I don't want to say names because I'm more than sure the user I'm referring is not in bad faith but I thought the same thing after seeing a series of post in ~news this morning. Even if I try,...
I don't want to say names because I'm more than sure the user I'm referring is not in bad faith but I thought the same thing after seeing a series of post in ~news this morning.
Even if I try, some articles just don't leave much space for a discussion unless started by OP.
So I would even go further and say that we shouldn't even have plain "link submission" here but I know that it's a rather extreme stance.
I guess you're referring to me. I don't leave any type of "submission statement" because I don't believe it's necessary. I don't feel I should have to justify why I post a particular story, nor do...
I guess you're referring to me.
I don't leave any type of "submission statement" because I don't believe it's necessary. I don't feel I should have to justify why I post a particular story, nor do I wish to set the tone of any conversation by saying "this is important because...." or "people need to know about this because..."
I really don't see any need to justify or explain why a news article is in ~news.
I disagree. Tildes will never be a better news aggregator than Google news or reddit. Tildes can, and should, endeavor to be a better discussion platform than Reddit. If it's worth posting, it's...
I don't feel I should have to justify why I post a particular story, nor do I wish to set the tone of any conversation
I disagree. Tildes will never be a better news aggregator than Google news or reddit. Tildes can, and should, endeavor to be a better discussion platform than Reddit.
If it's worth posting, it's worth discussing. if it's worth discussing, you should be willing to start a discussion about it. that's kindof the point, in my understanding.
Why post here then? Theoretically, it doesn’t take much more to explain in one sentence why you thought a particular link was worth sharing unless you value aggregation over discussion. And in the...
Why post here then? Theoretically, it doesn’t take much more to explain in one sentence why you thought a particular link was worth sharing unless you value aggregation over discussion. And in the former case — why would you value aggregation on a site that doesn’t even have karma? What motivates you to post news, not just on here but in general?
I think there’s an important difference between firing off multiple news stories in quick succession in a tiny community like this one, versus doing it in a huge community like Reddit. So I don’t think it’s unreasonable in a community of this size to question posting practices at such an early stage.
I post because it's early days for the site and very few others are. I'm trying to post from as broad a range of countries and topics as feasible without completely drowning the place in links....
I post because it's early days for the site and very few others are. I'm trying to post from as broad a range of countries and topics as feasible without completely drowning the place in links.
I'm watching to see what type of story, issues etc get any kind of traction and what the demographics of tildes think is of relevance to them. I've already noticed certain topics, and news from certain places are far more popular than others.
And anyone is capable of commenting on an article. Posting a link is a spur for conversation in and of itself, but it seems like there's an element of stage fright involved with people not wanting to be the first to offer any comment or opinion on stories.
What motivates you to post news, not just on here but in general?
Sharing information, stories and knowledge about things happening around the world. And trying to relate motivation for posting to karma/points is silly.
Thanks for illuminating your motivations, I definitely underestimated them and you’re right, the jab about karma was dumb. I also think you have an interesting method of evaluating the success of...
Thanks for illuminating your motivations, I definitely underestimated them and you’re right, the jab about karma was dumb. I also think you have an interesting method of evaluating the success of what you post.
Getting to the heart of the matter, and taking your reasoning into account, I think the reason you’re getting this kind of feedback is because you posted eight stories in one group within minutes of each other, instead of spacing them out over a longer period of time. It gives off a spammy impression, or at least it did to me until you explained what’s going on.
Now that I know why you do it, I actually don’t mind it if you’re adjusting your frequency and schedule based on the patterns you see. But it would still be cool if you spaced the posts out a little more :)
I usually post while I'm on the train going in to work. I don't have an office job and handy internet access while at work, so spacing things out like you suggest, which is something I'm very much...
I usually post while I'm on the train going in to work. I don't have an office job and handy internet access while at work, so spacing things out like you suggest, which is something I'm very much aware of by the way, is kind of difficult.
Yes I was and again, I didn't mean to use your submission as a "bad" example. The point is that if news becomes just a feed of random articles... it really doesn't add any value to a RSS feed I...
Yes I was and again, I didn't mean to use your submission as a "bad" example.
The point is that if news becomes just a feed of random articles... it really doesn't add any value to a RSS feed I can get from a news website, with the additional downside that it's only having news that the OPs considered worthy of being shared.
The whole point of tildes is to foster discussion, if we just copy and paste links from other websites... discussion can still happens but once every n links that catch the eyes of enough users.
What I'm afraid is of having a lot of noise compared to the interesting discussions that could raise from it.
I subscribed to news not to have a flood of links to news website but to have discussion about interesting or not-so-widespread news.
I try to post less well covered stories for the most part. But the last few days have taught me that people want to read/talk about the stuff that is already well covered and prominent in the news...
I try to post less well covered stories for the most part. But the last few days have taught me that people want to read/talk about the stuff that is already well covered and prominent in the news cycle.
Anyone can start a discussion and don't feel it should be incumbent on the person who posts a link to do so. The act of posting something is me saying "I think this is interesting and worth knowing about".
I seem to be in the minority with thinking submission statements are unnecessary for a news article though, so will leave it to others to post articles and their justifications for doing so.
I do agree that submission statements are not necessary. They could be necessary for some groups and I guess that will be fixed when the custom submission system is developed (like some groups...
