BARBELITH underground
 

Subcultural engagement for the 21st Century...
Barbelith is a new kind of community (find out more)...
You can login or register.


Underground > Policy & Help >

Reading Threads Before Posting To Them

  
  

Page: 1(2)

 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
21:23 / 20.01.04
Yes, it is. It's also not good for the discussion. Or, more precisely, contributing to a thread without reading it isn't good for the discussion. I wrote this yesterday, before my phone line packed up:

Actually, I think there's probably space for a "lengthy autobiography in the Revolution" thread as well, but that may just be me.

I think that's a broader issue, that of not really reading *Forums* before posting to them. Generally, I see the Head Shop as discursive. But if you haven't read a thread, how do you discuss ny of the points raised in it? Note the absence of question marks in that post. It isn't leading on from anything; it can't be. It is just a braindump, which we have to either address or work around. It doesn't have any connective tissue.

That's sort of the problem with not reading threads -you're not really interweaving with anyone. VJBJ could have read lots of interesting stuff about whiteness and Eastern European identity, and for that matter lots of other interesting stuff about the relationship between being caucasian and being white, but he felt it was more important to tell us about his own relationship to the idea of his personal whiteness, with excursions offtopic into his PC schooling (we really have got a thread for that. Young man, there's a place you can go, sort of thing...). To a degree, that's fine, but it's one of those things where if everyone does it you've got a dead forum, so who gets to do it?

I think Deva's approach (friendly, pointing out what he might have missed) was a very good one. I also think there's nothing in VJBJ's post to suggest any reading of the preceding thread, but that's not really the issue.

Thing is, this is a message board. Reading threads is part of the fun. If you don't want to have to waste time finding out what other people think, you're probably better off at speaker's corner, or starting a whole new thread in which you can dictate the subject. Oddly enough, I came across another post in another thread which likewise had almost no connection to the thread in question, and showed little evidence of having read it, but did not mention not having read the thread. It was just as uninteresting, but perhaps less impolite.

Ultimately, though, I don't think rudeness or otherwise is much of an issue. I think it's utility. If it's a seven-page thread in the Conversation, it seems perfectly reasonable to bowl in there. If it is a 3-page thread in the Head Shop, then if you don't have enough interest in the subject actually to read it, it's unlikely you're going to add much to it. Whether you would add more if you read the thread first may be contentious (and is pretty much by definition unprovable), but it's surely worth a go... The other question of utility is that peopel who have not read the thread have more of a tendency to rot it, because they have not worked out what the thread is actually about - this I would suggest is quite a good example of a thread where people seem at times to be responding to the title rather than the issue.

Back in the good old days, the major problem in the Revolution was seething personal animosities. Right now it seems to be threadrot and irrelevance. That's probably a condition of the changing demographic of Barbelith, but it seems that, as it was always worth attempting, while allowing people to have big fights, to keep those big fights on topic, it is also worth maybe trying to encourage people who are contributing in what might be seen as a somewhat unproductive fashion to interact more productively. Either that or we'll have to work out a new way of working in the Revolution...
 
 
40%
12:53 / 24.01.04
The other question of utility is that peopel who have not read the thread have more of a tendency to rot it, because they have not worked out what the thread is actually about

Generally I would agree, but taking the thread Flyboy referred to as an example, when you go to the 4th page, the first sentence you come across is:

Deva I have to take a stab at the idea that heterosexual sex is an action, even the majority of lesbians that I've come across have had regular sex with a man at some point in their lives

Hmm. Isn't this thread supposed to be about whiteness? Now I would personally be interested to find out how the discussion got from the original topic to this. But it is quite clear that whatever I wanted to post in response to the original topic would no longer fit with the flow of the discussion. I can tell that without having read any of it.

This means that someone who wants to post in response to the original topic might be considered to be rotting the thread. But surely in this case, it's doing the opposite - bringing it back on track!

Personally, I would find it more interesting to read the whole thing, and then take it for what it's become rather than what it was at the start. Hence why I don't think threadrot is a cardinal sin. But if, as many people's view seems to be, avoiding threadrot is priority number one, then isn't someone justified in jumping straight in in these situations? Aren't they doing the thread a service?
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
16:22 / 25.01.04
Well, Flyboy's thread is not a textbook example, because the thread quickly diverged into two related themes - the one of interrogating whiteness, and the other of whether whiteness should be interrogated. There were times when I felt personally that the secind of these threads might have been better placed in Policy and Help, but both are related. The section you excerpt is from a discussion of how one distinguishes the examination of whiteness from, say, the examination of womanhood. It is coherent in terms of the evolution of the discussion of the thread.

