# TLDR; clarification, please? **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [May 25, 2006, 12:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tldr-clarification-please/358108 "2006-05-25T00:32:05Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 17\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Richard\_Pearse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/richard_pearse/32/13144_2.png) [@Richard\_Pearse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Richard_Pearse)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2006, 7:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tldr-clarification-please/358108/61 "2006-05-26T07:22:59Z")
**Revenant Threshold** , You seem to be mischaracterising CKs post a little. It’s not > [@](#): > > tldr > > You’re an idiot, and I don’t respect your position on this topic at all. but rather, > [@](#): > > tldr _all_ of it. > > But I did read this, > > > [@](#): > > > > \ > > and here is my response to that… It’s quite clear that although CK didn’t read the entire thread (and his post suffered for it,) he did read some of it, and responded to what he read. And you’re right I didn’t read that entire thread before my first response to you. I had already read it when it was active and I’m not about to go through it again. Although CK may or may not have read the OP in the thread, the relevant point was that he had read some of the thread, and was responding to it. It was not just a drive-by “this thread is too long to read” post. Also, I have a brain, it resides in my head and is used for thinking, unlike yours, which resides in your tail and is used for basic survival reflexes :D. ---
**Author:** ![Revenant\_Threshold](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f1d935/32.png) [@Revenant\_Threshold](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revenant_Threshold)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2006, 1:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tldr-clarification-please/358108/62 "2006-05-26T13:40:33Z")
> [@Giraffe](#): > > Yes, both still would have been warned. The link to the other site was just the icing on the jerk cake. > > As for ‘tldr’ vs. ‘tldr, because it was boring’, we don’t have a quantitative, catchall rule for this, and we’re not going to – that’s why we have moderators. There are many cases where commenting solely on the length/readability of someone’s OP is fine (although I imagine we’ll always take a dim view of ‘tldr/lol/omg’-only responses). It depends on the thread and how you do it. In a thread about someone’s _dying mother_, we’re going to have a lot less patience for people coming in only to say “booooooorrrrrrrrring!” than in a thread about getting cut off in traffic. It’s not an issue of the number of characters or words in a post, it’s the message and the context. I’m not going to give you a magic rule for how to be an asshole and not get in trouble. Alright. I still think there should be a “magic rule”, but that’s just my opinion; you’ve cleared this up for me, which is what I asked. Thanks. > [@Frank](#): > > It’s mystifying, because Revenant Threshold has never been an asshole that I’m aware of. She just has a bug up her ass about the moderation. _shrug_ Aww. I’m touched. Can I put “never been an asshole that i’m aware of” on my CV? 😉 Oh, and i’m male. > [@1920s Style "Death Ray"](#): > > It’s quite clear that although CK didn’t read the entire thread (and his post suffered for it,) he did read some of it, and responded to what he read. Not really. While you could certainly say that for his first paragraph, the second; > [@C K Dexter Haven](#): > > Enough. **Those of you who hate these boards** , my best suggestion is that you go elsewhere. There are hundreds of unmoderated boards out there, be my guest. You’ll have no moderators to scream and yell about, and you can enjoy yourself without any frustration. But recognize reality: any time there’s moderated boards, or authority of any type, you’re going to find decisions and situations that you don’t agree with. ( my bolding) …certainly seems to address more than the one person whose post he quotes, and it’s “those people” who he seems to be talking to for the rest of his post, too. > [@](#): > > It was not just a drive-by “this thread is too long to read” post. Now that I do agree with. And since context does have a role to play in it’s jerkishness, then while I disagree this is still a reasonable reason for the mods to draw the line. > [@](#): > > Also, I have a brain, it resides in my head and is used for thinking, unlike yours, which resides in your tail and is used for basic survival reflexes 😃 Hah! I think that I started this thread shows that I have no basic survival reflexes at all! _wags tail happily_ ---