I do agree that submission statements are not necessary. They could be necessary for some groups and I guess that will be fixed when the custom submission system is developed (like some groups might want to set a series of fields to be filled and generate a specific title). I think @Amarok talked about that regarding a possible ~listentothis group. And I think it makes sense.
For news however, I think it's fine not to have them, and it might even be counterproductive, since we open the option of editorializing too much, setting the discussion and I'm sure many people would just fill it with a subtitle or a copypaste of the first paragraph of the story.
I find your submissions interesting since they do cover more than the US actually. It's true that posting them one after the other might come across as low effort or low filter though. But I guess that's what votes are for.
I'm definitely in favour of a submission statement I posted a song in ~music and I looked at it for a second before feeling the need to write something otherwise what do people really say to it?...
I'm definitely in favour of a submission statement I posted a song in ~music and I looked at it for a second before feeling the need to write something otherwise what do people really say to it? That said what often happens on truereddit is that people just lazily post the first paragraph or the link summary rather than anything of value.
So I would even go further and say that we shouldn't even have plain "link submission" here but I know that it's a rather extreme stance.
Is it extreme? I don't think it should be mandatory per say but I'd definitely like the option to post a link and then have space under it to say either why I'm posting it or what could be interesting about it.
Links without context are one of the reasons Reddit never appealed to me. If this place is going to develop that bad habit, I likely won't last long. If you can't be bothered to include something...
Links without context are one of the reasons Reddit never appealed to me. If this place is going to develop that bad habit, I likely won't last long. If you can't be bothered to include something about the link to indicate why you think people should visit it, then why should anyone bother?
I wanted to say that I agree with you on this topic. And that it seems @Deimos is planning to start the discussion on what we should prioritise more. So, whether or not it is sorted out after...
I wanted to say that I agree with you on this topic.
And that it seems @Deimos is planning to start the discussion on what we should prioritise more. So, whether or not it is sorted out after that, we'll see, but at least we all will know in what ways the community wants us all to participate.
What else should one post in ~news but news? If someone's posting news in ~news, I don't think that's a bad thing. I think that's exactly what that group is for.
I'm more than sure the user I'm referring is not in bad faith but I thought the same thing after seeing a series of post in ~news this morning.
What else should one post in ~news but news? If someone's posting news in ~news, I don't think that's a bad thing. I think that's exactly what that group is for.
One thing is posting a news and some commentary because maybe you're informed about it. Another is just spam links that I can get through any RSS feed.
One thing is posting a news and some commentary because maybe you're informed about it. Another is just spam links that I can get through any RSS feed.
Since we're not reddit, and no one is getting karma for posting, I hope that once ~ is fully up and running, we will see fewer "kneejerk" posts, and more posts that the OP actually cares about...
Since we're not reddit, and no one is getting karma for posting, I hope that once ~ is fully up and running, we will see fewer "kneejerk" posts, and more posts that the OP actually cares about discussing.
I hesitate to shame a person for posting in good faith (not that shaming is what you were doing, OP) since ~ is so small and we need all the content we can get, but generally I agree with you.
I can't find the topic easily on my phone, but I think this has come up before. A few arguments I saw against allowing descriptions and links at the same time were: it elevates the OP's opinion...
I can't find the topic easily on my phone, but I think this has come up before. A few arguments I saw against allowing descriptions and links at the same time were:
it elevates the OP's opinion above all the comments
it allows for editorializing
it confuses voting (are people voting for the link or the OP's comment?)
I'm going off my memory, so I may be missing some or putting emphasis in different places, but I wanted to share those because I didn't see them here.
Personally, I like the idea of a text box that turns the OP's stuff into the first comment. It makes a thread more appealing if it starts with a comment, and avoids a few of the problems listed in the previous thread.
I don't think this should be an issue. votes are intended to be a measure of quality, not a measure of how much you agree with the person or link. If you read the post and feel like OP has...
it confuses voting (are people voting for the link or the OP's comment?)
I don't think this should be an issue. votes are intended to be a measure of quality, not a measure of how much you agree with the person or link. If you read the post and feel like OP has provided enough content (both in the link and in their commentary) to spark a discussion, then OP's post should get the vote.
I saw it mentioned somewhere that, for a while, comments to a comment automatically added a vote to the parent comment. This was probably because if the comment you were replying to was worth...
I saw it mentioned somewhere that, for a while, comments to a comment automatically added a vote to the parent comment. This was probably because if the comment you were replying to was worth commenting to, it was clearly worth discussing, making it worth a vote.
personally, I don't think that giving up and resigning yourself to failure before you even start is worth anything. your time would be better served thinking of solutions.
One can think a link is worthwhile but not think that the OP's comment is sound or worth discussing. If you separate the two, you can vote for the link (and the general discussion going on below...
One can think a link is worthwhile but not think that the OP's comment is sound or worth discussing. If you separate the two, you can vote for the link (and the general discussion going on below it) without also endorsing the OP's framing and implying "yeah, let's talk about this particular aspect."
To be honest, it's not something that concerns me a lot, but I wanted to bring in a few new (well, old) objections to the idea. Wish I could find the other thread... Aha! Not sure if this is the exact one I'm thinking of, but: "Link topics don't directly engage users."
As someone who posts both music and news, I find this thread discouraging and somewhat hostile. I'm trying to submit high quality content. Well written articles about interesting subjects, and...
