Why we’re BANNING reader comments in SILLY capitals

Steely Dan says:

03:43pm | 23/02/10

Seconded.  If you can’t work out when you’ve got Caps Lock on, you’re probably not worth listening to. Sorry, but it’s true.

What about removing comments based on groan-worthy wordplay as a substitute for reasoned argument? Eg:
‘Krudd is dud! Liebor is communists!’
or
‘Brown isn’t Green he’s Red!’
or
‘Abbottom is crap!’

Daniel says:

04:47pm | 23/02/10

The “capitals = shouting” argument is really very tenuous.  Essentially some socially inept geeky types decided some time around 1990 that it would be so.  That the mass public allows itself to be so dictated to is bewildering.
Capitals have been around a hell of a lot longer than the internet.  They were never associated with shouting in their many hundreds of years’ use before.
For the Punch to give in to this dogma is a sign of appalling weakness.

Charles Kelly says:

10:49pm | 23/02/10

I agree with you completely Daniel. As far as I’m concerned, capitalising individual words adds visual EMPHASIS to those words - essentially highlighting them as key words/points. The whole “shouting” argument is infantile. I couldn’t care less if some people interpret it as “shouting”, because if they’re that weak-minded, their opinion is inconsequential to me.

Pavlo says:

10:23am | 24/02/10

Okay Daniel, if that’s the case how would you like to read your newspaper articles or online stories in allcaps all the time? It’s similar to using bold face type ALL the time. Plenty of studies have show that large amounts of text in all caps are not as legible as upper and lower case type. Caps are great for emphasis in text, display use or sometimes for use in headlines.

James says:

10:39am | 24/02/10

Okay then, how about the “capitals as stupid” argument.  I reckon a pretty strong case can be made that, if one sees the need to emphasise certain points, then their argument must be pretty weak to begin with.  A strong argument speaks for itself.  Anyone who thinks they need to capitalise words must be pretty weak minded, and their opinions are inconsequential and thus go unread by the majority of us.

Charles Kelly says:

03:03pm | 24/02/10

Adding visual EMPHASIS to individual words through capitalising (essentially highlighting them as key words/points) is a form of “dumbing down” a written argument to allow for the dismal lack of cognitive and comprehensive ability displayed with alarming regularity by many posters here and elsewhere. It’s unfortunate, but necessary nonetheless. Of course there are those for whom capitalising, incessant repetition or any amount of “dumbing down” is clearly an exercise in futility - and generally these are the people who object to such actions.

James says:

05:09pm | 24/02/10

Or it could be, Charles, that sometimes people disagree with you because you are wrong.  In that case, no amount of repetition or shouting or capitalising or personal abuse is going to do anything for your arguments.  We are all wrong from time to time; it takes a big person to admit that, and a small person to simply dress mutton as lamb by adding capitals.

Charles Kelly says:

05:31pm | 24/02/10

No James. If I (and many others apparently) capitalise individual words, it’s to add visual EMPHASIS to those words - that is my intention, and no overweight, pimply faced, socially dysfunctional geek is going to tell me differently! Therefore James, if YOU interpret my capitalisation as shouting, clearly YOU ARE WRONG.

Aysha says:

04:58pm | 23/02/10

They had no option with the old system but that has not been the ‘case’ for a number of years.

Julia (not THAT one) says:

11:32am | 24/02/10

I hated those. I could never get the gist of the content because I was sidetracked by the shouting.

A good sign a correspondent to an MP’s office is insane is the use of capitals and underlining to make points. Repeatedly.

MC says:

07:50am | 23/02/10

Agreed, Claudia. However, when articles appear on this website with spelling and grammar errors by people that are paid to write, what hope is there for the rest of us?

KH says:

07:56am | 23/02/10

I’ll assume you meant ‘grammar’.

bec says:

08:15am | 23/02/10

I too despise poor spelling and shocking “grammer”.

Nanabel Lector says:

08:55am | 23/02/10

No, don’t ban shocking Grammers!  Sending rude letters is the only fun I have left in life.

James says:

10:01am | 23/02/10

Grammar is becoming more obsolete by the day as new generations’ knowledge in the field is decreasing. Who cares? They still seem to be able to communicate and understand meaning.

