I did, I just merged another one; I usually do, but can't with nesting. - Edit 1
Before modification by Joel at 11/05/2011 11:05:23 PM
At least, not very conveniently, because I have to open all the subthreads at once then copy the sections to which I want to directly respond while hoping I don't miss any or copy them in the wrong order (to the extent order is still relevant under those conditions). And of course, if I want to respond to more than one person at once, if it's in fact logical to do so because five people make either related or virtually identical comments to which the same response is relevant, I either have to reply to each of them in turn, or hope they all choose to read a response I made to someone else. On phpBBs I frequently consolidate multiple responses into one and delete my originals to (GASP!) avoid spamming.
OK, we have an accord, simply because Dan Brown fans are factually as well as aesthetically challenged. It's the difference between disliking people because they're Democrats and disliking Obama because he's a Muslim terrorist.
For convenience, since my internet is trashed, I'm responding to your above comment on paged/nested threads here: It's more than laziness, else I'd be able to quote and respond to both here very conveniently, and would. I wouldn't spend five hours (so far... ) reading todays posts in the thread and only be through half of them, and wouldn't have made more posts than I can remember in this one thread. I'd probably have a couple yesterday and a couple more today, with each person to whom I responded quoted separately in the SAME POST. There are advantages to both formats, which is another reason why I don't like forcing anyone to use one they don't like: They prefer one because it has advantages the other lacks, and listing all the advantages the other has over the one they prefer won't change that. That's mainly reiteration of what I said to Palatine and Darth Katie above (and separately, perforce).
I'm getting really annoyed with this discussion, you know. It is not a really important issue - but I have this tendency to think that if you like the damn filthy BB thing so much, go post there instead. Myself, I have quite a distaste for it, and feel the average users of such systems are the ones commenting on youtube videos (see xkcd). I guess I wouldn't mind a hybrid much, as long as I never had to see it or notice it for myself.
Since it's not important to you and is important to me can I have my way? I guess you've already answered that seriously though, since my preference has always been a hybrid. As far as dumbing down society, it's disappointing to see how the discussion deteriorated into "your format sucks donkeys because my leet format does x, y and z". It's encouraging that some nesting supporters can see and appreciate why others prefer paging (and I've tried to do my part to make the opposite clear on "my" side), but I think any system that forces the whole site to use either format exclusively is equally bad for different reasons. It's like the exchange above between §ol and me (yes, I still think of everyone by their wotmania names, and thanks a bunch for making life easier for me there): He prefers Borda voting and I prefer Instant Runoffs, for different reasons. That doesn't make either system bad, it means we prioritize different things and therefor prefer different systems. In that case we can't each use the system and thus enjoy the advantages we prefer, but in the case of board formats we can. A hybrids cost to either side is negligible to none, and far more inclusive than either format by itself, which fosters growth without mutilating site or community character. I'd rank my preferences Hybrid-3, Paged-2, Nested-1. Not that this is democracy.
As for the lazy bums who don't want to click a few times to get a good discussion going: they are a symptom of the dumbing down of society - from the emergence of a two party system to the fact that no computer game which requires learning how to do stuff is ever published - all these small signs of impatience is a boil on society's butt. In all likelihood, they also wait for the movie instead of reading the book, and thus we don't want the bastards around.
I may be an elitist bastard, but I am damn good at it. Also, I was making a jest, but now I had to find arguments to hate new people, thank you very much.
But really, this is the only place on the internet with a decent board system; if that were to change in any significant way, well, most of the people I like here are on facebook, I might as well just leave and keep in touch there. I am somewhat convinced that while you might get an influx of new people (which is hard if the site looks like every other place on the internet) I think a large part of the backbone which carries the site will be lost. New people are important, but not at the cost of what makes the place interesting. I guess the decision is up to Ben, though, and every word we have written here will be deleted when he thinks it is annoying enough.
Thanks once again to Stephen for referencing Poes Law last week; I've always used it, but it's good to know it has a name now. Personally, I find it quite a time saver to just hate what people do instead of the people; you can usually find something to hate about ANYONE, and don't have to feel guilty about it if you later find out they donated a kidney to a stranger.
Again, I don't think page style threads are about impatience so much as having only so many hours in the day and the desire to use time efficiently. When it comes to websites that means reading over a few pages of posts in five minutes rather than spending half an hour clicking your way through a thread with a hundred replies expressing variations on a dozen opinions. If clicking them all is no big deal, why do we have the *NM* tag telling people not to waste time clicking? Ever seen one of those on a phpBB?
FWIW though, I agree with you that new people aren't important enough to sacrifice the old ones, and that the forms and facilitators of RAFOs unique character (of which nesting is certainly one) should be prized and defended. The format may not be important to you, but it's certainly not trivial if you'd leave the site over it. I don't want to confront anyone with that choice. As I said above, I'd resist a push to make the site paged thread only just as strongly as I'm arguing for a paged option, and ultimately for the same reason: Because preferences aside I think it unwise and harmful to force any one system on the whole site if it excludes people who don't like it, be they Elder or newbie. It's not a question of which is better; each is better than the other in some ways and worse in others, but fortunately there's no reason we MUST choose one or the other, and for that reason I don't think we should. I much prefer a choice of formats that includes everyone to a(ny) single format that excludes anyone.
beating.