As someone who posts both music and news, I find this thread discouraging and somewhat hostile. I'm trying to submit high quality content. Well written articles about interesting subjects, and great non-mainstream music. The site isn't drowning in either of those yet. Sometimes I post a comment but usually not. The content IS the submission statement, IMO. An article or song doesn't need to spur a discussion to be worth reading or hearing. If Tildes is to be only a discussion board then I have completely misunderstood what the site is supposed to be. I think there's more value in posting an unknown jazz song than in the upteenth "what is your favorite album" thread. Have I just been wasting my time?
I don't have a good response, but I just want to say - You are not wasting your time. I definitely appreciate everyone's efforts in contributing to this community. Lately, I've read a lot of...
I don't have a good response, but I just want to say - You are not wasting your time. I definitely appreciate everyone's efforts in contributing to this community.
Lately, I've read a lot of posts, actually in news, music and books, that I simply don't feel I can contribute to. For me too, there's only so many times I can read/post to a "what's your favourite something thread". I still enjoy still a lot of them, and those I don't, I just scroll past. The issue for me at least, is that yesterday and today, an overwhelming number of them have been a "scroll past" for me. If others are finding the same, perhaps it does point to a potential issue with our content submissions.
Thanks, I appreciate that. I might have been too hasty to reply - this thread was the first thing I read after waking up. Never a good idea to comment while still groggy. Regardless, I think this...
Thanks, I appreciate that. I might have been too hasty to reply - this thread was the first thing I read after waking up. Never a good idea to comment while still groggy.
Regardless, I think this is part of a continuing discussion about what exactly defines a quality post. To you it seems to be something that spurs discussion. But to my mind, there is such a thing as a quality post that can inspire the reader/listener without spurring discussion. Sometimes there really isn't anything to say other than "wow." Similarly, sometimes a discussion for its own sake can feel forced, repetitive or boring. For example there's a subreddit called /r/letstalkmusic. It's dedicated to quality discussion about music. But to be honest, I'm a big music guy and I can't stand that subreddit. I find the discussions there to be so damned boring. I don't want to talk about music - I want to listen to it! And then, maybe sometimes, talk about it, but only a little. ;-) Or, as Frank Zappa said, "writing about music is like dancing about architecture." The music itself is the point.
To my mind, if I'm exposing some listeners to something they haven't heard before, I'm doing my job as a submitter. And with articles, if I'm posting something that is interesting or thought-provoking, I'm doing my job even if nobody is compelled to comment. I'm not karma farming here or on reddit, and I read everything I submit. In the case of news stories, I'll even read multiple versions so I can find the best and most thorough one to submit. So even though I'm not posting a submission statement, my posts are definitely not "low effort submissions." It's true that there have been some low effort posts on the site already (both links and discussion threads) but the signal to noise ratio is still quite excellent IMO.
umm... The reason for sharing news is because... well... it's news. The standard submission statement for news posts is going to be something like: "I'm sharing this article because it's something...
umm... The reason for sharing news is because... well... it's news. The standard submission statement for news posts is going to be something like: "I'm sharing this article because it's something that happened today and people might want to know about it". That's the whole point of news - to inform people.
I've been sharing some news articles. My main goal in doing so is to provide activity for this brand-new website that we're all here to help get off the ground. If we don't post news links, then people will complain about the lack of content. And if you require me to write a submission statement for news, I'll just end up copy-pasting that sentence I wrote above.
According to Deimos' announcement, "Tildes prioritizes quality contentand discussion". [emphasis mine] I believe that posting quality content, such as news, is quite relevant to this website's interests.
How is copying a news link and then just posting it here quality though? It seems to me that all it does is make people read the headlines and that's it. As the op said, There should be a...
How is copying a news link and then just posting it here quality though? It seems to me that all it does is make people read the headlines and that's it. As the op said, There should be a discussion around the certain posted news story, starting with the poster stating why he posted said news article. That way there's actually a reason why someone posted the article. A post without any real reason is not really a quality post, in my opinion.
If you just read the headline than of course you won't have much to say. It sounds more like some of you here want the article posted along with a summary and a high school discussion prompt.
If you just read the headline than of course you won't have much to say. It sounds more like some of you here want the article posted along with a summary and a high school discussion prompt.
How looking for posts works for me is: Is the title interesting? If yes, I will click on it is the content of the post interesting? if yes, I will read it. do I have something to say to contribute...
How looking for posts works for me is:
Is the title interesting? If yes, I will click on it
is the content of the post interesting? if yes, I will read it.
do I have something to say to contribute for this post? If yes, I will comment.
If all the content is just the news article, it's usually not interesting enough to proceed to the third step, and even if it is, It's really difficult to start a discussion. All in all, It's just really low effort to post seemingly random news articles.
Also you don't have to make a summary of the article. You have to start a discussion.
Like I said. That's pretty much asking for a prompt. If someone needs OP to write a sentence or two to make it easier for them to comment on the article just means they don't have much to say in...
Like I said. That's pretty much asking for a prompt. If someone needs OP to write a sentence or two to make it easier for them to comment on the article just means they don't have much to say in the first place.
And if the poster can't write a few sentences to get the discussion going, he doesn't have a real reason to post it except for point collecting. It's really not that hard to put some thought into...
And if the poster can't write a few sentences to get the discussion going, he doesn't have a real reason to post it except for point collecting.
