Bad Formatting SUCKS! (Warning: anality-based rant within)

[livius drusus]

Okay, just what the fucking hell is so hard about figuring out BB code? No, scratch that: what's so hard to figure out about how to quote someone and respond without making it imfuckingpossible to read comfortably?

I can deal with a few dropped tags here and there. I can deal with people who haven't ever posted on a forum before and just don't know how the codes work. Hell, I try my best to link to sources and explain as well as I can because I know full well that most people aren't the avid manual readers and researchers that I am, and in fact, I'm glad they're not afflicted with my syndrome.

What pisses me the fuck off are those people who just don't want to fucking bother making their posts readable, the people who use two dashes to indicate an indented reply, the people who just toss their reply into the quote box that popped up automatically when they hit "reply with quote" because they can't be bothered to type a handful of new [ quote] and [/quote] tags, the people who use micromini fonts in every single post (sorry Chiron, I love you to death but that shit you do on phpBB is evil).

I'm talking about all those rat bastards out there who use quotation marks to quote someone and then reply underneath in bold or italics or fucking aqua bold italic Comic Sans. Can't they fucking see how horribly, painfully illegible it is? What do they have compound eyes or some shit? Are they trying to kill me? Seriously. I swear they're trying to kill me.

[Farren]

Okay, just what the fucking hell is so hard about figuring out BB code? No, scratch that: what's so hard to figure out about how to quote someone and respond without making it imfuckingpossible to read comfortably?

I can deal with a few dropped tags here and there. I can deal with people who haven't ever posted on a forum before and just don't know how the codes work. Hell, I try my best to link to sources and explain as well as I can because I know full well that most people aren't the avid manual readers and researchers that I am, and in fact, I'm glad they're not afflicted with my syndrome.

What pisses me the fuck off are those people who just don't want to fucking bother making their posts readable, the people who use two dashes to indicate an indented reply, the people who just toss their reply into the quote box that popped up automatically when they hit "reply with quote" because they can't be bothered to type a handful of new [ quote ] and tags, the people who use micromini fonts in every single post (sorry Chiron, I love you to death but that shit you do on phpBB is evil).

I'm talking about all those rat bastards out there who use quotation marks to quote someone and then reply underneath in bold or italics or fucking aqua bold italic Comic Sans. Can't they fucking see how horribly, painfully illegible it is? What do they have compound eyes or some shit? Are they trying to kill me? Seriously. I swear they're trying to kill me.[/QUOTE]

u left out those l33tsp3aking summabitches who abbreviate everything and dont use any punctuation those guys suck donkey balls big time
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[livius drusus]

u left out those l33tsp3aking summabitches who abbreviate everything and dont use any punctuation those guys suck donkey balls big time


True. I also left out the fuckers who think they're being clever by replying to a rant in the style being inveighed against. Now those are some evil motherfuckers.

[Scotty]

:hug:
:glomp2:
:cuddle:

-Scott

[Farren]

u left out those l33tsp3aking summabitches who abbreviate everything and dont use any punctuation those guys suck donkey balls big time


True. I also left out the fuckers who think they're being clever by replying to a rant in the style being inveighed against. Now those are some evil motherfuckers.

Babe, its almost a law of nature. If you've got a raw nerve the size of an elephant's tooth and you wave it around the place, someone's got to poke it.

[edited to add]
[/font][/slash]

[second edit]
Seriously though, it annoys me too (the formatting issue) ;)

[livius drusus]

No, we can't all get along, Scotty King, so don't even try to mollify me with cute smilies.

[Scotty]

But, I didn't make any mistakes or spelling errors with that post, I thought I couldn't lose. :(

-Scott

[LadyShea]

No, we can't all get along, Scotty King, so don't even try to mollify me with cute smilies.


So who wrote the badly formatted straw that broke the camel's back here? Can we at least see it? I want to point and laugh.

[livius drusus]

So who wrote the badly formatted straw that broke the camel's back here? Can we at least see it? I want to point and laugh.
It was a post on JREF, actually, where the respondent put all his/her answers in bold. It was just so horribly, horribly pointless and it made me think of the likes of dk on II. He hasn't been around in a while, but his spirit lives on in countless bastard posts from fiery bowels of Hell.

P.S. - Aww... Okay, Scotty. For you: :bouquet:

[Farren]

So who wrote the badly formatted straw that broke the camel's back here? Can we at least see it? I want to point and laugh.
It was a post on JREF, actually, where the respondent put all his/her answers in bold. It was just so horribly, horribly pointless and it made me think of the likes of dk on II. He hasn't been around in a while, but his spirit lives on in countless bastard posts from fiery bowels of Hell.

P.S. - Aww... Okay, Scotty. For you: :bouquet:

Oh that's right. Call me an evil motherfucker then give Scotty flowers. I can tell the way the wind is blowing. Trekkie bigot.

