Matthew Hunter <matthew at infodancer.org> wrote on Fri, 14 Jun 2002 13:32:05 > On Fri, Jun 14, 2002, Thomas Yan <tyan at twcny.rr.com> wrote: > > Matthew Hunter <matthew at infodancer.org> wrote on Fri, 14 Jun 2002 02:57:02 > > > [...] lets put a warning *prominently* in the list > > > rules that spoilers are rampant and if you have not read > > > everything available, beware... > > > This seems to me like a great way to scare people off. > > How is this different than putting spoiler warnings into every > message? Here's a little table of how the trade-offs of these 2 alternatives look to me. [Please view in a fixed width font, e.g. Courier New.] If a reader is If a poster doesn't want worried about spoilers to add spoilers. -------------------------------------------------------------- | Spoiler protection is | Don't worry, be happy. | Protection | not required, so you probably | | is *not* | shouldn't join: Steve has done | | required | a great job of foreshadowing, | | | so spoilers are likely to | | | spring up even in previously | | | safe-for-you discussions. | | -------------------------------------------------------------- | Spoilers are supposed to be | Please make sure a post | Protection | protected, so you should be | has adequate protection, | *is* | able to avoid most by paying | e.g. at least a broad | required | heed to the warnings. | spectrum warning. | -------------------------------------------------------------- > > Please explain why a simple "Rampant spoilers for everything Brustian" > > warning is significantly inefficient? > > Look at the amount of traffic we can generate when discussions > are running. Are you seriously arguing that typing a spoiler > warning into every message -- of which there are already nearly > 300, in a week or so -- is NOT significantly less efficient than > a single warning? Do you retype in quoted text? I don't. So since I expect most posts in a discussion to be replies, I expect most posts to automagically inherit *some* protection without any extra work. Sure, protection will need broadening now and then, but I expect that to be unneeded most of the time. - tky