It's really not that hard to put some thought into a post, if you are really interested in it. I don't see why are you fighting so much against it. If the article really doesn't provoke you to write just two lines of text, then is it really a worthwhile post?
There is no point collection because we don't get to see a "total" amount of points. The same can be said with commenters. Plus if the commenter needs a kickstart or prompt to start a discussion...
There is no point collection because we don't get to see a "total" amount of points.
It's really not that hard to put some thought into a post, if you are really interested in it
The same can be said with commenters. Plus if the commenter needs a kickstart or prompt to start a discussion then they themselves aren't that interested.
If the article really doesn't provoke you to write just two lines of text, then is it really a worthwhile post?
Because posts of news are relevant on ~news. If peope really are clamoring for deep conversation on news then I'm sure a news.discussion will eventually be made.
I don't see why are you fighting so much against it.
Because I see ~news as a hub for news. You I'm guessing want it to be more curated and only have interesting news that lead to deep conversation. This is really just a matter of two different people wanting different things. I won't change your mind and you won't change mind. Lets just leave it at this and see what happens once more users join in.
With all due respect... fuck that. If you want me to supply a submission statement with news posts, I'll stop posting news. I'm not talking about expert analyses or opinion pieces, I'm talking...
With all due respect... fuck that. If you want me to supply a submission statement with news posts, I'll stop posting news.
I'm not talking about expert analyses or opinion pieces, I'm talking about factual news articles. I can see the need for having some discussion about analyses or opinions, but what sort of discussion are we going to have about the fact that a volcano in Hawaii just wiped out a whole town or that a small asteroid burned up in our atmosphere?
a post that newsworthy will likely appear elsewhere many times over. as I said elsewhere in this post, if the goal is aggregation, then tildes cannot compete with Reddit, Google news, etc. Our...
a post that newsworthy will likely appear elsewhere many times over. as I said elsewhere in this post, if the goal is aggregation, then tildes cannot compete with Reddit, Google news, etc.
Our goal should be a better platform for discussion; if the news post isn't discussion worthy then it might as well have been posted elsewhere for all the value it brought to the tildes.
The broader question you raise is: why post a news article that’s not going to generate any discussion then? If you can’t think of anything to say about a link you’re posting, then maybe that’s an...
but what sort of discussion are we going to have about the fact that a volcano in Hawaii just wiped out a whole town or that a small asteroid burned up in our atmosphere?
The broader question you raise is: why post a news article that’s not going to generate any discussion then? If you can’t think of anything to say about a link you’re posting, then maybe that’s an indicator that it’s not worth posting.
Here's my final word on this: https://tildes.net/~tildes/1v1/idea_requiring_submission_statements_for_link_based_topics_at_least_in_certain_groups#comment-j5f
Lol I post science and tech related news in other groups already, and I will gladly add submission statements to those threads that don’t already have discussions. I already make sure that the...
Start posting news in ~news. None of the people here demanding better news posts and submission statements actually post any news themselves. 2. Make sure to include a submission statement when you post. We don't need to make this compulsory for people to do it voluntarily. Be the change you want to see in the website.
Lol I post science and tech related news in other groups already, and I will gladly add submission statements to those threads that don’t already have discussions. I already make sure that the content I post is something I’m really interested in, so this isn’t really a “gotcha” moment in the way you seem to have intended it. At least not for me.
I don't know about requiring submission statements for ~news, but I would like to point out that not all "news" is worth posting. Even if it makes the headlines.
I don't know about requiring submission statements for ~news, but I would like to point out that not all "news" is worth posting. Even if it makes the headlines.
With this logic someone could just spam random news articles without even reading them, effectively flooding the site. With the statement, you actually show that you have interest in what people...
With this logic someone could just spam random news articles without even reading them, effectively flooding the site. With the statement, you actually show that you have interest in what people think about your post, not that you are just fishing for internet points.
I don't read news, since I feel there are too many clickbait titles on no matter which news site, so I am not in a position to post thought provoking news articles, but what I want to say is that...
I don't read news, since I feel there are too many clickbait titles on no matter which news site, so I am not in a position to post thought provoking news articles, but what I want to say is that there is no reason to spam low effort content. Low effort content in this context is seemingly random links to news articles. If I wanted to see just random articles, I'd go to any news website, but for this web page, as I've understood correctly, thought provoking or posts that light up discussion are what we are after.
Here's a challenge to all these people in this thread who are saying that we should require a submission statement for news posts... Start posting news in ~news. None of the people here demanding...
Here's a challenge to all these people in this thread who are saying that we should require a submission statement for news posts...
Start posting news in ~news. None of the people here demanding better news posts and submission statements actually post any news themselves.
Make sure to include a submission statement when you post. We don't need to make this compulsory for people to do it voluntarily.
Walk the talk. Be the change you want to see in the website.
I'm not subscribed to ~news and likely won't ever be. I don't have any interest in it. this is not a post about ~news. this is a post about external links without context in general. news just...
I'm not subscribed to ~news and likely won't ever be. I don't have any interest in it.
this is not a post about ~news. this is a post about external links without context in general. news just happens to be where the most examples lie at the moment, although ~music is facing a similar problem in some instances.
If I ever post an external link, you can be sure I'll provide context. however, I don't think I will be posting many considering I don't come to tildes to then turn around and immediately leave tildes, so to me external links are intrinsically low quality.
