There was a discussion in a thread in the technical section about the value of picture posting. Rather than continue down that path in the technical section I thought it merited it’s own thread. There definitely appears to be an increase in this kind of thing but I can’t quantify this so don’t ask me to.
The objection was raised to vanity posting of pictures of one’s guns/gear when it serves no purpose in the context of the thread. This in contrast to posting a picture that directly relates to the topic at hand. An example of the former would be in a discussion of rifles from brand x someone posts a picture of their brand x rifle, while an example of the latter would be someone asking how to mount brand y accessory and posting a picture (or series of pictures) of same showing the mounting method.
It’s honestly never bothered me either way. What may be a useless pic to one, may be a catalyst of ideas and innovation for another. If you’ve got pics, post them. I’ll either look or pass them over based on my interest.
ETA: Of course, there’s a level of appropriateness that must be achieved. One shouldn’t douse the thread with tons of pictures, severely slowing down loading and reading of the thread. A random pic has very little distraction value to me, but of course, may be a peeve to others. I think around here, the threads tend to police themselves, as was the case in the thread you’re referring to.
I personally don’t see a problem with it so long as it is related and not excessive. Quite frankly photos on the web is how I learn about new gear and how people are running their rigs, so pics are welcome.
(EDIT) I found the thread that inspired this one, and I only have one comment: Vagisil.
If someone is asking about a KAC carbine and the first reply is “I like mine, look at 30 pictures of it” I am agreeing with you. I think it is more along the lines of the reply doesn’t address the question adequately.
ETA: Picture thread chatter could be cut down a little bit as well.
I have way less of a problem with an overabundance of photos than I do with the noodniks that quote THE ENTIRE PHOTO SERIES for no better purpose than to post “Looks good!” or ask a question about something in photo#3of15.
Say an initial post from somebody has 8 photos, and 4 lazy twerps quote that post without paring down imagery. Ends up with 40 photos where 10 would suffice. Annoying.
Everybody can edit the post the quote to parse it down to specifics, particularly in regard to photos. It’s nothing beyond sheer laziness and personal sloth to do otherwise.
I definitely agree that the over-quoting is a problem. It’s like that on every forum on the web. I believe there are technical computer-geek ways of fixing the problem though, I just don’t have the knowledgebase to know what they are.
posting a vanity picture of a gun doesn’t really have a tech fix. :sarcastic:
It doesn’t bother me; as long as it is relevant to the thread and isn’t excessive. Personally I have never posted a photo online anywhere and I don’t plan to do so.
+1 on the quoted photos JSantoro; that is annoying as hell!
I’m just through doinking the Submit button, and it hit me…
“Y’know, you can kinda DO something about that…”
Left to my own devices, I’m far more likely to start av-raping people with pictures of prolapsed colons and the like than actually getting around to truly fixing anything. I’m whimsical AND lazy.
The automated resizing helps for sure, although some of the picture-posters have cried about it. Everyone can personalize their own tolerances. I’ve considered knocking mine down to 300 pixels wide and 200 tall just to declutter some of the vanity posts. Simply clicking on the top bar of the photo then allows the user to view in native resolution if they so choose.
I don’t mind photos and photo threads because it gives me a good idea of what others are doing with their equipment.
The M4c crowd tends to keep pics to a minimum already but I like the photo resize feature which reduces bandwidth yet allows the user to look at the full size picture if that is what they want.
I love the pic resizing on this site now and its def. one of my favorite aspects of M4C
I hate the quoting of actual images like mentioned above…its easily one of the worst aspects of this wonderful site but hell the kiddie site gets it right in this dept. and wrong on just about everything else so I aint complaining.
As for the main topic…no bothers here however I do see people sometimes try to hard and post repeditive pics of their same gun/s, and this is kinda annoying as it seems the poster is just fishing for praise:nono:
I do it just so someone has a visual idea of what they are asking about, a setup, ect.
Some people learn differently than others. Some people can read a book, and learn it. Some people need hands on. Some are visual. Some can sit in a class with a 2 hour straight lecture, and learn stuff that way. I myself am a visual hands on learner. If I tried to read a text book to learn something Id fail. Equally so for sitting in a class for hours listening to a monotone speaker.
If you don’t like looking at pictures then auto resize down to a very small thumbnail size picture.
I do hate auto quoting image tags, though. I really hate people that quote an entire huge post, and then type one sentence or quote a whole picture string to type one sentence. Its especially annoying when Im using my phone, and it takes a HUGE amount of scrolling.
