Deciding on which WP threads to be read in full.

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I periodically assess the latest one to two pages of discussion forums, and often find that threads containing about two-dozen replies are an optimal number of replies to be read in full.

One exception is the ‘Random Discussion Forum’ - that is threads containing around three to even four-dozen replies. Yet, I find that reading several of the earliest, and several of the latest replies (one to two-dozen in total) suffices; as threads with forty-replies can become too cumbersome to read.

Another exception is the ‘Social Skills and Making Friends Forum’ - threads containing around a dozen posts are also optimal; that is very nature of social skills related discussions might just be handled with only about dozen replies. The unwritten rules of social customs “come to mind!”

Giving WP discussion threads with one to two-dozen replies priorities are just one of many ways in deciding which threads we read in full. More often than not, I find the “rough benchmark” of threads containing one to two-dozen replies indicating a pretty-good “pulse” or zeitgeist of WP!

I've read threads way longer than that. Like, over a hundred pages. Though, I tend to skim posts rather than read every word.

Do you also consider diversity of respondents?
If, for example a thread showed up with all responses coming from one "Exuvian", wouldn't it be instantly descried as the tripe it necessarily would be?

idk about a hundred pages but sometimes I read WP addicts anonymous when i'm away for long periods. but then again it continues to accelerate out of my control in page numbers :/

I read what interests me. It doesn’t matter if it’s 1 page or 100s of pages.

In going through a thread, if a post is concise then I read it. If it's lengthy then maybe I'll kinda skim it.

Reading is a slow and somewhat painful process for me.

If it is a necrobumped or extremely long thread I read the first few posts and the ones from the last day or so.

I have trouble reading long stuff also. Reading isn't exactly painful for me as long as I don't do too much of it. I normally use my laptop to read electronic stuff, and it hurts my neck looking down like that, with the fixed position and all. I also have this thing about not spending too much time on any particular thing unless it's clearly necessary, otherwise I worry about neglecting more urgent matters. And sadly I find it harder to read than to write, it's just a bit of a technical struggle turning other people's words into thoughts, especially if the material isn't presented in a very clear, systematic way or doesn't seem to contain any ideas that happen to grab my interest.

So I tend to avoid threads that have become long - about 6 posts filling about one page works quite well. Paragraphs of over about 6 lines I'm tempted to skip, and my brain balks terribly at the prospect of reading through a huge wall of text, though I have this thing about completeness, I can't for the life of me skim things to get the gist, I always feel that if I don't read every word I'll miss something important. I came a cropper the other day by posting before I'd read everything - unfortunately the OP had modified the original question, and I just waded in without seeing that, and thus posted unwanted material.

Other times there's a subject line in the form of a question that I'm interested in, and I've got my reply under construction in my mind before I click the link, then I find the original post shifts the emphasis and renders my intended response redundant. Then I feel frustrated. It's not so bad if the original post isn't long, but when it's a huge wall of text, I often just abort the mission, or simply answer the subject line's question and ignore the shift of emphasis. I've seen cases where the original post is very much about the original poster's life in great detail, but the subject line strongly suggests a more general question and seems to invite people to give their take on it, which probably isn't intended as bait-and-switch, but it can turn out that way for me.

Sometimes I think my scroll finger must be extremely lazy, because I don't like it when people include an already-posted video, picture, or other large object in the stuff they quote when they make their own posts, especially when it happens several times on the same page. There's just not enough text to read before I have to find the "next page" button with the mouse and click it. I don't like using a mouse, I've had strange aches and pains in my fingers which could be repetitive strain injuries, so I don't want to use it unnecessarily. I do a lot of music editing which can be very mouse-intensive with some programs, and it seems reckless to waste my clicks and points. I gather touch-screens give RSIs of their own, and I don't like using them, so that's unlikely to be a solution.

With active discussion forums such as 'The General Autism Discussion' forum, it's natural to apply some types of rough benchmarks e.g., giving discussion threads with one to two-dozen replies priorities in order to understand "the pulse" of a given forum.

The latest discussion topics that pique my interest sometimes just jump-out - regardless of how may replies a given discussion thread contains.

The topics that most often piques my interest are those important (yet often overlooked) topics.

If it's an interesting topic, and only a few pages, I tend to read it in full. However, if it's a really long thread then I usually read the first post, perhaps even the first page, then I often skip to the last few posts.

Unfortunately, the last few posts tend to be unrelated to the original topic, so I sometimes go backwards in the thread to figure out where this shift in focus occurred and why. There are times where the shift makes sense, and other times where it seems completely random.

On other forums I've been on, if they saw that a thread had lost focus like that, then moderators would post at the end of the thread telling people to start a new thread on whatever the current conversation was there, and then they would lock that thread, and anyone who was interested in that conversation would move to the new thread to discuss what the current conversation was rather than the original topic.

If two people on a thread were discussing something more personal that only involves them, and doesn't relate much to the overall topic, then they would usually be encouraged to send a direct messages or PMs to one another instead of holding up the thread.

Personally, I liked that method, and I'm still trying to adjust to the disorganised nature of conversation that seems to rule WP. I think I'm getting used to it now though, and sometimes I follow said rules. Or rather, anti rules. Anywhere else these unwritten rules that people seem to follow here would be considered bad conduct in conversation...

Out of interest, does anyone know if there is a post limit on threads here? If so, what is said limit?

Post limit for threads? Seriously doubt it.

Some threads (like the two threads about sharing sleep dreams) have been going on for years, and have over a 1000 posts.

Well, if there isn't a limit (either by post count or time, or both) then I think there probably should be. Otherwise, people will just keep replying to threads that are no longer relevant (such as that thread everyone was replying to with the inactive OP, including myself).

There are a few things I would change about this website really. For instance, how replies work. Sometimes I just want to know if someone has replied to me directly, without subscribing to the thread itself.

When you have a post in a thread like "Post your random thoughts", subscribing to it isn't great because then you'd be getting notifications for every single message that's posted on that thread, when really all you want to know is if anyone has quoted you, and replied directly to something that you've wrote. (The way it is now, well you have to keep checking on a thread if you want to see if there's any replies to you, and they are easy to miss because you never know if someone will reply to you or not and you might not check when/if they do).

Anyway, I'm getting off track here myself. I might post some of my suggestions/ideas in the suggestions section later. I'm not sure what they are capable of updating or changing here, because this website strikes me as being fairly outdated, and I haven't even seen the state of the coding yet.

I did two years of web design study, so I can be a tad nit picky when it comes to websites, haha.

I didn't read all the posts in this topic, though I did scan some of them. I'll never read any post that's more than 2-3 paragraphs, and if a thread has more than two pages (especially if the title sounds kinda random and "open for interpretation"), I won't read the intermediate posts in general (there are exceptions though). Same goes for e-mails; if they're long, they often never get read and simply get "marked as read" (especially if the title doesn't seem interesting). In fact I don't really reply to many of the emails I get.

Note: I don't reply to all WP threads I read.

So, the rule for making me read stuff is; make the title clear and get to the point, and don't expect a reply.