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THIS IS A
Chatterbox: Down to Earth
THIS IS A
THIS IS A PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT.
{The difference between replying to a thread and replying to a comment.}
Sec. one; Replying to a thread (or "add new comment").
One should reply to a thread when your comment is in response to the thread.
For example~
-The thread is dedicated to sharing writing prompts. You have a writing prompt you would like to share. You should click the "Add new comment" button at the bottom of the thread.
-The thread is an rp. You want to submit a character sheet or ask a question. You should click "Add new comment".
-The thread is the art thread. You want to post some of your work. You should click "Add new comment".
Sec. two; Replying to a comment (or "reply").
One should ONLY reply to a comment when one wants to respond to the contents of said comment, NOT the contents of the overall thread.
For example~
-A thread is dedicated to sharing short stories. You like someone's story and want to tell them that you enjoyed it. You should click "reply" at the bottom of that person's post.
-On a thread, someone leaves a comment asking a question. You want to answer said question. You should click "reply".
-Someone leaves a comment about something that happened to them a few years ago. You have also had a similar experience and want to share it with them. You should click "reply".
Sec. three; Summary.
If you want to say something relating to the thread itself, use "Add new comment".
If you have something to say in reply to a comment, use "reply".
{This keeps the Chatterbox organized and non-confusing.}
END OF PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT.
submitted by Alizarine, age unknown, whereabouts uninteresting
(May 16, 2019 - 12:20 pm)
(May 16, 2019 - 12:20 pm)
THANK YOU ALIZARINE.
I really appreciate this post, because I see people mixing this up all the time and it can get really confusing. It’s probably my biggest CB pet peeve, actually (no offense meant to anyone who does it of course). It’s pretty hypocritical of me, considering I used to do it all the time, mostly out of sheer laziness. XD But anyway, yes, thank you for this, and to everyone else: please try not to mix up replying to a thread and replying to comment, if only to conserve my sanity. XP
(May 16, 2019 - 1:06 pm)
(May 16, 2019 - 4:48 pm)
YES! Thank you so much for making this thread, Alizarine!
I'd like to add another example:
The thread is a song (there are plenty of examples of these all over the CB right now), where people post one or two lines at a time and together they get through the whole song. You should not post the next line in response to the line before it; there are two problems with this. (1) If people continue to do this, the comments will get very squishy and difficult to read. (2) This can throw off the order of the comments if, say, person A posts the same line at the same time as you but A's comment is not a reply, but then person B posts the next line in response to your comment, which would make A's line appear to be after B's line and confuse everyone.
Also, being lazy is not a good reason to post your comment at the bottom by clicking the reply button. You should take the small effort to scroll to the top of the page and press Add new Comment instead.
Lastly, and I hope I'm not getting annoying at this point, if you have a genuine response to a comment and said comment isn't on the last page, you should still post the response as a new comment and not a reply. This is because very few people actually read through all the pages instead of just skipping to the last one, and the intended recipient of your response might not see it.
That's all; thanks for reading!
(May 16, 2019 - 6:23 pm)
HOLY CROW THANKYOUTHANKYOU! this is been a problem lately, and I was about to say something myself.
(May 16, 2019 - 6:37 pm)
THIS INFORMATION IS ALSO FOUND ON THE FIRST PAGE OF THE ULTIMATE GUIDE.
(May 16, 2019 - 7:09 pm)
Yes. Thank you for this.
(May 16, 2019 - 8:24 pm)
I've always wondered . . . how do all you people even see the difference? I can never tell whether anyone is replying or adding a new comment at all (except of course by reading their post)
(May 17, 2019 - 9:46 am)
The reply that someone has made to a comment should be kind of indented to the right, like the box for the reply is smaller widthwise than the box for the comment, like this example from the Random Thoughts/Things thread (also, if someone replies to that reply, and someone replies to that, and so on, if that continues to happen they can get very small. But if two people reply to one comment, their posts should just stack beneath the comment and be the same width as each other and that's how you can tell if it's a reply to a comment, or a reply to a reply to a comment or...whatever. Hope that made sense.)
(May 17, 2019 - 11:54 am)
A reply is indented, like this post. See how the outline surrounding this post box is shorter than yours?
(May 17, 2019 - 1:33 pm)
*Standing ovation*
Yeah, a long time ago Mei-xue confronted/attacked/scolded me about posting-in-a-reply and I had no idea what she was even talking about; but eventually I figured it out. XD Now, I get annoyed when I see people doing it. I'm slightly a hypocrite.
(May 17, 2019 - 11:49 am)
Yes, thanks Alizarine! This should be very helpful to a lot of people.
When I first joined, I had no idea how things worked, and it took me forever to figure out that "replying" made the post smaller and smaller. But I eventually got it.
But yeah, Aliza, you explained it great.
(May 19, 2019 - 12:21 pm)
I'm so sorry, I literally used to only use Reply until very recently when I was like "yeah, I should stop."
(May 24, 2019 - 5:15 pm)