Why do you care so much about so little?

[Crazy Jerome]

One of the things that has (is?) taking me a long time to learn on internet forums, but that I hope I'm finally grasping is: When you don't have anything useful to contribute to a particular discussion, you should be aggressively not doing so. I've learned this from the many examples afforded me of people not following this suggestion.

The biggest reason why this is so is that--by nature--negative, repetitive "shouting" will take up a lot of attention, driving interest away from any more useful topics that happen to be competing for attention. You see this most commonly in the excellent topic that disappears off of the front page in less than 24 hours. And really, when the OP is that good, what is there to say about it, beyond multiple kudos? The XP system actually contributes to this, because people give the kudos, but don't generate much followup discussion. (From this, one could suspect that the ideal topic is an optimistic, constructive OP, however one with enough flaws to generate discussion. )

Also, I'm fairly certain that a certain amount of this at the moment is being driven by volunteer astroturfers--that is, people deliberately stirring up flames in order to drive more positive topics out of mind.* The best way to deal with such people is to ignore them.

* There are some subtle difference between such and trolls, but the practical response is pretty much the same.

 

[TarionzCousin]

You see this most commonly in the excellent topic that disappears off of the front page in less than 24 hours. And really, when the OP is that good, what is there to say about it, beyond multiple kudos? The XP system actually contributes to this, because people give the kudos, but don't generate much followup discussion. (From this, one could suspect that the ideal topic is an optimistic, constructive OP, however one with enough flaws to generate discussion. )

ENWorld has a noticeable lack of people whose entire post consists of one word: "This."

I don't think that's a bad thing.

I think we need to post in the excellent threads even if we don't have anything terribly constructive to say--but we shouldn't post just "I agree" or something similar.

So whenever I read a post/thread and have nothing to contribute, I try to say something funny. Sometimes it actually is funny. It's not as good as contributing something substantial, but I often don't have anything meaningful to contribute. I like to think I'm just keeping the ball afloat until a better swimmer comes along to take it further toward the goal.*











*No, I don't really play water polo. But the metaphor just fell into my head, so....