20 character minimum on posts — yay or nay?

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#1

Continuing the discussion from AirPlay or Bluetooth for home use wireless speaker?:

Just wondering what you guys think of the 20-character limit on posts. The idea behind the 20-character default is that people contribute to the discussion instead of just writing “LOL”, “+1 agreed” etc, as that’s kind of what the like button is designed to be used for, but I dunno, maybe Jesse has a point.

OCAU has a 10-char limit on posts as well, and I see it all the time over there where people append “10char” to posts to let others know that they needed more characters.

What do we think, hive mind?

1 Like
#2

20 is too much, I think, 10 is reasonable if you want to have the restriction in place. I’d prefer to have no restriction at all though.

Could try with no restriction and if the forum starts filling up from +1 posts we could put the limit back?
I think part of the OCAU restriction rationale was to stop people too quickly passing post number restrictions and for keeping their db as small as feasible due to the huge number of members which doesn’t apply to us (yet :wink: )

#3

I don’t see the need for a limit at all. If someone wants to contribute an LOL or +1 how’s that any different than making them type out “That made me laugh out loud” or “I agree with that”?

It looks like the Like and Save buttons are getting a good workout anyway, I think this is only really a problem on forums where those options aren’t available to people (read: vBulletin, etc)

4 Likes
#4

Alright, I’ve reduced the post limit to 5 characters. If we get a noticeable uptick in posts that don’t add to the discussion, I’ll consider increasing it again.

4 Likes
#5

I just spent a good 10min reading the above posts wondering…‘Why in the world would someone want to limit every post to a max of 5, 10, 20 characters? That’s insane’

…Then I realised, minimum…

/facepalm

1 Like
#6

Treat the cause, not the symptom. If somebody fills the place up with low- or no-content replies, tell them to stop and boot them out if they don’t. Simples!

3 Likes