On helpful/vague subject heds and mod interaction thereto

[Leo_Bloom]

A general topic, here in reference to this thread, merely because it’s handy: Why did they commit suicide? [Robin Williams and Kurt Cobain] - In My Humble Opinion - Straight Dope Message Board

The original hed was “Why did they commit suicide?” ecg quickly bounced it from GQ to IMHO, I then gently bitched about the vagueness of the hed, and then Colibri added the clarification in the title (as normal, with brackets and a mod note) about who the “they” are.

What do the mods think about “acceptable” post titles? Of course “clarity” and “more detailed” is relative. If something is titled “physics question,” the topic can be parsed all the way down (or up into broader terms) depending on what you know/what can be known; all knowledge is that way. But the question is basically on par with the old favorite, “what forum does this go into.”

[Regarding the particular thread I cited at top, I’d like to note that the scorers might give Colibri only an assist on this play, but it shows the quality and care of SD modding. If he did that because I bitched, then thanks. If not, because he was doing his mod thang as usual, then thanks also, and it’s just one more sign of the quality of SD and its highly paid staff.]

Now, my credibility as to clarity of OPs is compromised, sometimes unduly so, usually because of digression backstory in the post that obscures what I believe is originally–ie, in the hed–a straightforward question (except in rare moments when I’m hoping the hed’s silliness is immediately obviously as come-on/click bait, which I hope will be then forgiven when a forum-appropriate post is revealed).

But I, like many, and obviously the mods here and there, like somewhat “detailed” heds for 1) getting the “right” audience and 2) making the scanning of the post titles and using SD more appealing. I’m a hard-core GQ poster/schmoozer/lurker, but occasionally will skip threads that would be interesting (even though the lovely thread drift makes everything potentially interesting).
Bulletin board post lists are Gump’s chocolates, you never know what’s inside. I get it. But a reason I bitch, or am annoyed with what are to me too-broad titles, is that I think other posters may skip the threads–who knows what SD lies in the hearts of members and guests?–and it would be funner if I knew that they would be more enticed to join in.

[jimbuff314]

I’m not a moderator and therefore cannot address the only question I see in the OP, but I would just like to type the following 5 words:

Specificity in titles is desirable.

[Leo_Bloom]

@jimbuff314

I’m not a moderator and therefore cannot address the only question I see in the OP, …

Maybe the suggestion of irony is just too good not too point out what is “the only question” given this particular OP.

Especially in SD, and especially since posts/replies can consist of opinions and debate on the topic, as you have done (not cited) as a matter of course. And especially especially in ATMB, where everything is addressed to or concerns a moderator. If I really truly wanted to hear only from mods I have their addresses.

[GrandWino]

How’s your pyloric valve, Leo?

[Leo_Bloom]

Twitchin’.

[Colibri]

@Leo_Bloom

What do the mods think about “acceptable” post titles? Of course “clarity” and “more detailed” is relative. If something is titled “physics question,” the topic can be parsed all the way down (or up into broader terms) depending on what you know/what can be known; all knowledge is that way. But the question is basically on par with the old favorite, “what forum does this go into.”

Really, the simpler, clearer, and more precise the better. Vague and general titles don’t prompt people to open the thread. The more you can be specific the better.

[Regarding the particular thread I cited at top, I’d like to note that the scorers might give Colibri only an assist on this play, but it shows the quality and care of SD modding. If he did that because I bitched, then thanks. If not, because he was doing his mod thang as usual, then thanks also, and it’s just one more sign of the quality of SD and its highly paid staff.]

I was in the process of moving that thread with the edited title when engineer beat me to it. I ended up editing it anyway after I saw your post.

Now, my credibility as to clarity of OPs is compromised, sometimes unduly so, usually because of digression backstory in the post that obscures what I believe is originally–ie, in the hed–a straightforward question (except in rare moments when I’m hoping the hed’s silliness is immediately obviously as come-on/click bait, which I hope will be then forgiven when a forum-appropriate post is revealed).

But I, like many, and obviously the mods here and there, like somewhat “detailed” heds for 1) getting the “right” audience and 2) making the scanning of the post titles and using SD more appealing. I’m a hard-core GQ poster/schmoozer/lurker, but occasionally will skip threads that would be interesting (even though the lovely thread drift makes everything potentially interesting).

