New Minimum Character Count For Replies.

reply to post by ModernAcademia


But it is a purposeful addition to the data base not drivel and useless garbage. Yes I am being sarcastic.

reply to post by Blogstalker


My way of starring this member. It appears that they are in the process of tweaking the new system.

I thought this was one reason for the "alert" button, so members could alert staff of posts that were offensive, troublesome or somehow violate the TanC. Most members here are IMO responsible in that respect and staff are pretty good about removing those posts alerted.

reply to post by Ant4AU


You'd think they'd take onboard the, fairly overwhelming, feedback of this thread saying 'Get rid of it, bad idea'...

Its funny that I logged in today to find this going on, because it just so happens that I noticed I am spending much less time on ATS. The reason dawned on me when I read this thread. ATS is just not fun like it was in the old days. Too many rules, too many restrictions, too much coddling of any nutty theory that comes down the pike, are just a few of the problems I can think of off the top of my head.

ATS is falling victim to its own success, and just like other companies it is going to end up losing that success because it's enforcing rules which remove the very things that made ATS a success to begin with. I will never understand why companies who become successful immediately start changing things after they achieve that success? To me it makes more sense that if you have something that works, leave it alone!

In the old days we handled poor posting by jumping all over the guy who posted it until they either straightened up or quit. Now, we cannot do that because its not politically correct to personally attack another poster. This of course made the moderators jobs harder, so we implement new rules that punish the other 99% of the good posters and make their lives miserable with broken code that has all kinds of flaws in it.

In the old days the posters took care of the flow of most threads, making them fun and pertinent to the readers/posters. The moderators only had to jump in if there was a serious troublemaker. The threads used to ebb and flow with the interests of the people reading and posting in them. Sometimes they went mildly off topic, but what difference does that really make, we are not writing the Encyclopedia Britannica here after all. Now we have the thread Gestapo, and by the time I get into any thread over half the posts are replaced with warning flags of one type or another. Uhm... Guess what guys... Often those off topic posts are a nice break from the rest of the thread, even if they only added levity to the discussion. I used to laugh at stuff on ATS all the time, but not too much anymore.

People here used to be thicker skinned, and they took heat with a degree dignity and stuck up for themselves. Now we have a bunch of kiddies running to the moderators to tattle every time someone calls them a “debunker” or “agent”. I personally have been dinged for a personal attack simply for stating that someone misquoted me, and including the actual misquote in the post... (I have never figured that one out to this day).

The problem can be tracked back to almost the minute that ATS became a corporation. As soon as that happened the fun factor began to decline as they started trying to turn this into some sort of serious news source, conspiracy forum, with Disney values. In short, ATS started taking itself too seriously IMHO.

Too many rules = Not enough fun.

If you doubt me, look how many old ATS'ers now will only post in BTS...
Wanna guess why that is?

MORE FUN, FEWER RULES!

reply to post by defcon5


I certainly don't go back very far on ATS, especially in terms of members like you but it is very interesting and pertinent to hear the opinions of an "old timer"

I noticed the emphasis on the "line" no lonnger applies.
This is good because a line in the US could mean something totally different in the UK, or elsewhere. But many times the point can be made with a quick and simple reply or post. By forcing a minimum word policy members will now be required to add a bunch of meaningless fluff that increases page size.

What happens to the 3 word story thread on BTS?

hey skeptic.

I'm sorry but from my point of view, maybe we'll have to "distort" our original message, like adding unwanted details or extra info that could cause confusion to the readers of our posts.
I'm not feeling like a target when you talk about those stupid "one-line" sentences, i'm talkative ( ) but try to see things like me for a second.
keep up the god work anyway.
bye

Originally posted by SLAYER69

Have another look at the info in this post. I just tested the system on multiple browsers, and that's how it's working for me. If I quote a very-large post, and trim it down to one sentence, it's still only asking me for 122 characters of my text.

We have three web servers were two are tasked with replicating the code from the master. After reviewing the RSYNC error logs (the utility that synchronizes the code), there have been some connection errors, and it appears the code on one of the servers hadn't been properly synchronized until about 45 minutes ago. That's why some people were seeing the "BETA" code that I thought I had fixed... because in testing on the master server, I wasn't seeing that behavior.


Again, to reiterate... we're not trying to impose unrealistic minimums, but to inject something that is an "attention getter" to remind our newer users of the need to focus more on a meaningful contribution than an atta-boy or me-too kind of reply.

reply to post by SkepticOverlord


Hey SO, I just noticed that the minimum character post has been reduced to 100.

Is that intentional?

reply to post by SkepticOverlord


I see that you are in the process of tweaking this sysem myself and I am sure many other members thank you for this.

Oh BTW When I previewed my post above it INCREASED the number of characters that I was required to submit before it would allow my post. I had to cut that all back out of the browser then re-reply, re-paste, and re-post it to get it to go through.

This change is probably going to be the final nail in the coffin for ATS, the code is broken, and your trying to implement it on the fly rather then test it somewhere else first.

Also why can I now pick up parts of the screen and move them around in a drag and drop type fashion????

[edit on 4/12/2009 by defcon5]

reply to post by SkepticOverlord


And could you address the writers forums please. I do not feel a limit on poems etc should be neccesary

Everyone take a DEEP BREATH...

Thank you...

We implemented this on a Sunday for a reason (it's the slowest traffic day of the week) and in the hope we'd have the time to perfect the code and implimetation...

this is nothing more than an attempt to help those who are not familiar with our "standards" by getting their attention before they toss up a one liner that has little more to say/add than "Oh heck yeah!"...

Seriously, this is not a big deal so please, give us a chance to get it working through all the servers and then bask in the sweet light of genuine discussion...

Springer...

With all do respect, I don't think you are understanding the nature of the majority of complaints. It isn't the bugs in the system, it is the policy itself. Being forced to reply with a certain amount of words is what the majority here are objecting to. As I said in my earlier post, I had to answer a 'yes' or 'no' question today with 200 words.

So none of this has been serious discussion?

Seems to me a lot of people have put a lot of thought into their responses.

No disrespect intended.

Being concise is not a sin.
Being concise is not a sin.
Being concise is not a sin.

God, this is annoying.

reply to post by cranberrydork


re: Brevity is the soul of wit

I knew I had to read this entire thread or end up quoting Shakespeare after it had already been done. Interesting quote from a man whose work was entirely dependent on not only beautiful wordplay but a certain verboseness to boot.

I don't think it's that horrible to require that comments and responses meet certain standards whether by content or decorum. I, personally, am a little more concerned about a poster's ability to start a subject line with needlessly alarmist or false information. We may indeed be the generation of Newspeak, but I see the subject of the thread as an attempt to rein the practice in.

I would be remiss to end these comments without a brief acknowledgment to Strunk & White: avoid needless wordiness.

edit: fix typo



[edit on 12-4-2009 by elfie]

reply to post by Springer


We all agree that useless one liners need to be dealt with. But there are plenty of times when a simple one line post asks a valid question or provides a poignant detail and is not a one liner because it contributes. While dropping the requirement to 100 some will not have to fluff their posts as more and for that I do thank you.