When people post, what are the most annoying things about the way they format the posts? (I'm not talking about flaming, gratuitous insults, or just generally being stupid.)

Is it...

ALL CAPS?

archie and mehibital style, with no capitalization anywhere?

Run on sentences that go on and on and never end and you if you were reading them out loud you'd pass out from not having a chance to breathe?

Lack of paragraph breaks in a long post?

Poor spelling and punctuation?

Something else?

Let's hear it... what's the top thing for YOU that makes you not even want to try to read it?

The trait I find most annoying is when someone posts in a big block of text, stream of conciousness style. I generally don't read through those posts. That's closely followed by the no punctuation/text speak posts in my opinion.

EngineerGirl:

ALL CAPS?

Annoying and hard to read.

EngineerGirl:

archie and mehibital style, with no capitalization anywhere?

Who?

EngineerGirl:

Run on sentences that go on and on and never end and you if you were reading them out loud you'd pass out from not having a chance to breathe?

Gasp! Pant, pant!

EngineerGirl:

Lack of paragraph breaks in a long post?

This is probably excusable, since the Fray sometimes eats formatting, encluding paragrahs and even multiple spaces.

EngineerGirl:

Poor spelling and punctuation?

Depends how poor. Sometimes it's so bad, you can barely read it. If they are posting to complain about someone else's perceived posting blunders, it's even worse.

EngineerGirl:

Something else?

Here's what I find MOST annoying: All caps combined with run-on sentences and no punctuations, so that if I even get that far I pass out from lack of oxygen, combined with atrocious spelling and capitalization. Not just common errors like "their" for "they're" or misplaced apostrophes (which is my daughter's biggest complaint), but words that look like they were made up from a child's set of building blocks - words like "lyer" or "pidofile". With those words, you have to interrupt your train of thought just to figure out what they may have intended to say.

I actually was going to post that paragrah in the way that annoys me, but just couldn't bring myself to do it. :) Those are the posts I usually just hit about one word every other line to get an idea of the direction they may be headed, and give up about halfway through.

PhysicsGirl:

The trait I find most annoying is when someone posts in a big block of text, stream of conciousness style. I generally don't read through those posts. That's closely followed by the no punctuation/text speak posts in my opinion.

Yes, but sometimes that's the fault of the Fray itself. If the formatting doesn't load properly before hitting "post", it eats all the pretty formatting you may have included.

The three mile long posts with no paragraphs, no punctuation & sentences that run on & on.

With my learning disabilities, it makes it really, really hard to understand what I'm reading.

But do I love that most posters here forgive my misspelled words & improper use of punctuation.

Just about everything. I have a kitten with an upset tummy in the house this morning. The disgusting nature of this problem is beyond description.

The obvious manipulation of facts.

IncogNeato:

EngineerGirl:

archie and mehibital style, with no capitalization anywhere?

Who?

neato, there used to be a series of newspaper articles circa 1915 that became books, etc., supposedly written by a cockroach named archie; humorous anecdotes about his daily existence. since he was a cockroach, he typed by jumping from key to key. the shift key requires two fingers which of course he could not manage so he never capitalized anything. mehitabel was his alley cat friend.

i remember our 4th grade reader had a few archie and mehitabel stories, which were pretty funny, but i found the lack of punctuation disturbing and annoying.

I'm guilty of those long paragraph posts because I thought it would be even more annoying to sort of break it up into two and three sentence paragraphs for easy reading; then my post would stretch even longer. Personally, I love it when someone takes the time to long post. I save those for when I have time to read.

The posts I don't like are when someone seems to have lost their way and wandered over here from Faith Based or something and starts laying their crap on and being judgemental of people here who are sharing themselves. Some nutjob interrupted Iso's column this week and I thought I was gonna come unglued. It was neither the time nor the place for that. I was so pleased to see that no one fed that particular troll.

Tonto, is this the same kitten that got stuck in the tree? What are you doing to these kittens?

Same kitten. Three rescues. First illness.

I don't know what he is thinking when he gets himself into these jams, and he's not telling me. My older cat will tell me what happened to him but I can't understand any of it.

Teaser posts that start out sounding like something interesting or thoughtful, but degenerate into incoherence or banality.

The obviously incoherent (Ms. NelsonWest?) or banal (many, many, many...) are easy enough to avoid. I hate getting suckered into reading something, getting confused, re-reading to see if I missed the point, and finally realizing that there's nothing worthwhile there - no pony.

Didn't you know? Kittens only have two brain cells. One for getting into trouble, and the other for doing it at top speed. Also, they don't have a reverse gear. When they get stuck, they are well and truly stuck.

When Miss Ella of the Glorious Paws, Queen of the Most Comfortable Chair in the House was a kitten, she led with her nose. Some exploits:

1. Burned all of her whiskers off sniffing a candle. It took months for them to grow back. No, it wasn't scented.

2. Leaped into the air to grab a pesky bug, and caught it. She was carrying it proudly around the house when that big black wasp bit her on the lip. Good thing it didn't sting her instead.

3. Got her head caught in a gap between the cupboards. I don't know how long she was there yowling, but it was a trick and a half to get her out without damaging the cabinet.

4. Decided that a small cactus was intriguing, went in for the big sniff and ended up with an eye infection.

5. Did the same thing with a thistle in a flower arrangement - another eye infection.

6. Ate thread right off the sewing machine, the threw it up all over the living room carpet.

7. Gulped down a potato chip (she likes them) then discovered that it was "hot and spicy".

8. Hid under a side table, spooked herself, leaped straight vertical and smacked her head on the bottom of the table. Had the twirlies for several hours afterwards.

9. Hurled a hairball in The Boy's dress shoe. Yes, THAT dress shoe. He found out the hard way on his way to work in the morning. It wasn't pretty.

10. Recently, ate string and had to have major abdominal surgery to remove it.

Living proof that there are no free kittens.

Threads that entice with the promise of excoriating the feeble minded and end up being about cats. I would prefer if they ended up being about dogs, please. :)

Also, threads that "go meta" and end up being about themselves. Can't think of any examples, but it happens.

Oh, and people complaining about other people's posts. I hate when people do that.

The dogs in my life live next door....There's a sweet but elderly female rottweiler rescue dog, two hyperactive but brain-dead labbies, and the occasional visitor. One of the occasional visitors is a Jack Russell terrier. He's like a cartoon dog with the bugeyes and the ability to leap straight up several times his own height.

The whole problem with most of these dogs is that they have been mistreated and gotten skittish. My cats don't like them.