Leo, please please please don’t try to be creative in your post titles in GQ. It’s just annoying. Ask your question straight up without being cutesy. Also, please don’t do that thing where you post half the question in the title and the rest in the body of the post. I hate that, especially when it makes the subject of the question unclear. I often have to go in and edit the rest of the question back into the title. It’s more work for me.

Likewise in your OPs. Often they are so meandering and digressive that no one can tell what you are asking, or else has to hunt around to find the actual question. Just ask the question with only the necessary backstory.

Posters often shoot themselves in the foot with extensive digressions or side commentary in the OP. People seize on some side issue and the thread spins into a discussion of that rather than answering the original question.

A certain amount of creativity in GQ is OK, but the main purpose of the forum is to get questions answered factually. If you want to just muse about things and shoot the shit, open the thread in MPSIMS or IMHO. People can still post factual information there, without the restrictions of GQ.

[Voyager]

@Colibri

Really, the simpler, clearer, and more precise the better. Vague and general titles don’t prompt people to open the thread. The more you can be specific the better.

Two even worse things can happen too. The thread is opened, the reader finds it is not at all about what the title suggests, and the thread is closed in disgust.
Or, even worse, the thread devolves into nonsense about the actual title not the intended topic.

None of these happens that often thanks to the high quality of posters and mods.

[Leo_Bloom]

Um…you know I wasn’t interested in any of my threads or posts per se in this, right?

It was to open up the topic. When to ask the mods.

[TroutMan]

It was kind of unclear what you were interested in from your OP. It’s all very meta.

[Colibri]

@Leo_Bloom

Um…you know I wasn’t interested in any of my threads or posts per se in this, right?

You should be.

It was to open up the topic. When to ask the mods.

You don’t need to ask the mods if you just follow my advice. Make your thread titles simple, clear, and specific. What else do you need to know?

[Guinastasia]

“Hed” = “heading”, I assume?

(Sorry, I’m a little loopy right now – pain killers)

[VinylTurnip]

@Guinastasia

“Hed” = “heading”, I assume?

(Sorry, I’m a little loopy right now – pain killers)

Headline. Like “lede” and “graf,” it’s industry jargon used by those of us in “the biz” of professional message board posting.

[Leo_Bloom]

@Colibri

You should be.

You don’t need to ask the mods if you just follow my advice. Make your thread titles simple, clear, and specific. What else do you need to know?

When to ask the mods to alter other poster’s heds.

[Leo_Bloom]

@VinylTurnip

Headline. Like “lede” and “graf,” it’s industry jargon used by those of us in “the biz” of professional message board posting.

[Colibri]

@Leo_Bloom

When to ask the mods to alter other poster’s heds.

Since you’re one of the posters most likely to post vague and misleading titles and confusing OPs, I would suggest you look to your own posting habits rather than worrying about those of others.

In any case, if you can’t tell what a poster is asking from the title, then report the post for a possible title change. It’s not that difficult.

[Chronos]

I’d say the criterion is simple: Is the title likely to attract the right sort of people to the question? In this sense, a title like “physics question” probably is specific enough, since most of the people good at answering physics questions probably will check it out (though, of course, something like “relativity question” would be even more useful). On the other hand, “why did they commit suicide?” isn’t a good title, because it’s unclear who would be interested in it: Should that be for a mental health professional, a historian, or (as it turned out) one who follows celebrity news?

[Colibri]

@Chronos

In this sense, a title like “physics question” probably is specific enough, since most of the people good at answering physics questions probably will check it out (though, of course, something like “relativity question” would be even more useful).

I’d prefer a more specific title than that. More posters are going to be able to contribute to a question on Newtonian physics than to one on relativity or astrophysics. Maybe a lot of people will click it, but you’ll be wasting some people’s time.

[spinky]

@Colibri

Leo, please please please don’t try to be creative in your post titles in GQ. It’s just annoying. Ask your question straight up without being cutesy. Also, please don’t do that thing where you post half the question in the title and the rest in the body of the post. I hate that, especially when it makes the subject of the question unclear. I often have to go in and edit the rest of the question back into the title. It’s more work for me.

