[paul cotter (OP)]

Without mentioning any names, some poster's questions, having been answered in exquisite detail, are repeated again and again and this goes page after page. I don't know if this is a lack of comprehension or deliberate trolling. I am of the opinion that these threads are of very limited value and are annoying to read through(in case there might be some gem of wisdom buried within). Should a thread that is going in endless loops with no hope of progress be terminated? looking for opinions.









 

[Eternal Student]

Hi.

   OK but where else can people go?   My posts are long but they aren't usually harming anyone.   

Not a lot of people know this but there is actually a word limit for posts made in this forum.   My own posts ramble on sufficiently that I have actually found that limit and had to split one post into two posts.   I don't think anyone else has ever mentioned this limit or knew that it existed.

    So, a lot of policies will end up excluding people like myself.    None the less, some policy might be in order.  I'm willing to accept the same rules rather than just recommend that they are applied to others.   So... a word limit reduction could be done.   

    I also think there should be an automatic (computer coded) restriction on replying to your own posts too often - if someone else replies, then that's fine, the OP can reply again.   However, if there are no other replies, then the OP probably shouldn't keep adding endless replies themselves, a few is fine but too many is a problem.   When this happens the posts become personal blog sites, commercial advertising for a product, or "evangelizing" which doesn't refer to purely religious promotion but any situation where you just keep presenting your own ideas on a public website as often as you can.   

   So overall I would have some sympathy or support for your suggestion.   It should be a forum - a discussion between people.   However, not all forums agree with that - there are some that deliberately try to produce a few monologues (often called articles) and have only a tiny space for comments and feedback on those monologues  (if any space for feedback at all).   It's not my website and overall I don't make the rules BUT I'm sure you could collect some opinions here and/or just present your own  suggestions to the management.

   On a minor note... reading a lot of replies is OK but it can be faster if you present a few main choices and then just leave people to write longer replies if they want in the thread.     When you create a new thread you can actually start by adding a "Poll" to it.   I'll set one up in a moment and you'll see what I mean.

Best Wishes.

LATE EDITING:   If you haven't found it......    The New Poll example is here:
https://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/index.php?topic=85028.new#new

[evan_au]

The moderators do lock a thread if:
- It keeps going over the same old ground
- It degenerates into name-calling

The moderators can also merge a new thread into an old thread, if it is just repeating the same stuff
- Or split a topic into two threads, if it has diverged into two unrelated topics

The moderators can also suspend participants (temporarily or permanently) if they ignore a warning.

While insults are easy to spot, deciding when to lock a thread requires some judgement: Does it seem to be making some progress, perhaps by branching into closely related relevant areas?

repeated again and again and this goes page after page

You will find this most often in the "New Theories" section.
- Maybe just read the initial proposition (if its not too long), and the most recent comments on it before deciding to read the lot!

[Bored chemist]

 OK but where else can people go?   My posts are long but they aren't usually harming anyone.   

There are blogging sites for that sort of thing.

[paul cotter (OP)]

Eternal student, I am dismayed that you think I may be referring to you. On the contrary I find your posts and digressions to be absolutely fascinating, not suggesting that I fully understand all the arguments you so graciously provide. I am talking about the situation where the op repeatedly states the original question(or false conclusion), despite detailed explanation and this repeats, page after page, without any hint of progress. Dropped into the discussion at random, without page number, one could not tell if it was the first or last page as the same arguments, pro and con, are repeated and repeated. As evan au has said this is mainly confined the new theories subforum. I will always look at any new theory, however invalid, in the hope of finding some small nugget of wisdom. Rant terminated.

[alancalverd]

If someone want to sit in the stocks, I'm happy to throw verbal cabbages at them.

[Eternal Student]

Hi.

If someone want to sit in the stocks, I'm happy to throw verbal cabbages at them.

     This is about the "new theories" section isn't it?   That's always complicated.

1.   It's a civic duty to read at least some of the new theories.  You've got to start from the idea that sometimes people just don't have anywhere else to write a thing and had no opportunity - perhaps at school - to write some essays in Science and have them looked at by a teacher or expert.   There's also a lot of, let's say "blame", to be put on the popular media.   It's suggested that new ideas are what is important.  They aren't,  there's fundamentally no shortage of ideas in the world.

2.    Throwing cabbages doesn't always help.  I think, at school, you would have been steered in the right direction by a sympathetic teacher.   

Best Wishes. 

[paul cotter (OP)]

Alancalverd, cabbage won't do the job. I'd suggest durian fruit. Or ginkgo.

[alancalverd]

Throwing cabbages doesn't always help.  I think, at school, you would have been steered in the right direction by a sympathetic teacher.   

Indeed I was. After one playground brawl I was taken aside and advised to try leading with my right. Good advice.