# Avatars **URL:** \ **Category:** About This Message Board\ **Created:** [July 28, 2011, 5:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/avatars/590594 "2011-07-28T05:25:44Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 12
**Author:** ![Red\_Barchetta](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/da6949/32.png) [@Red\_Barchetta](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Red_Barchetta)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2011, 1:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/avatars/590594/221 "2011-08-03T01:14:29Z")
> [@Acsenray](#): > > So the only reasonable alternative to a site with avatars is a site with no content at all? If it helps you realize the absurdity I was pointing out. > [@Acsenray](#): > > There are some hamburger and hot dog joints that refuse to allow ketchup on the premises. This is the same thing. If you like the place enough to give up the ketchup, you’re welcome in. If you just can’t stand not having ketchup, just go to one of the 99.9 percent of joints that serve ketchup and stop complaining about this one ketchup-free zone. If this board ever does enable Avatars, I trust you’ll stay true to your word and leave. God forbid anyone dare to suggest changes to the sanctity that is the SDMB. Also, I hope you realize that in order to complete your analogy, the ketchup would be invisible to those who don’t want it, rendering any reasonable distinction between ketchup and non-ketchup serving kitchens moot. ---
**Author:** ![Revenant\_Threshold](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f1d935/32.png) [@Revenant\_Threshold](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revenant_Threshold)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2011, 1:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/avatars/590594/222 "2011-08-03T01:14:42Z")
What confuses me most about the whole “tone of the board will change” thing is that, apparently, there’s a lot of us for avatars. Which means that those horrible people, those picture-book requiring people, are\* already here\*. > [@Acsenray](#): > > So the only reasonable alternative to a site with avatars is a site with no content at all? > > There are some hamburger and hot dog joints that refuse to allow ketchup on the premises. This is the same thing. If you like the place enough to give up the ketchup, you’re welcome in. If you just can’t stand not having ketchup, just go to one of the 99.9 percent of joints that serve ketchup and stop complaining about this one ketchup-free zone. But that’s an argument that works both ways. If you don’t like board with avatars, equally, _you_ could go somewhere else that doesn’t have them. I don’t mean that in an unpleasant or mean way, just pointing out that the argument works both ways. Why should I be the one to leave? ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2011, 1:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/avatars/590594/223 "2011-08-03T01:27:00Z")
> [@Revenant\_Threshold](#): > > But that’s an argument that works both ways. If you don’t like board with avatars, equally, _you_ could go somewhere else that doesn’t have them. I don’t mean that in an unpleasant or mean way, just pointing out that the argument works both ways. Why should I be the one to leave? 1. There are few places to go free of ketchup. 2. You’re the one wanting ketchup. And the ketchup ban is not maintained just to keep ketchup from being seen. It’s there to prevent all use if ketchup and fir everyone to to k is and acceptthat ketchup is unwelcome. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2011, 1:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/avatars/590594/224 "2011-08-03T01:41:32Z")
It’s simple. There is no legitimate reason to want avatars. Those who want them must have something wrong with their heads. Is that a crazy, inflammatory, worthless argument that delegitimizes not merely the person making it, but that whole side? Sure it is. And yet: > [@Crazyhorse](#): > > I voted “yes” but I want to add that I think even having a vote creates a false premise on the question that those in opposition have any legitimate reason to oppose it. I don’t see that they do. If people are willing to go this far just in talk about the possibility of having avatars, then everything negative people have said about avatars themselves must be correct. You couldn’t have done a better job of ruining your own case. ---
**Author:** ![bucketybuck](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/898d66/32.png) [@bucketybuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bucketybuck)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2011, 1:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/avatars/590594/225 "2011-08-03T01:43:06Z")
I am quite happy for this place to have avatars, but damn, the sneering condescension towards those who dont is getting quite tiring. ---
**Author:** ![Revenant\_Threshold](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f1d935/32.png) [@Revenant\_Threshold](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revenant_Threshold)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2011, 1:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/avatars/590594/226 "2011-08-03T01:43:23Z")
> [@Acsenray](#): > > 1. There are few places to go free of ketchup. > 2. You’re the one wanting ketchup. 1. Surely, with opt-in, this would still be one of those places, though? 2. To which an alternative answer is bringing ketchup here. > [@](#): > > And the ketchup ban is not maintained just to keep ketchup from being seen. It’s there to prevent all use if ketchup and fir everyone to to k is and acceptthat ketchup is unwelcome. But that’s already failed - there are people here who would welcome ketchup (ketchup is rapidly becoming a nonsense word for me with all this repetition ;)). I’m one of them. Not having avatars doesn’t mean we don’t exist. The culture of ketchup acceptance is already here. The kind of people who want ketchup are already here. If the desire is to keep out the kind of person who would want ketchup, then you want quite a lot of us who are already here gone. ---
**Author:** ![Revenant\_Threshold](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f1d935/32.png) [@Revenant\_Threshold](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revenant_Threshold)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2011, 1:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/avatars/590594/227 "2011-08-03T01:44:33Z")
> [@bucketybuck](#): > > I am quite happy for this place to have avatars, but damn, the sneering condescension towards those who dont is getting quite tiring. With respect, I think unfortunetly the sneering condescension is going both ways. We’ve had old fogey accusations one way, and picture-book-reading kids the other. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2011, 1:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/avatars/590594/228 "2011-08-03T01:49:10Z")