Likewise in your OPs. Often they are so meandering and digressive that no one can tell what you are asking, or else has to hunt around to find the actual question. Just ask the question with only the necessary backstory.

I take back everything bad I’ve ever said about you. Reading titles and OPs from someone who thinks they’re being cute with their flowery and circuitous faux-academic writing is painful and annoying and usually just makes me say, “forget it, I don’t even want to engage with this person,” and click the close box.

@Leo Bloom

Now, my credibility as to clarity of OPs is compromised, sometimes unduly so, usually because of digression backstory in the post that obscures what I believe is originally–ie, in the hed–a straightforward question (except in rare moments when I’m hoping the hed’s silliness is immediately obviously as come-on/click bait, which I hope will be then forgiven when a forum-appropriate post is revealed).

Out of curiosity, is the self-referential humor in this sentence/paragraph intentional or not?

[Leo_Bloom]

@spinky

I take back everything bad I’ve ever said about you. Reading titles and OPs from someone who thinks they’re being cute with their flowery and circuitous faux-academic writing is painful and annoying and usually just makes me say, “forget it, I don’t even want to engage with this person,” and click the close box.

Spinky, what have of been saying about me? (I hope you don’t reply seriously–although of course it’s a free ATMB–for reasons set down below; this is meant as a :). Which is allowed.)

[snip of 1 paragraph recognizing my own involvement in topic]

Out of curiosity, is the self-referential humor in this sentence/paragraph intentional or not?

To read that paragraph (or “graf,” in the argot of special people) as ironic or humorous/self-aware ironic suggests that you, or others (as has been noted) can’t find a discrete question in first three paragraphs, or claim that the subject title is misleading or irrelevant or misleading; if so I can only suggest you re-read it (See the note below about blinking text.)

And about self referential, if you think it is humorous that this OP, about SD titles, OP content, and opinions on moderating which anticipates–correctly–that *the very fact * that “backstory” is appropriate at times, I can’t help you. I also anticipatedthat this thread would be taken as a personal question about me, which it is not intended to be.

I think it is a distraction to respond citing my posting history or analysis of how this very OP is written. If you find that particularly relevant, then you can’t claim that a paragraph on where I’m coming from is ironic. I am proud of my posting here, OPs and otherwise, and think I have made things interesting for many people, aside, of course, from the interesting posts/replies given directly to one my posts or any of the lovely thread drifts.

If someone asks “a physics question,” and his backstory – where he is coming from – helps with understanding what he (the poster) knows about the question already, or how far he is prepared to explore it, it is a net gain. And,in my opinion, writing what is eminently acceptable in subsequent posts (after the “thread must have discrete answer first before the fun begins”) can sometimes be part of the OP itself, I think. It can’t be that I am the only one who likes it.

I don’t run SD. The mods do. Posts and replies in SD GQ have never been a FAQ or a catechism. I know and like, in a virtual kind of way, many posters, each wiith the occasional flash of writing or observations that don’t belong. I have posted many many OPs, with happy thread results, where the title/General Question was clear and succinct enough that “see subject” sufficed. I have posted OPs–as have thousands of others in GQ–of the “what’ sip with x” category–with exactly that kind of subject headline–and at other times I have re-stated a particular question set-off with paragraphs, numbers, everything but blinking text.

It’s said that a good preacher, in a sermon, “tells you what he’s gonna tell you, tells you what he wants to tell you, and then tells you what he told you.” I happen to agree with that handy formulation, but it is not a rule. And of course it is not a rule for non-preaching situations, even in MPSIMS. The mods know this.

If I have not, and the reader doesn’t like what he sees, and thinks he deserves that every post be in some sort of pristine 1-2-3 style (ie FAQ/catechism) he can close it; or, as we know, a mod can do something. But some people use “what’s your point” in used to say something more personal, along the road to a thread shit. I’m not talking about my OP threads in particular. I’m interested in SD.

If Colibri can forbear from another more-in-sorrow-than-in-anger note directed at me here I would appreciate it. Not that I think he picks on me at all; I don’t think he or any mod picks on anyone.

[VinylTurnip]

brevity=soul<wit