It'd be nice to be able to poll people here like: "You like which of the following titles best?" And get some automatically calculated results instantly.
Otherwise, yes, I suppose it would be pretty useless to say "Did you like Eragon? Yes or No"
(Of course, we all know the answer to that question anyway.)
But I can see if I did a poll "Faeling or Faething" it might be interesting. Then I'd ignore it unless it came out the way I agree with.
Other forums ie: ones that use PHP(I think?) you can attach a poll to the top of a thread, but otherwise it would still behave like a normal thread with plenty of room for detailed or lengthy responses, and still allow for a simple, anonymous poll at the top. For easily colleced data.
[This message has been edited by Zero (edited December 18, 2007).]
For example, I can't just say, "Is this hook effective?" That is too arbitrary, and is left up to chance. You would have to provide hook A and hook B, and then take a poll of which is more effective than the other.
The same for character development. Your qestion couldn't just be, "did I develop the character sufficiently?" It would have to be, "Regarding character A: should his character be developed in direction X, direction Y, or direction Z."
The problem with any of this is that it might take more time and effort to get consistent and meaningful feedback than it is worth...
I think this is one of the problems with the 13 lines. We are limited to a first 13, so we are hard pressed to say, "Does intro A work better than intro B?"
Hope this is helpful...
T2
I disagree I am certain I could get very meaningful and interesting writing-relevant information from a poll, regardless of whether you think you could.
And I use the word meaningful in the sense of statistically significant data that is non-heteroscadastically distributed, and that is usable for inferential applications. Because it sounds like that's what you're going for. If you want to move past opinion and take a "poll" that is meaningful, then you are hoping to inferentially apply those results to a broader population.
As to my name/signature-- no, I don't have any illusions that I'm some futuristic robot. My name is Thane Thompson, so my initials are T.T., which I have just gotten used to shortening to T2 as a signature to most electronic communication. After five years or so, most of my colleagues at work just call me "Tee-Too," as geeky as that may sound.
[This message has been edited by Igwiz (edited December 20, 2007).]
Wait. I guess I should say, "Hasta la vista, baby."
But as for this,
quote:
And I use the word meaningful in the sense of statistically significant data that is non-heteroscadastically distributed, and that is usable for inferential applications. Because it sounds like that's what you're going for. If you want to move past opinion and take a "poll" that is meaningful, then you are hoping to inferentially apply those results to a broader population.
This isn't stats class. "Meaningful" is pretty subjective, or rather what you decide is meaningful is pretty subjective. And I think it's generally agreed upon that "meaningful," when written, means something along the lines of "having purpose." And here's the kicker, the purpose is subjectively decided by the asker.
But it doesn't sound like that's what you want to hear. I didn't even shoot down your idea. I just told you that it would be a lot of work.
You prove my point by continuing to argue about it, especially when you say, "'Meaningful' is pretty subjective, or rather what you decide is meaningful is pretty subjective. And I think it's generally agreed upon that "meaningful," when written, means something along the lines of 'having purpose.' And here's the kicker, the purpose is subjectively decided by the asker."
No kidding. In other words, this topic is too subjective to take a poll for.
The real irony is that it sounds like you think that if you write to the "poll," that it will make your work better, or give you a better chance of getting published. And that might hold true if the sample you are polling (us) were the decision-making body.
But we're not. So your data would have two fundamental flaws: It wouldn't be representative, because you couldn't achieve a large enough sample size, and, if you did get a large enough sample, it wouldn't be meaningful, because you're not polling the right people (which are magazine editors and literary agents).
What I find most fascinating is that you seem to be hell-bent on criticising me, my opinions, my responses, my electronic signature -- all because I'm not telling you what you seem to want to hear.
So here, Zero... I'll make your day.
Take a poll. Write to it. Submit your pieces. I certain it will work for you.
[This message has been edited by Igwiz (edited December 20, 2007).]
The topic was created to ask if such a device could be implemented here with our UBB format.
So, returning to topic. I think a poll feature would be useful, I'm not interested in whether or not people agree with me. I'm only wondering if we could implement one here with our web-standard, or if it would be impossible.
[This message has been edited by First Assistant (edited December 20, 2007).]