**Author:** ![Sublight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/439d5e/32.png) [@Sublight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sublight)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2006, 2:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tldr-clarification-please/358108/63 "2006-05-26T14:12:48Z")
> [@Revenant Threshold](#): > > Alright. I still think there should be a “magic rule”, but that’s just my opinion; I have to disagree (that there should be a magic rule. I fully agree that that was your opinion 😉 ). It seems to me that one asks for trouble by setting a hard and fast limit like this. When you set a line, for example that a tldr post must have X words to not qualify as jerkishness, you’ll get people who deliberately shit in threads by posting X+1 words, probably with the phrase “I’m posting the minimum number of words so you can’t warn me tldr bye.” Some people just feel they have to act like the annoying brother who’d wave his hands in your face while saying “I’m not touching you. I’m not touching you. See? I’m not touching you.” This is my personal opinion, but I’d rather deal with the occasional bad judgment (I agree with the OP in the thread **C K** posted in), than have a system that uses no judgement. ---
**Author:** ![EddyTeddyFreddy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eddyteddyfreddy/32/18796_2.png) [@EddyTeddyFreddy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EddyTeddyFreddy)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2006, 2:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tldr-clarification-please/358108/64 "2006-05-26T14:53:51Z")
> [@Revenant Threshold](#): > > Not really. While you could certainly say that for his first paragraph, the second; > ( my bolding) > …certainly seems to address more than the one person whose post he quotes, and it’s “those people” who he seems to be talking to for the rest of his post, too. I would posit that **Dex** meant, by “those people”, the cadre of Dopers who make a career, or at least a hobby, out of attacking the administration of the board every chance they get. Not saying there aren’t legitimate complaints now and then, but there are those who’ll gleefully haul out the machete for a flyswatter casus belli. **Dex** has read shitloads of spittle-flecked diatribes over the years as an admin, and it’s my take that his fed-up-ness with what he perceived as yet another game of “Kill The Admin!” is what provoked him to post that after reading enough of the thread to see it in that light. ---
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2006, 3:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tldr-clarification-please/358108/65 "2006-05-26T15:26:51Z")
> [@TVeblen](#): > > Apologies for my absence in this thread. I was out of town on vacation this week and didn’t have online access. Just got back tonight so I wasn’t deliberately ignoring you or this thread, **Loach**. > > I did a lousy job of explaining my warning in that thread. I was rushed with last-minute packing, etc. and should have left it **fluiddruid** or **Giraffe** to field. The post was reported as a possible problem. When I read it, it seemed like a no-brainer. I rushed through the initial explanation but the acronym was just a symptom, not the core problem: barging into a thread just to stay it wasn’t worth reading is obnoxious behavior. Most posters skip threads that don’t interest them. It’s pointlessly nasty to hijack a thread just to announce, “Hey, lookit _me, me, me_! I didn’t read this because I knew I wouldn’t like it!” Annoying as hell for other posters, y’know? > > Immediate feedback from posters made it clear that I _hadn’t_ been clear so I zipped off an apology and a clarification. I didn’t figure out the dare-ya-to-troll thing until a poster alerted me about it. It was a bizarre little riff, but nothing more, and it came well after I’d already warned **deevee**. > > Anyway, it was a valuable reminder to me to be clearer in explanations. The initial hijack seemed so obviously jerkish to me, even without knowing the extraneous stuff (and it _was_ extraneous), that I didn’t take enough time to consider a hasty warning wouldn’t be equally clear to others. Clumsily done but not dire, supersecret prejudices or anything.\* > > \*I am being facetious here, though it cracked me up to dump the whole mess in Giraffe’s lap with an equally hasty e-mail and a hearty “Good luck with THIS one!” Thank you for the explaination. This answers it all for me. The only thing I would have to disagree with you about is calling it extraneous. I thought bringing off board crap into threads was a bigger no-no. Since I am not a mod my opinion on that doesn’t hold much weight but I thought I would express it. ---