Linky for the JREF post?

[livius drusus]

Hey at least Scotty made an effort to sooth the ravening wolves within; you fed them raw meat and called it justice. :hmph:

The inexplicable bold (http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?s=&postid=1870622277#post1870622277)
The reply within quote box (http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?s=&postid=1870624787#post1870624787) (Notice the last chunk placed outside the box. SOP for jj on JREF, although he doesn't seem to fall prey to this idiocy on II.)
The improved version of dk (http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.php?s=&postid=1125208#post1125208) featuring hard returns between paras instead of his former one big sheet of text splendour.

[Dingfod]

Hey at least Scotty made an effort to sooth the ravening wolves within; you fed them raw meat and called it justice. :hmph:

The inexplicable bold (http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?s=&postid=1870622277#post1870622277)
The reply within quote box (http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?s=&postid=1870624787#post1870624787) (Notice the last chunk placed outside the box. SOP for jj on JREF, although he doesn't seem to fall prey to this idiocy on II.)
The improved version of dk (http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.php?s=&postid=1125208#post1125208) featuring hard returns between paras instead of his former one big sheet of text splendour.I don't see anything wrong with any of these things.Confusious say, man who get up on wrong side of bed have no wife. What is the relevance of that? I DON"T KNOW, it SeEmEd To Be ThE tHiNg To SaY aT tEh TiMe!!!!!!!!![/quote]

[Dingfod]

^ That's just evil, isn't it?

[Adora]

Damn straight.

And please, if you're just replying to the comment above you, you don't have to quote it! And what's with the multiple-quote replies you guys do, layer upon layer of boxes which make eyes bleed and modems slow down to a crawl? I mean, really, it's just bad fucking ettiquette.

[livius drusus]

^ That's just evil, isn't it?

Demonic, even. :pitch:

[pzmyers]

I'm talking about all those rat bastards out there who use quotation marks to quote someone and then reply underneath in bold or italics or fucking aqua bold italic Comic Sans. Can't they fucking see how horribly, painfully illegible it is? What do they have compound eyes or some shit? Are they trying to kill me? Seriously. I swear they're trying to kill me.

Go ahead. Ask me how I feel about smilies.

[livius drusus]

That's a button waiting to happen. You'd put the Herbalife shills to shame.

[Lauri D]

Damn straight.

And please, if you're just replying to the comment above you, you don't have to quote it! Except for, sometimes on a really hot topic (where people are replying quickly), it oft happens that one or more people hit "submit" before you do, and then it's unclear who/what your comment is addressing. Anyway.

My #1 killer.... NO PARAGRAPH BREAKS. This inspires in me a homicidal rage more than anything, really (post-wise, that is).

[livius drusus]

I just don't read anything without paragraph breaks. I am simply incapable of it.

It suddenly occurs to me that my obsessions/compulsions are hugely limiting. I know... Obvious much? :deepsigh:

[wade-w]

I just don't read anything without paragraph breaks. I am simply incapable of it.

It suddenly occurs to me that my obsessions/compulsions are hugely limiting. I know... Obvious much? :deepsigh:

You aren't alone there. I too am completely unable to read a long post with no paragraph breaks. I've tried, but my eyes glaze over and I find I simply cannot follow whatever point the poster is trying to make. I don't even bother to try anynore. Another thing I've noticed: why is that the same people who don't use paragraph breaks also seem to be very fond of run on sentences?

[freemonkey]

Go ahead. Ask me how I feel about smilies.
Even the bug smileys???? :bee: :spider: :scarab: :bluebutterfly:


Edit: Ooooh, look what I found!! :rollover: :bagcat:

[Farren]

I have to go with the no paras thing as one of my biggest pet hates. When combined with all-lowercase it's especially repugnant.

Here's infinity at IIDB doing the exclusively lowercase thing:

http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.php?p=1880063#post1880063

[Adora]

My #1 killer.... NO PARAGRAPH BREAKS. This inspires in me a homicidal rage more than anything, really (post-wise, that is).

Eh, call me nuts, but there's not many Anne-Rice wannabes on the board. There does seem to be a certain member who uses way too many though. *coughs*

[Dingfod]

That would be true if there are no posts that happened to be between what you are replying to and your post. Otherwise, it takes some detective work to figure out what the hell you are writing about.

[livius drusus]

Another thing I've noticed: why is that the same people who don't use paragraph breaks also seem to be very fond of run on sentences?

Good point. I wonder if they don't see the syntactical divisions that seem natural to me or you. Maybe they're just doing the equivalent of babbling. :shrug:

[Farren]

Another thing I've noticed: why is that the same people who don't use paragraph breaks also seem to be very fond of run on sentences?

