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Krizaz
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Krizaz
2,399 posts
Nomad

Now, raise your hands if you have good punctuation and grammar.
60% of us, good.

NO! Walls of Text

You know what I hate? Walls of text, nobody likes reading walls of text, people want information in summed up sentences, short and to the point.

You probably notice that I don't do walls of text in my post, the most lines of text I do are probably 3 lines down. This is because I hate reading my own post of walls of text, I might feel good after I get done, but then I notice nobody's reading it until the 1 in 100 devoted reader comes along and makes a comment.

I thought "Why would somebody skip my excellent literature?"
I answered "Because people hate walls of text."

So I changed my habits, I started typing up these short paragraphs, which are short and to the point, so if you get confused on something you can generally pin them down.

Now I know many of you will go "But Krizaz, I just absolutely love walls of text!" Well, your one in a few, or you may say you love walls of text, but then go and see one, and just ignore it because your too lazy.


Include Photos

http://caffaknitted.typepad.com/.a/6a00e54f8f86dc883401287636e5db970c-800wi

Look! A puppy!

Don't you just want to read this entire post now?
I personally find myself looking at the photos before anything else, I see a photo and skip right down to it, I don't care what your text says at that point, but the, magically, I do care what it says. Because we're attracted to color we like photos, it makes us more interested and acute.

images?q=tbn<i class=http://ewans.files.wordpress.com/2008/07/grey1.jpg" alt="http://t0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbnhttp://ewans.files.wordpress.com/2008/07/grey1.jpg" />

I bet you just locked on to that.

See how the gray photo was boring and uninteresting to you, you don't hate that color, it's just boring, it has nothing to study unlike the puppy picture.

I'm positively sure you didn't read the wall of text part.
Admit it.

Boring Post

I see this a lot in the Forum Games section, I get annoyed when I see my score for 'rate the above user' as just 8/10, instead of a reason why we rate that user that score. People can't read your mind.

Boring post really don't happen all that often, it's more of just a post here you don't have anything to say. There's really not much to say about boring post other than have a motive when you start to post.

Links

Links are awesome, they're blue, and they make you look like your smart. See how fascinated you are.

Including a link can also help when people want to know where you got your information, whether it's a legitimate site, or just some stupid conspiracist site.

When I see a nice link to a article, I try to click it, unless I honestly have no interest in the subject.

What we've learned

Walls of text are generally unanswered
Pictures Rule
Boring post are boring
Links are smart

R=(-W)P*(-B)L

R = Respect
-W = No Walls of Text
P = Picture
-B + No boring post
L = Links

Enjoy the free advice.

  • 32 Replies
Krizaz
offline
Krizaz
2,399 posts
Nomad

I read it, then the dog interrupted. Then I read on, and scrolled past the dog to be able to further ignore it.


The dog was too see if you would scroll down to it and read that section before the "Wall of Text" part, congratz, you passed.

And what made me laugh out loud was the fact that "you argument against walls of text, yet... you make a 'Berlin Wall of text' to proove your point! XD


I assure you my picket fence was nothing near actual walls of text.

The dog part does support your statement, but... that would mean slowing down the loading time of the thread pages, because everyone will paste pictures in their posts all the time! Ever though of that?


That was the point of the dog, . Our internet loads AG pretty fast, so no, I didn't really think about internet servers that take a while to load images.

I never meant to support lots of pictures, just a few to get the reader interested, that has worked for me on my topics.
Krizaz
offline
Krizaz
2,399 posts
Nomad

This topic really isn't that long compared with this and this. Click the second one, it's much longer.

Ernie15
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Ernie15
13,344 posts
Bard

