Reply to thread

Message

<blockquote data-quote="Guest 7034872" data-source="post: 8945553">DISCLAIMER: I have no special investment in any of this--it's just something that occurred to me while perusing the threads.In the forums there's been a small kerfuffle lately over (+) threads and what they are and are not for. While strategically marking both of those threads &quot;read&quot; so that I won't feel tempted to go read them in my &lt;New Posts&gt; list, one thing that might be helpful occurred to me: could the forums benefit from a notation that indicates &quot;on-topic posts only?&quot; The idea is that posts supportive or critical of the OP's positions on something are fine, but stuff about politics, social theory, and what you had for breakfast are politely but firmly discouraged in the same way that critical posts are discouraged in (+) threads. If that's useful, perhaps we could introduce a simple notation like (!), implying, &quot;Stay on topic!&quot;Or has this been tried already and proven a spectacular failure because the internet does not allow such niceties?</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Guest 7034872, post: 8945553"] DISCLAIMER: I have no special investment in any of this--it's just something that occurred to me while perusing the threads. In the forums there's been a small kerfuffle lately over (+) threads and what they are and are not for. While strategically marking both of those threads "read" so that I won't feel tempted to go read them in my <New Posts> list, one thing that might be helpful occurred to me: could the forums benefit from a notation that indicates "on-topic posts only?" The idea is that posts supportive or critical of the OP's positions on something are fine, but stuff about politics, social theory, and what you had for breakfast are politely but firmly discouraged in the same way that critical posts are discouraged in (+) threads. If that's useful, perhaps we could introduce a simple notation like (!), implying, "Stay on topic!" Or has this been tried already and proven a spectacular failure because the internet does not allow such niceties? [/QUOTE]

Verification