On Cain's Rants, Rehashing Arguments, and Beating One's Head Against a Brick Wal

[tyrannosaurus vex]

In response to the OP:

I like how it's my fault my rants aren't answered.  You know full well I keep shitty hours, am frequently tired and can be called away at any moment.  Sometimes I need days to recover from the lack of sleep I'm suffering from.

I'm terribly sorry that by the time I have my head back in working order, my threads have already sunk to the bottom of the page.

Oh, and "spies" might be watching.  CLUEPHONE RINGING: SPIES ARE WATCHING GODDAMN EVERYONE.  YOU'RE ALREADY BEING SURVEILLED.

Not that they'd have to do a very hard job on keeping an eye on this place.

What I'm getting from this is that basically people would rather have a conversation with a fanatic than with myself.  So enjoy your little drugs talk circle jerks, because, quite frankly, you deserve them.

Which threads works and which ones don't is an occurrence of chance, popularity contest, and general mood of the board. I don't think I've ever started a thread that lasted longer than maybe 4 pages, and if any of my topics get more than about 10 replies it's because they get threadjacked. I'm sure there are those who say that's because I post something uninteresting or in some other way bring about these results myself and they may be right. I don't expect everyone at PD to file into my thread and bring a discussion out of duty or obligation, and I'd probably hate it if they did because spontaneous conversations are better than forced ones.

You probably have a good point about the quality and recurrence of these tired threads, but if that's what the people want, that's what they want.

I'm questioning the dichotomy that apparently my threads are terribly interesting and drug threads are terribly dull, but one of them gets 7 replies, and the other gets 1300.

That doesn't seem a little....odd, to you?

I don't think that's what Net was saying at all. He was saying your threads are more substantive, and yes more interesting, but you do such a good job of explaining the situation that it often seems unlikely that the average reader has anything equally substantive to contribute. I know I run into that all the time. Drug threads and the like, on the other hand, are low hanging fruit. Everybody has something to say about that, even if it's already been said a thousand times. It's partly because of these threads' status as sub-standard that no one has any problem contributing to them. "It's a fucking drug thread, what am I going to do, lower the level of the discussion?"

[Anna Mae Bollocks]

Add in that you are an extremely talented researcher and parser of information and anyone that does decide to disagree with you is most likely going to come off looking like a fool.

I'm not scared of looking like a fool disagreeing with Cain or anybody else. "OMG I MIGHT GET SMACKED ON THE INTERNETS!"

The thing is, there's essentially nothing to disagree with. The man has his bases covered.

[Cain]

And this isn't just about my rants, though that was a useful example.  Roger's rants get just as little attention.  As does Placid Dingo's writing, and several other people's efforts I could name.  Creative work of any kind gets sidelined in favour of link-commentary, bashing easy targets and tired old arguments.

Why?  Because tired old arguments are easy and require no fucking original thought.  Everyone knows where everyone else stands and nothing is going to change but it sure is a hell of a lot simpler than looking at something you haven't seen before or thinking about something from a wildly different point of view and then either adding to it, where merited, or criticizing it, where merited.

What a great fucking advertisement for a religious of chaos, on a site of people who pride themselves on creativity. 

[Cain]

Oh Christ, now apparently I cannot be disagreed with.

Why don't you just put up a bronze statue of me?  It'll last longer.

[Anna Mae Bollocks]

  Fine, I'll look for something to nitpick.
You don't make it easy, though. 

[Cain]

Well, for someone who is so hard to argue against, you're all doing a great job of it in this here thread.

You can't have it both ways.  Either I'm right about this, or I can be argued with.

[Bebek Sincap Ratatosk]

In my experience, thorough, well-articulated, and properly supported dissertations are unlikely to garner much discussion, because they're thorough, well-articulated, and properly supported. You may get agreement, but if you've covered all your bases it's not all that likely that people will have much to say.

If you really want to get a debate or conversation going, the key is to throw out only part of the information. Leave it incomplete, and maybe even half-baked, so that people have something to argue with or correct. If you've already thought of everything, nobody's going to have anything to add... so leave some big, gaping holes for them to want to fill in. Rather than a well-supported conclusion, post an opinion, preferably worded controversially, and don't back it up right away. Keep your initial post short, and withhold the rest of your argument for dispensing in bite-size pieces in later posts as the thread develops. Your initial post is bait for the discussion; you want to leave your reader wanting more. Make them DEMAND more.

If you can phrase your thesis in a way that's inflammatory or even somewhat misleading, you're off to a running start.

Opinion: contributing to PD in any way is a complete waste of time.

Discuss.

Of course it is, in some sense. We have (during the good times) maybe 100 or so individuals that read our posts. Generally they're about things that are important in some sense, to some people. Let's face this honestly though, our posts here aren't going to fix any politics, change drug laws, revolutionize philosophies or win us nobel prizes. At best, they will be interesting to the people that find them interesting... at worst they will inspire a cult that will some decades hence have a bunch of people fighting with each other over whatever communication tools they have at that time.

