Noise to substance ratio in threads

[bluebell]

I'm fully aware that this is board nannying and I'm willing to be suspended for a few days over it if that's what it comes to because it needs to be said:

If the only reason you are posting is to--

• complain about another poster
• say something "witty"
• high-five a poster for saying something "witty"
• wax philosophical about how much more mature, enlightened, non-judgmental you are than some other group (or to otherwise just be condescending) 
• to repeat multiple times that you don't know why anyone cares about the topic or imply that anyone that does is just being a jerk

--please rethink the post or just don't say it at all.  Threads are being taken over by small groups of posters that add nothing of substance.  Threads are full of one-liners that are supposed to (?) inform everyone else of the superiority of a position without actually saying anything that is useful to the discussion, and it's getting old.

It starts innocently enough (and we all do it occasionally, which usually doesn't cause any problems) but if we aren't careful it starts to build and build until more and more posters are only posting in order to score "points" (on both sides), and every thread becomes groups of posters being self-righteously passive/aggressive towards each other while saying absolutely nothing of worth. 

I graduated from high school a long time ago and I have no desire to be immersed in that environment again.  

PLEASE STOP.  

 

[jkwilliams]

2 minutes ago, bluebell said:

I'm fully aware that this is board nannying and I'm willing to be suspended for a few days over it if that's what it comes to because it needs to be said:

If the only reason you are posting is to--

• complain about another poster
• say something "witty"
• high-five a poster for saying something "witty"
• wax philosophical about how much more mature, enlightened, non-judgmental you are than some other group (or to otherwise just be condescending) 
• to repeat multiple times that you don't know why anyone cares about the topic or imply that anyone that does is just being a jerk

--please rethink the post or just don't say it at all.  Threads are being taken over by small groups of posters that add nothing of substance.  Threads are full of one-liners that are supposed to (?) inform everyone else of the superiority of a position without actually saying anything that is useful to the discussion, and it's getting old.

It starts innocently enough (and we all do it occasionally, which usually doesn't cause any problems) but if we aren't careful it starts to build and build until more and more posters are only posting in order to score "points" (on both sides), and every thread becomes groups of posters being self-righteously passive/aggressive towards each other while saying absolutely nothing of worth. 

I graduated from high school a long time ago and I have no desire to be immersed in that environment again.  

PLEASE STOP.  

 

My wife said to me a few minutes ago, Why do you waste time in a place that brings out the worst in you? Good question.

Cleatly your post applies to my recent posts, for which I apologize. 
 

[ttribe]

1 minute ago, jkwilliams said:

My wife said to me a few minutes ago, Why do you waste time in a place that brings out the worst in you? Good question.

Cleatly your post applies to my recent posts, for which I apologize. 
 

Pretty sure I'm a target, too.

[california boy]

One lesson I learned a long time ago is that I cannot control the actions of other people, but I can control how I react to them.  Have you considered that perhaps it is how you are approaching the discussion board?  There are tools you can use if you find certain posters obnoxious.  And you don't have to respond to every comment.  You can also just skim threads to get the flavor of what is going on.  .

What I am saying is, if you are a regular participant here, you have a pretty good idea how posters from every position will respond.  You have complete control on how you participate on this board and how you want to respond or engage with what is going on.  I am sure there are plenty of fellow posters that don't want to hear my comments.That is fine with me.  But others find some value in the perspective I can offer.  Starting a thread about how others should behave from your point of view doesn't seem like a valid approach to take when there are things you can do to control your experience on this board.

Just something to think about.  I am not saying that you don't have valid points.

[Calm]

I am grateful bluebell posted her comments as I think she is dead on with a relatively new significant problem. (Happened in the past, but not to this degree or persistence.). When I am getting bored not from the lack of posts to keep my hours occupied, but from too many of empty headed knee jerk responses, something has changed. 
 

Having seen the destruction of one board because it was flooded with trivial, negative comments, I really don’t want it to happen again here. 
 

As to using ignore...posts are still quoted by others and also count as new posts, so even with ignore my experience is there is still a lot of exposure.  And the posters who are currently engaging in this also have some substantive posts...though less than usual unfortunately...that I would still like to read. 
 

But the worst effect imo is when there are too many of the posts bluebell has described, they overwhelm the positive, informative comments, which leads to less responses to them.  Posters who might be interested in saying something worthwhile don’t even bother to try.  Here and there drivebys and personal jabs they can just phase out and skip over them; when there are dozens in a thread, the thread gets skipped in my experience (this was reported to me when I was a mod on ZLMB when we were struggling with how to address the change in the tone of the board).  
 