Good point. I wonder if they don't see the syntactical divisions that seem natural to me or you. Maybe they're just doing the equivalent of babbling. :shrug:

I do it sometimes and I do actually speak like that at times (as Joe will testify from phone calls), but its a habit I'm trying to curb in both writing and speech.

[wade-w]

Another thing I've noticed: why is that the same people who don't use paragraph breaks also seem to be very fond of run on sentences?

Good point. I wonder if they don't see the syntactical divisions that seem natural to me or you. Maybe they're just doing the equivalent of babbling. :shrug:

I do it sometimes and I do actually speak like that at times (as Joe will testify from phone calls), but its a habit I'm trying to curb in both writing and speech.

Interesting. My father was an editor at the now defunct UPI, and is a legend in the wire services. He was the youngest Bureau chief in UPI history when he was assigned to the New Orleans office at 20 years of age. I'm told that green reporters on assignment trembled in fear whenever the phone rang; it might be my father calling about their latest submission. He is reputed to have asked one reporter "Did they teach English at your high school?" after a particularly mangled story.

Anyway, all that was to establish his bona fides as a writer. He once told me that you should write the way you speak.

[viscousmemories]

My father was an editor at the now defunct UPI
I didn't know UPI was defunct. When'd that happen?

[copiae]

Go ahead. Ask me how I feel about smilies.


How do you feel about smilies?


Heh, I disabled smilies in the forums. It really makes the place look totally different... And suprisingly, doesnt really detract much from posts: the descriptor word gives a good idea of the desired effect.

[wade-w]

My father was an editor at the now defunct UPI
I didn't know UPI was defunct. When'd that happen?

Hmmm. Apparently I was wrong. I know they went bankrupt twice in the late 80's and early 90's, but it seems the Moonies have resurrected it.

[livius drusus]

An argument could be made that being bought by the Moonies is death for a press organization.

[viscousmemories]

Hmmm. Apparently I was wrong. I know they went bankrupt twice in the late 80's and early 90's, but it seems the Moonies have resurrected it.
Oh that's funny. I didn't have any idea, I just thought I would've heard about it. Then again it seems like the Moonies taking it over is something I would've heard about too, so it's probably just my shoddy memory at work again.

[wade-w]

An argument could be made that being bought by the Moonies is death for a press organization.

Heh. You'd think so. But then again, there is The Washington Times.

vm, I don't know why you'd necessarily know about UPI's failure. In the past, whenever I've mentioned UPI in conversation, I get a lot of "Why would Big Brown employ editors?"

[viscousmemories]

vm, I don't know why you'd necessarily know about UPI's failure. In the past, whenever I've mentioned UPI in conversation, I get a lot of "Why would Big Brown employ editors?"
Hehe. Well y'know, sometimes I think I learned more having dropped out of school in Jr. High than I would have if I went to high school and college, if only because I learned to pay attention to the world around me instead of letting other people spoonfeed me knowledge. But then I play Trivial Pursuit or get into a discussion about science or history and it becomes apparent that I'm completely full of shit. :D

[JoeP]

Another thing I've noticed: why is that the same people who don't use paragraph breaks also seem to be very fond of run on sentences?

Good point. I wonder if they don't see the syntactical divisions that seem natural to me or you. Maybe they're just doing the equivalent of babbling. :shrug:

I do it sometimes and I do actually speak like that at times (as Joe will testify from phone calls), but its a habit I'm trying to curb in both writing and speech.
Not so. You have clear paragraph breaks in your speech, just not enough space to get words into. It's like all one post with no reply button. :twisted:

I had a friend at university who had a seriously irritating habit of saying ah - ah - ah - ah (even louder than his regular talking) in between sentences or words when he was thinking of what to say next.

[wei yau]

I've nothing to add, bad formatting does indeed suck. Especially, since it's so easy to get it right in the first place.

Just wanted to say that the word "anality" reminds me of "fatality", which in turn reminds me of "finishing moves" in Mortal Kombat...although, in a decidedly different way.

[reprise]

I don't know whether bad formatting is always the user's fault. Has anyone else noticed that nested quotes are the default on some messageboards using vBulletin but not on others. On messageboards where nested quotes aren't the default, people often don't realise that their reply lacks coherence until after the self-editing window has expired (or if they do realise, don't necessarily understand how to manually fix the problem).

Open tags are my big bug-bear, but to be fair I doubt that a lot of people even notice the "close all tags" button in the reply window.

[livius drusus]

I don't know whether bad formatting is always the user's fault. Has anyone else noticed that nested quotes are the default on some messageboards using vBulletin but not on others.

By default vB 3 doesn't nest. vm hacked that in here. Meanwhile, the kind of bad formatting I gave examples of back on page 1 isn't related to broken tags or nested quotes. They are intentional choices. Really, really bad ones.