Naked Science Forum
General Discussion & Feedback => Just Chat! => Topic started by: Pmb on 15/10/2013 21:25:19
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I would like some input here. I've seen some posters here and in other forums create consecutive posts in a discussion. I imagine that these people have something they want to contribute so they reply to a thread and then post their response. Later on the same person has more to say so they repeat what they did and in doing so create yet another post. Some people will do this many many times in a row. I myself have tried to reason with those who like to post this way because I find it makes things difficult in the long run. However I never got a response which told me why they do that. All I've gotten was the statement that I should forget about me changing how they post and that's that.
My question is - Why do people do this and why do forum administrators and moderators allow this?
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There are numerous reasons to double post.
Sometimes a thread will have essentially two different chains of conversation. If it is homogeneous enough, then one can fit the response in a single post, but sometimes it seems better to post separate posts for each sub-topic. It can also often be complex to quote multiple posts, so it may be easiest to just quote what you are replying to in separate posts.
Sometimes one thinks of new information that one wishes to add to the discussion. If more than an hour or so has passed, it may seem appropriate to just post something new rather than editing the old post (which is more likely to be missed). Some websites also turn off the editing capabilities after some time has elapsed or additional followup posts are made. However, on occasion I've fixed a mathematics error or such, significantly after the original post in order to try to avoid confusion.
There is also the "Bump". On classified ads or something on other boards you might see a reply that just says "bump". It is kind of frowned upon here. However, it is legitimate to add enough new information to your previous posts that it warrants bringing it to the top of the list.
Some of the new theories can be a bit of a monologue, but as long as it isn't a big problem, I certainly don't worry about it too much.
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There are numerous reasons to double post.
Sometimes a thread will have essentially two different chains of conversation. If it is homogeneous enough, then one can fit the response in a single post, but sometimes it seems better to post separate posts for each sub-topic. It can also often be complex to quote multiple posts, so it may be easiest to just quote what you are replying to in separate posts.
Interesting. I wish they explained that. I just got silence when I asked.
I've been thinking this over and you've changed my mind. I'm going to allow it in my own place and hope its not abused. If so we'll take it from there. Thanks for the input.
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There is also the fact that some of us are short on time and have to slip in a quick post when the opportunity presents itself. If quite a lot has been posted in a thread it may not be possible to read and respond to everything at once.
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There is also the fact that some of us are short on time and have to slip in a quick post when the opportunity presents itself. If quite a lot has been posted in a thread it may not be possible to read and respond to everything at once.
Would you object to the moderator taking your last post and concatenating it to your previous post if nobody has posted in the interim?
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I usually use a single post for a single thought as much as possible. Oftentimes I have multiple thoughts to add to a thread, so I use multiple posts.
As a user, I find it somewhat annoying to follow threads where a single user makes the same point over multiple posts in a row.
As a moderator, we try to keep a light touch as much as possible, so we don't clamp down on this. It would also take a lot of time to concatenate posts, and we don't have enough moderation staff to do this.