Re long, long opening posts

[Misscromwellrocks]

I seem to click out of nearly every second thread I open nowadays because of the lengthy opening post going into micro level details about whatever situation the OP is describing.

I don't remember, when I first joined mumsnet, seeing so many overly long first posts. Aibu to find them off putting and often very confusing?

‘Tl;dr’ Is just an acronym, why would you bother typing “too long didn’t read” when you can type tl;dr?

I know what a fucking acronym is. You’re actually proving my point.

Are you not very familiar with the internet?

Very familiar. That’s how I know this attitude annoys me. If I wasn’t familiar with the internet, I wouldn’t - indeed, couldn’t - be annoyed by an internet acronym (or the attitudes behind it). Didn’t really think that through, did you?

I agree with you however as others have said, if god forbid you miss out on a bit of information, people send passive aggressive accusations of drip feeding.

You don't have to engage with them, depends how interesting they are. There's a fabulous new thread today with an enormous couple of opening posts and I can't wait for the next one!

Enormous posts are fine if they are warranted. Indeed, you don’t need to engage if you don’t want to and I am sure many don’t. It’s the same as people talking to you in real life... if they are interesting you speak to them if they speak utter nonsense then you make your excuses and move on.

They rarely are warranted though and other posters would usually comprehend better and be more willing to engage if the op edited their post down. In the same way that in real life someone rambling on and taking ages to get to the point usually just causes people's eyes to glaze over after a while.

I can’t be bothered to read endlessly long posts. There are a couple of posters on here who seem unable to write anything other than War and Peace length posts. I don’t even have to look at the username when seeing a wall of text to guess who it may be. My life is too short to indulge them.

I'm such a fan of the editorial process that I leave the semi colon out of tldr.

I never bother reading if there are no paragraphs. A massive chunk of text, no thank you. Why do so many people not know how to use paragraphs? I wonder what is being taught at schools.

I know what a fucking acronym is. You’re actually proving my point

What fucking point? That I’d rather use acronyms when I can, instead of writing out longer words?

What’s your beef with that?

She didn't know what tl;dr meant but is too embarrassed to admit it

Are you really this stupid? If I didn’t know what the expression meant, how did I manage to write a comment about it?

I don’t bother reading them if I have to scroll down on this 8” long screen, just click back. If they didn’t bother putting in paragraphs, or any punctuation I put the same amount of effort in and click away from it, expecting people to perform labour for free to decipher the drivel and then respond-nah.

‘Here’s 300 lines of semi literate, unpunctuated wittering about fuck all, I of my LO of DP off too weeks isn’t nice to my of LO and his being shouty and of LO OH lol of went to turn round and said his should of lol’. No. I’d need paid before having to ‘read’ that shit. ((Throws a few ‘xxx’ at the end of the world spam for no reason))

They rarely are warranted though and other posters would usually comprehend better and be more willing to engage if the op edited their post down. In the same way that in real life someone rambling on and taking ages to get to the point usually just causes people's eyes to glaze over after a while.

I agree entirely, but you can’t stop people being rubbish communicators nor can you stop them posting.

Very true. But when you see a post like:

I went away with four friends last week let's call them Lisa, Sue, Michelle and Vicky. Lisa can be a right pain sometimes for instance she sat with a face on her all night when we went out for her birthday cos she didn't like the venue, and when I got married she sulked because I only asked my ds to be bridesmaid cos it was just a simple registry office affair. So she was sulking on the holiday about the food in the hotel and the pool was too small and then she had a go at the waiter about the slow service so Sue and Vicky said.....

Instead of

I went away with a few friends last week. One of them can be a moody pain and was complaining on and on about everything and being rude to the waiter so two of the group said.....

and you can see there's paras and paras to come you just tend to think 'life's too short' and click off. There's rarely a need for a 1000 word explanation of a situation. Most readers would prefer a quick summary.

The site and its obsession with "drip feeding" is turning AIBU into a police hearing where the OP needs to provide a complete witness statement upfront.it's absurd.

This.

Id never heard of tldr

absurd

Very true. But when you see a post like:..

Ha. I much prefer the first version. It tells me why the OP thinks their friend is moody, what type of relationship they had (close enough that bridesmaiding was an expectation), how big the holiday group was, etc.

Show, don’t tell

Fair enough , but the first version drives me mad as its usually followed by ten more paras of what Vicky said and what Sue responded and how the waiter was dead busy because there was a birthday party in the restaurant and then Lisa stormed off and now Vicky wants to go home and....... 😴😴😴😴🙄☹️

Darn, now I’m invested in this story. I want to know what happened next!

The problem is, in your example is that posters will then demand examples of Lisa, being moody, or they couldn't possibly judge.

I'd rather people kept posting for support, instead of being put off by not being able to keep their word count down.

The exceptionally long opening post-thread I mentioned earlier and thought had maybe been removed, is still going strong. A fantastic story building up to porn - so many are sucked in by it! However that was exceptionally long.

Generally, long opening posts are not that long and if they are properly punctuated and paragraphed, are readable.