More space for reviewing descriptions?

[INsanityPenguin]

Though I don't review many descriptions, when I do so I, sometimes, come across descriptions that are so badly written, that the space I have to give feedback isn't enough. Would it be possible to increase the space for feedback?

[Quintafeira12]

well, when I see such a description, I tell them that they should follow the link above the text entry when writting descriptions, because they're failing at too many rules that need to be followed.

 

Of course, this doesn't null the suggestion nor makes it a bad idea.

[Imbecamiel]

Oh, yes, yes! It would be very nice indeed to have more space there. I feel bad just telling someone to correct grammar/spelling/punctuation, or suggesting that they find someone to help them with it. I know a lot of people have trouble with such things themselves, and many have trouble finding someone who can help them. So it's frustrating when I'd be very glad to just tell them right where they need to change something - but don't have room to do so, if there are more than a couple mistakes.

[Completely Different]

I agree.

 

When I see a really badly written description, I only adress some of the more obvious problems, in hopes that other reviewers and the moderators will adress them. But a bit more room would be nice.

[Sasstrek]

I agree on this as well. I normally try to tell spelling, grammar mistakes and so on and sometimes don't have enough space.

[purplehaze]

I support this as well. I often null my response on a particular description because I don't have room to correct all the grammar/spelling errors and don't just want to tell them that they have a lot of errors. And voting the description down is not helpful to them, either.

[Emmejo]

I frequently wish there was more room, since I like to explain what is wrong with assorted parts of a poor description in hopes that it will help the author of it to write better ones.

 

Does anyone know the current character limit? I would go find out myself, but currently I am getting this message

Sorry, we couldn't find any descriptions for you to check. This probably means that there aren't very many descriptions left that you haven't checked already. Refresh and you may see more.

so I can't just experiment.

 

Edit: Okay, I get a 200 character max.

Edited January 27, 2010 by Emmejo

[F.ury]

Yes, I'd like to have more room! For some really badly written descriptions, I don't have enough room to correct all the errors, so I just comment on the major ones and reject it, bu it'd be more helpful if we could correct all the errors.

[Angziety]

I also suport this.

It is annoying to ocme across one that has a ton of gramerical errors or apears to be writen by someone one who's native language is not enlish, and then not be able to help them all to much =(

[klinneah]

Yes please.

 

Interesting story: I was reviewing descriptions out of boredom, and I came across one that looked a little shoddy. I corrected the errors and said basically "Looks good except for x y z fix those then resubmit pl0x." That was all I had room to say, when really it had qrs tuv w x y z wrong with it. I hit "Abstain" then kept going. A few descriptions later I ran into one that looked a little familiar... I kept reading and realized it was the same description I'd reviewed earlier, with x y z corrected but still having errors. I was then able to go back and say "Okay, looks better, now fix a b c and resubmit." This happened about twice more before I saw how much better it was. I was then able to say "Looks great! Now just to wait for the mods!" I was so happy to have helped that person make their description better.

 

Now, if I had been able to address all the errors at once, it wouldn't have taken nearly as long. Thus I add +1 support to this idea.

[Elecveg]

I also support this idea. It'd be really helpful.

[tinakhal]

I support this idea as well; When I review descriptions, I see many many errors that I can't all correct. It is rather annoying.

 

Also; I'd like if the comment form was maybe one line bigger... If it's possible? Because, it's only one line, and I have to keep on going all the way to the left, just to see what I previously typed, in case I changed my mind.

 

[cbussiere]

Yes, I would love to have more space to review a description. Usually I end not being able to give a decent review because there isn't a big enough chatacter limit. :/

[Sadako]

+1 support boost to thread.

 

I'd love to have not only more characters but a bigger spot in which to type so I can see what I'm typing.

 

I always sacrifice my own grammar/use chatspeak when commenting to make room for more corrections and I feel like telling someone 'u has spell mistakes: abcdqz' is just not very... authoritative?

[Sif]

+1 support boost to thread.

 

I'd love to have not only more characters but a bigger spot in which to type so I can see what I'm typing.

 

I always sacrifice my own grammar/use chatspeak when commenting to make room for more corrections and I feel like telling someone 'u has spell mistakes: abcdqz' is just not very... authoritative?

I typically just put "Spelling: word, word2; Good Job" Or something like that.

[Sadako]

I like to hear myself type, though. I'm not good at being concise, lol.

 

Oh, and OT, but I absolutely lurve the brightwings dragons, so, *fangirls you* I really want them on mah scroll!

[F.ury]

I typically just put "Spelling: word, word2; Good Job" Or something like that.

