Pet Peeve about this Chatroom

[stamper]

Perhaps the reason is that no comments are posted along with the links is that the originator hasn't read the link themselves or they might have read the link and didn't understand the content?

[SanderKikkert]

I see no problem at all with the links to posts you put forward as examples and do not understand at all why you'd find those irritating.
Regards, Sander

[stamper]

I see no problem at all with the links to posts you put forward as examples and do not understand at all why you'd find those irritating.
Regards, Sander

It depends on the originators motivation with respect to posting links. Is it to provoke an interesting discussion or just provoke.....?

[Zorki5]

It's even more annoying than the use of the inane "+1" to express agreement with a post.

BTW, I don't think there's anything wrong with the use of "+1".

Times have changed, people now write wa-ay more wa-a-ay shorter messages than they used to write. They are used to "Like" buttons. And writing style reflects that, whether we like it or not.

I'd like to recommend the famous Jargon File as a good reference of how the use of computers affected writing style:
http://www.catb.org/jargon/html/writing-style.html

Even though the chapter I linked is titled Hacker Writing Style, it's not just about hackers...

Look, for instance, at my first sentence. Old typographic conventions would require putting full stop inside quotes, but I doubt I ever did that. Why? It's practical, and eliminates ambiguity in certain important cases. You may want to refer to the Jargon File for complete explanation.

[Robert Roaldi]

I agree with some others about those 3 examples. In two of the cases, the OP simply presents to the community an article that he thinks they would find interesting. What's wrong with that? I presume that you think that the OP should have included a sentence or two of introduction. I guess he could have, but it's no more time-consuming to read his intro than it is to click on the link and see its own intro.

I even enjoy it when an OP's subject line is cryptic, it arouses my curiosity, which is not always satisfied but usually fun anyway. I'd say that in a coffee corner type section, that is perfectly fine. It's supposed to be fun. I can see where mis-directing subject lines in a more technically specific thread might be less well-received, but I don't think that has been an issue on these pages.

[SanderKikkert]

It depends on the originators motivation with respect to posting links. Is it to provoke an interesting discussion or just provoke.....?

Good question Robert, perhaps other examples might make it clearer, personally I'm fine with the posts from the examples whatever their intent was, I clicked on two out of three of those links and liked where I ended up.

Cheers Sander

[Eric Myrvaagnes]

BTW, I don't think there's anything wrong with the use of "+1".

+1.

Thank you for that, Zorki5!

I am perhaps one of the most frequent users of the infamous and much maligned "+1", and Peter's comment annoyed me and started me thinking about alternatives.

Sometimes I feel I have something useful to contribute to a thread, and when I feel that way, I do try to express my point of view. Sometimes I find it difficult to express exactly what I feel, and in those cases I often wait a while to see if some gem will occur to me. And often I see that someone else has expressed very well exactly what I want to say, and when that happens, "+1" is the most succinct way of expressing agreement.

To my mind, "+1" has the virtues of being (a) very quick to write, (b) very quick to read, and (c) obvious in its meaning.

None of the alternatives I have thought of share all of these desirable characteristics. Here are some I have tried:

   "--- has said exactly what I would have said if I had thought of saying it."

   "I feel the same way about it."

   "You said it, pal!"

   "I agree with --- ."

   "Yes."



I do think that "+1" should always be preceded by a quote selecting the part of a statement that one is agreeing to.


-Eric

[Eric Myrvaagnes]

+1.

+1.   

[Slobodan Blagojevic]

It depends on the originators motivation with respect to posting links. Is it to provoke an interesting discussion or just provoke.....?

Examples?

[amolitor]

I don't see much point in +1 or in any of the options. Simple agreement isn't that interesting, and in large scale contexts it can be ruinous. +1 and Like at least contain the disaster in the more populous spaces, but the don't render dumb agreement interesting.

Have you really nothing to add? No shading of the ideas that might shed some light, or even entertain?

What a shame.

[Slobodan Blagojevic]

.... Have you really nothing to add?...

I always thought that the + in +1 stands for a math operation known as "adding." Was I wrong?

[MattBurt]

I don't let myself get irritated about it but I agree it's not in the spirit of what I perceive the point of this forum is.
I think they are just trying to direct traffic elsewhere. I usually just ignore them.

[amolitor]

To be fair, there are several ways this happens.

Rob C, for instance, has plenty to say but tends to reserve his commentary for a little later in the thread. This strikes me as a fine approach, because initial commentary tends to set the tone and Rob would like to see what people have to say first. I trust him to weigh in later with some ideas and opinions.

Isaac doesn't. He doesn't seem to be a spambot, although the jury is still out on that, but he doesn't have any opinions or ideas that he's willing to share. He wants to provoke discussion, but not to take part.

Then there are the actual, blissfully rare, spambots who really are just trying to drive traffic to other places.

I've named names, but these are archetypes, not people. The names are just handy examples of various points in the spectrum.

[Zorki5]

I do think that "+1" should always be preceded by a quote selecting the part of a statement that one is agreeing to.

This is true not only for "+1", but for pretty much any comment on a previous comment.

[Slobodan Blagojevic]

... Isaac... wants to provoke discussion, but not to take part...

Which falls somewhere in-between the Socratic method and how shrinks operate. In other words, quite common and legitimate.

Isaac often posts in context. The context being on-going debates in several threads over the span of sometimes several years, where certain "usual suspects" have staked out their positions quite clearly. In that context, Isaac might post a link, without any further explanation, that supports or challenges those views.

The whole approach is more like an inside joke, i.e., understandable only to the members who are familiar with the forum history of debates. I can see that newbies might feel excluded or puzzled, but what is the alternative? To preceded every such link with an "executive summary" of years of debates and stances?

Bottom line: those who get it, get it. If you don't, don't click on it. Simple.

[Isaac]

plus one:  Usually written '+1', used in a forum post to indicate that the post serves no purpose other than to increase the poster's postcount. Usually used after an empty post along the lines of 'I agree'. Often used in a sarcastic manner to indicate the pointlessness of the entire thread

[RSL]

+1

[Justinr]

Another forum which I occasionally frequent has quite strict rules about starting threads and rights to do so are removed should the OP not present a constructive argument with a link or reference if appropriate. Mind you, it is a political site and attracts all sorts of attempts to promote the weird, wonderful and extreme, so any similarities with Lula must be purely coincidental.

[stamper]

Generally speaking I support the +1. IMO there is nothing worse than someone repeating what someone else has stated. Some members are more eloquent than others and I find that adding +1 is supportive of their efforts. On the other hand you have members who ramble on about something and it is obvious they could have stated their point of view with half the amount of words they used.

[pegelli]

plus one:  Usually written '+1', used in a forum post to indicate that the post serves no purpose other than to increase the poster's postcount. Usually used after an empty post along the lines of 'I agree'. Often used in a sarcastic manner to indicate the pointlessness of the entire thread

I see no sarcasm or double meaning in the use of +1 and I see its application broader than just increasing the poster's post count. I'm with Stamper, it's a way to express your agreement with a previous poster, no more and no less.