The only reason fuddy-duddies whinge about grammar is so they can hold a red pen and have a job, and to feel superior in their own laughable bubble.

Scott says:

10:35am | 23/02/10

Hehe, grammer…

papachango says:

11:34am | 23/02/10

while we’re at it how about banning emoticons?   :-p (_|_)

IMHO we should also ban stupid Internet acronyms lol, roflmao

Wot abt slly txt spk?

and those sarc tags are really clever aren’t they? /sarc

Schmavo says:

12:19pm | 23/02/10

here, here…....banning shocking grammer (sic) would make it way more betterer than before

JoeyDel says:

03:21pm | 23/02/10

Hehe… I am going to give you the benefit of the doubt and assume that you mispelt ‘grammar’ in an attempt to make your post hilarious.

D'oh says:

03:23pm | 23/02/10

Schmavo, that would be ’ hear hear ’ not ’ here here ‘.

Punshu A. Shun says:

01:20am | 24/02/10

Schmavo, when making a citation and using “sic”, the convention requires the square parenthesis—that is these “[ ]” —and not the curved brackets.

Vicki PS says:

09:01am | 24/02/10

@James:  Poor grammar = poor communication.  To confirm how difficult it is to communicate with the average under-20, try having a serious discussion in a Facebook group.  Composing a reply more complex than “wtf?” is beyond most of them, and they wouldn’t understand a sequential argument if it jumped up and bit them on the arse.  Conversely, a reasonably literate person can usually decipher the kindy-level mumbles that pass for conversation, but their attempts to argue a point tend to be mostly of the “yeah but, no but” genre. 

No James, they cannot communicate and understand meaning because they lack the tools.

Stephen Fitzpatrick says:

11:42am | 23/02/10

No Robert, Australia and The United States of America are examples of democracies. The Punch is what we call a website, and traditionally, the owers of a website can do whatever they please. Including enforcing the proper use of capital letters. However, I’m pretty sure your hand gun is safe.

To answer your question, and the question of other annoying commentors on this site who appear to be frothing at the mouth, capitals has ~always~ meant shouting on the internet, and your need to make certain words stand-out isn’t going to change that. Instead, internet communities much older than The Punch have used the tilde symbol to demote empahsis. Try it.

papachango says:

12:12pm | 23/02/10

see above - italics work - just use html tags.  bold and underline don’t work.

COF says:

08:40am | 23/02/10

Careful Steve,

Atkinson has a habit of protecting his reputation legally. I think he’s a wonderful bloke, just that his policy approach is misguided - right Michael?

acker's says:

09:33am | 23/02/10

It took me year’s of drawing nude picture’s during English classe’s to develop my apostrophic sometimes catastrophic style… don’t shut me down’s

T.Chong says:

09:23am | 23/02/10

Chris :although opposite sides of the political fence, i agree.
Whenever Ive been gob smacked by connservsatives lack of insight, and are being too foolish for their own good, I’ve wanted to hit the keyboard in exasparation , often cap locking.
Mind you my rage is justified, as I live too far from major centers to sit one to one and explain to you all how wrong you are you, so am grateful to be able to pontificate via this medium.
Ps Dave, I hoap yur not gonna be two harsh on spellung?

Chris L says:

01:24pm | 23/02/10

I normally enjoy the political smackdowns that occur at this website, but what really baffles me is how anyone thinks either side is going to loose an election?
“LET LOOSE THE DOGS OF VOTING!”

Sceptical says:

09:50am | 23/02/10

At first, I opposed the banning of capitals purely because it seemed trivial.
But if it leads to formersnag taking his ranting to another site - go for it!

papachango says:

11:40am | 23/02/10

Sometimes capitalising a single word or phrase for emphasis can be effective, though a whole paragraph of caps is annoying.

However, if I recall, basic html tags work on this site, so you can always use bold, italic, <u>underline</u> or even a <u>combination thereof</u>

papachango says:

11:59am | 23/02/10

hmm from my little experiment it seems that only italics work. Bold doesn’t render, and underline not only doesn’t render but you also see the tags.

Italics should be good enough for emphasis, however. It’s traditionally been used that way in novels.

