In theory, yes. It would be a thread that nobody would be likely to post to and it would quickly disappear.
Now I will concede that there might be practical difficulties in implementing such a theory. We could end up with a mass of bad threads crowding out the handful of good ones.
But that problem is as theoretical as the post you described. Qui’s post was not rows of the letter Q - it certainly had more content than that. And there is no glut of nonsense threads on this board. So how about we abandon speculation on hypothetical posts and threads and focus on what’s real?
I’m not saying that there are no possible circumstances under which a moderator should close a thread for poor content. I’m saying you shouldn’t have closed that thread in the circumstances that exist now.
Why so confrontational? You seem to see this as a battle between you and the plebiscite. I’m sure most people here just want to suggest that you made a bad call.
I “grok” that post #11 does nothing to imply what you say it does, and that it would be a waste of time to argue points that exist only in your imagination.
The problem was that thread had too much content. 75 points throughout all of history, all arbitrarily chosen by the OP, would have pulled it in too many directions to have a coherent conversation.
I am not a fan of the young poster who put so much work into the poll in the thread that was shut down. I am also not a habitual whiner about mod actions. In fact, if I posted more, I would probably be considered one of “the usual suspects” on the side of the mods.
The closing of the thread in question seems indefensible, and Czarcasm seems to be doing a pretty good job of proving the he has no defense for his action. The poll was there for thirteen minutes before the thread was locked. One person appears to have voted (the OP). Is it really so obvious that this thread could not have provoked some “civilized(or coherent) conversation”? It’s not obvious to me. I think reasonable moderation would have allowed this thread to sink or swim on its own.
Bad call, Czarcasm, and you haven’t added anything in this thread that makes you look any closer to reasonable.
Well, I guess that shows how “capable of more subtle lines of thought” you truly are…
Fine, how about this:
I retract my claim that you suggested to Curtis that he ramp up his poll creation. However, it’s ridiculous to assume that he won’t ramp up his poll creation after being told by you to start over again with a smaller chunk.
Given Curtis’ posting history and tendency to latch onto one large overarching theme for a few days at a time, don’t you think that telling him that the subject he posted has merit but would be better met by administration if posted in a smaller chunk, that that will result in Curtis posting yet another string of polls all at the same time on the same subject?
It’s clearly not the subject matter you have a problem with, otherwise you wouldn’t have told him to start over on a smaller scale. So that leaves the posting manner you have a problem with. I understand that - that’s why there’s a big thread in the Pit regarding Curtis. So why not just address that? Why let (and encourage) other posts that are all going to follow the same pattern of being abandoned?
I am sure you are aware that the poll with 50 options was created due to a particular article that listed those 50 options, with accompanying reasons and talking points. Using the article as a starting point, it was relevant to include all 50 options. I personally thought it was too many, and rendered the poll pointless, but there was reason behind it.
As opposed to 70 options pulled from the rectal area and threw out there to see what happened next.
Look, you’re not going to get any argument from me about the inanity of Qin Shi Huangdi’s poll. It’s just another example of that particular poster’s penchant for starting pointless threads.
But it doesn’t seem to me that the basic premise of the thread is any more or less stupid than one offering 50 choices for World’s Greatest Idea. Czarcasm’s exact words, in closing the thread, were:
I don’t think either one of those threads is any more amenable to a civilized or coherent conversation than the other. These “most important ever in the whole world”-type polls are, by their very nature, messy and inconclusive and tend to lead to lots of disparate contributions and strong disagreements. They are, quite simply, innately ripe for incoherence.
Anyway, please continue making pointless and arbitrary distinctions.
And that’s not the point. We’re not claiming that it was a great thread. We’re saying we don’t need you to decide which threads are good enough for us to participate in.
Actually, some of us are here exactly because the moderators close threads like that and raise the bar around for meaningful discourse. No, it’s not a perfect system, but it is one of the things that makes this board more enjoyable.
A random, one off thread from an otherwise coherent poster would be one thing. But this has been this poster’s MO from the beginning. An occasional gentle reminder that it’s not an appreciated form of posting is a good thing. It’s what I want a moderator to do, and it’s what I do on the forum I moderate.
A scattershot poll is closed and people complain? My reaction to the 75 options was “WTF”. My reaction to the complaints about the closing is an even bigger “WTF”. I mean, over a crappy poll like that?? Come on. Let it go. Where’s your sense of proportion?
Yeesh. Put me in the minimal-mod-intervention column, please. The thread was unwieldy but harmless.
The hypothetical lines-o’-Qs thread should be closed on the grounds of it not being (demonstrably) in English. Easy-peasy.
The too-stupid/unwieldy-to-live standard is appropriate for forums such as GQ and GD. It may, debatably, have a place in forums such as MPSIMS, IMHO, and the BBQ Pit. If so, I think the standard should be more lenient in the latter forums. If we acknowledge that everyone doesn’t have to agree that every thread in those forums is worth reading, well, we can certainly pick and choose which threads we read/participate in.
Yeah, but it’s not. The other thread had a theme, the article backed up the 50 choices and presented some significant basis for discussion. This thread was completely random with no support for the seemingly random choices. The number of items is a factor, but not the sole factor.
