Many thanks to Ludwig, Forrest and TRTL for your thoughtful replies.

FG

Disagree - I regularly fail to communicate with certain posters - although they do tend to be the same ones - is this indicative of a deliberate failure to communicate? Surely not...

I am aware on other fora there is facility for a mini poll - is there sufficient need for one here?

Ludwig

Am in agreement with need for very basic editing tools, bold, italics, etc - nothing too sophisticated.

TRTL

agree emoticoms tend to be over used.

Better facilities for quoting others' posts would be good.

Cheers

Belly

Your post came in just as I posted mine.

Effective communication is a challenge for everyone, even the most succinct of us. I suggest you check some of your earlier posts - you will be pleasantly surprised to see just how much your writing has improved.

I know I feel great satisfaction when I have assembled a well researched and clear post. Even if the reader chooses to dismiss whatever point I have made, I KNOW when it is worthy.

So Belly do you think that more editing tools would be of benefit to you or not?

I should point out that a demon that has afflicted OLO has been cast out. The 'New Discussion' dialog now accepts quotation marks in a proposed topic title. The observation is courtesy of RobP in the 102nd post to the 'Suggestions for OLO' thread, an older testament to the relevance of what is coming out here. See: http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?discussion=1954#42829

Ludwig: "I can’t see why we OLOers shouldn’t have access to all the facilities available in Word"

What is this 'Word' of which you speak? I gather it is something that must have been around since forever. I compose my posts in Gedit, then paste into the posting panel. I trust I am not missing anything?

TRTL: "Ultimately, all we have are the words on a page, .......I tend to think that makes me think harder."

Indeed and agreed. Without adding to or taking away anything from what Ludwig has proposed, in actual written expression I strongly suspect that less can be more. If we can get these facilities, it would be wise not to overdo it in the actual use thereof.

Momentarily off-topic, but my wife accuses me of being passive-aggressive sometimes. To be blunt, I reckon she's dead wrong. There's plenty of passion; it's just that I'm not into bashing women, except perhaps occasionally litero-verbally. BTW, and at the possible risk of getting into Fractelle's Black Books, might I point out that it appears that, at least embryonically, telepathic mind connection technology may be just around the corner. Apparently it arises as a consequence of chaos theory, something beyond my comprehension. Ask her about it. She seems fairly forgiving.

May the cool hand of Luke rest upon all who post here. Have phun.

PS It still seems, with respect to typos in discussion topic titles, that what has been written has been written. I am of the opinion that an ability to make correcting edits to titles, as distinct from textual alterations thereto, is important in maintaining overall OLO credibility.

Fractelle, whilst I've often wished for some more options I'm often grateful that they are not available to some.

Some posters writings are hard enough to read without the addition of multiple fonts, colours etc. Italics would be nice for quoted content and the ability to reference links without having the whole link shown on screen (cutting down clutter).

I guess you won't be to concerned about David's comprehension difficulties, it does not really matter how clear you are he will take the message he wants and ignore the rest (he seems to have the same problem when it comes to the bible).

My impression is that there have been a higher rate than usual of miscommunications recently - something to do with the weather. Or maybe I'm just noticing them more after my stuff up with Pelican.

Cheers
R0bert

Well Forrest Gumpp, I haven't seen any passive-aggressiveness in your posts here.

I tend to think of passive aggressive displays as those which are designed to get someone's back up, but also designed to try and avoid being able to be called out on it.
Sort of like jumping out from behind a tree to shout abuse and hurl a stone, then jumping back behind it before they can respond.

I do concur with the titles and I'm glad the quotation marks can now be used - though I'd argue that goes part and parcel with standard grammar. As for font... I admit, I'd like italics so I could emphasize certain words without resorting to CAPITALS which comes across as shouting. I suppose the *asterisks* are still an option, but I prefer to reserve those for sarcasm instead of emphasis.

Fractelle: "Effective communication is a challenge for everyone, even the most succinct of us. I suggest you check some of your earlier posts - you [ie. Belly] will be pleasantly surprised to see just how much your writing has improved."

And here was I thinking it was just me getting used to Belly's posts! Could't agree more, Fractelle. Well posted.

Regarding succintity (and spelling for that matter), I've always thought that this epitaph from the old Wild West (probably Tombstone, Arizona) encapsulates it all:

"Here lies the body of Lester Moore.
Four shots from a 'forty four'.
No les,
No more."

Making another pass on the topic, might not the use of a not too intrusive background colour be a better way of identifying a quote originating from some other post within the Forum? That can both make quotes clearly identifiable as such, and leave italics for some other purpose. For example, in this very post, Fractelle's words would be set against the quote background colour because they have originated from within the Forum. The stuff about Lester Moore could be in italics, as it is a quote, but one not from within the Forum.

RObert foresees a scenario in which text formatting facilities may be overused by some in making points or pushing wheelbarrows. Let but such formato-chromo browbeating be accompanied by the slightest breach of Forum rules, and these sought-for posting facilities could be progressively withdrawn from such offending users. Like Dreyfuss, offenders could be progressively stripped of their privileges, having if necessary their literary swords eventually publicly broken and being reduced to the indignity of plain text. "Every problem contains within itself the seeds of its own solution" - the emperor Nasi Goreng; said upon completion of the Great Wall and the expulsion of the rabbits from China.

I, too, KNOW when I have assembled a well researched and clear post; a wise post, a learned post, indeed a WORTHY post. What happens if we each make one such in the same thread contradicting the other? Cry havoc and let slip the dogs?