You can always use *_other means_* to empasise your point…

papachango says:

05:24pm | 23/02/10

...though if you’re going to use tags, don’t forget to close them. otherwise every comment after yours will be in italics !

DG says:

11:21am | 23/02/10

Mr Todd,

As per your request of 23 February 2010 (at 9:27am) the Oxford Dictionary has been adopted as the official standard for communications on The Punch.

As a consequence of this change your aforementioned communication is to be removed from this site. It does not meet the high standards required by The Punch.

“Touchstone” (meaning: standard, criterion) is, according to that standard, a single word rather than two words.

That standard also requires that where, instead of the full text, the abbreviation for “postscript” is used, it should take the form “P.S.”.

In addition, it has been put to the executive of The Punch that all further communications should be, to the fullest extent practicable, proper in both form and tone. Colloquial or informal language have no place in Australia’s best conversation and, to that end, we require that sentences be divided by commas and (where further clarification or qualification is desired) in parentheses, respectively.

Regards,
DG

P.S The Oxford Dictionary, rather than the Shorter Oxford Dictionary, has been adopted to allow for the use of longer words.

Ben says:

10:15am | 23/02/10

You obviously didn’t read the article in its entirety before getting on you high horse did you?
P.S. Penbo and fellow punchees, I think this is a great idea. If you have to yell at someone to make your point then the discussion is basically over already.

James2 says:

10:39am | 23/02/10

Well said Ben.  Next move is to make people remove stupid terms like “leftard”, “right-whinger”, and other inanities like “nitwit” from their posts.  The only time someone needs to resort to such silly styles of argument is when they have no argument.  I would say that, if you have no argument, you really have no place arguing.

Not the fun Police says:

11:27am | 23/02/10

I agree Ben. James2, what are you, the fun Police? Surely you wouldn’t begrudge me having fun….........:(

astrosodi says:

11:32am | 23/02/10

It is commonly accepted internet etiquette that all caps is used to express ‘shouting’, not emphsasis.

Perhaps you might try *asterisking* words you want tio highlight rather than what amounts to screaming at people by using all caps? Just a thought.

Martin G says:

11:48am | 23/02/10

A whole sentence in caps would be considered shouting, but one word is not ‘commonly accepted’ to be shouting - I’m not seeing any form on consensus on it.

I see what Penbo is trying to do, however he is going the wrong way about it. Give the readers more formatting choices, then I will be more than happy to put away the CAPS.

astrosodi says:

12:09pm | 23/02/10

Perhaps I am behind the times then, but I am always cautious about using caps only for initialisms and acronyms, particularly when I read comments where the ~emphasised~ word is unkind. I read that as shouting, even if it is an isolated word. Most of my friends (who admittedly may also be behind the times, and do not constitute the majority of the Australian public) take it that way as well (sadly, my friends and I have discussed this issue before). Same with using red text.

Besides, is it Pembo who is installing this policy, or is he merely the messenger. It seems to me that it is ‘The Punch’s’ position.

As another reader pointed out, some html tags work here to allow, for example, <i>italics<i>. More work, but fewer misunderstandings perhaps.

astrosodi says:

12:30pm | 23/02/10

Whoops, put the solidus in the wrong spot, meant to be italics. My mistake.

COF says:

11:07am | 23/02/10

“It’s baffling.”

That is a sentence fragment, Rob. You are lucky I am not the moderator.

astrosodi says:

11:39am | 23/02/10

COF, ‘It’s baffling.’ is not a sentence fragment. ‘It’ is a pronoun, and the subject of the sentence. ‘Is’ is a verb. ‘Baffling’ is an adjective. Therefore, you have a finite verb with a descriptor.

Penberthy isn’t commenting on grammar; he’s commenting on what amounts to rudeness. Just as I don;t see the need for two people who are apparently having a well-reasoned debate outside an office door to be screaming at each other, I don’t see the need for it on a forum like this either. There are other ways that you can emphasis points or words without resorting to internet yelling.

COF says:

12:24pm | 23/02/10

I stand corrected, Astrosodi.

