21 lines
1.2 KiB
Plaintext
21 lines
1.2 KiB
Plaintext
topic drift
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n. Term used on GEnie, Usenet and other electronic fora to describe the
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tendency of a thread to drift away from the original subject of discussion
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(and thus, from the Subject header of the originating message), or the
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results of that tendency. The header in each post can be changed to keep
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current with the posts, but usually isn't due to forgetfulness or laziness.
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A single post may often result in several posts each responding to a
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different point in the original. Some subthreads will actually be in
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response to some off-the-cuff side comment, possibly degenerating into a
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flame war , or just as often evolving into a separate discussion. Hence,
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discussions aren't really so much threads as they are trees. Except that
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they don't really have leaves, or multiple branching roots; usually some
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lines of discussion will just sort of die off after everyone gets tired of
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them. This could take anywhere from hours to weeks, or even longer. The term
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topic drift is often used in gentle reminders that the discussion has
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strayed off any useful track. I think we started with a question about
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Niven's last book, but we've ended up discussing the sexual habits of the
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common marmoset.
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