JGilder vs. IrTradRU ...

[jGilder]

If you find that outrage don't give it to me.

I don't want it.

It's somebody else that's looking for it.

The outrage will only be found when they start telling us the truth. If you don't want the truth, that's your prerogative. As they say – ignorance is bliss.

[s1m0n]

If you notice that any discussion seems to be getting into an intensive dialog between one or two people, regardless of how it started, it might be a reasonable thing for those parties to consider voluntarily moving the discussion onto its own thread.

You might have noticed that someone started a "Doom" thread with a quote I had posted in the cold war thread. I didn't have much more to say about the topic, so I didn't move my comments over there, but if I had anticipated or found unexpectedly that it was going to take over the cold war thread, and especially if I was beginning to get clues that it wasn't what some of the people on the first thread had wanted to discuss, I would have been happy to move the climate discussion over to the doom thread.

I disagree. In the real world, conversations don't stay on topic forever. People post digressions, and other people start talking about that, instead. That's organic, and it's way more interesting.

If you don't like the turn a conversation has taken, post something to bring it back to a track you prefer.

A conversation which remains on a single topic forever gets boring, FAST, and if your sole contribution is to yell at other posters for talking about somethign you don't wanna talk about, then you haven't done anything to make it more interesting.

I think it's rampant control-freakery to insist that every post to a thread MUST follow the guidelines laid down by the original post. If that's what you want, start up a blog.

[Jerry Freeman]

Simon, you might double check what you're disagreeing with.

I said "might consider," and I said "You can do as you like. My suggestion might not even be a good idea. Just thinking aloud."

I'm such a tyrant.

Best wishes,
Jerry

OK, Nano. Two or three people, then.

Nitpicker.

[Wombat]

If you don't like the turn a conversation has taken, post something to bring it back to a track you prefer.

I wish you luck. Never works for me.

One day when I have nothing better to do I'm gonna collect all my bringing-it-back-on topic posts that got completely ignored. I'm gonna publish them in a book called: Give Up the Love: Wombat's Collected Unrequited C&F Posts It'll probably be the follow up to You Must be Kidding: Collected Rejection Letters and Referee's Reports wherein you'll find all my scholarly and literary rejection letters together with the detailed reasons.

Once upon a time you had to die before stuff like this came out but today's post modern university wants results NOW.

[s1m0n]

One day when I have nothing better to do I'm gonna collect all my bringing-it-back-on topic posts that got completely ignored.

Then maybe the original topic was played out or not all that interesting to start with. That happens.

[Wombat]

One day when I have nothing better to do I'm gonna collect all my bringing-it-back-on topic posts that got completely ignored.

Then maybe the original topic was played out or not all that interesting to start with. That happens.

True. Both those things happen. But the short attention span explanation is also sometimes appropriate. That and the I'd-never-have-asked-had-I-known-30 books-had-been-written-about-it reaction.

[Nanohedron]

OK, Nano. Two or three people, then.

Nitpicker.

Why, Jerry, I made our comment in all seriousness. We talk to myselves all the time, and your inclusion of types such as ourself into the array of possibilities warmed my hearts. It ain't easy being a "poly", you know.

[susnfx]

Why, Jerry, I made our comment in all seriousness. We talk to myselves all the time, and your inclusion of types such as ourself into the array of possibilities warmed my hearts.

In the musical "Top Hat," Fred Astaire's pal (Edward Everett Horton) has an English butler (Eric Blore) who talks like this through the entire movie. Actually some of the funniest stuff in the film...
Maybe you have a future as a comedian, Nano.

Susan

[Caj]

I disagree. In the real world, conversations don't stay on topic forever. People post digressions, and other people start talking about that, instead. That's organic, and it's way more interesting.

Right, and that is a good thing. The diversity of discussion is what we want.

The problem is that a sufficiently heated argument between just two people can bury the rest of the thread. Then it becomes harder to find the other articles, and your organic process is sort of choked by weeds.

See the problem isn't people changing the subject, or politics, or voicing strong opinions, or anything like that: the problem is not the content itself. The problem is just volume, which can be disruptive. If I posted 60 long news articles about the Cold War I'd be on topic, but I'd basically disrupt the thread by sheer volume.

If you don't like the turn a conversation has taken, post something to bring it back to a track you prefer.

This isn't feasible if the problem is volume of traffic. For example if I post 50 spam messages into your thread every hour, you can't bring the thread back on track by posting, "so anyway, how about those Bears..."

This isn't control-freakery, either: it's just the reasonable person principle. My posts are not supposed to make the rest of the thread harder to read.

Caj

[Nanohedron]

Why, Jerry, I made our comment in all seriousness. We talk to myselves all the time, and your inclusion of types such as ourself into the array of possibilities warmed my hearts.

In the musical "Top Hat," Fred Astaire's pal (Edward Everett Horton) has an English butler (Eric Blore) who talks like this through the entire movie. Actually some of the funniest stuff in the film...
Maybe you have a future as a comedian, Nano.

Susan

Never saw it. But that's how it is; society's fringe elements in the entertainment world get the humor angle thrust upon them. It's a bit of a redundancy to suggest we (meaning society, not I) need more diversity of inclusion, as the "poly" is about as diverse --in a self-contained sense-- as it gets. Some days I are too distracted to care.

[s1m0n]

This isn't control-freakery, either: it's just the reasonable person principle. My posts are not supposed to make the rest of the thread harder to read.

Everyone's convinced they are the reasonable person.

[Caj]

This isn't control-freakery, either: it's just the reasonable person principle. My posts are not supposed to make the rest of the thread harder to read.

Everyone's convinced they are the reasonable person.

Okay, but seriously, though, I think you can agree on the above.

Regardless of what we actually say in our posts, the volume of posts themselves should not actually impede the conversations of other people. This is the online equivalent of having a conversation in a restaurant using megaphones.

Even though we all have our own ideas of what "reasonable" means, I think the above principle is pretty universal. Not just here, but in just about any Internet forum, even very unregulated ones.

Caj

[jbarter]

so anyway, how about those Bears....

[IRTradRU?]

GO PACKERS!!

[Walden]

If you find that outrage don't give it to me.

I don't want it.

It's somebody else that's looking for it.

The outrage will only be found when they start telling us the truth. If you don't want the truth, that's your prerogative. As they say – ignorance is bliss.

Perhaps the ignorance is in assuming that there is only one valid emotional response.