OK, we have an accord, simply because Dan Brown fans are factually as well as aesthetically challenged. It's the difference between disliking people because they're Democrats and disliking Obama because he's a Muslim terrorist.
For convenience, since my internet is trashed, I'm responding to your above comment on paged/nested threads here: It's more than laziness, else I'd be able to quote and respond to both here very conveniently, and would. I wouldn't spend five hours (so far... ) reading todays posts in the thread and only be through half of them, and wouldn't have made more posts than I can remember in this one thread. I'd probably have a couple yesterday and a couple more today, with each person to whom I responded quoted separately in the SAME POST. There are advantages to both formats, which is another reason why I don't like forcing anyone to use one they don't like: They prefer one because it has advantages the other lacks, and listing all the advantages the other has over the one they prefer won't change that. That's mainly reiteration of what I said to Palatine and Darth Katie above (and separately, perforce).
I'm getting really annoyed with this discussion, you know. It is not a really important issue - but I have this tendency to think that if you like the damn filthy BB thing so much, go post there instead. Myself, I have quite a distaste for it, and feel the average users of such systems are the ones commenting on youtube videos (see xkcd). I guess I wouldn't mind a hybrid much, as long as I never had to see it or notice it for myself.
Since it's not important to you and is important to me can I have my way?
I guess you've already answered that seriously though, since my preference has always been a hybrid. As far as dumbing down society, it's disappointing to see how the discussion deteriorated into "your format sucks donkeys because my leet format does x, y and z". It's encouraging that some nesting supporters can see and appreciate why others prefer paging (and I've tried to do my part to make the opposite clear on "my" side), but I think any system that forces the whole site to use either format exclusively is equally bad for different reasons. It's like the exchange above between §ol and me (yes, I still think of everyone by their wotmania names, and thanks a bunch for making life easier for me there): He prefers Borda voting and I prefer Instant Runoffs, for different reasons. That doesn't make either system bad, it means we prioritize different things and therefor prefer different systems. In that case we can't each use the system and thus enjoy the advantages we prefer, but in the case of board formats we can. A hybrids cost to either side is negligible to none, and far more inclusive than either format by itself, which fosters growth without mutilating site or community character. I'd rank my preferences Hybrid-3, Paged-2, Nested-1. Not that this is democracy.The comment you made to which I wanted to respond was the (hopefully facetious) one asking whether we really want people too lazy to click on every post to read the whole thread. My thoughts on that are equally appropriate in this discussion about the WoTMB: Seeing people who want paged threads met with the same "well, we don't want THEM anyway" attitude WoT so often is doesn't exactly make me optimistic about RAFOs future. If you were simply making a jest I shouldn't have taken seriously, my apologies, but, whether or not it's valid, I get that impression a lot at RAFO. Granted it hasn't put me off the site, but I'm not as worried about the villagers showing up with torches as the average newb might be (and, let's be fair, the quality of my posting over the years has been inversely proportional to how much what people think concerns me.
As for the lazy bums who don't want to click a few times to get a good discussion going: they are a symptom of the dumbing down of society - from the emergence of a two party system to the fact that no computer game which requires learning how to do stuff is ever published - all these small signs of impatience is a boil on society's butt. In all likelihood, they also wait for the movie instead of reading the book, and thus we don't want the bastards around.
I may be an elitist bastard, but I am damn good at it. Also, I was making a jest, but now I had to find arguments to hate new people, thank you very much.
But really, this is the only place on the internet with a decent board system; if that were to change in any significant way, well, most of the people I like here are on facebook, I might as well just leave and keep in touch there. I am somewhat convinced that while you might get an influx of new people (which is hard if the site looks like every other place on the internet) I think a large part of the backbone which carries the site will be lost. New people are important, but not at the cost of what makes the place interesting. I guess the decision is up to Ben, though, and every word we have written here will be deleted when he thinks it is annoying enough.
Thanks once again to Stephen for referencing Poes Law last week; I've always used it, but it's good to know it has a name now. Personally, I find it quite a time saver to just hate what people do instead of the people; you can usually find something to hate about ANYONE, and don't have to feel guilty about it if you later find out they donated a kidney to a stranger.
Again, I don't think page style threads are about impatience so much as having only so many hours in the day and the desire to use time efficiently. When it comes to websites that means reading over a few pages of posts in five minutes rather than spending half an hour clicking your way through a thread with a hundred replies expressing variations on a dozen opinions. If clicking them all is no big deal, why do we have the *NM* tag telling people not to waste time clicking? Ever seen one of those on a phpBB?
FWIW though, I agree with you that new people aren't important enough to sacrifice the old ones, and that the forms and facilitators of RAFOs unique character (of which nesting is certainly one) should be prized and defended. The format may not be important to you, but it's certainly not trivial if you'd leave the site over it. I don't want to confront anyone with that choice. As I said above, I'd resist a push to make the site paged thread only just as strongly as I'm arguing for a paged option, and ultimately for the same reason: Because preferences aside I think it unwise and harmful to force any one system on the whole site if it excludes people who don't like it, be they Elder or newbie. It's not a question of which is better; each is better than the other in some ways and worse in others, but fortunately there's no reason we MUST choose one or the other, and for that reason I don't think we should. I much prefer a choice of formats that includes everyone to a(ny) single format that excludes anyone.