I don't know how many would agree with me, but I would like to bring to the attention of the Moderators etc. that oftentimes some very helpful and well-meant posts get diluted and even confusing when someone decides to pick on one sentence and discuss it to bits. One such topic is "Soft Skills" and there are many others too that have started off well and then gotten distorted because someone decided to "take the bull by the tail."

Please excuse my bluntness, but this forum has been very helpful to many of us and we would like to see it getting better and recommend it to more of our friends. It sometimes happens that after a prolonged break we get back to the forum to catch up on some interesting stuff and get confused when it has taken a tangent.

I wonder whether someone could step in at an opportune time and get the topic back in focus. This criticism is meant to be constructive and no offence meant, please.

Marian

-----------------------------------------------------------------
The best way to make your dreams come true is to wake up - - Paul Valery

Speaking of straying from the subject, what is your message doing under the Jobs section?

Also, it is pretty difficult to prevent a thread from straying.
This is after all a free and open forum and I think barring certain types of posts, everything else is allowed.

I am not a moderator, so I can't comment any further, but as a user I would hate to see the moderators step in every time a thread deviates from the topic.

Plus it is more work for the moderators - would you volunteer to be such a moderator who has to keep track of all threads throughout the day?

Come on, we are all humans and it is very normal to digress like this.

I guess you are not in IT and haven't been a member of a technical discussion list, isn't it?
If you were, you would have seen highly technical discussions on C++ pointer aritmetic digress into solving the world food problem, communism and the endangered spotted owl species

-----------------------------------------------------------------
"Mah deah, there is much more money to be made in the destruction of civilization than in building it up."

-- Rhett Butler in "Gone with the Wind"

Quote:

---

Orginally posted by pratickm

Speaking of straying from the subject, what is your message doing under the Jobs section?

Also, it is pretty difficult to prevent a thread from straying.
This is after all a free and open forum and I think barring certain types of posts, everything else is allowed.

I am not a moderator, so I can't comment any further, but as a user I would hate to see the moderators step in every time a thread deviates from the topic.

Plus it is more work for the moderators - would you volunteer to be such a moderator who has to keep track of all threads throughout the day?

Come on, we are all humans and it is very normal to digress like this.

I guess you are not in IT and haven't been a member of a technical discussion list, isn't it?
If you were, you would have seen highly technical discussions on C++ pointer aritmetic digress into solving the world food problem, communism and the endangered spotted owl species

---

-----------------------------------------------------------------
The best way to make your dreams come true is to wake up - - Paul Valery

Margo,

I can totally identify with your post. As a moderator, its really frustrating to see this straying. However I've come to accept it as an inevitable consequence of the ease of conversation that the net affords us. I'm guilty myself of doing this ocassionally.

As moderators, we do step in from time to time when any one of us feels that things are getting out of hand and I've locked a few discussion myself this way.

However, it is impossible to micro-manage the board to stem straying completely. For two main reasons

1) It would take too much time.
2) It would amount to too much censorship which we try to stay away from.

Many times, some member steps in on their own to put the thread back on course, only to have it stray again at a later point. So the onus lies upon the reader mostly to sift through the garbage and extract substance.

Anyways, its a good point that you make and I really hope members themselves make a conscious effort to refrain from straying.

-----------------------------------------------------------------
Are you there?

Thanks BL for appreciating the point I was trying to make. While the freedom enjoyed by all in this forum is really great, it should be used in a more positive way for the greater benefit of all.

Regards, Marian

-----------------------------------------------------------------
The best way to make your dreams come true is to wake up - - Paul Valery

I agree with Margo.

Incidentally my reply on "Soft Skills" thread is in line with Margo's sentiments.

But as they say (after reading BL's remarks here) that a public forum is difficult to be controlled on all aspects.

Nonetheless even with few shortcomings I still find this forum a worthy place to visit everyday.....

-----------------------------------------------------------------
ashbamor

Hi Margo and others,

As BL has concurred, straying from the main post is oft prevelent in this forum - and specifically the one that you have pointed out, I am one of the guilty ones. However, realising that, I immediately withdrew from the discussion, though I could have continued the strayed one with lot of emphasis.

Now let us take a practical situation - we have a big get-togather at our place where say three persons sit down and start discussing something. Suddenly, someone from the other group or after having served himself a drink, joins the the first group and picks up from the last few lines he might have heard, or some phrases that suddenly appeal to him to voice his thoughts. While two persons in the original group want stick to the original discussion, one of them replies to the newcomer.........and hell, the direction of the discussion either changes completely, or takes on a related but slightly new subject. Now, if the point raised by the new entrant to the group is not very strong enough, all four come back to the original discussion, or another one of the original group leaves to talk to someone else, or to refill his drink. And so on and so forth. So the chances are, either the topic might be discussed to the full extent, or it could turn out to be something which started with puja on Diwali and ended with Bush and WMD This is something which happens with our everyday life and it is not controllable.

Not exactly the same, but very similar to that, it happens on this forum too. The difference is that the topics are clearly identified, and a participant can choose and pick to join one or more, while in a party at home, it is not so easy to move from one to another group or attend to two or more groups at a time. Secondly, here we do have moderators, who, time permitting and if justified, do pop in and try to put back the discussion on the original (I wouldn't say right - since the digression could be right too) track. However, if it done very often, participants will feel that it is a police academy and might decide to leave it. That in my view would be more undesireable, when compared to letting the discussions divert to certain limits.

What do you say?

Chandresh

-----------------------------------------------------------------
Chandresh

Advice is free – lessons I charge for!!