MetaTalk

It's possible that MetaFilter has reached the tipping point with comments. There hasn't been a 0 comments for 6 months now (although I have come perilously close). [more inside]
posted by tellurian on Nov 1, 2005 - 84 comments

Warnock's Dilemma is the situation you face when people don't comment on your postings. The problem with no response is that there are five possible interpretations:

1. The post is correct, well-written information that needs no follow-up commentary. There's nothing more to say except "Yeah, what he said."
2. The post is complete and utter nonsense, and no one wants to waste the energy or bandwidth to even point this out.
3. No one read the post, for whatever reason.
4. No one understood the post, but won't ask for clarification, for whatever reason.
5. No one cares about the post, for whatever reason.

This perfectly captures my thoughts when I see an amazing post with only 2 or 3 comments (of course, I believe everyone else is thinking point 1 as well). This probably explains why we can't equate lots of comments nor low comments with the quality of a post, since it could be good or bad in five different ways, as described here.
posted by mathowie on Apr 24, 2005 - 41 comments