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<Cambridge, MA> In a study released from the Blackhead Institute, the impact of capitalization on readership of articles was discovered to have the inverse effect expected by the users.
Researchers used the a survey of reader response to gauge both intention of authors and resultant readership across a range of political articles. According to the abstract, the percentage of letters capitalized had an inverse effect upon readership of entries on popular message boards.
In a separate study, it was also discovered that the higher percentage of capitalization was linked to a reduced content level and readability coefficient in the referenced articles. Whether these are causal factors, and whether the lower content levels and readability coefficients might be related to the reduced readership are questions that remained unexplored in this study.
Dr. M. A. Zing felt, though, that his planned follow-up study into the areas suggested by these works might prove very fruitful, and provide some direction for improving the overall quality of posts. Not everybody was quite so confident, feeling that "people who write those things never listen to anybody anyway. Why should they listen to us?"
My guess, and it is a good one, is that a poster would post in caps if he has a vision issue and cannot see the screen well. The caps allows him to pick out his threads. The caps are for him, not meant for others.
<Cambridge, MA> In a study released from the Blackhead Institute, the impact of capitalization on readership of articles was discovered to have the inverse effect expected by the users.
*******That's why people in the "know" have switched to ****asterisks******.*******
My guess, and it is a good one, is that a poster would post in caps if he has a vision issue and cannot see the screen well. The caps allows him to pick out his threads. The caps are for him, not meant for others.
Just a guess.
It's as good a theory as any.
For me, the "Find all threads started by _______" function works really well - the most recent ones come at the top.
I also use the "Increase Font Size" function on my browser when my eyes aren't handling the size well.
But without a doubt, the caps distinguish a post really well. The problem is that they are interpreted as histrionics, and as the good Dr. Zing observed, there seems to be at least a correlation between the two.
It's the same thing with threads that have the word "Hussein" in the title in reference to someone other than the former Iraqi dictator. Just another subtle reminder that there's nothing worth looking at inside.
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