A proposal to those who use the Desktops thread

  • Thread starter Thread starter Sage
  • 27 comments
  • 998 views

Should thumbnails be required in the Desktops thread?

  • Yes

    Votes: 41 83.7%

  • No

    Votes: 8 16.3%
  • Total voters
    49
  • Poll closed .
Sage

Sage

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I've tried making this proposal within the thread itself, but it quickly got buried and forgotten. So let's try discussing this in a separate thread (and I'll close it later if need be).

Anyway, my proposal is this: Have everybody post a thumbnail image of their desktop that links to a full-size picture, such as this post of mine.

Why? Two reasons.

1) Half the Internet population is still using dial-up. Normally, it takes me way over five minutes to load one page in that thread. Thumbnails will easily reduce that to a minute or two.

2) Easier scanning. Bigger, and especially wider images mean more scrolling and more looking at stuff you might not care for. For example, look at this screenshot thread, which requires thumbnails. It's way easier to scan through the screenshots and pick what you want (and as you can tell, many of them get creative with their thumbnails), there's no need for horizontal scrolling (yeck), and, back to #1, it loads infinitely quicker than the GTP Desktops thread.

So, vote please! Regardless of the outcome, I'd like to make it a suggestion for everybody to do so—If "Yes" wins, then it'll be a requirement. Also, please don't complain about not being able to make thumbnails, because most free image hosting services will automagically make the thumbnail for you (ImageShack will even give you the vB code to show the thumbnail and link to the full-size image).
 
To me, I don't care since I'm on broadband. And personally, I don't like the idea of having to go through the process of copy/pasting the screen, saving it, making a thumbnail of it then hotlinking (although imageshack.us has a nifty thumbnail code). I'd rather just copy/paste and upload. So, I don't care. Either way it's fine for me.
 
Yes, it should require thumbnails. That's kind of the reason I avoid threads like that because of the large number of full size images that I would have to load. I may be on broadband now, but since I had 56k for years I know what it's like to have to wait for something to load slowly.
 
👍 It's a good idea. Quicker loading for the dialup users, and less to scroll through for the rest of us. I hate pages that make me scroll sideways.
 
Thumbnails! I hate having to scroll over to read to the end of lines and scroll back to read the beginning and scroll back to .. well .. you get the point.

I'm on a superhighspeed connection, so load times don't matter to me unless GTP is being hellishly slow .. like it is now.
 
I agree with thumbnails.Easier for us and cheaper for the hosting companies.Everyone wins. 👍 👍
 
All go for thumbnails:tup: , poor 56kers get stuck with us bandwidth eating broadband monsters. It would be best for all that way the host will get their ads displayed and less bandwidth usage.
 
I tried to post this last night when I voted, but GTP kept timing out. I think thumbnails should be used in all threads for all of the above reasons. The only ones that I think should be excluded from this "rule" are the voting treads. I wouldn't want to have to click on each pic, and when you go into the photography comp voting, you should know what you are getting into anyway.
 
Cosmic
Agree 👍
I say thumbnails! ;)
Click to expand...
I agree too. Nothings more annoying than having to wait ages for a page to load only to see the pictures arent much good (not that the desktops are) :grumpy:
 
I mentioned this right at the start of it's latest incarnation and, on the whole, it was ignored.

I detest having to scroll sideyways in a forum because of some big ass picture.
 
I'd love to see thumbnails in the Desktop threads. As of now I've given up browsing it altogether as I'm on 56k and it makes it much to hard to navigate. Thumbnails would be much appreciated 👍.
 
I say thumbnails, I'm on 56k and I barely go to that thread because of it. It's very irratating to have to load so many pictures like that.
 
I'm on a slow 56k connection and i don't prefer thumbnails.
I hardly ever click images on pages which have thumbnails or clickable attachments. Mainly because i'm on 56k and can't be bothered loading up another window - i prefer waiting until everything downloads.
 
Those of us who browse through corporate firwealls don't want to be pulling all that needless data through for each new post. So I say: yes to the thumbnails.
 
A big 'Yes' to Thumbnails. I still visit the Thread on the odd occasion, but I always press "Stop" so it will quit loading and dropping the page down because new pictures are loading. It also kills my internet. I avoid the Thread most of the time, though, because I have 56K.
 
Okay, I'm assuming the "Yes" has pretty much won. So, starting Friday I'll be enforcing thumbnails in the Desktops thread (I've got Finals the rest of this week, so no time). However, I'll be gone from December 21st to January 9th, so that makes for a huge gap, but we'll all live, right?

Let's shoot for no larger than 400 x 400 pixels – I won't be super-super strict about that, but obviously it'd be stupid to have people posting 900 x 900 px "thumbnails". If somebody new comes in the Desktops thread and they don't seem aware of the rule (I'll be editing it into the first post, but it'll still be easy to miss), please just politely tell them about it.
 
Edit the first post and add a post so it is at the end of all of the large pictures and then people won't have to go so far to read the first post.

I have cable so it doesn't really matter to me.
 
Just a quick question, Sage. What about Attaching pictures via "Go Advanced" and "Manage Attachments"?

I think that's just as good, and even easier on 56Kers. Although it's harder to see I guess. Up to you.
 
Usually you can't upload a picture the size of that through attachments on GTP. Usually a picture of a desktop is too big.
 
Jimmy Enslashay
Just a quick question, Sage. What about Attaching pictures via "Go Advanced" and "Manage Attachments"?
Click to expand...
Of course – they're under 400 x 400 pixels, so why not? ;) Most people would rather use an outside host though, since GTP has a 102 KB cap on attachments.
 
That's fine. All of my Desktop screenshots have been posted through Attachment, so size limits don't seem to matter.
 

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