Honestly, for me some of these submissions (and I'm not speaking only of or directly at yours) have felt like low effort spam. This community is still growing and I do think this is just part of...
Honestly, for me some of these submissions (and I'm not speaking only of or directly at yours) have felt like low effort spam. This community is still growing and I do think this is just part of growing pains. However, it's important to decide what we want as a community.
And, I don't need to be a mechanic to drive. When I see something that I feel is not growing this site, there's no reason I can't comment on it just because I may choose to participate differently.
Following up on this to let you know I've gone ahead and added those statements to the threads I'd posted in other groups that hadn't generated discussions so far, and will continue to do so...
Following up on this to let you know I've gone ahead and added those statements to the threads I'd posted in other groups that hadn't generated discussions so far, and will continue to do so moving forward – lest there be any question about me putting my money where my mouth is.
I don't understand the issue. Posts about news naturally belong on news. Plus if you need someone to kickstart a discussion on an article than you probably don't have much to say on the matter to...
I don't understand the issue. Posts about news naturally belong on news. Plus if you need someone to kickstart a discussion on an article than you probably don't have much to say on the matter to begin with. I don't mean this in a negative way either. I read a lot of the posts there but I just don't have anything to say. I go on there to find news.
I have definitely felt this in the last couple days too. It's not that these articles aren't worth posting or interesting, but just don't seem to often generate any discussion, which I believe is...
I have definitely felt this in the last couple days too. It's not that these articles aren't worth posting or interesting, but just don't seem to often generate any discussion, which I believe is the purpose of Tildes. We're not just duplicating news sites, right?
Good discussion post, @Kat. I agree that we should be doing more to substantiate our posts, and I like the "reason why it was posted." Unlike what others were saying, I believe we could find a...
Good discussion post, @Kat. I agree that we should be doing more to substantiate our posts, and I like the "reason why it was posted." Unlike what others were saying, I believe we could find a reason why news was posted, other than it just being news. If OP is posting it, they must find it interesting for some reason. And if OP is posting it, not because they find it interesting and would like to discuss it, but for the ego boost of imaginary internet points, my opinion is they shouldn't be posting it at all.
I totally agree. Otherwise, it honestly feels low effort. And if a post has zero comments after a while, I don't think it's a lot to have OP return and comment on it too.
Unlike what others were saying, I believe we could find a reason why news was posted, other than it just being news.
I totally agree. Otherwise, it honestly feels low effort. And if a post has zero comments after a while, I don't think it's a lot to have OP return and comment on it too.
If the main purpose of tildes is to generate interesting discussion, and those links in ~news and ~music don't seem to, something like a mandatory submission statement would be ideal. That said, I...
If the main purpose of tildes is to generate interesting discussion, and those links in ~news and ~music don't seem to, something like a mandatory submission statement would be ideal. That said, I do like subreddits with rules stating that you have to thoroughly explain why you posted something and if you don't, your post is removed. /r/badhistory and /r/badlinguistics are the ones that come immediately to mind.
While I usually like news, I've unsubscribed from ~news because there's just not much there of interest. I might resubscribe if there is a way to promote interesting discussion from those links.
I don't know if I want it as a requirement, but I would like the option when posting. When I posted a link in ~music, I would have liked the ability to add more explanation as to why I think...
I don't know if I want it as a requirement, but I would like the option when posting. When I posted a link in ~music, I would have liked the ability to add more explanation as to why I think people should give that video a look.
If you post your submission comment within a few minutes of posting your link, it's not really bumping it. It would only be considered bumping if you did it hours or days later.
If you post your submission comment within a few minutes of posting your link, it's not really bumping it. It would only be considered bumping if you did it hours or days later.
I don't want to say names because I'm more than sure the user I'm referring is not in bad faith but I thought the same thing after seeing a series of post in ~news this morning.
Even if I try, some articles just don't leave much space for a discussion unless started by OP.
So I would even go further and say that we shouldn't even have plain "link submission" here but I know that it's a rather extreme stance.
I guess you're referring to me.
I don't leave any type of "submission statement" because I don't believe it's necessary. I don't feel I should have to justify why I post a particular story, nor do I wish to set the tone of any conversation by saying "this is important because...." or "people need to know about this because..."
I really don't see any need to justify or explain why a news article is in ~news.
I disagree. Tildes will never be a better news aggregator than Google news or reddit. Tildes can, and should, endeavor to be a better discussion platform than Reddit.
If it's worth posting, it's worth discussing. if it's worth discussing, you should be willing to start a discussion about it. that's kindof the point, in my understanding.
Why post here then? Theoretically, it doesn’t take much more to explain in one sentence why you thought a particular link was worth sharing unless you value aggregation over discussion. And in the former case — why would you value aggregation on a site that doesn’t even have karma? What motivates you to post news, not just on here but in general?
I think there’s an important difference between firing off multiple news stories in quick succession in a tiny community like this one, versus doing it in a huge community like Reddit. So I don’t think it’s unreasonable in a community of this size to question posting practices at such an early stage.
I post because it's early days for the site and very few others are. I'm trying to post from as broad a range of countries and topics as feasible without completely drowning the place in links.
I'm watching to see what type of story, issues etc get any kind of traction and what the demographics of tildes think is of relevance to them. I've already noticed certain topics, and news from certain places are far more popular than others.
