I’d say the posts fall more under the heading of “hurr durr i’m a doper i don’t know what pop culture is hurr durr” coupled with “let’s all make the same joke 7 times in a row so that everyone knows how funny we are.” Makes me wish I still knew where my doper bingo card was.
Damn. 
If you hadn’t beat me to it, I would’ve done something similar. That thread title was just begging for it.
Well, thank you, Inner Stickler! You know what I mean, and your description hits the nail right on the head.
I can concede that sometimes hijacks are inevitable and may even possibly bring some liveliness into a dying discussion. My main beef with the thread I linked to in the OP was partly because people were hijacking right off the bat, but also partly because the dolts were going “Huh? Wha? I don’t understand!” even when it was already explained. That’s really fucking annoying.
ETA: ESPECIALLY the poster who said the same “Li’l Sebastian is a rapper’s name” comment AFTER twickster fixed the title. UGH.
You are correct: the various personal definitions of “threadshit” aren’t important. What is important, is the definition used and applied by the moderators of the board. And under that definition, your Facebook example is not threadshitting, unless it happens in a thread that is specifically about Facebook, and even then, only if it’s a thread that’s generally positive about Facebook, or some feature of Facebook.
“Threadshit” amounts to a term of art in the context of the Straight Dope. You’re posting on the Straight Dope, complaining about the behavior of other posters, and your OP touches on (although is not directly concerned with) the moderation of the board - it’s therefore not unreasonable to think that you’re attempting to use the term as its officially defined in the board rules. So, with that understanding, it’s worth pointing out that you don’t know what the fuck your talking about.
Which brings us to a pet peeve of my own: people who start pit rants about something they can neither identify or define, and are thus left waiting for some other, more coherent poster to come along and recast their rant in terms that are understandable to people with normally functioning intellects.
I can go with the second part, but for the first part - really? Everyone on the planet watches fucking Parks and Recreation except the “omg you plebes actually watch that crap” posters? I can see bitching if someone snobs it up about who the hell Lady Gaga is or something.
Yes, the thread title made me think it was a rapper, too, but I didn’t post that because someone beat me to it.
And for the love of all that’s good, if you don’t want people making posts like that, write a decent thread title and occasionally throw readers a bone with some extra links/descriptions.
I watched an episode and a half of “Parks and Recreation” last night because everyone raves about it; I laughed twice, I think. The show still sucks.
Now THAT’S a threadshit! 
This is why I don’t have Facebook.
I personally don’t consider it threadshitting unless somebody maligns the subject of the thread. For example, every time I see a “Two And Half Men” thread, I have a desire to shit in it like I’ve been eating at Taco Bell exclusively for a month and just passed a bowel obstruction. I really hate that show and it saddens me that it’s so popular. But I also hate threadshitting so I don’t even open it.
<threadfart>
The posts in that thread are not threadshit. The OP of that thread is a shitter for putting (what I assume to be) a spoiler in the thread title. (I haven’t seen the episode yet.)
You may have thought it was explained but for those of us who have never heard of the show, it wasn’t until posts started referring to what sounded like characters in a TV show that I caught on that Parks and Recreation must be a sitcom. Li’l Sebastian does sound like a rappers name, and I didn’t realize people got this, er, emotional about the death of a character, so I thought Li’l was a real live person at first.
Oh ha ha. I used the term in its unofficial capacity, so that must mean my rant was incoherent. What exactly is so hard to understand about “If you don’t know what it is, google it or shut the fuck up”?
Look out behind you, a strawman!!! I haven’t been here for eons like some other posters, but I know that any comments about moderation and board rules go in About This Message Board. Is this thread in there? No! Therefore, this rant is actually about the behaviour (which you may or may not define as “thread shitting”) of posters who derail threads with unfunny jokes.
Also, you should confirm with twickster that my post report text only said “Vague thread title. People seem confused by it”. I did not complain that it was thread shitting, so it’s pretty moronic to be bringing things like official definitions for “thread shit” and board rules into discussion. I know it says Moderator under your name, but not every thread that mentions moderators is ACTUALLY about board moderation.
I’ve actually seen people ask who Lady Gaga was before. No joke.
It’s pretty obvious by now that Li’l Sebatian isn’t a rapper. If L’il Sebatian doesn’t even exist as a rapper, what the hell are these people who don’t know who “Li’l Sebatian” is even doing clicking on the fucking thread, let alone posting in it? Are these people’s back button broken?
I thought maybe I should know who it was. Or at least, I might learn about someone interesting, unique, or entertaining. The first post certainly sounded like this might be the case. We’re here to fight ignorance, after all, so not clicking on things that I don’t know about is just stupid.
I never realized someone could be driven so far over edge over a sit-com thread. Chee-rist … how about a Xanax or something.
How about googling it? And then when you have your answer from google, report the post to a moderator?
It was in Cafe Society and the very first response clarified that it was about a tv show. Every post after that bitching about the vague title falls under “hurr durr doper” or "can’t be bothered to read anything except the OP because my viewpoint is special and unique dammit! (And the same as the 3 people who posted above you.) I give a 5 minute window for simulposts because hey, life but after that…
Nothing at all, except what it has to do with the concept of thread shitting, which you appear to define as, “any post I don’t like.”
Given the tenor of this thread, I wasn’t prepared to give you that much credit. At any rate, ATMB is for questioning acts of moderation. Plenty of people open pit threads about other posters for violating board rules. If someone wanted to pit forum spammers, for example, that would be perfectly appropriate in this forum - and not at all appropriate in ATMB, despite the fact that forum spamming is very much against the rules.
Which brings us to a second pet peeve of mine: people who can’t handle the concept that not every post needs to be directly on topic. Does someone posting, “I thought he was a rapper!” prevent you from discussing the content of the episode? No? Then stop fucking whining about the thread being “derailed.”
No, but I don’t think that it’s an unreasonable expectation that a thread that specifically uses a term that is defined as a violation of the board rules might - just might - have something to do with a violation of the board rules.
More to the point: learn what words mean before you use them. Otherwise, you sound like an idiot.
Did he hit a nerve or something?