I had no idea that capital letters were an example of “shouting” in internet etiquette, and I am sure the majority of people here who have an objection to Penbo’s article agree with me. Some may think that the use of capitals is rude, but I personally think this is being a tad over sensitive. Why aren’t exclamation points used as an example of shouting and capitals for emphasis? We could get nauseatingly pedantic about it if you wish.

People can still have a reasoned debate, but they need to take into account that we all have certain quirks and tics in our writing. You can go down two paths with this - assume that the writer is being rude, or pull yourself together, let it slide and concentrate on the argument. Hence the point I was trying to make - I have no solid reason to take objection to Rob’s statement, but I am sure I can make one up, especially if he disagrees with me.

If you feel you are being yelled at, maybe you should think about whether the problem lies with you and not everyone else. It’s only a blog, after all.

astrosodi says:

12:39pm | 23/02/10

Hey COF. For sure we have to consider whether our own responses are overly sensitive, and I try to assume that people don’t mean to be offensive.

As pointed out by Stephen Fitzpatrick [11:42am | 23/02/10], the tilde symbol has traditionally been used to show emphasis online. Some people also use *asterisks*, or italics.

I guess it becomes a real issue when you see the ~emphasised~ words in someone’s posts being unkind, which to me emphasises theat they’ve chosen offensive words. Sometimes it isn’t just an assumption that people are being rude—they just are. We do all have quirks, and I try to take a moment and assess my own reactions to posts before I comment. As I was always advised—‘Don’t type angry!’, ha ha.

s says:

03:02pm | 23/02/10

lecdysics? what does that terminology derive from?
Are you referring to left handed, left side of the brain?  I guess I may be one of lecdysics too.
Or may-be you mean the left side of politics?? Oh please do tell…
I have to know,  now.  the suspense in killing me.

Bengeck says:

01:18pm | 23/02/10

IP bans are easy to get around, use a proxy or if you any ISP other Telsuck, you have a IP that changes every time you reset your modem. so get baned from the pucnh, reset wait 30sec go for it again.

There are things the punch can do to stop that but they cost a pretty penny and i don’t they would for forum pests.

James says:

10:41am | 23/02/10

Did you miss the point iansand?  You can still post opinions, you just need to conform to certain standards.  We really do need a Godwin’s Law that applies to communist analogies, so that someone can call you on it.

chris says:

11:13am | 23/02/10

Good idea. It will stop half of the posts looking like they were typed by a pissed chimpanzee. If a few years of reeducation camp is what is required to bring some of these neanderthals up to speed, then bring it on.
And please; give the “but im on teh internet’s so it does’nt matter” defence a rest. If you have opposable thumbs, a set of working eyes and a sixth-grade education then you are capable of proofreading a couple of paragraphs before you hit the submit button.

nom de guerrs says:

07:33pm | 23/02/10

I, nom de guerre said, on the flip side of things also must be allowed on THE PUNCH.  smile and say thank-you back.
And thanks

Julie Coker-Godson says:

12:34pm | 23/02/10

What a load of rubbish!  Typing words in capitals has always been regarded as shouting in the etiquette of the internet right from the inception of blogs.  I recall a set of guidelines being published along with text abbreviations to help those new to the blog arena.  This is not censorship, far from it.  The only people coming up with this notion are people who are unable to conduct a debate without shouting at others who disagree with them.  Just because one is having a debate it does not mean that one has to shout.  I fully support The Punch in this.  Well done.

James says:

01:48pm | 23/02/10

At its worst?  You honestly can not think of an example of censorship which is worse than this?  How hard did you even try?

ChrisD says:

04:27pm | 23/02/10

Censorship at its worst. Ah, that has to be comment of the year.

Frivolous or malicious says:

08:55pm | 23/02/10

Harquebus,
Talk about something a politician would think up?  Well it so happens, according to THE NEW LAWYER:
Bringing men and women in wigs into account has become the end-game for a host of politicians and legal representative bodies
in recent years. Now, finally, they are getting somewhere. A federal Labor politician has now made his mark on the cause, introducing a Private Members Bill to fill what he says is a vacuum in the law when it comes to dealing with complaints against judges. The Hon. Duncan Kerr SC said the Bill is set to create a fair process when Parliament is called on.
The Parliamentary (Judicial Misbehaviour or Incapacity) Commission Bill 2010 aims to give some certainty to Parliament when considering rare cases of judicial impropriety. He said the case of Justice Lionel Murphy in the early 1980s first
highlighted the need for there to be a clear and consistent method for dealing with any alleged misconduct by federal judges. “This Bill and proposed changes to Standing Orders fill a hole in the legal system where the law is silent,” Kerr said.
The Bill applies to any of the 145 judges now serving on any of the four Federal courts – the High Court, Federal Court, Federal Magistrates Court and Family Court – as well as any judges that would be created
within a new Military Court. 
Any MP bringing frivolous or malicious baseless accusations against a judge will be guilty of serious contempt of Parliament.

Harquebus says:

01:28am | 24/02/10

Uppercase equals shouting is a load of rubbish. This is reading and writing, morons. Nobody actually hears anything and those that take offense are fools.

Dagster says:

12:12pm | 23/02/10

Yeah, good on ya, Al. Always a wisecracker in every forum - you BIG DAG!

Kim says:

04:39pm | 23/02/10

awwwwwwwwwww - that’s sad.

Susan says:

01:24pm | 23/02/10

Agblaster..cheers for the tutorial on using tags but, should we have to? I’d rather people spent time on getting their opinion out rather than needing to stop and think..oh, I can’t use a capital word there, I will need tags..ummmm…..now, what was italics again? Some people know this off by heart of course but I so rarely ever need to use tags that I tend to forget. Ah well, I guess most of us can deliver an opinion without needing a tag.

Trolldoll says:

07:32pm | 23/02/10

Yes Susan, most people do as you do and post without thinking about what they’re saying, so much easier to just blast away. Seriously, is learning too much for some people It’s not that hard to emphasise with out going into a shouting match. Perhaps it’s just easier to mantain the rage than to think about what you’re saying.

Susan says:

01:17pm | 23/02/10

I agree. I’ve also been a paid moderator for a very large business site and I know what it is to read hundreds of posts each day, however, I found abusiveness far worse than caps.  Interesting how sites tend to accept that as part of the mechanism of social discussion but, here, now, apparently, not the conventions people use to (I would normally have emphasised the ‘to’) ‘discuss’.

So, I can get away with calling you idiotic names, as long as I don’t capitalise them. 

Btw, any chance we could have an Aussie English spellcheck on Punch forums and not American?

Susan says:

01:18pm | 23/02/10

I agree. I’ve also been a paid moderator for a very large business site and I know what it is to read hundreds of posts each day, however, I found abusiveness far worse than caps.  Interesting how sites tend to accept that as part of the mechanism of social discussion but, here, now, apparently, not the conventions people use to (I would normally have emphasised the ‘to’) ‘discuss’.

So, I can get away with calling you idiotic names, as long as I don’t capitalise them. 

Btw, any chance we could have an Aussie English spellcheck on Punch forums and not American?

Louise says:

02:51pm | 23/02/10

I was in a meeting the other day.  A number of participants did get quite passionate (discussing budgets does seem to do that do you).  However, there was a vast difference between those who could put their case forward in a reasoned and sensible manner, this was compared to a couple – one of whom tried to make their point via aggressive finger pointing – and my thought was “If you do not stop wagging that finger and jabbing your arm I’ll snap it off”’ – and another who just got shouty (I just tuned her out after a while). 

Shouting the loudest and being the most aggressive will in no way impact on whether or not I am going to agree with your point of view (and in fact it is human nature to completely disinclined to view someone’s position favourably if their approach to negotiation to be aggressive or simply get the poops up like a two year old because they don’t get their way).  It was a very unedifying spectacle for the two people concerned and at the next meeting both had the good grace to look sheepish.  However, as David said resorting to childish representations of your argument because you don’t possess the capacity to make it any other way is diminishing.  The internet and blogs are a great tool for communicating and posing differing viewpoints, however, people diminish its capacity to teach by engaging in the meeting version of banging your fist on the table or the schoolyard version of “My daddy’s bigger than yours and he’s gonna beat you up cos your stuuuuupid”.  The same way I would pay scant regard to someone who is trying to get their point across in a meeting by berating participants into submission, the same applies to those on blogs who cannot get their point across without insulting and demeaning others.  People can get their point across assertively and civilly.  Perhaps it is sheer intellectual laziness that makes people resort to insults.