And anyone is capable of commenting on an article. Posting a link is a spur for conversation in and of itself, but it seems like there's an element of stage fright involved with people not wanting to be the first to offer any comment or opinion on stories.
Sharing information, stories and knowledge about things happening around the world. And trying to relate motivation for posting to karma/points is silly.
Thanks for illuminating your motivations, I definitely underestimated them and you’re right, the jab about karma was dumb. I also think you have an interesting method of evaluating the success of what you post.
Getting to the heart of the matter, and taking your reasoning into account, I think the reason you’re getting this kind of feedback is because you posted eight stories in one group within minutes of each other, instead of spacing them out over a longer period of time. It gives off a spammy impression, or at least it did to me until you explained what’s going on.
Now that I know why you do it, I actually don’t mind it if you’re adjusting your frequency and schedule based on the patterns you see. But it would still be cool if you spaced the posts out a little more :)
I usually post while I'm on the train going in to work. I don't have an office job and handy internet access while at work, so spacing things out like you suggest, which is something I'm very much aware of by the way, is kind of difficult.
Yes I was and again, I didn't mean to use your submission as a "bad" example.
The point is that if news becomes just a feed of random articles... it really doesn't add any value to a RSS feed I can get from a news website, with the additional downside that it's only having news that the OPs considered worthy of being shared.
The whole point of tildes is to foster discussion, if we just copy and paste links from other websites... discussion can still happens but once every n links that catch the eyes of enough users.
What I'm afraid is of having a lot of noise compared to the interesting discussions that could raise from it.
I subscribed to news not to have a flood of links to news website but to have discussion about interesting or not-so-widespread news.
I try to post less well covered stories for the most part. But the last few days have taught me that people want to read/talk about the stuff that is already well covered and prominent in the news cycle.
Anyone can start a discussion and don't feel it should be incumbent on the person who posts a link to do so. The act of posting something is me saying "I think this is interesting and worth knowing about".
I seem to be in the minority with thinking submission statements are unnecessary for a news article though, so will leave it to others to post articles and their justifications for doing so.
I do agree that submission statements are not necessary. They could be necessary for some groups and I guess that will be fixed when the custom submission system is developed (like some groups might want to set a series of fields to be filled and generate a specific title). I think @Amarok talked about that regarding a possible ~listentothis group. And I think it makes sense.
For news however, I think it's fine not to have them, and it might even be counterproductive, since we open the option of editorializing too much, setting the discussion and I'm sure many people would just fill it with a subtitle or a copypaste of the first paragraph of the story.
I find your submissions interesting since they do cover more than the US actually. It's true that posting them one after the other might come across as low effort or low filter though. But I guess that's what votes are for.
Ive always thought there should be a submission statement field to go with a link post. So your text content just posts to first comment as well.
I'm definitely in favour of a submission statement I posted a song in ~music and I looked at it for a second before feeling the need to write something otherwise what do people really say to it? That said what often happens on truereddit is that people just lazily post the first paragraph or the link summary rather than anything of value.
Is it extreme? I don't think it should be mandatory per say but I'd definitely like the option to post a link and then have space under it to say either why I'm posting it or what could be interesting about it.
Links without context are one of the reasons Reddit never appealed to me. If this place is going to develop that bad habit, I likely won't last long. If you can't be bothered to include something about the link to indicate why you think people should visit it, then why should anyone bother?
I wanted to say that I agree with you on this topic.
And that it seems @Deimos is planning to start the discussion on what we should prioritise more. So, whether or not it is sorted out after that, we'll see, but at least we all will know in what ways the community wants us all to participate.
What else should one post in ~news but news? If someone's posting news in ~news, I don't think that's a bad thing. I think that's exactly what that group is for.
One thing is posting a news and some commentary because maybe you're informed about it. Another is just spam links that I can get through any RSS feed.
Since we're not reddit, and no one is getting karma for posting, I hope that once ~ is fully up and running, we will see fewer "kneejerk" posts, and more posts that the OP actually cares about discussing.
I hesitate to shame a person for posting in good faith (not that shaming is what you were doing, OP) since ~ is so small and we need all the content we can get, but generally I agree with you.
A good first step would be allowing a comment to be submitted along with a link. Right now it's link OR text.
I second this. It is annoying that you have to write a separate comment when you want to talk about the content you are sharing.
I can't find the topic easily on my phone, but I think this has come up before. A few arguments I saw against allowing descriptions and links at the same time were:
I'm going off my memory, so I may be missing some or putting emphasis in different places, but I wanted to share those because I didn't see them here.
Personally, I like the idea of a text box that turns the OP's stuff into the first comment. It makes a thread more appealing if it starts with a comment, and avoids a few of the problems listed in the previous thread.
EDIT: Found a thread covering some of this, not sure if it's the exact one I was thinking of. "Link topics don't directly engage users."
I don't think this should be an issue. votes are intended to be a measure of quality, not a measure of how much you agree with the person or link. If you read the post and feel like OP has provided enough content (both in the link and in their commentary) to spark a discussion, then OP's post should get the vote.
Voting will always turn into that.
I saw it mentioned somewhere that, for a while, comments to a comment automatically added a vote to the parent comment. This was probably because if the comment you were replying to was worth commenting to, it was clearly worth discussing, making it worth a vote.
personally, I don't think that giving up and resigning yourself to failure before you even start is worth anything. your time would be better served thinking of solutions.
