If you are going to give feedback to a new user a downvote may not be clear, and I would go as far to say, is never clear. Please leave them a comment and explain the site, you can flag as Not an answer for a moderator or higher rep users to clear out the post with a delete and have a comment explain what they have misunderstood. A good comment to leave might be along the lines of: > This forum is not like other forums, there is already an answer for > this question and the way to support it is up voting. The reason you > cannot upvote is because you have not yet attained the reputation > required to do so, a rough estimate of both expertise and knowledge of > the site. Please try to add new answers other places or ask questions > you have. If you have any confusion about the site, visit the > [FAQ\](http://electronics.stackexchange.com/faq)! I put a space in between FAQ and the link so that you can copy paste and remove it for a working link.