And from experience asking the mods to keep the numbers down rather than posters accepting personal responsibility for avoiding that type turns moderating into a hellish job which does little to stop the nastiness in the long run. Mods don’t have the option of hanging out on the board 24/7 to ensure posts are removed quickly. Therefore the thread gets swamped or at least unbalanced by the time mods can step in. 

This board has something that ZLMB didn’t have and that is the posters who are currently indulging in trivial, negative posts are very capable posters who have contributed in the past to making this board fun and worthwhile to read.  For whatever reason the shift to the negative personal, there seems no reason I can see that it can’t shift back if posters stop and think ‘is this something that needs to be said, have I already said it, is it on the subject or more the poster I am responding to’.

 

Edited June 18, 2021 by Calm

[CA Steve]

I agree with the OP.

Frankly one thing that would go a long way to eliminating these issues would be if posters would stop trying to define a post or poster as a defender or critic and simply address the point being made.

 

I would also be in favor of a limit on much a poster can breakup another poster's post into separate quotes. Sometime I feel like we are arguing over what the definition of 'is' is.

Edited June 18, 2021 by CA Steve

[Danzo]

"you could tell what a Baggins would say on any question without the bother of asking him."

From Chapter One of the Hobbit

 

At times I feel that this is the case with manys poster here.

One can often Look at who is posting to tell you what they are going to say without actually having to read the post. 

 

 

 

[bluebell]

4 hours ago, california boy said:

One lesson I learned a long time ago is that I cannot control the actions of other people, but I can control how I react to them.  Have you considered that perhaps it is how you are approaching the discussion board?  There are tools you can use if you find certain posters obnoxious.  And you don't have to respond to every comment.  You can also just skim threads to get the flavor of what is going on.  .

What I am saying is, if you are a regular participant here, you have a pretty good idea how posters from every position will respond.  You have complete control on how you participate on this board and how you want to respond or engage with what is going on.  I am sure there are plenty of fellow posters that don't want to hear my comments.That is fine with me.  But others find some value in the perspective I can offer.  Starting a thread about how others should behave from your point of view doesn't seem like a valid approach to take when there are things you can do to control your experience on this board.

Just something to think about.  I am not saying that you don't have valid points.

Very true.  I have a couple of posters on ignore because nothing good ever came from discussing anything with them and not being able to read their posts kept me from responding.

But I can honestly say that I like the posters who I feel have been struggling with this lately, so I don't want to put them on ignore.  I would be missing out on some good posts.

[Scott Lloyd]

3 hours ago, CA Steve said:

I would also be in favor of a limit on much a poster can breakup another poster's post into separate quotes. Sometime I feel like we are arguing over what the definition of 'is' is.

I would not support this suggestion. Inter-linear comments serve as an orderly way to deal with multiple points in a post, especially a lengthy one. Smac97 is especially good at this, and he definitely does not fit your characterization. His posts are, in my opinion, the most substantive and intelligent ones on the board. 
 

And if someone is inclined to quibble over the definition of “is” he’s going to do it no matter what form his post takes. 

Edited June 18, 2021 by Scott Lloyd

[bluebell]

3 hours ago, CA Steve said:

I would also be in favor of a limit on much a poster can breakup another poster's post into separate quotes. Sometime I feel like we are arguing over what the definition of 'is' is.

I think breaking up discussions can be helpful, especially if someone has made multiple points that they are asking another to comment on or answer.  

But there comes a point where it's less effective.  Posts grow to sizes, and have so many side topics, that few (if any) other posters are going to care to try to follow along.  And it becomes overwhelming for the person being replied to, to respond back to each point. 

Eventually someone in the conversation has to stop or things snowball and devolve into useless back-and-forth.

[bluebell]

6 hours ago, ttribe said:

Pretty sure I'm a target, too.

I didn't want anyone to feel like a target.  It was a general plea.  We've all been guilty of it, but we can't let it take over.

[JustAnAustralian]

I'd be happy if threads just stayed on topic.

Edited June 19, 2021 by JustAnAustralian

[Fether]

Another thing that would fix it is trying to understand what the poster is saying rather than deciding what they are saying and arguing that straw man argument. I recently said something in a post and I misexplained a concept. Someone called me out and I quickly corrected myself. The next 2 pages of posts were of others ignoring my correction and all my comments. They seemed more interested in the misexplanation than what I really meant. 
 

