Tomb Titivator
Posts: 911
Joined: Thursday, 17th December 2015, 02:36
Sunday, 6th March 2016, 01:44
Replace thanks with laughs
so it's clear that people miss the opportunity to express their appreciation of a good joke. I'm afraid this “thanks” “thanks me too” running gag won't end soon. Plus, what about the people who want to thank, but hold back from spamming “lol thanks” messages? They skew others away from reading legitimately funny posts, out of politeness. One of the reasons thanks are getting throttled is they're ambiguous. Well that's because gratitude is ambiguous, no matter whether it's applied to an OP or to a reply. So let's disambiguate thanks: they are funny-thanks. Solemn thanks, if necessary, can be expressed in actual messages, which they often are anyway, even with the thank feature.
Another advantage of laughs is that people can use them to express their opinion about a proposal. Too often on GDD people mutter some banal design cliche or declare their lack of conviction and call it a day. It's a cheap way to seep credibility from an idea, because it doesn't add anything of value but it does invoke a level of apparent sophistication that a mere laugh doesn't. In other words, it creates the illusion that a counter-argument has been made. Laughs would not prevent people from making such pointless posts, but it would give them an alternative outlet which, if used, creates a more accurate impression of the situation. If the ability to revert a thank is carried over to laughs, you could meaningfully change your position by unlaughing, which is as good as a thank. All of the above also applies to bad advice and its shunning.
Laughs also mitigate the sense of mob mentality by taking the bite out of potentially offensive posts, since people can't “agree” with them by thanking.
so let's
Another advantage of laughs is that people can use them to express their opinion about a proposal. Too often on GDD people mutter some banal design cliche or declare their lack of conviction and call it a day. It's a cheap way to seep credibility from an idea, because it doesn't add anything of value but it does invoke a level of apparent sophistication that a mere laugh doesn't. In other words, it creates the illusion that a counter-argument has been made. Laughs would not prevent people from making such pointless posts, but it would give them an alternative outlet which, if used, creates a more accurate impression of the situation. If the ability to revert a thank is carried over to laughs, you could meaningfully change your position by unlaughing, which is as good as a thank. All of the above also applies to bad advice and its shunning.
Laughs also mitigate the sense of mob mentality by taking the bite out of potentially offensive posts, since people can't “agree” with them by thanking.
so let's
