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Poll: Should you be required to preview before you post?

This hasn't caused a great deal of discussion on AN because we're used to it. Before the upgrade, it was impossible to post a comment or reply without clicking preview first. After the upgrade, it's still impossible to post a comment or reply without clicking preview first. Nothing has changed in that regard, so most of us haven't even thought about it.

Star-divide

Preview became mandatory with the Ajax upgrade, which was implemented at about this time last year. That's the same upgrade that gave us other features, like recommending diaries and adding tags. AN and a few others got Ajax, but many other SB Nation blogs did not. If you go to one of the latter, such as Lookout Landing, you'll notice that it lacks a lot of things you were used to from old AN (eg, recommended diaries). Folks on LL have always been able to post without previewing, so they think of that as normal.

Now, with the current upgrade, some readers from LL and other non-Ajax sites have come over here to check out the new system, and for them being required to preview is a new thing. It got mentioned in one of the threads here, and it's been discussed quite a bit at LL.

The main complaint seems to be that it slows down posting. That prompted the observation that it's really just one more click so it's not a big deal. That prompted the observation that for the exact same reason that it's no big deal, it doesn't accomplish much either: Anyone who doesn't want to preview his or her comment won't look at it anyway, and making them click a second time won't make them. By the same token, anyone who does want to preview still has that option if it's not mandatory. I pointed out that in case of an egregious error -- like if you accidentally bracketed a big chunk of text with "<" and ">" causing it to be swallowed by the software, or if a picture you inserted is much more ginormous than you realized -- mandatory preview can force you to notice even if you don't reread your words.

Opinion at LL is strongly against mandatory preview, but they're open-minded enough to realize that, unlike us, they aren't used to it. Someone there wants to hear objective opinion from those of us who are actually used to it. Does it bother us? Do we like it? Do we care at all? Hence this poll.

Important: Since the purpose of this poll is to gauge the experience of those of us who are used to mandatory preview, please don't choose any of the top five answers (the ones that say "I'm used to it") unless you're at least a semi-regular user of AN or another Ajax SB Nation blog. For the rest of you, so that you don't feel disenfranchised, there are three more choices at the bottom (the ones that say "I'm not used to it").

Poll
How do you feel about being required to click preview before you can post?
I'm used to it, and I think it's much better this way.
18 votes
I'm used to it. I prefer it this way, but it's no big deal.
25 votes
I'm used to it, and I have no preference.
10 votes
I'm used to it. I would prefer we didn't have to, but it's no big deal.
13 votes
I'm used to it, and I still hate it.
7 votes
I'm not used to it, and I think I would like it if this requirement were imposed on us.
3 votes
I'm not used to it, and I think I wouldn't care if it changed for us.
1 votes
I'm not used to it, and I think I would dislike it if this requirement were imposed on us.
8 votes

85 votes | Poll has closed

Comment 13 comments  |  3 recs  | 

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I prefer it but it really

isn't that big of a deal.
Regarding the tags...they've been a joke in the past. Hope that changes on this version. But it's up to those who make them on that one.

by IM4Oakgal on Feb 19, 2008 7:39 PM PST reply actions  

I went with Option 4

Used to it, prefer we didn't have to, no big deal.

"There's no real reason why a flight in which one flies naked should be more expensive than any other."

by Poppy on Feb 19, 2008 7:59 PM PST reply actions  

Correction

The Ajax (aka 2.0) upgrade did not create diary recommendations; those had been around long before that. Nor did it create dairy recommendations, which were forced through over the strenuous objections of mikeA and xbhaskarx.

There is an A in Whimsy.

by FreeSeatUpgrade on Feb 19, 2008 8:08 PM PST reply actions  

thanks for the correction, FSU

I'm not totally clear on what started when. I just know we've had mandatory preview for quite a while now, and LL has never had it.

formerly known as mdl

by iglew on Feb 19, 2008 8:10 PM PST up reply actions  

that was a really cheesy joke

It has been considered a blunder for decades and will probably continue to be so. @('.')@

by monkeyball on Feb 20, 2008 7:53 AM PST up reply actions  

I'm not telling how I voted.

So there.

[ a.k.a. mkt a.k.a. whiny douchebag ]

"God doesn't pay attention to your cute little hypotheticals." -- Jeff from LL

by oblique on Feb 19, 2008 8:47 PM PST reply actions  

We need a poll!

[ a.k.a. mkt a.k.a. whiny douchebag ]

"God doesn't pay attention to your cute little hypotheticals." -- Jeff from LL

by oblique on Feb 21, 2008 7:32 AM PST up reply actions  

I think I figured out why

everyone on Lookout Landing is so opposed to mandatory preview, and why they all talk about how much it would slow them down. My reaction to that was, "How much does it slow you down just to do one more click?"

But posting there again today I realized that on LL -- and presumably on all the non-Ajax SB Nation sites -- when you click preview it reloads the entire page, which can take quite a while if the page is long or your connection is slow.

Probably they're imagining that every time they post they have to sit through a reload like that. Not having ever been on an Ajax site, they don't realize that over here preview just expands a space to insert the preview and leaves the rest of the page alone.

formerly known as mdl

by iglew on Feb 20, 2008 1:14 AM PST reply actions  

could we have it both ways?

How about if there is a preview button and a post button? I would still use preview because I really don't like it when my links or other html comes out wrong. But I suppose that for a simple comment like this one, it would be nice to just hit post.

Also, I'm still having a problem with my browser (Firefox on Linux) that it jumps to the top of the page when I hit preview, so I have to scroll down to hit post. I thought this would be fixed if I just waited long enough for the page to reload, but that doesn't seem to work.

by colin on Feb 20, 2008 9:35 AM PST reply actions   1 recs

non-mandatory IS both ways

The question is whether preview should be required or optional. Taking it away altogether is not under consideration here.

What you describe is how non-Ajax site (eg, LL) behave right now. Here on AN, preview does not make the page reload (or at least for me it doesn't).

formerly known as mdl

by iglew on Feb 20, 2008 10:25 AM PST reply actions  

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