On the other hand, I personally find it occasionally useful to post here. I've made arguments that have been invalidated and forced me to reconsider my position (many times). I've been inspired to write something creative and I've found some occasional sanctuary in the middle of office hell.


PD posts - Bullshit makes the flowers grow, and that is beautiful.

[Nephew Twiddleton]

It should also be noted that youre the first person we ask what your thoughts are if we come across anything political. Your a respected source and an expert. But the other side of that is that were not going to have much to say in response. In regards to rogers posts ive been reading and posting from my phone a lot lately. A long thought out post is going to be too long to view from anything but my computer at home.

[Triple Zero]

I'm questioning the dichotomy that apparently my threads are terribly interesting and drug threads are terribly dull, but one of them gets 7 replies, and the other gets 1300.

That doesn't seem a little....odd, to you?

No, and neither should it seem odd to anyone who spent time researching trolling techniques. That does NOT mean it is a good thing, nor does it mean it's the fault of the thread with less replies.

- The drug thread has people in it with opposing viewpoints. Your threads usually do not. Unless people like Disco Pickle jump in and you'll find that those threads did get a lot more replies. But it'll be about some dumb thing DP can't wrap his head around. I suppose in some sense it's not all that bad because it allows everybody to pounce on him, while showing they did indeed read and understand the OP.

(not entirely serious) ideas: should we get a Court Jester? Or maybe just reinvite Wade?

- There's a lot of trolling going on in those drugs threads, especially the last one I estimate about 75% of the posts. I'm assuming that's not how you want your threads to get big.

- As you already point out, THIS thread is getting quite some discussion. Why? Because it's a controversial topic. Similarly your thread about Islam got quite a few pages of replies, IIRC.

But are those the kinds of discussion you want to see?

If I had a dial to turn between "discussion in drugs threads" and "discussion in Cain's threads", I'd turn it all the way. But as you say, the same goes for Placid Dingo's and Roger's and other's writings not getting a lot of attention.

So from that I distill a good reminder to myself:

To not spend as much time in reading and/or replying to "link-commentary, bashing easy targets and tired old arguments", in favour of spending my energy on threads that require creative input to start and to keep going.

And that probably includes this thread.

I'm also going to ponder if it's possible to purposefully start a thread about a controversial topic in order to build a large, interesting discussion, without actually trolling or taking a position I don't agree with.

[Roly Poly Oly-Garch]

In response to the OP:

I like how it's my fault my rants aren't answered.  You know full well I keep shitty hours, am frequently tired and can be called away at any moment.  Sometimes I need days to recover from the lack of sleep I'm suffering from.

I'm terribly sorry that by the time I have my head back in working order, my threads have already sunk to the bottom of the page.

Oh, and "spies" might be watching.  CLUEPHONE RINGING: SPIES ARE WATCHING GODDAMN EVERYONE.  YOU'RE ALREADY BEING SURVEILLED.

Not that they'd have to do a very hard job on keeping an eye on this place.

What I'm getting from this is that basically people would rather have a conversation with a fanatic than with myself.  So enjoy your little drugs talk circle jerks, because, quite frankly, you deserve them.

Which threads works and which ones don't is an occurrence of chance, popularity contest, and general mood of the board. I don't think I've ever started a thread that lasted longer than maybe 4 pages, and if any of my topics get more than about 10 replies it's because they get threadjacked. I'm sure there are those who say that's because I post something uninteresting or in some other way bring about these results myself and they may be right. I don't expect everyone at PD to file into my thread and bring a discussion out of duty or obligation, and I'd probably hate it if they did because spontaneous conversations are better than forced ones.

You probably have a good point about the quality and recurrence of these tired threads, but if that's what the people want, that's what they want.

I'm questioning the dichotomy that apparently my threads are terribly interesting and drug threads are terribly dull, but one of them gets 7 replies, and the other gets 1300.

That doesn't seem a little....odd, to you?

Only when you consider that Democracy Now! has 10 listeners and Jerry Springer, millions.

A bit of a false equivalence that, since we're talking about participation and not viewership. But it does go to the same point that Nigel made. Complete is complete and there's not much to add. Bullshit at least warrants an "OMG! THAT'S BULLSHIT".

My favorite threads on AI are those that discuss actionable things. So much of what is on here is just  (appropriately). But really, beyond making a smart ass comment to keep from screaming, there's not a lot to add. OTOH, there's always room for discussion and debate in tactics even when we all agree that they should be aimed towards the same end. The Occupy threads have given plenty of evidence of that.

I've been a lazy ass in not creating the kinds of threads I like, even though I've got plenty of them running around in my noodle. Your threads are pure gold, even when I only read them and don't comment. So if there's blame for lack of participation it's on me, and I'll take it.

[Kai]

Sorry, what exactly does this have to do with politics?