> [@Revenant\_Threshold](#): > > 1. Surely, with opt-in, this would still be one of those places, though? Nope. Invisible ketchup is still ketchup. > [@](#): > > If the desire is to keep out the kind of person who would want ketchup, then you want quite a lot of us who are already here gone. If you can stick it while being deprived of ketchup, even though you’d like to have it, that’s good enough. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2011, 1:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/avatars/590594/229 "2011-08-03T01:49:22Z")
> [@Revenant\_Threshold](#): > > If you don’t like board with avatars, equally, _you_ could go somewhere else that doesn’t have them. I don’t mean that in an unpleasant or mean way, just pointing out that the argument works both ways. Why should I be the one to leave? You might notice that there’s two high correlations in this thread. One is between members and people who oppose avatars. The other is between guests and people who favor avatars. When the PTB consider the subject, which one do you think they’ll give the greater weight? And which group will they want to stay? I agree that any vote in a poll is meaningless. But that’s because there has already been a real-world vote. You think Ed won’t notice or take that into account? That’s the way the world works. And you know what? That’s the way it should. ---
**Author:** ![Crazyhorse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crazyhorse/32/31_2.png) [@Crazyhorse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crazyhorse)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2011, 1:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/avatars/590594/230 "2011-08-03T01:51:59Z")
> [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#): > > It’s simple. There is no legitimate reason to want avatars. Those who want them must have something wrong with their heads. > > Is that a crazy, inflammatory, worthless argument that delegitimizes not merely the person making it, but that whole side? Sure it is. > > If people are willing to go this far just in talk about the possibility of having avatars, then everything negative people have said about avatars themselves must be correct. You couldn’t have done a better job of ruining your own case. I never implied that anti-avatar people were any of those things. I said they just shouldn’t have any say in the question since it has no impact on them or their current use of the boards and is between TPTB and those asking for them. Your astute observation that at times people seem to go to great lengths in an apparent desire to impose their beliefs on others about an issue that has no impact on them is noted. And it hardly ‘ruins my case’, which is simply the answer is either yes or no to a feature request by TPTB and a board-wide vote is meaningless under the circumstances. ---
**Author:** ![Revenant\_Threshold](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f1d935/32.png) [@Revenant\_Threshold](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revenant_Threshold)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2011, 2:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/avatars/590594/231 "2011-08-03T02:13:48Z")
> [@Acsenray](#): > > Nope. Invisible ketchup is still ketchup. Well, to remove the analogy for a moment; ketchup has qualities other than visibility. Pictures, by and large, don’t. > [@](#): > > If you can stick it while being deprived of ketchup, even though you’d like to have it, that’s good enough. Good enough in what way? I’m acceptable to you because i’m not making avatars a requirement for myself to stay? [QUOTE=Exapno Mapcase] You might notice that there’s two high correlations in this thread. One is between members and people who oppose avatars. The other is between guests and people who favor avatars. When the PTB consider the subject, which one do you think they’ll give the greater weight? And which group will they want to stay? [/QUOTE] I went back to have brief check on your numbers - and you’re correct. Amusingly, the numbers also show that a majority are for avatars, so I guess we’ve both got useful statistics for our teams. > [@](#): > > I agree that any vote in a poll is meaningless. But that’s because there has already been a real-world vote. You think Ed won’t notice or take that into account? That’s the way the world works. And you know what? That’s the way it should. In purely money-making terms, I suspect the way the world works is that you want the most potential money. Plus, he kinda already has your money. The group **Ed** is currently courting is - as you yourself point out - the \*smaller \*of the two groups. If **Ed** takes these things into account, i’m not sure I would consider being in the less financially viable group to be a good thing. ---
**Author:** ![Crazyhorse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crazyhorse/32/31_2.png) [@Crazyhorse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crazyhorse)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2011, 2:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/avatars/590594/232 "2011-08-03T02:16:02Z")
> [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#): > > You might notice that there’s two high correlations in this thread. One is between members and people who oppose avatars. The other is between guests and people who favor avatars. When the PTB consider the subject, which one do you think they’ll give the greater weight? And which group will they want to stay? I don’ t know where you are drawing that incorrect conclusion but I see quite a few charter members, members, custom title holders, and even an Admin and a SDSAB member who runs their own board all speaking up in favor of avatars in this thread. Beyond that basic flaw in the statement, the other implication is incorrect as well. Guests are as important to the board as members in many respects. If there were never any more guests, there would never be any more members. And ad revenue is a part of the board’s income as well. ---
**Author:** ![Peremensoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ce7236/32.png) [@Peremensoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peremensoe)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2011, 2:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/avatars/590594/233 "2011-08-03T02:26:15Z")
> [@Crazyhorse](#): > > If the greasemonkey workaround caught on then every user, whether they wanted to be involved with avatars or not, would definitely have to see the links being tacked on to the end of every post anyway, with no option to opt out of them. And the mods would have to moderate all those links and make sure they weren’t porn or something harassing another user, etc. etc. just like with the built-in avatars except more difficult and less in the control of TPTB. I’m using Greasemonkey and Reiconizer right now. You see anything? ---
