You need to look at it from the user’s point of view. Again, consider a Wiki article, or FAQs on some website. Since the things being looked for are not organised conveniently (i.e., sections of articles are not designed to be in chronological or alphabetical order), having everything listed at the top with the appropriate links makes it much easier to navigate.
It does make it easier to see updates. No one is disputing that. I am (we are?) not asking for the thread to be returned to its original format; only the OP. By all means, keep posting new announcements; but post them in the ‘Table of Contents’ in the OP as well.
As far as ‘remembering’ people, it’s an awkward word on my part. It would be easier if I could sit next to you and point out what I mean. When I’ve gone to the thread, sometimes I wanted to see who died when. This is easier when everything is right in front of your eyes in a list. And then I’d go up and down the list, reading the names, and be like ‘Oh, yeah… I remember her,’ and such. When scrolling, many people (including me) tend to scroll quickly. It’s easy to miss things when you’re scrolling, quickly or not. And then you add in having to change pages, and it slows things down even more. It’s much better and easier to be able to scan a list (‘ToC’) at the top of the page.
And considering the infrequency of updates, it doesn’t see like much to ask.
I don’t see the problem with the existing system. If you subscribe to the In Memoriam thread, when a name/post is added to the end of the thread, you will get a notice. Entering the thread, you can always say “view first unread” or get to the end other ways, and you will learn about the latest demise. It works.
It’s not about seeing the latest notification or getting alerts. It’s about ease of reading all the names that were listed before and the overall usability of the thread to look through past entries.
I think the point you’re missing is that the change makes it much harder to take a serene walk though the Doper cemetery–which I dare say is pretty much what Johnny LA et al are talking about. Not just getting the announcement that a Doper has passed, but reflecting on our community at large passing a moment in remembrance. The multi-post doesn’t block that per se, but imagine a cemetery or zen garden with isolated memorials but with large billboards at every corner.
Or to be slightly less morbid, imagine wanting to look through a site with an art gallery. Would you prefer all images on one page or a slideshow where you click each image to get to the next? A minor difference, but decimating to the user experience.
This not a huge thread with a gazillion posts in it.
This is not a swiftly moving thread; in fact, changes to it are infrequent and rare, thanks be.
Because the thread is stickied in the forum it’s always close to the top of the list, so it’s easy to see in most any listing. A quick glance at the forum listing will tell you if there’s any change.
And if you subscribe to that thread, any time anything is added to it you’ll get an email.
It’s fine as it stands and needs no further amendments.
That’s what I was doing when I remade the thread six weeks ago. I didn’t make the changes for my own amusement or because I thought I was creating a marvel of graphic design. I did it because posters asked me to do it because it would make the thread more useful. If readability and these other things were going to take a huge hit perhaps someone could have pointed it out the last time we discussed the thread?
I find the organization – naturally by posting date – perfect for looking at things chronologically. If you want to find a specific name, just search for it on the page (ctrl/F on a PC). Each name’s post usually includes a link to a thread about that particular Doper’s demise, so if you want more, go there.
I don’t like the idea of a mod having to post the same info twice, which is what I think is being proposed. Two problems with that. First, the main list will keep increasing as long as this message board exists, eventually getting unwieldy; and second, anytime you have to hand-enter the same data twice, you run the risk of entries not matching. Misspell one and you make the search harder. Commercial name and address databases, if properly designed, avoid duplicating information for exactly this reason.
And Control/F won’t find a name any faster if it’s in a compact list or scattered thru a thread. If it’s in both places, you will just have another match to look at.
Again, this is not about notification. It’s about readability.
Nobody is asking that the thread be returned to its original state; only that the OP be returned to its original state.
I would have, had I know it was being discussed. Like (I presume) most Dopers, I only look into ATMB on rare occasions. (And it was my birthday week, so I was otherwise occupied.)
Which is what we’re doing now. Having the ToC in the OP would make the thread more readable and more useful.
To be clear- I’m not advocating for or against it, but trying to help clarify the argument. I think the OP has a point, but I don’t have strong feelings about it. If the issue is going to be discussed, I feel at least misconceptions of what the issue is about should be cleared up.
This is why I though it should be styled as a favour–an exception to the general rule of not burdening the mods with additional work. In this case, there’s no reason to re-type everything; copy/pasting is sufficient (so Musicat’s otherwise legitimate concerns don’t quite apply).
