I have a serious Newby question

[hickman1937]

Why is it when ever you guy's post a link to free republic, I go there, and it sounds like a circle jerk? The same 2 or 4 people responding. Is this a technical thing with their site?

[TaleWgnDg]

1. Nah, it's probably a DNA thing . . . n/t

[Merlot]

2. They all think alike

There may be more than 2 or 4 people but they all say the same things.

[hickman1937]

6. No really

There's usually only 2-4 names responding to any thread. A stampede seems to be about 7.

[Truman01]

3. No, it is a circle jerk! nt

[politicaholic]

4. They only have six members.

The freep site puts DU down for getting donations to run their site because they can't admit that they couldn't maintain a site with doantions from the tightwad in-it-for-myself morons they have on there.

[Sporadicus]

5. Because It IS a Circle Jerk?

or a circle of jerks. Seriously, the software running that place is pathetic. It's like a throwback to the early '90s. Very confusing to keep track of the thread when the only reference to whom someone is replying is the dickweed's name. It's so much better to have a graphic showing how a thread is structured; I have to refer to those graphic depictions frequently when trying to interpret a very long thread here at DU. It's damn near impossible in The Troll Hole (not that I really give two shits anyway who's replying to whom over there anyway).

[candy]

9. What's a circle jerk?

[crispini]

12. Hoo boy, the instant anyone responds to this..

instant threadlock. :evilgrin:

[hickman1937]

13. A group of usually teen boys

standing in a circle jerking off, or it was in the 60's.

[Sporadicus]

14. I'd Tell You

but the thread would get locked. Ahhh, what the hell...imagine a circle of men, each one administering masturbatory maneuvers to the fellow to his right (I assume right, since the majority of people are right-handed).

[hickman1937]

11. Do they do this on purpose?

[Sporadicus]

16. I Don't Claim Any Insight into the Mind of a Freeper

I believe the software is crappy on purpose, since the owner gets to pocket any donations without making useful upgrades to the site. As for thread development over there, I've noticed that it resembles a wolf pack - complete with alpha males and more subservient toadies. The sycophants spend a good deal of energy trying to outdo each other in order to curry favor from the alpha males. Very hierarchial, chauvinistic structure. Good little fascists.

[snippy]

7. Because freepers are coprophagic and must eat often they spend

a great deal of their time emptying their colostomy bags, which they call MREs because of their love for military jargon.

[Ediacara]

8. Well it is partially a circle jerk and partially technical

They don't have branching threads like we do, so it never seems like anything is actualy a response to what was posted, just random and bizaar comments having something to do with something said up-thread, but without any real context.

[crispini]

10. They boot people off for anything remotely resembling debate.

Sometimes the booted come over here and complain about it, which is how I know. :)

[brainshrub]

15. Serious reply:

I've thought of that same question, and it lies in the format of the forum.

Here at DU, we use a branch-based, visual thread system that makes topics easy to follow and reply to. This allows posters to have an ongoing give-and-take conversation with the rest of the membership.

At Freep they use a scroll-based thread system that does not engender a conversational style because the reader has to dig through everyone else's material in order to put anything into context. After a post gets a certain number of replies, it doesn't even fit on the same page... so most of the comments don't even get read.

I often wonder why the admins at Freep keep this cumbersome system when there are many thread-based software applications that could easily accommodate their needs and make everything smoother.

The only answer I can think of is that they don't want comments to be easily perused because it would uncover their own dearth of intellectual ability.

[hickman1937]

17. My opinion only

Maybe they want people to have to jump through a lot of hoops first, while their lurking, before they can really participate. Isn't that a tad elitist? How did these people get profiled on CNN and not Skinner or Elad? Skinners choice?

[brainshrub]

18. When did they get profiled on CNN?

It could also be because, like typical conservatives, they don't like change once they have found something that used to work.

[hickman1937]

19. Actually I read it here.

They were talking about defending the monuments from violent liberals during the inauguration. I think profiled was wrong. More like spotlighted.