**Author:** ![Revenant\_Threshold](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f1d935/32.png) [@Revenant\_Threshold](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revenant_Threshold)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2006, 3:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tldr-clarification-please/358108/66 "2006-05-26T15:33:51Z")
> [@EddyTeddyFreddy](#): > > I would posit that **Dex** meant, by “those people”, the cadre of Dopers who make a career, or at least a hobby, out of attacking the administration of the board every chance they get. Not saying there aren’t legitimate complaints now and then, but there are those who’ll gleefully haul out the machete for a flyswatter casus belli. **Dex** has read shitloads of spittle-flecked diatribes over the years as an admin, and it’s my take that his fed-up-ness with what he perceived as yet another game of “Kill The Admin!” is what provoked him to post that after reading enough of the thread to see it in that light. But **Dex** pointed out he _hadn’t_ read the thread. I’m just pointing out to **Death Ray** that he wasn’t solely responding to the single poster he quoted. ---
**Author:** ![Oy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/bc8723/32.png) [@Oy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Oy)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2006, 4:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tldr-clarification-please/358108/67 "2006-05-26T16:47:18Z")
> [@Loach](#): > > If the Mod in question were to say they didn’t know about the comments elsewhere I would have no reason to call them I liar. So far that hasn’t happened. The lack of honesty I sensed was not a lie and I never said it was. I meant a lack of honesty as in not telling the whole truth. I find it hard to believe that the comments on the other site had nothing to do with the warning. This boggles my mind. Someone comes along and posts “tldr” or “I really don’t care about your mother enough to bother to read the OP” on a post about someone’s mother _dying_, and you \*don’t \* consider that being enough of a jerk to qualify for a reprimand??? I don’t give a shit about the other message board. But I damned well care about how incredibly dismissive, rude, and hateful such remarks were under the circumstances. It’s one thing to make that kind of comment on a light, humorous or trivial thread, but on one like that? What other possible reason could someone have for posting that there than purely to be a jerk - pure malice in written form? ---
**Author:** ![EddyTeddyFreddy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eddyteddyfreddy/32/18796_2.png) [@EddyTeddyFreddy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EddyTeddyFreddy)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2006, 4:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tldr-clarification-please/358108/68 "2006-05-26T16:51:13Z")
> [@Revenant Threshold](#): > > But **Dex** pointed out he _hadn’t_ read the thread. > > I’m just pointing out to **Death Ray** that he wasn’t solely responding to the single poster he quoted. And I’d point out that there’s a long inglorious history of anti-admin/mod vituperation on this board, some of it justified, some not. Given the context of events around that thread and past brouhahas, I’m not surprised that **Dex** took a quick glance and launched into what to me boils down to “What, this shit again? Screw reading more of this drivel, I’m sick of your whining!” That he happened to be somewhat off-target in this particular case doesn’t change the fact\* that his outburst sprang from far different motivation than the TLDR we’ve been discussing. \*What I consider a fact; YMMV, of course. ---
**Author:** ![Revenant\_Threshold](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f1d935/32.png) [@Revenant\_Threshold](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revenant_Threshold)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2006, 5:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tldr-clarification-please/358108/69 "2006-05-26T17:23:51Z")
> [@EddyTeddyFreddy](#): > > That he happened to be somewhat off-target in this particular case doesn’t change the fact\* that his outburst sprang from far different motivation than the TLDR we’ve been discussing. I agree it was a totally different motivation, I just didn’t think (given what was said by mods in **Sampiro** ’s thread) that motivation had anything to do with it; it just seemed to be a case of tldr (or equivalent) being the offense, regardless of context or motivation. I’ve now been set straight on that. ---
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2006, 2:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tldr-clarification-please/358108/70 "2006-05-27T02:21:31Z")
> [@Oy!](#): > > This boggles my mind. Someone comes along and posts “tldr” or “I really don’t care about your mother enough to bother to read the OP” on a post about someone’s mother _dying_, and you \*don’t \* consider that being enough of a jerk to qualify for a reprimand??? It may have been enough except there \*was \* more to it. Why not give the whole story? Like I said it’s been answered to my satisfaction now. ---