**Author:** ![Mewl\_Dear](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d6d6ee/32.png) [@Mewl\_Dear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mewl_Dear)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2011, 2:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/avatars/590594/234 "2011-08-03T02:27:09Z")
> [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#): > > You might notice that there’s two high correlations in this thread. One is between members and people who oppose avatars. The other is between guests and people who favor avatars. When the PTB consider the subject, which one do you think they’ll give the greater weight? And which group will they want to stay? > > I agree that any vote in a poll is meaningless. But that’s because there has already been a real-world vote. You think Ed won’t notice or take that into account? That’s the way the world works. And you know what? That’s the way it should. Condescend much. "This is the way “I” like it. You people are a quite pretensious bunch. And exhausting. ---
**Author:** ![Crazyhorse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crazyhorse/32/31_2.png) [@Crazyhorse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crazyhorse)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2011, 2:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/avatars/590594/235 "2011-08-03T02:32:14Z")
> [@spark240](#): > > I’m using Greasemonkey and Reiconizer right now. You see anything? No I don’t. But are you saying if I were running the script right now I would see your avatar in your post? My only familiarity thus far with the SDMB and greasemonkey scripts is another script recently posted here that shows inline images in posts. (a totally different subject) But in that setup, the link obviously has to be included in the post for it to work. ---
**Author:** ![running\_coach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/running_coach/32/15836_2.png) [@running\_coach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/running_coach)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2011, 2:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/avatars/590594/236 "2011-08-03T02:35:55Z")
> [@Mewl\_Dear](#): > > Condescend much. "This is the way “I” like it. > You people are a quite pretensious bunch. > And exhausting. Pretentious. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Fenris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fenris/32/498_2.png) [@Fenris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fenris)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2011, 2:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/avatars/590594/237 "2011-08-03T02:38:41Z")
> [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#): > > You might notice that there’s two high correlations in this thread. One is between members and people who oppose avatars. The other is between guests and people who favor avatars. When the PTB consider the subject, which one do you think they’ll give the greater weight? And which group will they want to stay? > > I agree that any vote in a poll is meaningless. But that’s because there has already been a real-world vote. You think Ed won’t notice or take that into account? That’s the way the world works. And you know what? That’s the way it should. Good. Then you agree we should have avatars for those who want them since Ed has said many times that they make more off guests than members Here’s one such [link](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=10638328). There are several others. So the condescending " :sniff: we members are the ones Ed wants to court, unlike you lowly plebes" crap is both obnoxious _and_ wrong.\* And again, why do _you_ object to other people being able to see avatars? Because that’s the actual question since you won’t see them unless you make the proactive decision to enable them “Do you want other people to be able to see/have avatars? If not, why not? Be specific” \*It’s also wrong because there are probably 5 times at a guess more guests than members. And “members” is a fairly stagnant group in terms of growth. ---
**Author:** ![Fenris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fenris/32/498_2.png) [@Fenris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fenris)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2011, 2:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/avatars/590594/238 "2011-08-03T02:45:13Z")
Heh–oops…I linked to the one thread where he said “Fees better than Ads.” so…um…oops. ---
**Author:** ![Peremensoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ce7236/32.png) [@Peremensoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peremensoe)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2011, 2:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/avatars/590594/239 "2011-08-03T02:48:12Z")
> [@Crazyhorse](#): > > But are you saying if I were running the script right now I would see your avatar in your post? No, not unless I gave you the URL of an avatar I wanted to represent me (if I wanted it to be available to anybody, I’d put it in my profile, as **GSV Consolation of Dreams** did). You would assign that URL to my name _in your browser_. Nothing would have to change, in the posts, for any other readers. You could see all the avatars you wanted, and _only_ those you wanted. ---
**Author:** ![Crazyhorse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crazyhorse/32/31_2.png) [@Crazyhorse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crazyhorse)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2011, 3:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/avatars/590594/240 "2011-08-03T03:06:57Z")
> [@spark240](#): > > No, not unless I gave you the URL of an avatar I wanted to represent me (if I wanted it to be available to anybody, I’d put it in my profile, as **GSV Consolation of Dreams** did). You would assign that URL to my name _in your browser_. Nothing would have to change, in the posts, for any other readers. You could see all the avatars you wanted, and _only_ those you wanted. Then that does somewhat lessen the point about it being a moderator challenge(it still leaves open the possibility of having to mod for ‘profile abuse’ more often), but it kind of strengthens the point about it being a seemingly unnecessary and cumbersome workaround. All for something that is just a basic feature of the board software and won’t affect anyone who doesn’t want to use it. The main point is just that each post already needs moderating, or has the potential to need moderating. For content, links, tone, intent, etc. Adding a small picture to the mix for those who choose to have one seems like only a tiny addition to a long list of things about any given post that could require mod attention. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/avatars/590594.md?page=11) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/avatars/590594.md?page=13)