Yeah, but sometimes you get ones that are so bad that you need more room to correct them. If you had "omg this my fav dragon it loves to make meh cheezeburgahs when I gets hungrey and mmm they tasty and it so cool cause it a rare breedz of draggons and i think it's a ninja cause i luv ninjas and this my fav dragon so it's a ninja lulz", you wouldn't have enough room to list all the problems with it. And personally, I've reviewed description that are much worse than this one.

[vegetariancannibal]

I totally agree with this. When I get one that's really bad I like to list through all the mistakes and show them how to make it better. It's really annoying when you run out of room. Sometimes it's obvious someone doesn't speak english very well and I have to telll them to "revise use of commas" or "use more pronouns/conjunctions to help the flow of the piece" and even some people at my school (in Scotland) would have trouble understanding that. I feel really bad when I do that.

 

And then when you get one that you really can't put into words what's wrong and what to change, and it just makes you want to re-write it for them with a comment on what you changed and why.

 

Also, just as a side note, I find it a little cconfusing that "." is called a period and "!" is called an exclamation point. And it's also hard to know whether to correct someone's spelling in American or British spelling.

 

I feel sad dropping the u in colour for instance. But that's just a language problem and I'll just have to get used to it I guess.

[Vilne]

I like this idea. When it comes to giving advice on grammar and the like, I like to be able to not just say "____ should be ____" but also to explain why in order to perhaps help the person grasp the concept better and have a better chance of avoiding the mistake in the future--teaching them to fish rather than just giving them a fish, you know? I think having more space for writing a description review would definitely make doing it that way much easier.

[nickjr]

Support 101%. I actually stopped reviewing descriptions quite a few months ago because most of the descriptions I encountered were kinda...well, I couldn't fit all the errors into the textbox

 

A new idea popped into my head: what if there were three textboxes? In one of them, you could list spelling mistakes, while another one would be grammar mistakes, and the last box could be other comments (like 'I like blablabla, but try adding more about your dragon's lalalalala') ^^

[Mew101]

yes, some people can be annoyong, ive seen ones like:

 

This dragon came from a purple egg

This dragon came from an orange egg

 

 

[Emmejo]

A new idea popped into my head: what if there were three textboxes? In one of them, you could list spelling mistakes, while another one would be grammar mistakes, and the last box could be other comments (like 'I like blablabla, but try adding more about your dragon's lalalalala') ^^

I don't know if that would be workable. I know nothing about coding, or how much more strain it would put on the site to have three times the amount of textboxes displayed and processed. It might be doable.

 

However it might make newbies who feel a little overwhelmed by correcting the descriptions feel even more uncertain, particularly if they are not sure if a something is just bad word choice or a grammar mistake.

 

I would be interested to read other people's impressions of this idea.

[dragon_mando]

Oh Force yes, yes, yes! Moar space plz

[RMMC]

We definitely need more space for reviewers. I had several last night that were in severe need of mini English composition lessons. Being able to help these folks in a private mode is more likely to garner positive results, than to continually send their descriptions back with only a fraction of what's needed to fix it.

 

I thought about directing them to the forum thread that's up to help people by beta-ing their descriptions, but if you're being told you writing has more mistakes than can be pointed out, how likely are you to have it paraded to the whole forum? Not very, and for some, it may even prevent them from trying again, which is sad. And some who get their descriptions handed back over and over due to a lack of space for reviewers to adequately assist them, may likewise just throw up their hands in surrender.

 

So, please, give us more space.

Edited March 2, 2010 by RMMC

[Terriah]

In all honesty, I never really understood why more space was needed.

If there's a few tweaks needed like a couple of spelling corrections then there's space to do that, or if a phrase needs editing or correcting you can do that. If it needs capitals or something specific, there's space to state that.

 

 

But if a description has SO many errors that you need more than the designated space to correct it, then perhaps you should tell them to contact you on the forums for help, provide the Proofreading topic link or tell them to check spelling/grammar etc.

 

Because in honesty, if a description DOES have more than a handful of spelling errors, grammar errors, capitalisation/other errors then I won't be correcting them anyway. I'd reject and they'd still have to resubmit.

 

If the argument is that a bigger space box will encourage them, there IS also a flip side to that. Don't forget most descriptions, especially incorrect ones, are getting 5/10 comments. I think it would be pretty daunting to have all your descriptions receive a massive paragraph on what's wrong with it from multiple users. Because if that was me, I'd be feeling pretty bad anyway since multiple people found a lot to criticise my descriptions about.

 

I can see where you're coming from, but also from experience and my own opinion I can see why it's not necessarily the best idea.

 

However, if you do think that you need more space, if you could specify exactly how much space, I'll think about it and prod TJ. But in all fairness, I don't think it's really necessary for the above points.