**Author:** ![Oy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/bc8723/32.png) [@Oy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Oy)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2006, 2:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tldr-clarification-please/358108/71 "2006-05-27T14:45:15Z")
> [@Loach](#): > > It may have been enough except there \*was \* more to it. Why not give the whole story? My guess would be for two reasons. First, the initial rudeness/malice, regardless, was sufficient to merit a reprimand - in fact, _I_ would have banned him on the spot! Second, why bring in the mention of another board. The people who know about \*\*ark probably know, the people who don’t dont, and why take the risk of starting a board war for no reason? It’s not like we get \*lots \* of folks running around here doing things for the sake of pleasing a board full of mean-spirited bitchers, so it wasn’t like there was an example needing to be made. Basically the second board business, AFAIC, wasn’t particularly relevant. YMMV, of course. ---
**Author:** ![Oy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/bc8723/32.png) [@Oy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Oy)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2006, 2:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tldr-clarification-please/358108/72 "2006-05-27T14:46:46Z")
Please excuse me - it’s the first thing in the morning for me and apparently my punctuation hasn’t awakened yet! Possibly my spelling as well. :eek: ---
**Author:** ![deevee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/57b2e6/32.png) [@deevee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/deevee)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2006, 10:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tldr-clarification-please/358108/73 "2006-05-28T22:53:31Z")
> [@Oy!](#): > > This boggles my mind. Someone comes along and posts “tldr” or “I really don’t care about your mother enough to bother to read the OP” on a post about someone’s mother _dying_, and you \*don’t \* consider that being enough of a jerk to qualify for a reprimand??? > > I don’t give a shit about the other message board. But I damned well care about how incredibly dismissive, rude, and hateful such remarks were under the circumstances. It’s one thing to make that kind of comment on a light, humorous or trivial thread, but on one like that? What other possible reason could someone have for posting that there than purely to be a jerk - pure malice in written form? Who knew the power of 4 consonants? Not me thats for sure. I can assure you that my remark, jerkish in hindsight, was typed in a spirit far more benign than has been ascribed to it in several pages of brouhaha. I don’t have an office job. I go online at home on my own time. Once my email has been dealt with and my porn jones has been sated I have about 10 minutes to piss about on the net before I turn in. Sometimes I visit the _other_ board because I only have time to read one thread and they often pick the silliest. I spent less than ten unthinking seconds taking up the challenge and typing 4 letters. When I actually did read **Sampiro’s** post I was briefly mortified. Had it been a post about his cat I wouldn’t have given a shit, but when I actually read the post I truly felt like a jerk, briefly, because I just don’t fucking matter. **Sampiro** you have my sincerest apologies, I got a well deserved mod smackdown for my momentary lapse of reason but the rest of the kerfuffle astounds me because _I just don’t fucking matter._ I’m not a snarker, I’m not a Doper, this place just doesn’t mean as much to me as it does to others. I accept the fact that it was a jerkish thing to do and once again I offer my apologies and sympathies to **Sampiro**. The malevelant motives people are seeing just aren’t there. ---
**Author:** ![Garfield226](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Garfield226](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Garfield226)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2006, 11:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tldr-clarification-please/358108/74 "2006-05-28T23:01:38Z")
> [@deevee](#): > > I spent less than ten unthinking seconds taking up the challenge and typing 4 letters. And for this alone you should be banned. “Taking up the challenge.” :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![deevee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/57b2e6/32.png) [@deevee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/deevee)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2006, 11:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tldr-clarification-please/358108/75 "2006-05-28T23:04:21Z")
> [@Garfield226](#): > > And for this alone you should be banned. “Taking up the challenge.” :rolleyes: Blow me :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Oy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/bc8723/32.png) [@Oy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Oy)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2006, 5:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tldr-clarification-please/358108/76 "2006-05-29T05:24:53Z")
