An interesting proposition

Petrie. · **on:** June 08, 2009, 04:44:42 PM

A member of the board brought to my attention the postcounts that people can rack up in the Party Room alone by posting responses to games that require a one-word answer and no real detail or length like a topic in the Fridge might. They feel that a real post or message to others has real thought and detail in it, and that those thoughts and opinions are what should be represented through the numbers, not the number of times you can make a new message.

Invision does allow the admin staff to disable individual postcounts for specific forums, so it wouldn't be any work at all to disable postcounts from the party room (board wise, the post would count as a new message, but the individual member would not be credited).

This isn't something I'm going to do out of the blue. Do any or most of you agree with this view of a "message" or a "post" and perhaps should the ability to measure creativity be given more preference than the ability to rack up numbers based on games?

I'll leave it to you guys to decide.
Adam

landbeforetimelover · **Reply #1 on:** June 08, 2009, 04:50:02 PM

I agree with making the one-word responses not count and such....but if it includes RP then I don't support that. Although I don't participate in them myself, some RP's are well thought out and require long responses and I believe that posts should count there.

I wish there was a way to limit the number of words in a post before the post actually counted. Nothing ridiculous but say.....20 words or so. That way posts that don't have a lot of thought put into them such as "Glad you're feeling better" wouldn't get counted.

Nimrod · **Reply #2 on:** June 08, 2009, 04:59:49 PM

It¥s a good idea Adam. I would do it.

Nick22 · **Reply #3 on:** June 08, 2009, 05:03:57 PM

I like the 20 word minimum.. It would require taking more than five seconds to post...

landbeforetimelover · **Reply #4 on:** June 08, 2009, 05:16:07 PM

I don't suppose they give you access to any Java or Pearl huh Petrie? If there wasn't such an option like a minimum post count I could code one for you.....but something tells me they're not about to let you mess with their server side script code.

The Chronicler · **Reply #5 on:** June 08, 2009, 05:27:32 PM

I'm undecided on this. :unsure: But, then again, I'm not much on making decisions, anyway. Also, after checking a few random posts, I think a 10 word minimum might work better than a 20 word minimum.

F-14 Ace · **Reply #6 on:** June 08, 2009, 05:48:03 PM

I personally don't care about post counts. Either way is fine with me.

Mumbling · **Reply #7 on:** June 09, 2009, 12:47:08 AM

Hmm, I have this on another forum I'm with. Think it's a pretty good idea

Noname · **Reply #8 on:** June 09, 2009, 03:14:25 AM

The limit should be 10 words, if there is one at all. I'm not an admin, and my view on this is "if it ain't broke, don't fix it..." Still, it is not my call to make...

Lillefot · **Reply #9 on:** June 09, 2009, 05:22:25 AM

Why not make it a real challenge, with 2500 words being the minimum!

Boy, I hated that exam.

Nevertheless, 20 words would be a good minimum I suppose.

Petrie. · **Reply #10 on:** June 09, 2009, 06:57:52 AM

Quote from: landbeforetimelover,Jun 8 2009 on 04:16 PM

I don't suppose they give you access to any Java or Pearl huh Petrie? If there wasn't such an option like a minimum post count I could code one for you.....but something tells me they're not about to let you mess with their server side script code.

Not sure. Invision is pretty dated...their newer zetaboards might have this already pre-installed. I've never really checked.

I'm thinking more along the line of two sentences for a reply than an actual number of words. One sentence is to tell a thought, the other is to say why you think that way. That would get you anywhere between ten or twenty words in most cases.

The only section where no post counts would increase is the Party Room and any subsections (Caption This, Trivia, etc.). Every other place would count because they're set up and encourage more thought.

Cancerian Tiger · **Reply #11 on:** June 09, 2009, 08:00:53 AM

This will make for terribly long captions in the "Caption This" section :blink:. I'm not sure 'bout this one. I would hate to see it affect the RP section as well.

lbt/cty_lover · **Reply #12 on:** June 09, 2009, 08:28:53 AM

Even though most of my postcounts are from the Party Room, I don't mind in the least. It'll help me be more active on this forum, anyways.

Also, CT, this wouldn't affect the RP section. It's only targeted for the Party Room.

Cancerian Tiger · **Reply #13 on:** June 09, 2009, 10:42:33 AM

If it's just the Party Room being affected, then that's alright with me. It should have a ten word minimum rule. Ten seems more reasonable than twenty.

Kor · **Reply #14 on:** June 09, 2009, 12:00:24 PM

Why not just disable post counts and redo everyone's to 0, or have them frozen at some point, once you hit the highest level, 5,000 I think it is.

Noname · **Reply #15 on:** June 09, 2009, 12:12:38 PM

Easy for you to say, Kor; you have over 16,000 posts!

Seriously, though, if there is to be a limit... 10 words is probably best...

You can still express a full thought with ten words.

DarkHououmon · **Reply #16 on:** June 09, 2009, 12:18:23 PM

I don't like the idea of reseting everyone's post count to 0. That would really bother me. I like to know how many times I posted on a forum. If I came onto the board and saw my post count went down to 0, I would be pretty angry.

I'm not too fond of the idea of limiting the postcount. This is due to the fact that I personally like to know how many times I posted. If a limitation were implimented, then postcounts in member profiles would no longer be accurate. When I post, I expect the number of my postcounts to go up by one, regardless of how long my post is.

But if the decision to limit postcounts is put through, I guess I can't really do anything about it.

Kor · **Reply #17 on:** June 09, 2009, 12:23:25 PM

That is ok, none of my ideas are liked by anyone so none of them will be implimated nor even considered by the admin so need to give those a second thought.

Petrie. · **Reply #18 on:** June 09, 2009, 07:26:13 PM

Quote from: Kor,Jun 9 2009 on 11:23 AM

That is ok, none of my ideas are liked by anyone so none of them will be implimated nor even considered by the admin so need to give those a second thought.

How negative....

I never said I was going to implement this without other members knowing about it. That's why I threw this out here for us to look over. The person that told me this had a reasonable argument for what they suggested, enough so, that it got me interested in the idea.

There won't be any official word count minimum, but it does bring a point that all members should try and give reasonable thought to their messages whenever possible. Perhaps that isn't applicable in the Party Room or Caption This...that's ok, I wouldn't expect it to work there. For things in the Fridge or the role plays or the other discussion sections, I think a little thought can go a long way, so longer posts could actually help in these cases.

Littlefoot1616 · **Reply #19 on:** June 10, 2009, 06:42:28 AM

I'm game for it. It makes sense that only posts with a decent amount of brain power should be counted rather than one-word replies in game like "Word Association" which is on like it's 400th page almost now

This should be a truer reflection of everyone's post count so I say go with it.

One question though Mr Looker in the Sky. Once this protocol goes into effect, those who have posted in the Party Room (which is pretty much everyone at some given stage of their stay here), will their posts in said room be deducted from their current total they've acquired so far? I.e. Mr X has 10 posts, 4 of which are in the Party Room so his updated post count will now be 6.