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[Maikel]

Sometimes you just have to smile ....and you have nothing to say.

Nah... if all you can post is a smilie or an l.o.l., then you shouldn't post at all.

[mouse31e]

Originally posted by Maikel@Jan 23 2005, 12:28 AM
Sometimes you just have to smile ....and you have nothing to say.

The smilies don't bother me at all!

What bothers me is people who really don't have anything to say, saying it anyway! Normally in an aggressive way with excessive swearing! LOL

Well, getting hostile and swearing in a thread isn't spamming...

[Unknown Hero]

Originally posted by MasterGrazzt@Jan 22 2005, 12:02 AM
...people who put a whole line of emoticons in their posts? Do they think it will annoy people into responding to them, or do their fingers lock up when they click on the smiley? Either way, it should be construed as spam and punishment should be levied.

This must be because my post in thread when I asked for help and latter thanked to you (MasterGrazzt)!

[mouse31e]

Originally posted by einherjar@Jan 23 2005, 12:34 AM
Well, getting hostile and swearing in a thread isn't spamming...

No, but there are those who overdo it.

I don't have a problem with swearing but I do have a problem with swearing for the sake of swearing because some people seem to think it makes them look good. And quite often you can't decipher the message behind the swearing in which case I think it probably counts as spam.

Well, spamming in a forum amounts to making a large amount of meaningless and repetitive posts in individual threads, or making pointless posts. Most forums I belong to, including those in which I participate as a moderator, consider one smilie or net-acronym in a post to be spam.

[mouse31e]

Originally posted by einherjar@Jan 23 2005, 12:39 AM
Well, spamming in a forum amounts to making a large amount of meaningless and repetitive posts in individual threads, or making pointless posts. Most forums I belong to, including those in which I participate as a moderator, consider one smilie or net-acronym in a post to be spam.

Exactly and I would consider (continuing my previous point) a post that is so hostile and full of swearing that it is unreadable to be meaningless and irrelevant to other forum members and therefore spam.

Moderation is about judgement. For example, if you're on a small forum you don't go too hard on minor spam, because if you moderate too harshly you'll put people off posting. On a large forum, you need to come down hard on spam because the forum is chaotic enough without loads of spam mixed in. In the right context, a one smiley post could be appropriate. In most context's, it isn't. It's down to the moderator to decide whether that one smiley post actually contributed to the thread or not!

Exactly and I would consider (continuing my previous point) a post that is so hostile and full of swearing that it is unreadable to be meaningless and irrelevant to other forum members and therefore spam.

Nah. It would be illegal, but it wouldn't be spam. Depending on the purpose of such a post, it would be edited or deleted.

Moderation is about judgement. For example, if you're on a small forum you don't go too hard on minor spam, because if you moderate too harshly you'll put people off posting. On a large forum, you need to come down hard on spam because the forum is chaotic enough without loads of spam mixed in. In the right context, a one smiley post could be appropriate. In most context's, it isn't. It's down to the moderator to decide whether that one smiley post actually contributed to the thread or not!

On the other hand, there are those forums where reaching a set level of posts brings benefits, and if mods ignore simple posts, then the system would be abused. Forums and chat rooms are very different from each other. A single smilie is acceptable in a chat room, but not in a forum.

[mouse31e]

Originally posted by einherjar@Jan 23 2005, 12:52 AM
On the other hand, there are those forums where reaching a set level of posts brings benefits, and if mods ignore simple posts, then the system would be abused.

But that's the point about context. On this forum, you don't gain any status by post count. If you do it so much it becomes annoying to other members then action needs to be taken but if it's just the occassional one it is not going to make any difference! If it's an occassional :roflol: in response to a joke when you can't think of anything else but want to convey what you thought, it's pointless but it does actually convey an opinion. If I went through every game in the Games Discussion and posted k: or :not_ok: , that would require action!