Shake Me Like A Monkey

[Rob]

Actually; I'm not entirely sure what "shake me like a monkey means," nor for that matter am I exactly certain how a monkey would shake "me" or any other human for that matter. Basically I just did a Google search and chose the wackiest autocomplete I could find. So there.

What this article is really about is human contact. That's right, no monkeys need apply.

Recently we've been having a very enlightened and I think, productive discussion on the value and importance of handshaking on the forums. There seems to be a passionate message on both sides.

The impetus for the discussion and the circumstances surrounding it aren't really relevant to the discussion. Feel free to explore them and comment in the forums if you so desire. But for the most part we've reached an impasse with neither side willing to say definitively that handshaking is or is not important to the webcomics community.

So this is where you come in.

Originally I had considered a poll. A simple "Do you think handshakes are important" kind of thing. But that doesn't really cover the complexity of the issue. And most forums don't allow for more than one question to a poll (because once there is more than one question it becomes a survey... not a poll). So I found this very cool site that allows one to make up custom polls and I went to work.

I submitted the poll to the members here and got feedback. Fixed mistakes and altered some of the responses based upon their input. I think together we've come up with as honest and impartial a survey as people who don't make surveys for a living (and in my case scraped by with a "C+" in Statistics in college) could hope to make.

The problem posed is a simple one. I'll quote the text here but you can read it yourself on the survey page.

Convention attendance can often lead to illness. Many people in a small, crowded place often does. There are many old jokes about "Con Flu" and often exhibitors and attendees can find themselves ill for some time after attending. While illness is not guaranteed and cannot be traced specifically to handshaking (there are many other possible causes like airborne viruses, food contamination and unclean surfaces) recently some organizations have suggested a "no touching" policy. I'd like to know how important a handshake is to the people who attend conventions.

There are ten questions, all multiple choice and all related to your opinion. You can only take the survey once and once you have submitted your answers you will be redirected back here to our front page.

I'm inviting everyone to take the survey at this time. Even if you have never attended a convention, your feelings on the subject in general would be appreciated. You never know, you may one day decide you do want to attend a convention; and your answers to this survey could affect how people interact with each other at conventions for some time to come. So think about it carefully and please take the subject seriously. For many of us this is our business and as fellow business members, fans, or even just customers we want to know how you feel.

I'd also ask that you tell as many people as possible about the survey. The larger the sample we receive the more validity the results will have. That's one thing I remember from my Statistics course. I'm also going to push back Monday's article to Tuesday and place a reminder about the survey in the article on Tuesday to give this Survey as much exposure as possible.

I will leave the survey up for two weeks. On Monday, April 26th I'll post a new article containing the results of the Survey for all to see.

Thank you in advance for your participation. Now press the big red button to begin the survey.

And if for some reason you cannot get the button to work here is the URL to copy and paste into your browser.

http://www.kwiksurveys.com/?s=KIMJIH_cc71d42c

[Rob]

Wow.... I was expecting less people to care about handshakes... but so far it's about an even split on the results. I'm kind of surprised.

Well it's early yet.  :-\