Why reply without reading the thread???

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
Sorry, if the thread title is a question, then sometimes I just answer the question without reading the details.

This is why, when I create a thread about something a little complex, I don't put the question directly in the title, and I make an effort to write clearly and concisely, without all the relevant points.

What? Do you want good advice, or are you just trying to get as many people as possible to respond to feed your ego?

My early internet experience was on heavily moderated forums where the rules were that you had to read the entire thread (or last 5 pages, whichever was shorter) before responding. If you posted something that echoed a previous post without acknowledging that post and adding something extra to it, your post would be deleted. I realize that's not the way of the interwebs these days, but those habits have been ingrained in me. I read everything before responding. If a thread is already 10 pages long before I see it, I figure I wouldn't have anything to add to the conversation and skip it entirely.

And if you're not going to read other people's responses...FFS, don't announce it. Just post your hot take (that's already been posted half a dozen times) and keep it moving. Nothing gets me to skip over a post faster than a first sentence that says, "I haven't read the other replies, but..." If you don't think our opinions are important, I don't think yours is either.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why? Because people quote ridiculously long posts to begin with and I'm reading on my phone. Because some are many pages long and I don't feel like it.

Right! I'm not reading through pages of quoted posts.

Other forums have a quote function that captures only the post you're responding to, and not the 10 posts before that. Wish DCUM would go this way. The quote within quote within quote within quote is ridiculous and impossible to read on a phone.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why? Because people quote ridiculously long posts to begin with and I'm reading on my phone. Because some are many pages long and I don't feel like it.

Right! I'm not reading through pages of quoted posts.

Other forums have a quote function that captures only the post you're responding to, and not the 10 posts before that. Wish DCUM would go this way. The quote within quote within quote within quote is ridiculous and impossible to read on a phone.

There is info in a post in the website feedback forum on how to quote fewer previous posts thus reducing the clutter.

[Anonymous]

TL;DR
My 2 cents...it's because it's the tower of Babel!!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
There is info in a post in the website feedback forum on how to quote fewer previous posts thus reducing the clutter.

Any person with half a brain can figure out how to reduce quote clutter. The point is that it's not automatic, and the people eager to jump into an argument with their ill-informed opinions aren't going to bother.

[Anonymous]

So often the conversation devolves onto some tangent based on minutiae from the op. And then the whole conversation is focused on that tiny point that's not really important anymore. So, IMHO, often the posts that don't read the whole thread are more relevant to the original question anyway!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:"I only read OP's post. Not interested in people's responses."

So you think of a forum like this as a two-way conversation between you and OP? Do you think the OP's look at it this way too? The thread is 40+ distinct 2-way conversations with OP as one party and each commenter as the other?

No, OP asks a question, I give my answer. Try it.