--Off Topic, One Liners and General Back Scratching Posts—

I think it should be pointed out that if you want your S&F to be recognized and you either can't U2U because you're new or you just think its creepy stalking or you want everyone to know you agree it should be fairly simple to add the reason you agree and be good on the T&Cs as well as contributing a thought!

As an example:

"Pop rocks are the best candy on earth, they are manufactured by magical gnomes who can beat up those cookie elves. I have proof please follow these links and look at this video."

You agree! So you S&F but you want all of ATS to know you agree but have nothing to add! Well this is simple, Ask yourself why do I agree? Well you once found a little red hat in you bag of pop rocks and now you can contribute! So instead of S&F you can now say:

"I Completely agree! S&F. I've suspected this for quite awhile as I found a little red hat in my pop rocks once and thought it looked a lot like a gnome hat."

And even if you have no evidence you have to agree for some reason, just say what that reason is. If the OP didn't want to hear other reasons for why people agree (or disagree) they wouldn't have posted it. They would have just kept the thought in their head and greedily told nobody.

Yes good point OP.

It's funny, but people seem to want others to know that they like something haha
When you really get down to it, it's more of a psychological issue,
based on personal representation on the site.

I don't use star and flags, but I do subscribe to threads I like.

Well good luck curbing the appeal of the single line postings,
but also to be considered is the anti-authoritarian appeal of the single line post,
bad boys got to break the rules right haha.

Originally posted by mblahnikluver
I also wonder about the new crop of members.

Do they not care about what they are posting and just post and move along? Or do they really just not know how to form a thread or a post? Could be one or the other or a mixture of both.

I am guilty as both one of the new crop of members, and posting and moving along. Also guilty of posting stupid flippant remarks, although I have curtailed that practice. I apologize. I have a different way of expressing myself. I'll think before I post.

Originally posted by Naptown317
.

You have a very valid point.

As for the OP...part of it is the ego of some folks. They want people to know WHO gave them a star and a flag---makes them feel important 'bout themselves, or maybe it helps people give s&f back and forth.

Then there's the issue of those who post smartass, sarcastic, one-liners. Don't get me wrong, it's funny. Real funny. Once. Twice. Thrice. But on every damn thread? Gets irritatin', if ya ask me.

But ya get the loons 'n toons with the good and the precious, I guess. No worries.

"I, Aeons, Approve This Message."

Yes, the personal seal of approval is important to a great number of people. It is even more important sometimes to the readership. "I respect posters 1, 2, 3 and two of them starred or responded to this post. I'll look at it more closely."

reply to post by KingAtlas


I too only subscribe to threads and posts that i like and never have used the star and flag system, and yet at the time of writing this post i have 9 stars allocated to me, by whom i have no idea,

My time is limited on ATS and if i read something that i like and makes sense or is a good thread or post and i reply i do not use one liners that i often see posted i would like the person to know it was me who is in support of their thread/post/thinking.


Icanseeatoms.

I post much, and it may seem like I have ADD or ADHD but . . . . . . . . ..


Sorry. I saw something shiny.

What was the topic?


Seriously, if it's an issue, I will work to curtail stated points.

reply to post by tothetenthpower
You know sometimes you come across threads that draw you in but they leave you speechless?Every once in a while I run across these and can think of nothing but a few words to sum up the whole thread!I'll stop posting in them and just shake my head instead.

reply to post by tothetenthpower


I agree but sometimes I just want to bump a worthy thread. Oneliners work.

reply to post by soficrow


I guess that leads to an important question, would it be within T&C to respond with something like this:

"I think this is an important topic and would like to see further discussion, does anyone else have an opinion or observation to share?" And then possibly add any particulars you would like to see discussed or any further questions.

reply to post by tothetenthpower


100 % Agreed!

And can I just say ....

Its really bad when a one liner is nothing but a personal insult with profanity circumvention.

I have seen a huge increase of this, its like flaunting the pass on a one liner.

Thats hard to ignore...
If they are left standing then the poster just gets braver next time.

I agree,

When I first started attending this site, I used to be very nervous about posting due to the calibre of people's writing.

Now it seems people will just post for the sake of it. People hunt in groups.

There is less debate and more opinion bashing.

Originally posted by Cedik
I agree,

When I first started attending this site, I used to be very nervous about posting due to the calibre of people's writing.

Now it seems people will just post for the sake of it. People hunt in groups.

There is less debate and more opinion bashing.

I know - I regularly gang up on three or four guys at a time.

Oh wait - I guess that I hunt groups.

reply to post by Jinglelord


I'm well aware that a) once a thread has fallen down the list to the 10-20 mark, it's "dead" and b) most people barely read the OP, never mind even the last post. In addition, I often have little time and /or am v. tired and couldn't string 5 words together sensibly. Frequently I do just S&F (without posting), and subscribe or even bookmark.

Sometimes though - when for whatever reason I can't post but think the thread deserves attention - I write something fairly quick and vacuous just to bump it back up. Is that wrong?

reply to post by soficrow


As long as your post is on topic, more elaboration. I see no issue with that.

Originally posted by soficrow
reply to post by Jinglelord

 

Sometimes though - when for whatever reason I can't post but think the thread deserves attention - I write something fairly quick and vacuous just to bump it back up. Is that wrong?

If its my decision I don't think it's wrong, in fact that is kinda what I'm suggesting. I think its easy to make a reply that is empty and easy to get attention to a post without actually breaking the T&Cs.

Seriously just asking for elaboration from someone can get a dead post rolling again and that is about as empty as it gets.

I agree! (But I will be posting more, so no worries!)

Another poster mentioned that people want to be "associated" with agreeing or disagreeing with a poster. This made my gears turn and I thought up something that MIGHT solve that problem and would make the board a little more "alive", so to speak.

What if....there was a program inside the forum that did a couple of things?

1. Display the person's personality via Briggs/Meyers, but cater it to the ATS community and display it somewhere either in the Avatar area or in the signature area. There's a reason for this, so bear with me while I complete this thought...

2. Along with that, this program will monitor, log and fashion a "live" personality attached to the avatar that lets others know where that person stands, who they agree with most, who they oppose most, in terms of personalities, etc....this gives more of a pattern and "why" than the current friend/foe feature. The more they participate, flag, star, and comment, the more complex and complete their ATS personality becomes. In this way, there is motive for simply staring and flagging, because they will be contributing to their own virtual personality that will instantly give people an anonymous snapshot of who they are.

3. On our profile page, we could pull up a graph and see the genetics of our stars and flags in terms of topics, and how our personality interacts with these other personalities. We could see where our interest lies, where our tendencies are, and link up easier with others who have similar interests. Let's face it....ATS is not a small community. It's more like a large city.

In addition, and completely unrelated (sorry, but I'm piggy-backing since I'm in brainstorm mode), I've often thought it would be really neat to have a feature on ATS that takes the sum of ALL a person's posts, in every forum, and crunch it like a web bot, then spit out a paragraph based on the history of that person's activity on ATS. Facebook did something similar and it was hilarious reading some of the things that came up. I think it's quite revealing what someone REALLY thinks and believes....could be fun!

Problem is trying to fight human nature...

Go to any photography site and 99% of the posts are "Nice Picture"

Most people just auto respond with that kudo because they feel the need to say something. Hard to fight that

Speaking of one-liners.

Have the Mods reviewed and selected some of the more humorous and clever responses to other's posts?

Those are some very funny threads!

How about it, Mods?