In other words, the thread has (or some of us would like it to have) two purposes: memorial and announcement. The recent change addressed the announcement aspect of things, but at the cost of the memorial aspect of the thread. I think we’re recognizing that we’re asking for a series of additional steps. That Marley23 or whoever update/edit the OP just as they always did, but now 1) highlight what they wrote, 2) copy it, 3) paste into the Quick Reply box, and 4) hit submit. There may be the addition of unlocking/relocking the thread to make the new post, but those steps are already necessary given the new treatment.
It’s not a table of contents, though, it’s duplicating all of the information posted throughout the thread. I understand why you’re asking for that, but no, it doesn’t strike me as being worth the effort.
It would be great if everyone had that kind of insight. Perhaps the people making the last suggestion weren’t thinking about the impacts. Perhaps the people making this suggestion didn’t participate last time because they didn’t know the conversation was occurring. Perhaps people don’t realize the impacts until they actually see them, then think “Oh, I didn’t think about that.”
grumble grumble You people, can’t agree on anything. “Welcome to the Dope, where disagreeing is a way of life.”
I called it a ‘table of contents’ as shorthand, which is why it was in quotes. It’s easier to write ‘table of contents’ or ‘ToC’ than ‘an easily scannable chronological list of dead Dopers, with links to their profiles and threads’.
Yes, it’s duplicating information; but considering how rarely the thread is updated, it’s not a lot of work.
As far as being worth the effort goes, it seems like you went through a lot of effort simply so that people who don’t pay attention would be notified of deaths.
The memorial thread is usually not updated until weeks or even (in at least one case) months after someone posts a notification in MPSIMS. Given that, it doesn’t seem to be crucial that people who miss the deaths be notified. They’re still going to be late. All they would have to do is notice that the thread title has gone from grey to blue, or else do as I do and check it every couple of months. Instead, they get notified weeks after the thread has disappeared from the main page, and readability of the memorial thread suffers and will get worse as time goes on.
Or, you could restore the OP and yes, duplicate the information, which would take about a minute to C&P, and everyone would be happy.
This seems like such a reasonable request, and such a small amount of extra effort, that I can’t fathom why one wouldn’t grant it. Let’s look at the workflow for new entries, which (one certainly hopes) only occur once in a blue moon.
Click “Reply.” Type in the new info, click “submit.”
Click “Edit.” CTRL+A (to select all), CTRL+C (to copy). No need to click save, just hit the back button.
Go to the OP.
Click “Edit.” CTRL +V (to paste), click “Save.”
That’s not exactly onerous a task for something that is done so rarely.
And since I bet it’s the idea of recreating the original OP that’s making the extremely reasonable mod Marley23 balk at a reasonable suggestion? This one’s for you:
-----------------------------EDIT MY POST AND COPY BELOW------------------------------
Over the years the Straight Dope community has included a huge variety of memorable and remarkable people. Posters come and go for their own reasons, but some have left us much sooner than we would have liked. This is a short list of friends who have died over the years. We miss them, but we’re glad to have known them in the first place, and thank them for helping us fight ignorance and pass many happy hours.
There, I went to the trouble of doing it for you. So I do hope you’ll please consider this simple request. It’s a nice thing to do and seriously, as an admin of another board, I know it’s not too much for a community to ask of its mods. Thanks.
Or if you want extra spaces between the lines (easier to read):
-----------------------------EDIT MY POST AND COPY BELOW------------------------------
Over the years the Straight Dope community has included a huge variety of memorable and remarkable people. Posters come and go for their own reasons, but some have left us much sooner than we would have liked. This is a short list of friends who have died over the years. We miss them, but we’re glad to have known them in the first place, and thank them for helping us fight ignorance and pass many happy hours.
And there’s an unintended illustration, too. Notice how much easier it is to read the list without spaces, than it is in the post with spaces between the lines. With the individual posts, there are effectively eight spaces between entries – spread (eventually) over two pages. And the ‘spaces’ are filled with clutter.
Huh I find the double-spaced version vastly easier to read. (Doesn’t everyone?) Johnny L.A. is right, of course, in everything he says above about individual posts.
I find the double-spaced version vastly easier to read. (Doesn’t everyone?) Johnny L.A. is right, of course, in everything he says above about individual posts.