the forum signature.
Many of you aren't old enough to remember a time without colorful forum signatures - but it happened! In the early days of the Internet, text-based information was the norm because of restrictions on data flow through the nation's infrastructure. Most forums had very few, if any pictures or graphics at all...they were just too costly in bandwidth. Later, as Internet speeds increased, forums allowed users to pick a small graphic to associate with their usernane.
Although this added a small degree of personalization, it was more functional than anything. It provided an easier way to scan the forum page and break up the monotonous stream of text. Users weren't able to upload their own images until sometime later. That's when graphical personalization really began on forums (and probably should have ended too).
The signature itself was a little something extra to help identify the user, in addition to the username and avatar. Although a username is somewhat descriptive, not everyone can get the username they want on every forum - and an avatar doesn't say too much more, especially if you have to choose one instead of adding your own. Traditionally, the forum signature was text only and often contained links to the user's personal website, or possibly a website related to the forum topic. Then one day, someone got the idea to put a small image in that space, thus the userbar came into existence. Although people still use userbars (which have a popularly accepted, fixed size), they have been largely replaced by the huge, hideous signatures we see today.
OK, I got this far, and I still don't get what your point is...
A forum is a place to share information. Content is key. Even the visual layout of a forum is designed for readability; to enhance the experience of the users and readers. Colors, text size, graphics; all of these play a part in the transmission of valuable, informative content through your eyes and (hopefully) into your brain. When an Internet forum fails to be pleasant to the eyes, content starts to get lost. In fact, this is true of any media. Some people attribute the massive success of Google over Yahoo to the trim, minimal look of Google's homepage. Some of the best looking movies, TV shows, and magazines, are successful because of brilliant art directors and designers. But too many cooks spoil the soup...and nowadays everyone with a copy of Adobe Photoshop is an "artist".
So, what happened? What went wrong?
It seems to be a natural human instinct to "1-UP" another person at every given opportunity. Internet forums are a perfect place to do this since many discussion boards have topics that get people fired-up. It's all about getting the last word, or at least being heard. Forum users will do anything for attention because what they say is so much more important than anyone else. After all, they are right and you are wrong! And since you need your eyes to be "heard" on a forum, all sorts of visual abuse ensued.
The abuse followed the same progression as the development of the forums themselves. First, it was text only. When you wanted to be heard you did it in CAPITAL LETTERS! It wasn't long before you lost credibility when typing in capitals. But of course, there was always huge, colored, bold text. That was sure to get people to notice right? And they did notice, but you didn't get the recognition you felt you needed. So, maybe an animated GIF for an avatar would make people like me? Nope. Didn't work either. The signature is the last place you can 1-UP someone. And because there is a limit on how amusing you can be in what was intended to be a small space, the only thing left to do is make more signatures, and larger ones too.
Well, you're just a jerk. Who cares what you think?
Wait! I'm just getting to the good stuff! Right now this looks like I'm some anti-signature *. This couldn't be further from the truth. As a creative individual myself, I understand how fulfilling it can be to create avatars and signatures and personalize your forum experience. What I protest against is the lack of genuine creativity in signature design and ignorance to the purpose of forums themselves.
As I said before, content is key. The visual ratio of signatures versus written information is appalling these days. Think of it this way: When you turn in a 10 page paper for a class, the cover page doesn't count as page one. Using that same analogy, this forum looks like a 10 page paper with nine cover pages! All the excess graphical noise detracts from the integrity of the forum. For another example, consider the types of CAPTCHA that introduce or overlay noise to a series of characters. Not only is it difficult for bots to read, but many humans too. The excess graphics on this forum work the same way by making it difficult to read.
Imagine one of your textbooks in school What if every paragraph of your history book included a random picture of a duck, or a hammer, a satellite, or a cartoon character. How easy do you think it would be to concentrate on studying for that upcoming quiz? (And I'm not mixing apples and oranges here, so don't tell me a textbook and game forum are not the same. Yes they are the same, because they exist to communicate information. In fact, it's more important for the Internet forum to communicate effectively because it is two-way communication!)
Now, besides the visual mess signatures create, there is also the little matter of bandwidth to consider. The number and size of signatures greatly increases the page load times of forums. Not everyone has a super-fast connection and you should be considerate of others. Imagine you have a slow connection and the disappointment you might feel when someone replies to your topic/comment. You wait for 30 signatures to download just so you can read what the last person said - and all they said was "rofl". What a waste of time!
