Can we have some sort of 'warning' for people who repeatedly post without reading all of OP's posts?

[HyggeTygge]

In the last 3 months or so I think this has gotten so much worse. Not only does it fill up the thread with pointless posts that have been addressed (sometimes days or weeks beforehand), it can actually be quite horrible - in one case a woman being slagged off because a few posters didn't read her sympathetic circumstances.

Could there be a 'report' reason just for this, and perhaps the posts don't need to be removed (but they could be?) but the user asked to 'see all' of OP's posts in future and shown how to do it? And repeat offenders suspended....?!

Or could it even be a note before posting if you go straight to post on a page where you couldn't possibly have read all of OP's posts?

I know it's easy to do, and obviously sometimes OP will update while people are in the process of typing and posting or they haven't refreshed. But when it keeps happening it's really frustrating on a thread and good helpful posts get missed in all the 'OP has actually updated to say this' 'well how was I supposed to know' derails.

'Cancel the cheque!!!' is still as much of an issue now as it was back then!

Same way as MNHQ enforce anything!

It is extremely annoying when you get the first paragraph saying something like “my 6 year old daughter wants a pony” and the first response asks how old the child is.

If an OP sets out the detail of a situation and asks a straight question it is not unreasonable to answer it without reading all the replies.

That's an example where not having even cursorily skimmed the thread can be extremely annoying - it's really not reasonable to weigh in with an answer to the OP (especially if you quote the whole thing) on a thread which already has more than a dozen or so posts. If the question has been clearly put then anyone with an ounce of common sense will realise it'll have already been answered and that the discussion will have moved on.

If the OP put all relevant info in the opening post it would be more helpful. Yabu.

This is why I use the browser and not the app.

Using the talk app doesn't give you the option to read all op posts!

OPs who drip feed important information are to blame for a lot of this.

How do you know they didn’t read it vs read it but missed the age?

They clearly didn’t read it properly - I’m talking about very obvious things here.

But you seem very defensive about this.

You seem very defensive about banning posters for simply missing one tiny detail in an OP.

Thank you. The worst is when it's the very next post. Everyone on a thread should have read the first post, it doesn't need to be repeated and it's very easy to find

It's not necessarily about drip feeds/ missing info from the op. Its just as likely to be that the situation has changed/ moved on and therefore the advice needed has also changed.

Honestly, I don’t agree with you. This doesn’t really bother me and it isn’t likely MN could ever enforce this.

Ultimately it’s an online forum, you can’t police every post. Some people just look at a title and respond based on that. Other people are responding to other posters. Some just aren’t tech savvy or are genuinely confused or have noticed something across OP posts that doesn’t make sense hence referencing to older posts. I don’t imagine getting staff to check every post that gets reported is completely on topic to the last OP update, would be worthwhile to enforce.

I think the spirit of the website is to foster discussion so I’m not sure how warning or suspending people as you want them to
would support that. It would likely do their reputation more harm than good.

I think if anything MN, needs to make it more easy to spot the OP’s responses like Reddit for example, and give the ability to collapse responses that are low value. And possibly remove the thread post limit so “filling up threads” isn’t an issue.

I think the bigger issue is the culture here of pedantry. If posters were not so inclined to correct or argue with other posters, no one would bat an eyelid at this.

It does on iPhone

@MJconfessions I don't think you have been on many extremely long threads where this happens. Posters writing "cancel the cheque" many times after the poster has posted that they have cancelled the cheque is very frustrating to read.

@HyggeTygge I have also asked this of MN before.

Exactly.

People also need to understand that even when they put a lot of emotions into a thread, the poster of it might not be for real as well.

You can't police this stuff.

As much as I agree that all of the annoying things are annoying, as an adult I really don't want to be 'nannied' in that sort of way.

There will always be annoying things on chat forums and as users, it's up to us to either politely state our annoyance or just scroll past.

Did anyone read this reply from MNHQ on another thread today? Here's the relevant part posted at 11.50am....

We've already responded to several hundred reports this morning - it's been incredibly busy and we're doing our best to get through them all as quickly as we can.

I really don't think they need the extra stress just because someone's quoting the opening post, or not reading all the OP's replies.

People quite rightly complain that racist/homophobic/transphobic etc posts can be left up far too long, but it'll only get worse if MNHQ are busy dealing with petty stuff.

I agree it’s annoying but no, I don’t agree it should be policed. What next, disciplining people for spelling mistakes or leaving out apostrophes?

I would like the "reactions" apart from the heart, smile and agreement to also include some form of disagreement.
There isn't much of a way to express different opinion rather than quoting a person.
Similarly, from another bucket, the "dislikes" disappeared from YT comments.
The PP who said about correcting grammar had quite a good idea 😁👍😜

How on earth can you miss the age when it literally is in the first sentence of the OP or the thread title? There was one the other day, "Should I do xxxx with my 6 year old" then went on to mention she had a newborn, the amount of posters asking how old the child was and whether she had any other children was staggering. No reading comprehension whatsoever, so I think a PP is right, whatever rules you make up you can't fix stupid.

People with poor reading comprehension aren't always stupid.

Although I accept it can be annoying at times.

People miss details all the time in a long post. It’s very common. It doesn’t make them stupid. Reading comprehension is measured in terms of what % of a text can you perfectly recall after reading it once.

The average rate of reading comprehension is 60% at the average 200 words per minute reading speed.

So yes, people who have read it, and have above average reading comprehension are still going to miss details. You’re just annonyed that they’re missing a detail you didn’t miss, but rest assured you will have missed details they didn’t miss.

You’re just annonyed that they’re missing a detail you didn’t miss, but rest assured you will have missed details they didn’t miss.

That's a very good way of putting it actually.

Also, reading comprehension can be a little more difficult when English is your second or third language and I would consider multilingual posters as anything but stupid.

Same here. Many things affect reading comprehension rates- dyslexia, attention deficit, poor memory, brain fog (menopause, fatigue, illness), 🍷

Maybe those in favour of this should have a Mensa board for the geniuses who always have 100% reading comprehension with perfect spelling and grammar.

If you're asking a question, though, you could just re-read the OP before pressing post. It's not some kind of exam where you only get to see the post once then have to respond based on whatever percentage you manage to retain.

It doesn't bother me so much when people are like "sorry I missed that bit", but often you get someone derailing threads and/or really aggressively hammering the OP about some point they've made up which has already been contradicted by one of the OP's posts, and they seldom apologise after this is pointed out.