Another example might be the "When is a Red Indian not a Red Indian? And other un-PC terminology". That was intended by its originator to be a discussion of terms for Native Americans. She was not expecting another discussion to spring up about what it meant to call terminology "PC" or "non-PC", but the idea clearly existed in the thread title and opening posts, so the thread sustained the two conversations. Now it looks like somebody may have asked a question big enough to justify spinning off a new thread, just as discussions of Indian land rights or gambling legislation might have occasioned a spin-off thread in the Switchboard or Head Shop.

And, ultimately, there is a difference between saying, "I'd like to look at an earlier part of this discussion/I'd like to go back to the original question", saying "I haven't read any of the thread, but I would like to add this idea/question", saying "I haven't read this thread, but here is my response to the question asked in the title", and saying "I don't have the time to read what other people think, but I think you guys really need to hear me talk about what the title has made me think about". The likelihood of each in turn being on-topic or useful is progressively reduced.

I think this is one part of the answer to the question:

But if, as many people's view seems to be, avoiding threadrot is priority number one, then isn't someone justified in jumping straight in in these situations? Aren't they doing the thread a service?

The other would be an extension of the comments above. The discussion has moved on to address other questions relevant to the core question, and it would be useful for contributions at least to acknowledge and understand that (as, at the risk of appearing cheeky, reading the first three pages of that thread would have made clear). Threadrot is to an extent in the eye of the Beholder. The odd non-sequitur is not threadrot - to go back to the "Androgyny and Polarity" thread, it was only after an autobiographical ramble with no real interest in the thread's development inspired other offtopic rambles that threadrot, rather than simple irrelevance, became the issue. One problem is that VJBJ seems to have decided that, since his comment was not deleted, it was good, whereas in fact it was simply not deleted, as opposed to the second which seemed to indicate a persistent indifference to the actual questions posed by the thread, and the third which suggested that perhaps a move to the Conversation would be the best way to let the personal diaries breathe and flourish, and provide a reference for any ongoing discussion in the Head Shop...
 
 
Cat Chant
08:26 / 26.01.04
it's like turning up to the pub ten minutes late and being told to shut up because story about you and the three transexual strippers taking mescalin last night might cover ground that had already been.

I just wanted to expand on this, and reiterate that no-one is asking anyone to read multi-page threads "with a fine tooth comb", which would be unenforceable anyway. The thing is that if you turn up to a pub ten minutes late, you may discern all sorts of cues in your friends' behaviour that will let you know whether or not, for example, someone's significant other (a transsexual stripper) has just died of a mescalin overdose and thus your story will not be appropriate. Since Barbelith, unlike a pub, is a text-only medium, the only way you can get these cues with regard to a particular thread is reading the thread.

I thought the experiences of the last week (where - if the errors affected other people's browsers the same way they did mine - you could see thread titles & abstracts and post, but not see anybody else's posts) were quite a good example of why, at the limit, there is no point being on a discussion board if you don't/can't read the threads before posting.
 
 
Ex
18:31 / 26.01.04
Just a brief thought: while not arguing with the idea that it is basic ettiquette, and functionally useful, to read the previous posts, I wanted to suggest that there is a two-camp split on the function of the "I haven't read this" prefix.
I think people may be using the "I haven't read this thread but..." as a form of advance apology, to lessen any offence caused, and as a get-out clause in case they make an idiot of themselves. Many other people (myself included) are reading it as a bit of a salt-in-the-wound eye-poking insult, performing exactly the opposite function - making it less likely that the post will be read in a charitable manner, and making everyone feel like pointing out exactly where the poster has been repetitive, muddle-headed and twatty.
So whereas if I'd skim-read the thread (which I wouldn't, Scout's Honour), the last thing I'd do is attention to it; but I feel some posters may feel it is actually good ettiquette to do so.
I'm not sure what this argues for, except it might explain how something so self-evidently offensive might seem like a good idea. And thus spread sweetness, light and huggles.
 
 
40%
20:46 / 31.01.04
The discussion has moved on to address other questions relevant to the core question, and it would be useful for contributions at least to acknowledge and understand that (as, at the risk of appearing cheeky, reading the first three pages of that thread would have made clear).

Not cheeky. I mean, I never professed to have any awareness of what that thread was about, I was talking about my first impression that

it is quite clear that whatever I wanted to post in response to the original topic would no longer fit with the flow of the discussion. I can tell that without having read any of it.

But in retrospect, that was a rash assumption, and one which was born out of laziness if I'm being honest, and given that the rest of my post basically rested on that assumption, I can't really stand by it.

Thanks for replying anyway Haus.
 
  

Page: 1(2)

 
  
Add Your Reply