So around 50% people can understand it with very little effort, and 80% with some effort. That’s about in line with my expectations.
Do you propose any sort of conclusion from this data (other than the above observation)?
For me, regardless of the precise stats on how easy/difficult people find it to read, it’s clear that the OP in question isn’t a productive way to ask for help, because:
– Sufficient number of people did find it annoying enough that this became the focus of their response (and this might have happened if only 10% of people found it difficult/annoying)
– Once the thread derails in that direction, even the people who can read the OP will get sucked into the argument about standards
– Others arriving late, who can read it, will not bother to respond at all, having decided that the thread is a lost cause
My conclusion: If you want to ask for help, make it as easy as possible for people to want to help you,
Not to mention the 99.9% probability that person will never be back.
This is my bet.
The English is far too good for a non-native. I teach English in Taiwan, and anyone who gets the tenses that consistently correct can spell much better. The idioms are used right, but with almost deliberate mistakes.
The deliberateness and inconsistency of the text-coding simply suggests someone pushing it, trying to write bad, but not knowing how.
WTF is with the “did” and “dat.” Are there attempts to sound like someone who speaks AAVE? If so, it’s really bad because none of the other features follow AAVE.
No. I’ve lived in East Asia for 25 years and it’s not someone from this part of the world.
TL: DR If there aren’t paragraph breaks, then I skip it.
No, no conclusion. I made this thread solely because of my surprise at the rather strong claims made regarding the comprehensibility of the post. I have no quarrel with its demonstrable ineffectiveness as a means of getting advice on the SDMB. I was always skeptical about how genuine the OP was anyway.
Post that paragraph as a riddle to solve and people will be competing to tell you how small of a fraction of a second they spent cracking its meaning. It’s trivially easy to understand. The only point of saying that it isn’t is to call the OP a moron.
It’s not hard to understand at all. It’s rather obvious what is being written and I only paused a few times at typos. I am flabbergasted that someone whose first language is English could read that and have difficulty understanding it, or call it “incomprehensible.”
Like Jimmy, I suspect most if not all people calling it “incomprehensible” can understand it just fine, but just say that to demonstrate disapproval of poor grammar.
The poster’s profile indicates that she is an Indian. I’m an Indian myself, and dis, dere, odrwse etc. is(was?) certainly common usage among certain demographics that employ texting shorthand, and such usage is apparently common on facebook. Other parts of the passage also hew closely to how I would expect someone who uses textspeak so liberally to write. So it’s not quite the slam dunk fake that you think it is. In fact, had it not fit the pattern of SDMB troll so perfectly, I would be hard pressed to disqualify it on just the writing. On the whole though, I agree with your conclusion, if not the steps that you took on your way there.
blech. nvm
Fair enough. Just wondered.
Actually, I found it much easier to read than standard English. In fact, it was so easy to read tht I bow going to rite dat way all de tim.
The lack of punctuation and paragraph breaks make it hard to just naturally know exactly where I am, and it gets easy to get lost. I don’t necessarily mean I lose my place on the page. I mean that I have a hard time keeping it memory. It just becomes like a wash of words.
It’s akin to the level of reading I have to do to actually understand Shakespeare, rather than just enjoy the language. It’s why at the very least say Shakespeare must be heard. I would guess that, if I could hear this other person talking, I could understand them a lot better.
In fact, if I speak it out loud for a little bit, I suddenly can read the rest, as it helps it stay in my memory, and I can actually start anticipating what’s going on. That’s better than some much worse stuff where I pretty much just edit the text before reading it. At least those ellipses break up the sentences.
Understanding the post wasn’t really a difficulty, though somewhat more so than regular English. Understanding the ‘this is the Straight Dope where everybody is super smart and writes like Shakespeare’ attitude is considerably harder.
Germany has virtually none—basically everything is dubbed over here (regrettably). I imagine it’s similar in other countries.
Get thee to a Reddit thread!
My writing is bad but I do try. I found that painful and had to force myself to finish it.
Shhhh…! Don’t distract them. That shark in the pool looks hungry… 
Well, that’s sort of the point though. I might be tempted to wade through a river of shit for some sort of reward. I’m not sure I’d be so inclined to do that if it was to fulfil your demand for cookies.
Not really. You not wanting to wade is valid, but saying that the river is difficult to wade through, and that’s why you don’t want to do it is untrue, and that’s what being discussed here.
It’s both. I will do easy things for smaller reward than difficult things. I will do fewer favours for people who make it more difficult than it needs to be.
But what is being discussed is not whether or not you will do something, but whether or not that thing is difficult. To some extent of course difficulty is tied to motivation, but I’d argue that as far as it is possible to be objective about difficulty, the passage in question is not difficult to comprehend.