I participate in a few Latter-day Saint forums. All of them I feel comfortable to share my thoughts openly, ask questions, and challenges concepts that even I agree with. But here, I pause before everything I post because I know there is a line of 2-3 people who have a problem with what I say and proceed to attack not only my point (which is expected and what forums are for), but me as well and the proscribe straw man argument to a single line in a post. It’s exhausting

With how we communicate sometimes (and yes, I am part of the problem), I would think this was a political battleground forum

Edited June 19, 2021 by Fether

[The Nehor]

Then what exactly am I supposed to post?

[let’s roll]

It’s true that the petulance meter has been in the red on a few threads recently.  We can all do better.  Thanks for the invitation to do so.

[Scott Lloyd]

4 hours ago, bluebell said:

I think breaking up discussions can be helpful, especially if someone has made multiple points that they are asking another to comment on or answer.  

But there comes a point where it's less effective.  Posts grow to sizes, and have so many side topics, that few (if any) other posters are going to care to try to follow along.  And it becomes overwhelming for the person being replied to, to respond back to each point. 

Eventually someone in the conversation has to stop or things snowball and devolve into useless back-and-forth.

I’m wondering, then, how else one would deal with the occasional scattershot attack post filled with arguments of varying degrees of validity. If there is more efficient or effective way than the interlinear comments method, I’m open to hearing about it. At the moment, the only other option I can think of is multiple posts answering individual points in turn, and that strikes me as even more unwieldy. 

Edited June 19, 2021 by Scott Lloyd

[california boy]

2 hours ago, bluebell said:

I think breaking up discussions can be helpful, especially if someone has made multiple points that they are asking another to comment on or answer.  

But there comes a point where it's less effective.  Posts grow to sizes, and have so many side topics, that few (if any) other posters are going to care to try to follow along.  And it becomes overwhelming for the person being replied to, to respond back to each point. 

Eventually someone in the conversation has to stop or things snowball and devolve into useless back-and-forth.

I completely support this.  I find that some posters literally break up a post so much that even single sentences are broken into parts.  I have found that often people write a paragraph to help explain a concept.  If you read the whole paragraph in context, it is easier to understand what point of view they are trying to get across.  When you pick that same paragraph apart, the context is not only completely lost, but often the remarks are a complete distortion and often opposite of what the poster intended.  What also happens is one sentence or even a part of a sentence is pulled out and THAT becomes the subject of subsequence posts, often having nothing to do with the tread title or what the poster wanted to say.  

I find my post often so contrived into an almost unrecognizable collection of comments, I don't want or bother to comment.  

I also feel the breaking down of a post to single sentences is causing some posters to post these one line answers.  Something that can't as easily turn into a nightmare to respond to.  

Edited June 19, 2021 by california boy

[Calm]

28 minutes ago, Scott Lloyd said:

I’m wondering, then, how else one would deal with the occasional scattershot attack post filled with arguments of varying degrees of validity. If there is more efficient or effective way than the interlinear comments method, I’m open to hearing about. At the moment, the only other option I can think of is multiple posts answering individual points in turn, and that strikes me as even more unwieldy. 

I would break it up into at least two posts and try to group the subtopic together. Otherwise, I would suggest just saying something like ‘I am going to respond to the three most important points in my view to give them the attention they deserve and may come back to this post to address other comments once I am satisfied with the ones first chosen’. 
 

I appreciate Smac’s posts as if I responded ‘naturally’, mine would be breaking up a post in the same manner.  But at times by the time I finish a post, I have been distracted by a minor issue and forget to address something more substantive.  And I find I get more in-depth or on point responses if I keep a post limited to one or two topics/main points at a time. Not saying I am always or even mostly successful as I also ramble. 

[Scott Lloyd]

36 minutes ago, Calm said:

I would break it up into at least two posts and try to group the subtopic together. Otherwise, I would suggest just saying something like ‘I am going to respond to the three most important points in my view to give them the attention they deserve and may come back to this post to address other comments once I am satisfied with the ones first chosen’. 
 

I appreciate Smac’s posts as if I responded ‘naturally’, mine would be breaking up a post in the same manner.  But at times by the time I finish a post, I have been distracted by a minor issue and forget to address something more substantive.  And I find I get more in-depth or on point responses if I keep a post limited to one or two topics/main points at a time. Not saying I am always or even mostly successful as I also ramble. 

I think the scattergun type post with a cluster of remarks, any one of which is apt to provoke push back, is a more urgent problem than those who endeavor to answer such a post with quote-by-quote responses. If we deal with either, let us take up the more urgent problem first. We might then find that the second problem — if such it is — takes care of itself. 

Edited June 19, 2021 by Scott Lloyd

[bluebell]

3 hours ago, Scott Lloyd said:

I’m wondering, then, how else one would deal with the occasional scattershot attack post filled with arguments of varying degrees of validity. If there is more efficient or effective way than the interlinear comments method, I’m open to hearing about. At the moment, the only other option I can think of is multiple posts answering individual points in turn, and that strikes me as even more unwieldy. 

