I should just clarify the traditional rationale: it is not that the serial threads and all posts within them are spam, but that those threads were allowed to exist as a place in which a greater degree of spam would be tolerated, the price for which would be that the posts would not contribute towards post count.
I never did understand this "traditional rationale." I seem to recall holding the same opinion then as I do now. I wasn't in favor then, and I'm waaaay past the view now, that there is any reason to essentially penalize people for posting in threads that have more than one topic going on at the same time.
As I recall, the earlier serial threads were not spam fests (the true spam fests were the "babe" threads, which we don't have anymore). As a matter of fact, they had some very good posts and good conversations, and at some point someone PM'd me and said (paraphrased) "Valka, I wish you'd come and post in the Random Raves/Rants threads" and when I asked why, they said it was because they liked my posts.
I said thank you, but I preferred to keep my posts for the threads where they were actually counted, rather than dismissed as spam.
Posters are not required to indulge themselves in the full extent of that latitude, and are quite welcome to make non-spammy posts in those threads if they wish. The lack of post count does not imply any judgment in relation to those posts. It's not that staff look at these threads, evaluate them, and deem them unworthy. Rather, it's a matter of having some threads where people are more free to post what they like without keeping on eye on whether posters are just farming the threads for post count (this was perhaps more a realistic possibility in the earlier days of forums, where that sort of thing absolutely would happen without some controls).
Except we're not free to post what we like. Spam infractions were handed out in serial threads in the past, double-posting, while not stomped on as much as before (I did my share of stomping when it was required), it's still frowned on and routinely edited, and now we get Arakhor coming along and berating us for staying on one conversation for too long ("This is supposed to be RANDOM!"
) and killing whatever chance there might be for a natural end to the conversation and preventing some people from joining in if they'd just noticed it and wanted to contribute.
And yes, it damn well does imply a judgment that serial thread posts are deemed unworthy. There are some really good posts in those threads, and they deserve to be counted - and I don't just mean my own.
One of the benefits I pointed out about the serial threads many years ago is that they're good material to comb through if someone is looking for a good thread topic. It's what we did on another forum I belonged to - we had a kind of 'miscellaneous say whatever's on your mind' thread in the general discussion forum, and some people would periodically read through that to see if anyone had posted about something they thought would make a good topic for a whole thread of its own. It turned out that that thread was a goldmine of opportunities to find things to make a thread about.
But here? They get discarded in the archives where they're not easy to search, if anyone remembers them at all, and we lose the post count - like it never happened.
I could understand if it was some silly thing like posting a letter of the alphabet in each post or counting by threes or just a smiley. I've seen forums that allow that, and those
are just meant to get easy post count. But since nothing here is tied to post count - it doesn't open any hidden forums, gain any perks that go with ranks, and no notice is taken of milestone posts - the argument that it's to "farm post count" is utter nonsense. I'll admit that I'm curious as to how some people managed such high post counts, but I just assume they've had a lot to say over the years and much of that happened during some of the times when I've taken a break and just didn't notice.
I would expect a decision to be reached on this issue shortly.
Thank you. I've seen legislation that's gone from tabling to Royal Assent in less time than this is taking.
