Slashdot

We're all pretty much aware of The (Hopefully) Great Slashdot Blackout and many are also aware of The (Hopefully) Great Slashdot Whine-out . If you find either one of the above two silly, you're likely to find this even sillier.

Just to set you straight, brief descriptions of each of the above are recapped for you here:

• The (Hopefully) Great Slashdot Whine-out.

  Whining about trivial things by the ignorant is more dangerous than a gun in the hand of a child.
  [...]
  This whining about being "underappreciated" is offensive. Thus, I propose a small revolt: The (Hopefully) Great Slashdot Whine-out.

  T(H)GSW will be during the week of April 21 through April 27. Easy to remember, because it corresponds with the blackout (completely worthless information: the full moon in April falls on the 27th). During that time, I will be posting completely whine-free posts, and further will be smacking anyone down (through posts, of course) who whines about Slashdot. I will become Malda's idea of the ideal Slashdot reader. I will provide insightful content -- completely whine free.

...and the original "-out" that started it all:

• [Rob Malda's] easy dismissal of the value of the only providers of interesting and insightful content on Slashdot is offensive. Thus, I propose a small revolt. The (Hopefully) Great Slashdot Blackout.

  T(H)GSB will be during the week of April 21 through April 27. Easy to remember, the full moon in April falls on the 27th. During that time, I will not be posting, nor will I click through to read the comments from the home page. I will become as Malda's idea of the typical Slashdot reader. I will provide no new content (neither comments, nor story submissions--although I'm not much of a story submitter).

  During that week, I'd like to see if Malda sees Slashdot become a better place, or if it becomes the Hallowed Shrine of Troll.

As a compromise to all this silliness I propose The (Hopefully) Great Slashdot Slash-out wherein each visitor chooses to simply read the articles without clicking through or scan through all the postings and beat whiners over the head with a post berating the whiny post.

I have no strong feelings either way as far as either of these other 'revolts' are concerned. I do think T(H)GSB is an interesting experiment to find out how many fewer posts are made during that week by people who might otherwise post comments. I also find T(H)GSW interesting insofar as promoting whine-free posting for a week. But in both cases, the 'revolts' or whatever you want to call them are quite silly and I think they would best be rolled into a single silly event instead of splitting our beloved Slashdot into camps of "black-outers" and "whine-outers". At least T(H)GSS has an acronym that can be vocalized to sound a little like "thugs".

...finally the usual disclaimer and how to join info:

• To spread the word, I'm changing my sig to link to this journal entry. If you would like to help, you can link to this journal from your own sig, or you can simply resolve to enter into a voluntary one-week Slash-out. Pass the word. This will only work if an ungodly number of comment posters participate.

  To summarize, if you wish to participate, during the week of April 21 through April 27 do one set of the following exclusively:

  • Do not click through from the home page to the comment page
    Do not post any comments to stories
    Do not submit new stories

  • OR

  • Do click through as many stories as possible to check for whining
    Post as many comments as possible without whining (e.g., "They don't appreciate me", "Malda can't spell", "This story is redundant", etc)
    Drop the hammer on anyone caught whining with a big fat "No whining this week!" post.

  Here are some useful HTML links to other T(H)G?? journal entries:

  • T(H)GSS
    Join <a href= "http://slashdot.org/~StringBlade/journal/6536" >The (Hopefully) Great Slashdot Slash-Out</a> (April 21-27, 2002)
  • T(H)GSB
    <a href="http://slashdot.org/~rho/journal/5872" >The (Hopefully) Great Slashdot Black-out</a> Apr 21-27
  • T(H)GSW
    Join <a href= "http://slashdot.org/~Reality+Master+101/journal/6131">The (Hopefully) Great Slashdot Whine-Out</a> Apr 21-27
  • T(H)GSWB
    Join <a href= "http://slashdot.org/~cjpez/journal/6146">The (Hopefully) Great Slashdot Weevil Blackout</a > Apr 21-27

Let's make it a great Slash-out shall we?