Guidelines for Topic Index Contributors

1. The information should generally be of encyclopedic value. No temporary situations or posts that are relevant to only a very small number of people. Will the information be useful 5+ years from now?
2. Recognize that the purpose of the index is to provide users with a quick and easy way to get to the information they are intersted in.
3. Link to the most relevant post of a thread rather than just the first post of a thread.
4. Priority should be given to posts with credible sources.
5. On very popular topics that often generates multiple threads (such as darksiding or oil brands) make sure that the thread you are linking to provides a user with new information. Example: If there are 25 threads on oil brands, we should limit the number of links in the index to those that provide different information than all the others, or to those that provide a representative sample of the breadth of opinions.
6. Always link directly to a single post (using the small white page icon beside the "by username") even if the link goes to the first post in a thread. This will allow other contributors the ability to determine at a glance if the post has already been submitted by comparing the numbers at the end of the link.
7. Posts on obscure topics should be considered for inclusion, due to the potential difficulty in finding those posts in the future. Example: Farquarforever had problems with a broken subframe. Even though very few people would ever encounter this situation, it would be important for another person in the same situation 5 years from now to know how to find if it has happened before.
8. Provide a simple one sentence statement above the link describing the content of the post.
9. Topics not specific to Burgmans (helmets, riding safety, etc) should not be included. The index should be a concise list of topics specific to Burgmans that can not be found elsewhere. Generic information can be found throught the WWW.
10. Due to having the same topics for multiple models (i.e. CVT for both 400s and 650), each article or topic category must have the appropriate model as a prefix.
    • Examples:
    • 400 CVT
    • 400 b CVT
    • 650 CVT