Pragmatically, I think we can ask ourselves, what is the best way to achieve my objective? 

Is answering or replying to every single thought going to actually help anyone engage with what I'm saying, or are people more likely to just stop reading and move on because things have become too time-consuming and cumbersome?

If our objective is to the get the final word in, then super long, multi-quote, posts will almost always achieve that, but I don't think that's the goal for most of us.  So, we need to think about the main goal and focus there.  

• That might look like doing one or two multi-quote post to respond back but then, if it looks like there is no end in sight, picking out 3-4 of the most important points and replying just to those. 
• Or, bolding one section, underlining another, and italicizing a third, so that we can reply to each thought clearly without making the post too long.  
• Or, using multiple posts (but not too many like you said, or we are right back to where we were before) to make our thoughts even more clear and precise, but remembering not to clog up the thread with too much of our voice.

If the discussion has been going back and forth for a while, getting bigger and bigger and more tangential, I like to sum up my thoughts one final time and just agree to disagree.

The main thing--for me--is trying not to let my ego take over and let it become just about me proving that I'm right.  I try to be ok letting other people have the final say on stuff, though sometimes I'm less successful at that than others.

Edited June 19, 2021 by bluebell

[bluebell]

15 minutes ago, Scott Lloyd said:

I think the scattergun type post with a cluster of remarks, any one of which is apt to provoke push back, is a more urgent problem than those who endeavor to answer such a post with quote-by-quote responses. If we deal with either, let us take up the more urgent problem first. We might find that the second problem — if such it is — takes care of itself. 

What the most urgent problem is will be different for all of us.  There's a lot of room for different approaches, thankfully. 

Speaking for myself, I'm not saying "this is a bad way to post".  Just more along the lines of "this style of posting is not always well received or serving your purposes so use caution" kind of thing.  It doesn't mean it's not ever appropriate.

 

[Scott Lloyd]

13 minutes ago, bluebell said:

What the most urgent problem is will be different for all of us.  There's a lot of room for different approaches, thankfully. 

Speaking for myself, I'm not saying "this is a bad way to post".  Just more along the lines of "this style of posting is not always well received or serving your purposes so use caution" kind of thing.  It doesn't mean it's not ever appropriate.

 

OK. 

Best not to have any mandates or edicts prohibiting or limiting it, then. Right?

[Scott Lloyd]

25 minutes ago, bluebell said:

If our objective is to the get the final word in, then super long, multi-quote, posts will almost always achieve that, but I don't think that's the goal for most of us.  So, we need to think about the main goal and focus there.  

What if our approach is to set the record straight in response to a post riddled with falsehoods and half-truths?

[CA Steve]

4 hours ago, bluebell said:

I think breaking up discussions can be helpful, especially if someone has made multiple points that they are asking another to comment on or answer.  

But there comes a point where it's less effective.  Posts grow to sizes, and have so many side topics, that few (if any) other posters are going to care to try to follow along.  And it becomes overwhelming for the person being replied to, to respond back to each point. 

Eventually someone in the conversation has to stop or things snowball and devolve into useless back-and-forth.

Sometimes it can be helpful to break down a few parts,  but we have a few posters who will break up a post until it really isn't a discussion, just a useless rebuttal. It's like the defense attorney who feels the need to ask a question just so the jury thinks there is a response, regardless of whether or not it is really relevant. I realize it would be an impossible rule to impose but I get frustrated with a response that just takes sentence by sentence and offers a response regardless of content. Frankly there are a few posters whom I no longer read at all because of their propensity to do that very thing.  And I agree with you regarding the length of responses, some of them are just ridiculous.  

The back and forth is another irritating thing. Why is having the last word so important?

Edited June 19, 2021 by CA Steve

[bluebell]

2 hours ago, Scott Lloyd said:

What if our approach is to set the record straight in response to a post riddled with falsehoods and half-truths?

I think the same reasoning applies, whatever the motive.  If a post becomes cumbersome and confusing to follow, not many people are going to read it, or be able to follow the arguments anymore, anyway.   Usually at that point it's just the fan base that is still following along (if that), and writing to an echo chamber doesn't serve any purpose or accomplish the initial objective.

So, I think sometimes it's just better to say less if you can and hope the less has more impact.

But really, these are just some of my thoughts on this specific topic.  They are not a standard other posters need to worry about.  I think most of us are just trying to do our best and I think unique styles and ways of seeing things are important.