Forum Rules

[Jan Klimkowski]

In very lengthy posts containing quotes from a second party,
I frequently lose track of the party of the first part and the
party of the second part.

I do not mind length per se, but length without knowing who
is talking is something I usually scroll right through. If it is
too hard to know who is speaking, I lose interest.

Jack

Jack - a most fair point.

However, when one hits the "quote" button, as I have done to your post, you will see the following within square brackets.

QUOTE=Jack White;18387 and /QUOTE

If one wants to quote a particular part of a post, or a particular part of an exchange, then as long as one preserves these codes within square brackets, then the identity of the original poster(s) will still be clear.

What I personally find most irritating is a long post which is immediately quoted in full for the new poster to offer a couple of words of new commentary. It can lead to an entire page of a thread containing no more than three or four fresh thoughts.

My own judgement is that if one is responding to a post immediately above, it creates a much more fluid discussion to state: "With regard to post #3 above" or to select within quote marks the particular point being addressed.

My post #23 here:
http://www.deeppoliticsforum.com/forums/...800&page=3

is an example of where I have used the square quote brackets to extract the two parts of Ruben Mundaca's post which I want to address. It's clear who is talking when and, in my judgement, leads to a more fluid conversation than quoting an entire post.