One can think a link is worthwhile but not think that the OP's comment is sound or worth discussing. If you separate the two, you can vote for the link (and the general discussion going on below it) without also endorsing the OP's framing and implying "yeah, let's talk about this particular aspect."
To be honest, it's not something that concerns me a lot, but I wanted to bring in a few new (well, old) objections to the idea. Wish I could find the other thread... Aha! Not sure if this is the exact one I'm thinking of, but: "Link topics don't directly engage users."
As someone who posts both music and news, I find this thread discouraging and somewhat hostile. I'm trying to submit high quality content. Well written articles about interesting subjects, and great non-mainstream music. The site isn't drowning in either of those yet. Sometimes I post a comment but usually not. The content IS the submission statement, IMO. An article or song doesn't need to spur a discussion to be worth reading or hearing. If Tildes is to be only a discussion board then I have completely misunderstood what the site is supposed to be. I think there's more value in posting an unknown jazz song than in the upteenth "what is your favorite album" thread. Have I just been wasting my time?
I don't have a good response, but I just want to say - You are not wasting your time. I definitely appreciate everyone's efforts in contributing to this community.
Lately, I've read a lot of posts, actually in news, music and books, that I simply don't feel I can contribute to. For me too, there's only so many times I can read/post to a "what's your favourite something thread". I still enjoy still a lot of them, and those I don't, I just scroll past. The issue for me at least, is that yesterday and today, an overwhelming number of them have been a "scroll past" for me. If others are finding the same, perhaps it does point to a potential issue with our content submissions.
Thanks, I appreciate that. I might have been too hasty to reply - this thread was the first thing I read after waking up. Never a good idea to comment while still groggy.
Regardless, I think this is part of a continuing discussion about what exactly defines a quality post. To you it seems to be something that spurs discussion. But to my mind, there is such a thing as a quality post that can inspire the reader/listener without spurring discussion. Sometimes there really isn't anything to say other than "wow." Similarly, sometimes a discussion for its own sake can feel forced, repetitive or boring. For example there's a subreddit called /r/letstalkmusic. It's dedicated to quality discussion about music. But to be honest, I'm a big music guy and I can't stand that subreddit. I find the discussions there to be so damned boring. I don't want to talk about music - I want to listen to it! And then, maybe sometimes, talk about it, but only a little. ;-) Or, as Frank Zappa said, "writing about music is like dancing about architecture." The music itself is the point.
To my mind, if I'm exposing some listeners to something they haven't heard before, I'm doing my job as a submitter. And with articles, if I'm posting something that is interesting or thought-provoking, I'm doing my job even if nobody is compelled to comment. I'm not karma farming here or on reddit, and I read everything I submit. In the case of news stories, I'll even read multiple versions so I can find the best and most thorough one to submit. So even though I'm not posting a submission statement, my posts are definitely not "low effort submissions." It's true that there have been some low effort posts on the site already (both links and discussion threads) but the signal to noise ratio is still quite excellent IMO.
umm... The reason for sharing news is because... well... it's news. The standard submission statement for news posts is going to be something like: "I'm sharing this article because it's something that happened today and people might want to know about it". That's the whole point of news - to inform people.
I've been sharing some news articles. My main goal in doing so is to provide activity for this brand-new website that we're all here to help get off the ground. If we don't post news links, then people will complain about the lack of content. And if you require me to write a submission statement for news, I'll just end up copy-pasting that sentence I wrote above.
According to Deimos' announcement, "Tildes prioritizes quality content and discussion". [emphasis mine] I believe that posting quality content, such as news, is quite relevant to this website's interests.
How is copying a news link and then just posting it here quality though? It seems to me that all it does is make people read the headlines and that's it. As the op said, There should be a discussion around the certain posted news story, starting with the poster stating why he posted said news article. That way there's actually a reason why someone posted the article. A post without any real reason is not really a quality post, in my opinion.
If you just read the headline than of course you won't have much to say. It sounds more like some of you here want the article posted along with a summary and a high school discussion prompt.
How looking for posts works for me is:
If all the content is just the news article, it's usually not interesting enough to proceed to the third step, and even if it is, It's really difficult to start a discussion. All in all, It's just really low effort to post seemingly random news articles.
Also you don't have to make a summary of the article. You have to start a discussion.
Like I said. That's pretty much asking for a prompt. If someone needs OP to write a sentence or two to make it easier for them to comment on the article just means they don't have much to say in the first place.
And if the poster can't write a few sentences to get the discussion going, he doesn't have a real reason to post it except for point collecting.
It's really not that hard to put some thought into a post, if you are really interested in it. I don't see why are you fighting so much against it. If the article really doesn't provoke you to write just two lines of text, then is it really a worthwhile post?
There is no point collection because we don't get to see a "total" amount of points.
The same can be said with commenters. Plus if the commenter needs a kickstart or prompt to start a discussion then they themselves aren't that interested.
Because posts of news are relevant on ~news. If peope really are clamoring for deep conversation on news then I'm sure a news.discussion will eventually be made.
Because I see ~news as a hub for news. You I'm guessing want it to be more curated and only have interesting news that lead to deep conversation. This is really just a matter of two different people wanting different things. I won't change your mind and you won't change mind. Lets just leave it at this and see what happens once more users join in.