You're right, beastahayes, you can't always trust links when they're posted anywhere, unless it's some newer user who doesn't know BBCode and has their link in regular URL form instead of in blue text, but even that takes some BBCode knowledge, and sometimes (though seldom), you'll have a user who knows BBCode well enough to disguise one link as another link, and when that happens, you can only rely on one thing to help you out with trusting that link, and that's your handy-dandy status bar, which, if it isn't a default on your browser, you can find it under "View" and then under "Toolbars", and then you're life will change forever, because no longer will you ever have to be living in fear or rick rolls and soul stealers, but I've gone off-topic at this point, and now I will try to set myself back on the topic, which is about long walls of text, and those long, boring walls of text are always annoying when they pop up in front of you, and you just don't feel that you have to read them, because there are so many words that you just feel overwhelmed by reading them, but the best technique when creating a long wall of text if you don't want to use any pictures, links, or spaces between the lines, is making the entire wall of text one giant run-on sentence, because once you start reading it, you never stop, and I have proof, because if you're quoting this post right now, you've obviously read the rest of this long wall of text and you really want to stop, but you can't because there are no periods or any other form of punctuation besides commas, so if you stop now, you'll stop mid-sentence, and you wouldn't finish reading one sentence of the text-wall, and that never looks good on your permanent record, now does it?

Krizaz
offline
Krizaz
2,399 posts
Nomad

Ernie, I read you wall, but by around this

you're quoting this post right now, you've obviously read the rest of this long wall of text and you really


line my eyes started to hurt. horrible grammar Ernie, just horrible.
Ernie15
offline
Ernie15
13,344 posts
Bard

Don't make me give you a whole lecture about how when I declare at some point in the run-on sentence that it is, in fact, a run-on sentence, like this one you're reading right now, grammar is no object.

Aside from that, did you notice that my run-on sentence never used a period, even at the end? It was just one giant question. One more reason to make a wall of text into one sentence: if someone sees a question mark at the end, they'll look for the beginning of the sentence to start the question without reading the rest of the post. If, however, that question turns out to be the entire wall of text, the only way to accurately answer the question would be to read the entire wall of text.

Krizaz
offline
Krizaz
2,399 posts
Nomad

So what your saying is... Walls of Text are spam. Sucking us in and spitting us out confused, and far form home.

Klaushouse
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Klaushouse
2,770 posts
Nomad

This is stupid advice from someone clearly from 4chan and has no grasp on how to keep people reading without shitty gimmicks.

knight_34
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knight_34
13,817 posts
Farmer

This topic really isn't that long compared with this and this. Click the second one, it's much longer.


I've seen longer. Go and seek out Cenere and Strop.

This is stupid advice from someone clearly from 4chan and has no grasp on how to keep people reading without ****ty gimmicks.


Lol, Klaushouse always speaking like he talks.
leo99rules
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leo99rules
2,765 posts
Nomad

I've seen longer. Go and seek out Cenere and Strop.


You just had to make me go to WEPR didn't you...*collapses from exhaustion*
knight_34
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knight_34
13,817 posts
Farmer

You just had to make me go to WEPR didn't you...*collapses from exhaustion*


Not there. In the wonderful place named the Tavern. Though you will have to go back dozens of pages.
Cenere
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Cenere
13,657 posts
Jester

It's still considered a wall of text even if you do break it up into short paragraphs

Urban dictionary does not agree.
A piece of writing that does not use proper grammar and generally looks like a giant essay with 20 to 400 sentences without using paragraphs or any bit of spacing at all.
UD Wall of text

And example would be if I posted any part of my fantasy-project-paper here. And the grammar would be so bad, it would be in Danish.

@the wall of text kings-issue: Go see the WoM. Or rather, go here. No, I am not going to find my rants... These are of course paragraph'd, for an easier read, but there is a lot of text, especially in the later pages.
Pazx
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Pazx
5,845 posts
Peasant

Breaking it up into paragraphs doesn't make It any shorter is what him and I were saying, although it may not be a wall of text.

Wow, that line I just wrote was atrocious.

Cenere
offline
Cenere
13,657 posts
Jester

Breaking it up into paragraphs doesn't make It any shorter is what him and I were saying, although it may not be a wall of text.

I know, I just said that Beast was wrong is saying a wall of text is something that has been broken into paragraphs.
It is still long and sometimes hard to read through a lot of text, yes, but paragraphs does make it a bit easier, especially because people have a tendency of saying the most important first in their paragraph, and then explain it further down through the paragraph, just as I am doing now.
WexMajor82
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WexMajor82
1,026 posts
Nomad

I love shorth answers.
And I hate walls of text.
Even more, I hate wall of text with spelling mistakes.
Walls of text remind me of Exel...

Asherlee
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Asherlee
5,001 posts
Shepherd

Are we not just arguing aesthetics, here?

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