Please understand that the people on irc are there because they like to help people, and usually enjoy doing it.  This help is provided by people who are unpaid volunteers with a lot of experience and know how - they often have to take time off from other personal work to assist you.  Often the combined knowledge available results in solutions or workarounds for complex issues.
But hours of gracefully answering the same questions over and over (most of which could be found on the web or my faq page) often with not as much as a thank-you (like there is some obligation being fulfilled) are involved and some slack should be allowed, if yours isn't receiving the attention you feel it deserves.  This is forgotten on irc at times as the lack of personal contact seems to bring out the worst in some people.  To this end I keep my "Repostitory of Irc Stupidity & Ungratefulness"  here.

THIS IS NOT THE OFFICIAL RULES SITE FOR ANY IRC CHANNEL  some like UNDERNET #HTML have their own and you should check that out —

but in my ohhh so subtle manner, I'll sumarize them, and add a few of my own.  

Things marked with a  *  will often trigger an automatic kick from the robots - it's nothing personal - no human evaluated and made a decision - something you did triggered it.  The rest may just get you some what you may think negative comments about the action — your question might be ignored — a kick or ban depending on the action or phase of the moon.

1.  DO NOT USE PROFANITY  we all know that you've been working on this problem for a long time - have done everything you could and are now totally frustrated - but please don't pass that along.   * 

2.  ASK A CONCISE QUESTION  you obviously know what you want - but you now have to express that to people who do not have that inside knowledge (check here if you need an explanation of concise) - be prepared to provide a url to the problem.  You do not need to have permission to ask a question - it's assumed - please don't expect private messages for the answers.
However asking even the most concise question repeatedly is another issue, see question 1 about the frustration level — and question 8 about no respose — repeating too quick will get the   * 
REPEATING: If you feel the need to repeat yourself to a 'new' crowd, keep the requests to no more than once per 15 minutes.  If no one is responding.. take the hint..  Do not use a timer to automatically repeat your request.  If you are looking for something then stay alive in the channel and pay attention to those answering you;  don't leave requests then go to sleep.  Continued annoyance is usually a quick ticket to a vacation.

3.  DON'T PASTE YOUR CODE  This rarely results in readable code, and only clutters up everybody's irc window.  If it's necessary to see your code a url - or if asked a paste by message please.  A paste of code will probably trigger an automatic flood kick by the channel robots.   * 

4.  NO ADVERTISING  Spam or get rich quick schemes, trying to get business for yourself, incrementing your hit counter etc.  If you have a problem state it with the url

5.  NO WAREZ OR PORN  We are not a source for "illegal software" or porn.  People identified as providing illegal content of any kind are subject to being banned

6.  NO COLORS OR AUTO SCRIPTS  Ascii art - colord nick completions - way cool auto away scripts - sound requests, etc — all these cute things belong in #teenchat not a professional help channel.   * 

7.  AVOID "<insert anything here> SUCKS"  Everybody has preferences, and discussion of them with well thought out comments does happen.  Gratuitous whining about browsers makes no sense, since nearly all problems are operator inflicted with sloppy or incorrect code — and some of the balance have workarounds.  Your feelings about users of other platforms intelligence are also not wanted either.  Non-constructive comments about a site's quality should be as, your mother hopefully taught you - kept to yourself.

8.  DEAL WITH LAG AND NO RESPONSES  Just because you don't seem to be getting an answer is not a reason to throw a fit - either nobody currently active has your answer (your bad luck) or because of lagg it's not getting to you.

9.  DO NOT MESSAGE PEOPLE  Just because I or anybody else is active does not = it's okay to message about your personal problem - use the channel - if a message is required it will be initiated or requested.

10.  DO NOT EXPECT HELP ON SCREWING OVER YOUR FREE SERVER  Some of us have very strong feelings about people who make "deals for a service" then want to cheat — expect a hard time with this.  Funny how people wanting this info are also the ones who want to hide source or bitch about graphics being stolen.

11.  DEAL WITH THE FACT THAT YOUR IDEA MIGHT BE CONSIDERED LAME  Okay so you want a window open on leaving your site, or things in that vain, if you manage to have a sense of humor about it most likely you'll get it — then again you might not, but burning bridges isn't all that smart.

Now the bonus for reading all this - if after checking all there is here you still need some help - you "may" message me with the secret help word "HOYO"