Partly caused by non-reporting of possible rule violations. The mods don’t (and can’t) read every post in every thread.
The different forums have their own rules and cultures. A good joke will usually be allowed to stand if it’s really funny - but you shouldn’t attempt it until you’ve got the feel for the room.
In re threadshitting - to follow your example, you shouldn’t barge into someone else’s thread and slag all over the OP, but you’re always free to start your own thread and say, for example, “I think Tom Petty’s overrated and here are the reasons why.”
Nope. That’s what I mean I about lurking until you have a feel for board culture. You weren’t picked on. People, in the Pit, took you task for your crap writing habits. The Pit is the proper place for taking each other to task and the Board Culture is to use correct, standard, English. That was all perfectly within bounds.
What’s this thread about? Nevermind. I don’t care and am not gonna even bother reading it.
(That’s a good example of threadshitting)
This is important enough to bear repeating. Each forum is different.
Formally there is one set of rules for the board as a whole and a deliberately relaxed subset of them for the Pit.
Informally, each forum has a distinct tone or culture. The Pit stands out on the one extreme as high on emotion and backbiting. GQ stands at the other extreme and at its limit case reads pretty much like Wikipedia. Calm and impersonal.
The others are somewhere in the middle. But each is different about their tone, in-jokes, etc. Being a little out of tune with the crowd is usually fine. But more than one person has gotten modded for posting something into a thread they thought was in Forum X that was actually in Forum Y.
Oh…okay.
Oh, yeah. Everybody gets that. This board has a LOT of people who range from “fussy about details” to outright pedants. Every poster gets nitpicked at some point. feel Free to ignore it, unless it’s a Mod saying “that sort of grammar isn’t allowed here”.
Reported. 
An earlier discussion of threadshitting.
Nice!
The poster in question was using the same abundance of ellipses instead of periods that billfish/**watchwolf **has been doing. It’s not a style we need to see more of.
That is so unfair. What the hell is wrong with ellipses, except maybe you don’t like this other poster very much.
Because sentences with periods are easier to read. Not picking on you personally, but with sentences with fragments and many ellipses, it’s hard to tell where one thought leaves off and the next one begins.
Ok ok ok, I get it. I have been reading since I was 4 years old and I don’t ever recall being that upset about punctuation or lack-there-of, that people seem to get on this message board. In fact I come from a long line of poets and poetry lovers and punctuation is used rather differently. So bear with me on this point, til I catch up!
When you post poetry, no one will complain about your punctuation. You persist in posting prose, a totally different animal. Print prose has been subject to 500 years of natural selection to ensure maximal ease and speed of reading and comprehension. You subvert that at your own peril.
I got it.
Plus…do you want…everybody to read…every one of your posts…in the mental voice…of William Shatner?
Sounds…fun…to me! I understand what is needed or wanted, As I’ve said before, I am highly teachable. I will try to punctuate correctly and use less ellipses. Thx for your input!
Nothing wrong with them at all when used correctly and in the right context.
If I remember correctly, last week in a different thread Colibri explained this to you quite clearly and courteously, and you said you got the message.
It’s never too late to learn! Again! And again!