I guess you are right. Just different points that are all pretty much accurate. Thank you for the discussion though. Enjoy your weekend!
With all due respect... fuck that. If you want me to supply a submission statement with news posts, I'll stop posting news.
I'm not talking about expert analyses or opinion pieces, I'm talking about factual news articles. I can see the need for having some discussion about analyses or opinions, but what sort of discussion are we going to have about the fact that a volcano in Hawaii just wiped out a whole town or that a small asteroid burned up in our atmosphere?
a post that newsworthy will likely appear elsewhere many times over. as I said elsewhere in this post, if the goal is aggregation, then tildes cannot compete with Reddit, Google news, etc.
Our goal should be a better platform for discussion; if the news post isn't discussion worthy then it might as well have been posted elsewhere for all the value it brought to the tildes.
Asking for a sentence-long explanation of your reasoning isn’t asking for a lot...
"I'm sharing this article because it's something that happened today and people might want to know about it."
The broader question you raise is: why post a news article that’s not going to generate any discussion then? If you can’t think of anything to say about a link you’re posting, then maybe that’s an indicator that it’s not worth posting.
Here's my final word on this:
https://tildes.net/~tildes/1v1/idea_requiring_submission_statements_for_link_based_topics_at_least_in_certain_groups#comment-j5f
Lol I post science and tech related news in other groups already, and I will gladly add submission statements to those threads that don’t already have discussions. I already make sure that the content I post is something I’m really interested in, so this isn’t really a “gotcha” moment in the way you seem to have intended it. At least not for me.
I don't know about requiring submission statements for ~news, but I would like to point out that not all "news" is worth posting. Even if it makes the headlines.
Exactly the way I feel about this too.
I see no reason to justify posting news to ~news.
With this logic someone could just spam random news articles without even reading them, effectively flooding the site. With the statement, you actually show that you have interest in what people think about your post, not that you are just fishing for internet points.
So lead by example instead of pontificating and theorising.
I don't read news, since I feel there are too many clickbait titles on no matter which news site, so I am not in a position to post thought provoking news articles, but what I want to say is that there is no reason to spam low effort content. Low effort content in this context is seemingly random links to news articles. If I wanted to see just random articles, I'd go to any news website, but for this web page, as I've understood correctly, thought provoking or posts that light up discussion are what we are after.
Here's a challenge to all these people in this thread who are saying that we should require a submission statement for news posts...
Walk the talk. Be the change you want to see in the website.
I'm not subscribed to ~news and likely won't ever be. I don't have any interest in it.
this is not a post about ~news. this is a post about external links without context in general. news just happens to be where the most examples lie at the moment, although ~music is facing a similar problem in some instances.
If I ever post an external link, you can be sure I'll provide context. however, I don't think I will be posting many considering I don't come to tildes to then turn around and immediately leave tildes, so to me external links are intrinsically low quality.
Honestly, for me some of these submissions (and I'm not speaking only of or directly at yours) have felt like low effort spam. This community is still growing and I do think this is just part of growing pains. However, it's important to decide what we want as a community.
And, I don't need to be a mechanic to drive. When I see something that I feel is not growing this site, there's no reason I can't comment on it just because I may choose to participate differently.
Following up on this to let you know I've gone ahead and added those statements to the threads I'd posted in other groups that hadn't generated discussions so far, and will continue to do so moving forward – lest there be any question about me putting my money where my mouth is.
I don't understand the issue. Posts about news naturally belong on news. Plus if you need someone to kickstart a discussion on an article than you probably don't have much to say on the matter to begin with. I don't mean this in a negative way either. I read a lot of the posts there but I just don't have anything to say. I go on there to find news.
I have definitely felt this in the last couple days too. It's not that these articles aren't worth posting or interesting, but just don't seem to often generate any discussion, which I believe is the purpose of Tildes. We're not just duplicating news sites, right?
Good discussion post, @Kat. I agree that we should be doing more to substantiate our posts, and I like the "reason why it was posted." Unlike what others were saying, I believe we could find a reason why news was posted, other than it just being news. If OP is posting it, they must find it interesting for some reason. And if OP is posting it, not because they find it interesting and would like to discuss it, but for the ego boost of imaginary internet points, my opinion is they shouldn't be posting it at all.
I totally agree. Otherwise, it honestly feels low effort. And if a post has zero comments after a while, I don't think it's a lot to have OP return and comment on it too.
If the main purpose of tildes is to generate interesting discussion, and those links in ~news and ~music don't seem to, something like a mandatory submission statement would be ideal. That said, I do like subreddits with rules stating that you have to thoroughly explain why you posted something and if you don't, your post is removed. /r/badhistory and /r/badlinguistics are the ones that come immediately to mind.
While I usually like news, I've unsubscribed from ~news because there's just not much there of interest. I might resubscribe if there is a way to promote interesting discussion from those links.
I don't know if I want it as a requirement, but I would like the option when posting. When I posted a link in ~music, I would have liked the ability to add more explanation as to why I think people should give that video a look.
You already have that option: simply post a comment on your own post after posting.
True. I just... don't want to seem like I'm bumping my own post? And it can't be expanded from the main feed unless someone clicks through.
If you post your submission comment within a few minutes of posting your link, it's not really bumping it. It would only be considered bumping if you did it hours or days later.