The problem with Eternal September isn't that n00bs are stupid lusers - but that we do a terrible job introducing people into our culture.
So many online spaces seem to have an attitude of "if you don't already know the rules, you can't play". There's no helping newbies and neophytes learn the how and why of a community.
Most organisations are desperate for new members. And yet, when people show up, they're laughed at, blocked, or sent away.
Eternal September should be a cause of joy! Look! All these new people want to talk about our hobby! New friends to play with! New people we can tell our jokes to! New blood to help give us new ideas!
Instead, they're treated as an annoyance or irrelevance. Why is that?
@Edent I know this is a rhetorical question but I think there's an answer anyway.
There are two models: either the community teaches people how to behave after they have joined, or people are required to learn how to behave before they are allowed to join.
Both models are stable, but the first one requires effort from community members to matriculate new members, and therefore cannot handle the workload when a wave of new members arrive that vastly outnumbered the original members.
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