> [@deevee](#): > > … When I actually did read **Sampiro’s** post I was briefly mortified. Had it been a post about his cat I wouldn’t have given a shit, but when I actually read the post I truly felt like a jerk, briefly, because I just don’t fucking matter. **Sampiro** you have my sincerest apologies, I got a well deserved mod smackdown for my momentary lapse of reason but the rest of the kerfuffle astounds me because I just don’t fucking matter. I’m not a snarker, I’m not a Doper, this place just doesn’t mean as much to me as it does to others. I accept the fact that it was a jerkish thing to do and once again I offer my apologies and sympathies to **Sampiro**. The malevelant motives people are seeing just aren’t there. I’d love to know what effect you think those consonants would have on just about anyone to whom you addressed them! At best, “tldr” is rude and dismissive; at worst, it is outrageously hurtful, \*especially \* for someone who is known to write many long, folksy OPs and clearly enjoys writing. Whatever was going through your mind, even if it \*had \* been about **Sampiro** ’s cat, sure as hell wasn’t the milk of human kindness! There is simply no way to make that remark without being at least a little hurtful, and if you had thought about it for even a tenth of a second, you could have realized that too. But somehow I doubt that would have deterred you; are other people real to you at all? You don’t get it, do you? It doesn’t matter that “you’re not important.” In fact, it’s all the worse because you’re a total stranger, because under most people’s moral codes, they have no axe to grind when they critique a stranger’s whatever, and therefore are highly likely to give their honest opinions. You also don’t get the idea that far more people lurk here than actually post, and therefore it is quite realistic to assume that for one person who posts something like that, there are ten, a hundred, a thousand others who feel that way but \*didn’t \* post it. Aw, you were briefly mortified, were you? Just what did you think a thread with the words Mother and Dying in the title was going to be about??? If it honestly never occurred to you that it might deal with, you know, the \*Dying \* of his _Mother_, you’re too stupid to be on the Internet at all, and you’d better get off before you do some real damage to yourself or others. Hey, here’s an idea. If you have only about ten seconds to browse the net after your “necessities” are seen to, why don’t you just hang out at your porn pages a little while longer? In fact, between what you wrote in that thread and the post quoted above, I’d have to say that you have about as much empathy as a Barbie doll, and probably shouldn’t interact with people at all. But if you insist on inflicting yourself on society, for Pete’s sake at least take two seconds to \*think \* before you say something (either on a message board or in person)! You may think of yourself as not important, but as I said above, the comments one gets from strangers often seem to be the most valuable of any, because they’re presumed to be unbiased. Words can and do hurt, no matter who says them. ---
**Author:** ![Lakai](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/9de0a6/32.png) [@Lakai](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lakai)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2006, 7:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tldr-clarification-please/358108/77 "2006-05-29T07:58:36Z")
> [@Revenant Threshold](#): > > The first example earned a mod admonishment; the second a warning\*; the third - nothing at all. > Is it simply a case of “tldr” only being jerkish if that’s the only thing you post? I disagree; for one thing, that interpretation of the rules only works if the rest of the post isn’t jerkish, and also I don’t believe there are any other “jerkish” behaviours which are diluted by further posting. > > I’d really just like to know what makes the third example different from the other two in terms of acceptableness; i’m not seeing it. You have to look at the overall jerkiness of a post. The fact that someone did not read a thread is not inherently jerkish. You might think it is jerkish because CK did not feel like reading whatever worthless crap was written in that thread (god forbid your life’s greatest bitching goes unread), but it is not. CK does not have to read the whole thread to respond to one post, no one does. Forget about the tldr part. Reading posts is not a requirement. The requirement is relevant and somewhat decent content. Does anyone else find it ironic that **Revenant Threshold** has not absorbed the content from CK’s post that he quoted? Almost as if he did not read it. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tldr-clarification-please/358108.md?page=3)