To Powayseller and Sdrealtor

[Jim Brubaker]

I’m getting tired of reading minutes of what you have done or done to each other. Both of your last blurbs were totally worthless.

The only reason I am mad, is that both of your blurbs were a waste of my time. I don’t care who got up and told their life story and I could care less who you had lunch with.

If you can’t enlighten us with your views on the subject of real estate, I suggest that you stop posting. THIS CRAP HAS TO STOP!

While I’m at it,If you can’t say what you mean in 500 words, you need to write a letter to the editor.

sign me

Pissed off

[sdduuuude]

I agree. Succinct = good

[zk]

Yes.

[KingKong]

Yes!

[tucker…]

yes

[Anonymous]

I disagree with Mr. Brubaker; seems to me that people around here can pick and choose what they wanna read.

Forums are multitudes of us coming together. Some give economic food for thought, others ask specific questions about a neighborhood, others post personal advice questions, and some people intertwine with story telling.

If you don’t like it, you don’t have to read it.

My favorite article is wayyyy over your 500 words limit called Sell Now and my wife and I got the book because we liked the posting so much.

[Jim Brubaker]

Rocky I have no qualms with the original post length. Its the replies that were getting to me. Some of the threads get to be 5 pages long, and from there its very hard to follow the issue unless you have a lot of time to read each post. From reading some of the replies, it looks to me like the very long responses just get skimmed over and not really read.

Everyone has something to say, its the listener or reader that has limited time.

[pencilneck]

I agree completely. Postings should consist of little more than either praise or condemnation of the prior post and a smarmy comment.

Two or three lines should cover it.

[rankandfile]

I think that if there is a recurring problem with long replies, and a lot of people don’t like it, then the host can put a cap on the word count, if it hasn’t been done already. I don’t think it would be wise to handcuff respondents by forcing them to make 2-3 sentence replies. I personally have found a lot of good information in, and enjoy reading some of the longer replies. This depends on who wrote the replies, of course. And if I don’t want to read it, I simply scroll down and move on to the next page. The irony here is that you aren’t forced to read the replies, yet you are trying to force how others reply. I’m not so sure that is a good approach. The repliers are only hurting their own reputation when they post long, meaningless comments. Doing so will make readers less likely to read what they have to say…simple supply and demand.

PS: Sorry for going over the 2-3 sentence reply limit.

[pencilneck]

Pardon my attempt at humor.

I believe short replies such as the one provided by myself above are much more damaging to dialog than long replies. I read several financial and housing related blogs, and thanks to posters such as Powayseller, this is one of the best.

Thanks for giving us the opportunity to post here Rich.

[sdduuuude]

Ya – it isn’t the number of words, it is the insight-to-number-of-words ratio. Also important is the insight-to-insult ratio. Ah – more ratios. Can we plot those on a per-user basis?

500 words is a good rule of thumb, though, not necessarily a limit. As the post grows past 500 words, we should ask ourselves – “is this really that insightful.”

[rankandfile]

I agree that maybe there should be a reasonable cap limit of X words. I do know that one of the first posts I read on this website was pretty long (I can’t remember who posted it), but it taught me like 5 or 6 things about the housing industry that I didn’t have a clue about before. That’s what got me hooked on this site.

[Jim Brubaker]

Don’t get me wrong, when I was in High School a 500 word report was a dreaded assignment– TWO typewritten pages.

I don’t think that anyone should be limited by “us other posters,” it more of a courtesy sort of thing.

What I am trying to point out, is that a short post will be read, a long post will most likely be skimmed or skipped.

[docteur]

I believe a long post will be skimmed or skipped if it doesn’t grab the reader initially. Some of the topics on this forum are complicated and need a detailed and precise explanation, which often can be lengthy.

I sincerely enjoy the oftentimes long but highly informative posts of several of this forum’s participants. These are complex times and in depth disucssions are the catalyst that keeps this forum moving.

Remember, we always have the choice to read or ignore a post. If we skip a great post because it is too long, then it is our loss. Some folks write like Hemingway, others like Michener. Both hold my attention because their content is what matters.

[Author]

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