It's certainly a political discussion, taking place among members of this board instead of talking about members of some parliament or whatever.

Politics has to do with the distribution of power in a community, so, uh, fail etc.

That's a narrow definition. There is also "office politics," which is what this is akin to.

Yeah, no shit it's a narrow definition, I expect Kai has a narrow definition of what science is, too.  Oh, well, in that case, co-worker backstabbing must really be a form of violent assault.

Indeed, though I don't have as succinct a definition as you do for politics. I think it's time to remind everyone of the Virtue of Narrowness.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

And this isn't just about my rants, though that was a useful example.  Roger's rants get just as little attention.  As does Placid Dingo's writing, and several other people's efforts I could name.  Creative work of any kind gets sidelined in favour of link-commentary, bashing easy targets and tired old arguments.

This. 

No matter what you write, everyone's down in the fucking drugs thread.  All day.  It went up something like 30 pages over the weekend, for fuck's sake, and nothing else was said anywhere.  Because apparently the best "TFYS" can mean is "VIEW" the same tired-ass arguments all day.

Opinion:  Shut down the rest of the board and rename PD "All Drugs, All Day".

Opinion:  Discordianism is utterly bogus.  In its own way, it's worse than Paganism, because at least Pagans don't make claims of original thought.  They make claims of ridiculously long traditions, which specifically condemns original thought.  Discordianism is about thinking for yourself.  That rarely, if ever, happens.  It's too much work.  So much easier to VIEW, and then make excuses.  It's television in a funny dress.

[ñͤͣ̄ͦ̌̑͗͊͛͂͗ ̸̨̨̣̺̼̣̜͙͈͕̮̊̈́̈͂͛̽͊ͭ̓͆ͅé ̰̓̓́ͯ́́͞]

And this isn't just about my rants, though that was a useful example.  Roger's rants get just as little attention.  As does Placid Dingo's writing, and several other people's efforts I could name.  Creative work of any kind gets sidelined in favour of link-commentary, bashing easy targets and tired old arguments.

This. 

No matter what you write, everyone's down in the fucking drugs thread.  All day.  It went up something like 30 pages over the weekend, for fuck's sake, and nothing else was said anywhere.  Because apparently the best "TFYS" can mean is "VIEW" the same tired-ass arguments all day.

Opinion:  Shut down the rest of the board and rename PD "All Drugs, All Day".

Opinion:  Discordianism is utterly bogus.  In its own way, it's worse than Paganism, because at least Pagans don't make claims of original thought.  They make claims of ridiculously long traditions, which specifically condemns original thought.  Discordianism is about thinking for yourself.  That rarely, if ever, happens.  It's too much work.  So much easier to VIEW, and then make excuses.  It's television in a funny dress.

Creative writing and art isn't an argument. As far as the game theory of how I see people approaching it here is more like entering an art gallery. People observe it, share their appreciation, stifle most criticism as they don't want to discourage creativity or appear rude for sharing their negative reaction unsolicited, and then leave the building. The threads stay short.

Debates, even one's you find tiring, have an explicitly participatory game theory. Convince someone, practice arguments on an opponent, learn new angles from allies, research sources, critically evaluate evidence, turn some anger into mockery, and so on. For the endlessly repeated arguments, the challenge is to find a new angle, new evidence, or an undiscovered weakness in someone's argument.

When there was more of a collaborative spirit on this board, there was less animosity and a less critical atmosphere, so it was only natural for more people to feel comfortable enough to share their creative content or take a stab at a creative sphere they aren't familiar with. I also think people were also less possessive of their work and ideas. Explicitly making things kopyleft or creative commons is an invitation to collaborate and riff in ways that people are not likely to do otherwise.

Asserting copyright certainly is your right as a writer and artist, but the costs of doing so are severely inhibiting collaborative efforts and interest. Navigating a collaborative process that retains copyright and licenses work is a time-consuming, hairy, scary thing for anyone that has not done so before. It actually isn't that big of a deal to license work, but I'm aware that that perception is out there and is quite strong.

Unfortunately, joint efforts have often went very wrong here, so it makes sense that people are leery of anything more than expressing appreciation. And even showing admiration in the wrong way has been heavily criticized. Then people didn't post enough. Now they're posting in the wrong topics and not showing enough appreciation for the creative work that has been posted. But what if I don't like people's creative work? I'm not going to criticize it unless they ask for that input, and most people don't. I'm also wary of saying that I appreciate work in a way that is too brief, as that has been taken as insulting as well. So the result is that I don't even comment until something crystallizes.

[Anna Mae Bollocks]

???

Everybody just sliced and diced the guy that guy that wrote that TRUE PAGANIZM thing. I think that was last week. And Alty just posted a rant and it was great, but kind of naive and people mentioned that.

[Salty]

Well that was the second one I ever posted. And when I did post it I expected much more intense critique. Now I don't really get anything but mittens. Which, you know, is awesome and all...