Remove the 50 character limit

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#22

By feedback, I meant things you should change/suggestions, not just the equivalent of a like.

#24

50 characters is too long. I would suggest reducing it by half.

I once tried to ask the question “What plugin did you use to make those ropes?”, but couldn’t because its not 50 characters. This reply would be meaningful and not contain any filler.

Even arseny had trouble with the 50 count restriction. He had to have his post edited to remove all the filler he had to add.

I completely agree that one or two word responses like “cool” and “looks great” make for terrible posts (which is why we should keep the like button). But the 50 word count is just way too high, its leading to people having to add filler in their posts and that’s a problem.

2 Likes
#25

Hello.
There is a point in the implementing of the 50 character requirement to the forum.

This addition ensures that posts are meaningful and contributes to keeping threads free of small-no effort posts. If you have something meaningful to contribute to a topic/thread you should have no worry with this limit.

With your example: “IMO, change the GUI to make it more colorful.”

This can easily be changed and become more like you put effort into it:

In my opinion, you can improve on the GUI and make it more appealing by making it more colorful. Here are some thoughts/ideas I ha e for this. Maybe make the buttons to the left, a BLANK kind of color, and the background on the right a BLANK color, other then that really good job!

1 Like
#26

I agree completely when this is applied to scripting support threads and such. I have found myself just wanting to “tag” my name on (to a thread I have very little to offer) so I have had to scrap some posts.

But some threads in #public:public-updates-announcements actually ask for your opinions in the comments. They don’t want to see just a heart, they want to see the love the feature gets and if their time was worth it. Here is such a post:

And, believe it or not, the first comment was posted by you and it stated:

Now I’m not posting this to say “HA you are a hypocrite” but to show, in some situations, these comments are really needed and appreciated by our hard working engineers. I feel it warmed the developers’ hearts to read the comment you gave (and all the others for that matter) as it shows their hard labour wasn’t taken for granted.

(Again, this post is an honest argument against the 50 char limit in #public:public-updates-announcements and NOT meant to insult @buildthomas or anyone else for that matter. Please do not take the arguments personally. Thank you.)

3 Likes
#27

I apologize for the lackluster example, but there are better uses for removing the limit. When someone is asking for feedback on a feature ( and you have nothing more to give ), it can be difficult to find a space-waster to tack on to make it 50 characters. A lot of the time the mods bypass the limit to post things they need to post, so why can’t we?

1 Like
#28

The context being that I was the person who requested a related feature to that. I wanted to let them know that this now solves my need (see the likes on that post, the person who responded to my feature request also liked that post). This note has a clear functional purpose and isn’t just an into-the-void “wow this is great thanks”.

I was also personally tagged by two Developer Relations members to that thread when they posted it so I could comment, because they know I took interest in the release of that feature.

This is not the case for the hundreds of other developers that post similar messages to this. These are random notes that could have just as easily been likes.

Context is important. I put Likes on new features I like that I didn’t suggest myself or was involved in somehow.

4 Likes
#29

Again, just restating this, I do not mean to attack you personally; the post is meant to be just a fair argument. Sorry.

My bad. The post was before my DevForum days so I didn’t see it. Also, I couldn’t have known about you being tagged, but I apologize for that.

For me personally, if I were a developer, I would prefer positive comments rather than “hearts”. For me, having real words to put to an individual means so much more than profile pics under a heart icon.

Does this mean short “thank you” posts in the #public:public-updates-announcements category are able to be taken down too?

#30

(PS: let’s use engineer = Roblox staff, developer = roblox game developer for clarity)

That’s fine, but if you are an experienced developer, and you’ve been here for 3+ years, and every single announcement thread has 50+ posts that are like “wow that’s so great, this will really help boost my development” and then a few posts with interesting opinions/discussion on the feature that goes beyond just saying it’s great, it gets really tedious to get through and it makes it very hard to be critically constructive about things Roblox releases. These discussions are just as important as supporting the feature (which Likes already do), but these avalanches of short thankful posts just inhibit that too much right now.

It’s always a balance with communities like this. We’re not saying “please never post a short thankful post again”, but currently it’s too much. That’s why they’re trying out the 50 character limit.

6 Likes
#31

I see where you’re coming from. As of now it’s super difficult to find problems or constructive criticism under posts like this. I guess I have to accept the 50 character limit as it is right now.

I also, then, will have to change my normal “thanks, we appreciate it” comments to hearts. It won’t be the same, but for the sanity of the engineers/developers, I guess this will have to do.

Thank you for your time and open-mindedness (is that a word?)!!

3 Likes
#32

I say either reduce the 50 char minimum or scrap it entirely. I agree that we should discourage low quality posts, but if people are just padding out their low quality posts and high quality posters are getting annoyed, then it’s not working. I didn’t see a problem with just flagging the posts.

Alternate idea: warn people before they post a short post with the whole ‘constructive message that adds value’ stuff, but don’t force them to pad out their messages with meaningless words and waffle.

edit: whoops this wasn’t meant to be a reply, derp

1 Like
#33

Somebody has to deal with those flags. Reducing workload wherever possible is important to keep the forum healthy and well-kept.

If it makes people stop and think about their reply for a minute, it can ultimately reduce the number of flagged posts staff need to review. Many simple posts can be easily lengthened if you think for a minute.

1 Like
#34

I get it. Making people think twice about what they’re sending may prompt them to add more constructive elements to their reply, but sometimes simpler it better and we’d only be adding waffle. That’s how I came up with my alternate suggestion for a warning rather than prohibition :slight_smile:

edit: also thanks for clarifying about the reason just flagging didn’t work!

1 Like
#35

In my opinion the 50 character limit is perfectly acceptable. It’s not hard to fit what you’re saying into 50 characters and if your message doesn’t make it to 50 characters you’re most likely not including enough information.

For example, look at how I structured my post so far. I start with a short summary of what I mean (my opinion) and then I explain why this is the case. This can be applied to any post and you’ll easily get over the 50 character limit and ensure your message has valuable content.

First, give a summary. Second, explain what you mean, explain how it works or why it’s important, etc.

1 Like
#36

Here’s a bunch of under-50 replies which are succinct and perfectly acceptable, and which don’t need extra words:

Replies

37 characters:

This bug is fixed in the next update.

33 characters:

Should that be in a local script?

35 characters:

This didn’t fix the clipping issue.

33 characters:

Is this listing still up to date?

33 characters:

Please don’t post on old threads.

35 characters:

No, this is not possible on Roblox.

33 characters:

No, it doesn’t output any errors.

42 characters:

What specifically does that rule apply to?

32 characters:

I’ll release it in about 4 days.

33 characters:

This is fixed in the next update!

39 characters:

I can’t add that, it’s against the ToS.

31 characters:

Replace the last else with end.

41 characters:

Using the new solver should fix this bug.

I would say a better limit would be 30 characters, that’s why I argue it should be reduced.

2 Likes
#37

The solution to this problem is to add more text to the reply. It doesn’t hurt to add another sentence or two to these and I could easily add more content to any of these messages.

#38

My point is that it’s unnecessary. The less I have to read to get your point, the better. After all, we’re not in an English exam!

I think that a slight reduction in the character floor would not harm the quality of replies all that much. It would still weed out pretty much all the same unwanted stuff after all. But to reduce the annoyance to people writing higher quality responses, I would still advocate for a warning system as before. That way, you could even bump up the character floor but not filter out higher quality stuff, while still making people revisit their post content.

2 Likes
#39

Looks like the limit was reduced to 30 characters. I approve of this change :+1:

4 Likes