It may be a bit difficult to bust into the circle(s) of friends we have around here, but that's life. Personally I try to be friends with people who seem to be good friend material, be they oldbie or newbie or whatever. I think enforced friendship to all newbies would be a really big waste of time (since so many newbies do and will leave in short time, no matter what), and also it wouldn't be honest, as other people said. In real life, school for example, such things are necessary because people HAVE to fit in in school eventually; they're forced to go to school there. But if someone doesn't fit in here, they're free to leave and find an MB where they do. Some people probably just don't belong here, and I think it's better that those people don't receive false impressions that they will fit in here when they don't. That's my opinion on the matter anyways. But yeah, we still do have some "newbies" who stick around for a long time. Not many, but enough to keep the place going, and the people who do stick around as a general rule tend to be really great people.