BTS says:

01:40pm | 23/02/10

Guess they couldn’t stand it Susan.

Susan says:

01:53pm | 23/02/10

Is ‘strong tags’ the new PC term for bold. I can see it now… “To strong tag go, where no-one has gone before”!

Flo says:

06:40pm | 23/02/10

Destry, well hello to you.  you go for it Destry….sock-it-to-them.. Like I mean to say, there are far more important things to complain about.  I love caps.  You may say I am a happy-cappy.  god bless and thank-you
Aunty Flo

Trolldoll says:

08:10pm | 23/02/10

I find that last scentence facinating as I cannot for the life of me pick a verb from a pronoun yet I can construct a legible scentence and my vocabulary is far larger than any of my contemporaries. However my spelling sometimes is lacking somewhat!

Em says:

05:43pm | 23/02/10

Agreed - plus one more!

In all seriousness, I would much rather see the odd capital letters here and there rather than the Stupid People Who Type Like This.  I Mean, Seriously, Who Actually Enjoys Typing This Way Let Alone Reading It?

Ugh.  UGH! /disgust (LMAO)

I’ve been online way too long.

por spelling girl says:

07:00pm | 23/02/10

is it por spelling.
or is it poor spelling

Sipu says:

11:56pm | 23/02/10

ChelseaLee, darling, it’s difficult to know if you are being ironic.

Leaving aside your poor spelling which I shall ascribe to words being mistyped, I find your request to ban “Incorrect use of apostrophe’s” too delicious for words.

ChelseaLee says:

11:00am | 24/02/10

Em, I couldn’t agree with you more. I just wish I’d thought of it myself. =)

por spelling girl and Sipu, darling - you may choose to leave aside my por speling, which can only be ascribed to por tieping, and my request to ban “incorrect use of apostrophe’s”, which is so positively delicious…

Or you could just read my post again whilst practising that ever so witty humour of yours. You may actually discover a few more displays of irony than even the most cleverest people like yourself managed to pick up on the first go.

DG says:

12:53pm | 24/02/10

We should consider all logical fallacies on this site but this should be addressed by the users in the form of debate rather than by the moderators.

In particular the assertion that a person should not be listened to, or should be presumed wrong, because they were wrong about something else or believe something that the respondent disagrees with (i.e “Bloody socialists/communists/conservatives, you lot are a bunch of bleeding hearts/bludgers/self indulgent jerks that don’t know anything about [topic]” ) is a logical fallacy. Broadly is it ad hominem, but it could also be considered “poisoning the well” because it attempts to discredit the speaker in one area to affect their acceptance in another area.

That is how an intelligent discussion should operate:

Person A makes statements 1, 2 and 3. Responses to those statements should acknowledge such fallacies and respond to assertions and statements directly. As with the calls of “Godwins Law” we should call “poisoning the well” as well as slippery slope arguments and various other logical fallacies.

However, such technical issues are rather less inclusive than the “all’s fair” approach currently adopted by The Punch.

James says:

10:31am | 24/02/10

Personally, I ignore people’s posts if they are filled with capitalised words.  It makes me think that if they see a need to yell, they have nothing substantial to say.  Rational, clever comments speak for themselves, and have no need of accentuation.

James says:

10:29am | 24/02/10

I will go right ahead and assume that last sentence was a joke.

Julia (not THAT one) says:

11:29am | 24/02/10

I agree with the Pix. Text language is lazy and cheapens the comments. I particularly hate it in emails, and I used it as a culling device when I was using a certain online dating website.

And yes, Pixi didn’t get capital right, but she used the German word so I’ll forgive her.

James says:

12:21pm | 24/02/10

Julia,

Her choice of capitol was interesting, but I was referring more to excentuate.  I had assumed Pix meant accentuate.

BTS says:

11:00am | 25/02/10

Ask the people who suffer from tourettes, whether that is funny or not.

Old Man says:

04:12pm | 24/02/10

This has me rolling on the floor laughing my arse off. (If only I was allowed to say ROTFLMAO)
Well done Charles Kelly!