Fine, I get your point. Now what?
Luckily, I've come up with two ways for you to keep your signature, but use it in better taste!
The first one has to do with the ratio of written content to signature size. A good size paragraph might be about 150 words and could take up a screen area roughly 600px by 300px, or 180,000 sqpx (square pixels). All you have to do is make sure the amount of screen space you take up is at least 4x larger than the size of you signature. (You don't really need to do the math, but your forum comments should be much, much larger than your signature.) If my signature is 400px by 200px, I should probably write about three healthy paragraphs before I attach it to the post. If you are just posting "LOL!", then you should definitely skip the signature altogether. Of course, the alternative is to make the signature much smaller.
The second way to have better taste with signatures is much easier. You add your signature the first time you reply to a thread, and not again. When you think about it, this makes perfect sense to do. Your signature is redundant information. Why do you want to keep repeating yourself over and over and over again? It makes you look crazy!
My final point about signatures deals with the lack of creativity. Unfortunately, I have no solution to this except "don't do it". A lot of people think signatures are a form of creative expression. I balk at this notion. A vast majority of signatures follow a very common, simple workflow: Download a picture of something you like (a sport, game, character, car, whatever), place it in Photoshop and crop or retouch. Next, use another image and/or Photoshop filters to create a background. Add some text in an uncomplimentary typeface, and wow! A "cool" signature to put on a forum. You can't get any more uncreative in my book.
However, someone might take the following approach and have great success: Think about your avatar and signature. Are they in visual harmony with each other? Do they say something about you without looking too cliché? Do your avatar and signature compliment the colors and style of the forum you are posting on? Finally, does your graphical representation overshadow or detract from your writing?
Thanks so much for reading, and good luck with your signatures in the future. I'm sure they will be much more tasteful! And for more interesting reading about signatures, try this blog entry by Adrian Miu.
Best forum post ever, anywhere, about signatures.
Last edited by compguygene on Sat Mar 13, 2010 12:50 am, edited 1 time in total.
Armagetron: It's a video game that people should just play and enjoy
https://bit.ly/2KBGYjvCheck out the simple site about TheServerPharm
https://bit.ly/2KBGYjvCheck out the simple site about TheServerPharm
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epsy
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Re: How do I make a signature?
I think the "do not distract" rule applies for forum backgrounds too *wink* *wink*compguygene wrote:sinewav on the Wild West Forums wrote:
After all, many successful gaming-oriented websites use very sober backgrounds, including this one.
Re: How do I make a signature?
Gene, it would have been better if you copied that into the body and retained the formatting instead of using a quote. It looks terrible. Can you edit your post, or delete it and I'll post it under my name? (It's some quality writing there.)
And you can't "quote" a whole essay man, that's not what a quote is. You're republishing an article.
And you can't "quote" a whole essay man, that's not what a quote is. You're republishing an article.
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Clutch
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Re: How do I make a signature?
Well i guess if you're immature like me and want a cool flashy signature you could just download GIMP or "buy" photoshop. Go on youtube and look up some tutorials they are pretty helpful. Some of your fellow tronners also make sigs that they let other people use so look around in the graphic section maybe
Boxed
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compguygene
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Re: How do I make a signature?
Thanks for pointing that out, fixed.sinewav wrote:Gene, it would have been better if you copied that into the body and retained the formatting instead of using a quote. It looks terrible. Can you edit your post, or delete it and I'll post it under my name? (It's some quality writing there.)
And you can't "quote" a whole essay man, that's not what a quote is. You're republishing an article.
Armagetron: It's a video game that people should just play and enjoy
https://bit.ly/2KBGYjvCheck out the simple site about TheServerPharm
https://bit.ly/2KBGYjvCheck out the simple site about TheServerPharm
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septembern
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Re: How do I make a signature?
Thanks a lot... It was tiring though to read the longer posts!
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septembern
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Re: How do I make a signature?
Maybe I'll just leave it like it is... simple and easy to read...
Re: How do I make a signature?
No...compguygene wrote:Forget that graphical stuff. Type some witty text! That is what sigs were originally.
Download Photoshop and go to http://www.sigtutorials.com
That should get you started.
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Clutch
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Re: How do I make a signature?
If you dont mind forkin over like what 400 dollars? O.oMecca wrote:No...compguygene wrote:Forget that graphical stuff. Type some witty text! That is what sigs were originally.
Download Photoshop and go to http://www.sigtutorials.com
That should get you started.
Boxed