Chat, Chat, Chatterbox

If you have spent a few days away from the computer (to craft, of course ;) ) then you have surely seen just how many posts the Ravenclaw Common Room can gain in relatively short periods of time.

In the past, it was determined that Wednesday is generally the chattiest day.  The lulls in conversation usually happen around the time that the end of the month rolls around, as everyone is trying to finish up classes to turn in.

Have we always been this chatty, or is it a recent phenomenon?

Do the terms when we can't seem to quit chatting have an impact on our points earning?

Please Note: There are no official scores for Fall 2010, but Ravenclaw is listed as having a tie for first with Gryffindor.

There doesn't seem to be a definitive answer, but this does show that being talkative in the Common Room doesn't actively *hurt* our points.

Perhaps the camaraderie of the Common Room helps motivate more people to earn points?  A good bit of excitement can be easily stirred up in the Common Room.  There are many times when a Specialist Study will grow out of a discussion, for example.

If you find the Common Room too much for you, don't fret!  This is part of the reason why the Tower is organized into Dorms as well as having a Common Room.  Those who wish to talk to some of their fellow 'Claws but don't have the time or desire to keep up with the Common Room can chat with those is a similar cohort to themselves or pop into Specialist Studies or any of the term-specific threads like the Quidditch Pitch and the Advanced Studies thread to check on how Housemates are doing.

If you are considering a venture into the Common Room, here are some tips from Ielith for how to handle all of the posts.

Too Many Posts!!!

You don’t have to read everything. Really. We want you to play with yarn sometime!

Learn to Skim!

• The Reading Way: Skimming is the art of letting your eyes look at large blocks of text at once and pick out just a few words to give your brain an idea of what’s in that large block of text so you can decide whether you want to pause and read it or move on to skim another large block of text. (Serious kudos to anyone who can do this effectively in a non-native language.)
  
• The Data-Driven Way: Skimming is the art of looking first at the button-clicks along the bottoms of posts and pausing for the ones with lots of button-clicks of the type you find interesting. “Educational”, “Interesting”, and “Funny” have particularly high signal-to-noise ratios.
  
• The People-Driven Way: Skimming is the art of looking for the Ravnames (or Ravatars, but these change!) of certain individuals you’re paying close attention to, looking at their posts, and skipping over the rest.
  
• The Skipping-Pages Way: Skimming is the art of skipping hundreds of posts without asking the same question that’s just been answered in the post above you. Skip to the last page of the thread, skim or read the last page or two of posts. You can click the “In reply to” link on any intriguing post to trace back through that particular conversation.
  

Use any or all of these techniques to help you keep up with the threads that interest you. Playing the game is more fun when you feel like you’re in-the-know!

Corollary to Too Many Posts!

We want everyone to talk freely, but a few things you might want to keep in mind:

• If you’re overwhelmed by how many posts there are, posting lots of times to say so only adds to the post-count for others who are also overwhelmed.
• When everyone’s saying the same thing, you might consider using your “Agree Button” instead of posting a “Me Too!” post. Although 45 “Me Too!” posts in a row are easy to skim, they add up fast and can be scary to people who just see the post-count in the thread going up and up and up.
• We have a Chat Room! Furious posting conversation? Consider moving it to the Chat Room.

Please hang out in as many threads as you can manage and still enjoy being here. Talk to us. Post. Be as active a part of our Tower community as your schedule permits.